Thursday, October 13th 2011
Bulldozer Aims For 50% Improvement By 2014: Is This Really Enough To Counter Intel?
The reviews are now out for AMD's brand new Bulldozer architecture, in the form of the Zambezi FX 8120 & FX 8150 processors and they don't paint a pretty picture of these flagship products. The chips use lots of power, run hot and significantly underperform compared to their Intel competition. On top of that, they are being marketed as 8 core processors, when they are actually 4 core with an advanced form of multi-threading, due to the siamesed nature of each dual processor module. Perhaps to counter this negative publicity and try to restore some faith in the AMD brand, they have released a roadmap for the planned improvements to the architecture, all the way to 2014 - an ambitious timeline, given how much and how unexpectedly things can change at the cutting edge of the technology world.
Looking at the chart, one can see that the various architectures Piledriver, Steamroller and Excavator all add up to between 30-50% projected improvement by 2014 (subject to change without notice, of course). These are all names designed to impart a tough-guy image to their products to give one the impression that they must perform very well, beating the competition into submission. Therefore, if they fail to perform competitively against Intel, those names will continue to be branding embarrassments like Bulldozer is, currently. As Intel is already 20-50% faster right now depending on the benchmark, how are these modest improvements possibly going to compete with Intel's future products? AMD has already had a change of management at the top recently, so we can only hope that the right CEO comes along and turns them around, otherwise they may end up not manufacturing x86 processors at all in future, possibly becoming a GPU company only.
The main problem with the current Bulldozer architecture is that it's very, very late to market. AMD started working on it four years ago in 2007, which is a very long time in the world of desktop processors, so AMD have effectively released a new "old" product. The two important things that it has going for it, are that it scales well with core count and clock speed - those 8GHz overclock marketing demos weren't completely without merit. What we need to see is AMD improving performance much more than the prediction slide they've released, more like 100% or more perhaps, which is not really such an unrealistic target to achieve in three years of design and process improvements. Perhaps discarding this whole architecture and starting afresh with fully discreet cores like on the Phenom might be the way forward? AMD has recently let go some of its top-level management, so perhaps their replacements can turn the company around?
So, even if AMD achieves this projected performance improvement and more, will it really be enough to counter Intel, or will Intel steamroller AMD's Bulldozer back into submission?Source:X-bit labs and Bulldozer block diagram courtesy of Hexus' FX 8150 review.
The main problem with the current Bulldozer architecture is that it's very, very late to market. AMD started working on it four years ago in 2007, which is a very long time in the world of desktop processors, so AMD have effectively released a new "old" product. The two important things that it has going for it, are that it scales well with core count and clock speed - those 8GHz overclock marketing demos weren't completely without merit. What we need to see is AMD improving performance much more than the prediction slide they've released, more like 100% or more perhaps, which is not really such an unrealistic target to achieve in three years of design and process improvements. Perhaps discarding this whole architecture and starting afresh with fully discreet cores like on the Phenom might be the way forward? AMD has recently let go some of its top-level management, so perhaps their replacements can turn the company around?
So, even if AMD achieves this projected performance improvement and more, will it really be enough to counter Intel, or will Intel steamroller AMD's Bulldozer back into submission?Source:X-bit labs and Bulldozer block diagram courtesy of Hexus' FX 8150 review.
132 Comments on Bulldozer Aims For 50% Improvement By 2014: Is This Really Enough To Counter Intel?
times are different right now. there isnt a lot of software that even pushes hardware to the limits because software is currently behind in the race so it doesnt even pay off to pay premiums for the fastest available cpu
I am glad that AMD is looking forward and designed their hardware for the future. having said that- I agree that they should have focused on the server side first instead of rushing this to consumers
don't forget my rig is amd so no fanboyism or trolling is in my post....
Refinancing their debt is going to be difficult and expensive. A double edged sword.
Do you think there is any hope of a stock price recovery? Or is it a SELL?
