Sunday, November 27th 2011
Bulldozer Beats Politicians As The Biggest Fail
On our front page, we placed a poll in mid-September, ahead of AMD FX Processor family launch (based on the "Bulldozer" architecture). Based on the most plausible specifications and the hype surrounding the products at the time, we had a hunch that neither Bulldozer nor Sandy Bridge-E will meet our readers' expectations. AMD FX Processor family turned out to be a Duke Nukem Forever, clogged in the pipeline for too long (since 2007, as a matter of fact), when it came out, it made a mockery of itself. It's barely faster than its previous generation.
Sandy Bridge-E promised to be a pin-up processor platform that's eons faster than its predecessor, its specs-sheets warranted its hype. As it turns out, although they're the fastest processors, they aren't much faster than previous-generation Westmere six-core chips at multi-threaded applications, and aren't much faster than Sandy Bridge LGA1155 Core i7 processors at gaming and serial loads. We set out to find out which would turn out to be a bigger "fail" (failure, in internet jargon). To stuff the poll up with more options, we experimented with the idea of placing a seemingly-unbeatable poll option "Our Politicians", just to see if either of the two could fail so hard, that politicians end up better. The myth that politicians always win at a failing contest is busted, at least in this case.
At the time of counting today, "Bulldozer" edged past "Our Politicians". The graph above shows the trend of voting chronologically. At the start of polling, people were evenly optimistic about both Bulldozer and Sandy Bridge-E. Politicians were off to a flying start, and although there were a few spikes, their votes per day figure was decreasing. Then by the 7th of October, votes began to increase for Bulldozer (around the time when unofficial benchmark results were doing rounds, reviewers had samples at hand). On 12th October (AMD FX launch day), Bulldozer got a Noah's flood of fail votes. People weren't expecting Bulldozer to be a Sandy Bridge-E killer, but they were at least expecting it to outperform Intel's LGA1155 platform. That was not to be. Despite not really bringing shock and awe to the table that its specifications Sandy Bridge-E managed to be the fastest processors money can buy. This ensured that Sandy Bridge-E didn't fare badly in our poll, few thought it was a fail. Sarah Michelle Gellar? Well, apparently people tolerate her provided they mute their TVs.
In before dragons and grammar tutors.
Sandy Bridge-E promised to be a pin-up processor platform that's eons faster than its predecessor, its specs-sheets warranted its hype. As it turns out, although they're the fastest processors, they aren't much faster than previous-generation Westmere six-core chips at multi-threaded applications, and aren't much faster than Sandy Bridge LGA1155 Core i7 processors at gaming and serial loads. We set out to find out which would turn out to be a bigger "fail" (failure, in internet jargon). To stuff the poll up with more options, we experimented with the idea of placing a seemingly-unbeatable poll option "Our Politicians", just to see if either of the two could fail so hard, that politicians end up better. The myth that politicians always win at a failing contest is busted, at least in this case.
In before dragons and grammar tutors.
93 Comments on Bulldozer Beats Politicians As The Biggest Fail
Unfortunately, I think we're back to the era of incremental performance improvements for each CPU generation. This is driven in part by the lack of competition from AMD and the fact that even a low end CPU runs everyday tasks and 3D games very well - even the failed Bulldozer. Just look at the Early Ivy Bridge benchies I wrote about. It's also barely faster than a stock Sandy Bridge CPU.
come on politicians win hands down have they cut all your tax or sumat :wtf:
Look at it this way: Bulldozer is simply a failed effort of one company to compete with another. It's a real shame and the marketplace is much more lacklustre because of it, but it's hardly a crime.
Politicians on the other hand... well, where the f* do I start? Incompetence, greed and corruption, which affects all our lives negatively and significantly, rules most of what they do. Therefore, they should be the clear hands down winner.
...perhaps AMD and Intel know something that we dont about W8 and have made designs changes to harness the new potential
j/k lol
All this and more will be revealed in the next few years.
What we have in Bulldozer is a CPU with on-par/worse clock for clock performance than the previous generation CPU's, with higher power usage, even though it was 32nm. That's no improvement at all, not even incremental.
But qubit have a point actually, even my in modern computing "modest" system is for what I do with it almost overkill, and that includes gaming (at 1280x1024). For home users the power race is almost irrelevant.
Smell a bd thread take over cooking....
in heinsight would it not out perform bulldozer???
What IS fail, is the marketing surrounding them.
It's clear to me, personally, that both AMD and Intel are having issues with the current silicon node. P67 was recalled, X79 is missing drive functionality(P67 nearly killed it's own drive controller, so this issue with X79 is far worse than portrayed.), SB-E chips themselves aren't fully functional, and seemingly, BD missed it's clock target.
Ok, so there are real physical problems that led to the current situation, but at no point has AMD or INtel ever conveyed that there was any problems. They just hype'd away, not realizing that they hyped away customer satisfaction.
I have always been a proponent of OEMs being more transparent, and more honest with their customers...namely us. If anything, they are even more full of it.
At least, myself, I can remain hopeful. AMD at least has some newer management(and fired some marketing staff), so I'm willing to give them a chance to pull up thier socks, and become the real company they should be. Intel, on the other hand...