This chart does NOT say there will be 10-15% performance increase per year, but there is a possibility of a 10-15% increase in performance per watt. READ THE AXIS. AND READ THE FOOTNOTE! Not actually a plan but an extrapolation based on history! WTF!
So 4 years of this magical-mysterious 10-15% performance per watt increase each year gives us the 50% figure we are discussing here. But it is a bogus number made up for this slide and subject to change without notice. It is just PR guesstimates. There is NOTHING in the pipeline, or they would have made reference to it.
WATCH OUT! This is worse than I though!
Bullldozer -> Piledriver -> Steamroller -> Excavator indeed!
What they mean is
Bucket and Spade -> Bigger bucket -> Wheelbarrow -> Get granny to help pull out the turnip!
It's over for AMD. Never mind if they have any decent engineers left, they haven't got the right marketing and PR teams. It is FAIL right across the company rather than fail of a specific design. And that is going to be too difficult for AMD to fix. I'm selling the stock.
AMD will go back to doing what they do best and focusing on the low to mid range sector like they have been for the last few years.
Their APUs are in a league of their own currently. theres still no substitute for having a a dedicated graphics card though.
AMD can only grow in areas they are familiar with.
As far as competition is concerned. The dream of AMD being the top dog in the CPU world is getting further and further away each time they release a new CPU and they have no doubt lost a lot of loyal fans with BD.
They can still pull a rabbit out of the hat though. but by that time i wonder if anyone would still be watching them and give them a round of applause.
Tom Baker
Back on topic though :
I honestly thought they were gonna bulldoze that sandy bridge easily...
Hilarious though that the last name on the roadmap is Excavator, I only hope it's not for digging their own grave!
And, am I the only one finding these names funny? just think of it seriously. First, they are gonna bulldoze themselves off the market, piledrive themselves in earth then use the steamroller to secure their burial ground. If you're optimistic though, they can at least use that excavator to undig their grave and resurrect!
So while the CPUs are a large chunk of their business, AMD does have other things to fall back on, which makes them still a viable company while they fix the problems with the BD architecture. Hopefully they can make not a 50% increase in performance by 2014, but something closer to 100%. Hey, they did something similar with the Athlon/XP/64, maybe with the right management they can do it again.
So I'm not counting them out either, although I agree that these chips are not what we needed. If anything, they could surely release Piledriver as a quad-channel chip, make everybody angry if that requires a socket change, but then they could possibly claim a leap forward in performance. One big problem with that "option" is that BD already required a socket change. And for what. BAD AMD, BAD.
AMD needs to learn from Intel, before Intel even thinks about releasing a CPU, they ensure they are in direct contact with Software and Hardware manufacutrers to ensure all there T's are crossed and I's are dotted.
If anything, it will be, AMD GPU's and that's in 2014. Because there plan for the processor division honestly sucks so much balls, the naming scheme, the performance improvement's.
The time and energy being wasted on small improvement's, adjustments in manufacturing (TSMC), The loads of money that are going to be spent on the marketing, and last but not least, the new scheme's and boxes for the processor's.
The point is, it takes a lot of resource's to have yearly consecutive releases, and they already have problems getting shit on the shelve's. There plan is literally a grave digger in disguise.
BUT, the grave that will be dug, is for the legend of the AMD CPU's.
They will live on with there graphics card market if it ever got that bad. Which frankly it will.
I'll believe it when i see it confirmed by reviewers, though.
"Shocking news rocks CPU world: Bulldozer just bulldozed Intel's Sandy Bridge!!!!"
*Insert that avatar's pic with a bulldozer dozing off Intel's Sandy Bridge's CPU logos for a more dramatic effect*.
*Patch does nothing, Nerds rioting all over the internet!*
*Insert picture of Nelson from the Simpsons wearing an Intel tshirt and pointing and laughing at a crying Ralph Wiggum decked out in AMD*
:D
Because of this, I think the "patch" is a fake and it's just some blogger trying to get attention on the internet.