Friday, November 18th 2016
AMD's Zen Rumored for January 17th Launch; 8 Cores With 16 Threads for $300
As we inch ever closer to AMD's Zen launch, more and more information seems to be slipping through the cracks. This time, MAXSUN, an AMD China partner (poised to provide customers with AM4 platform motherboards) is the source of the proverbial leak, with information that, if true, is sure to stir the pot of bubbling Zen excitement even more.
According to MAXSUN, Zen's initial release date is pegged for January 17th, which, if true, would probably mean a product announcement around CES 2017 (scheduled from the 5th of January through the 8th) - at the same time as Intel is expected to fully unveil their Kaby Lake parts. The company also reports a second release window at March 2017, which lends further credence to AMD's expected staggered launch of Zen-based processors, first for the High-Performance-Desktop (HEDT) market, and trickling down from there. MAXSUN also confirms the pricing scheme we reported yesterday, with regards to the companies' SR7 processors (the top-of-the-line parts in the Zen line-up, and whose naming scheme I think isn't the final one) - the company states these are expected to be priced at around 1500-2000 Yuan SKU ($250-$300).
Performance levels for the price are reported to be not too shabby - that AMD's best performing offerings (8 core, 16 thread chips) would be competitive with Intel's $1089 i7-6900K, an equally 8 core, 16 thread offering (like AMD demonstrated with it's Blender test on-stage, though clock-speeds for the Intel processor were normalized at Zen's 3.0 GHz engineering sample). Taking those performance levels with a grain of salt, the value proposition does seem to be considerably high, especially if Intel's Kaby Lake performance improvements do end up being as rumored.
MAXSUN also seemingly confirmed expected, finalized clocks for AMD's next processors, quoting an improvement from the 3 GHz on Zen's engineering samples, at 3.15-3.30 GHz base clocks and 3.5 GHz boost; the company also reports that Zen can be easily clocked to 4.2 GHz on conventional means, and up to 5 GHz with LN2. All in all, rumors being worth what they are, it is definitely an exciting time to be a PC enthusiast. Let's just see if AMD will deliver, or crash and burn like it has done in the past.
Source:
MAXSUN
According to MAXSUN, Zen's initial release date is pegged for January 17th, which, if true, would probably mean a product announcement around CES 2017 (scheduled from the 5th of January through the 8th) - at the same time as Intel is expected to fully unveil their Kaby Lake parts. The company also reports a second release window at March 2017, which lends further credence to AMD's expected staggered launch of Zen-based processors, first for the High-Performance-Desktop (HEDT) market, and trickling down from there. MAXSUN also confirms the pricing scheme we reported yesterday, with regards to the companies' SR7 processors (the top-of-the-line parts in the Zen line-up, and whose naming scheme I think isn't the final one) - the company states these are expected to be priced at around 1500-2000 Yuan SKU ($250-$300).
102 Comments on AMD's Zen Rumored for January 17th Launch; 8 Cores With 16 Threads for $300
And even then they couldn't ever quite catch them. At every turn, nVidia seems to be so far ahead of them it's ridiculous. Not quite as far as Intel is ahead of AMD, but it turns out that when you're trying to compete against two of the richest, cleverest, and well-run tech companies in the world you better be a wunderkind yourself. Alas, AMD lost most of its talent after years of staff layoffs and reorganizations. Sure, they rented a few big names on the cheap, but even they are mostly gone now.
Sorry. This ain't your grandpa's AMD. It ain't yer dad's AMD. It ain't even your older brother's AMD. This is the new AMD. And they have not proven themselves to be worthy of the legacy you speak of. They need a big win because they haven't had any in so long even the AMD fanboys buy Intel CPU's.
Remember the FX-57/60's? Enough said!
The CPU market, at the present, is a monopoly, because AMD is a competitor in theory only.
If AMD comes up with a competitive product, in any price range, Intel will have to adjust price and/or performance...either way we'll win.How many times have you had a CPU as a Christmas present? (any number above zero will make me wildly jealous...and a little suspicious)
Both business and consumer market are the ones profitting from AMD's actions. I'd like to upgrade my Vishera platform as well in the future (2 more months) and run a kick-ass AMD platform which does EVERYTHING.
Exciting times. Cant wait for Vega with HBM2 as well. :)
Gifts? I don't even know what that means XD
We are looking at the best bang for our buck and when the opposition has that we usually don't hesitate to buy from them.
I probably would have an RX 480 8GB in my rig right now, but I've bought a month old GTX 1060 off from a collegue of mine at a pretty good discount.
I think if AMD Zen will be competitive, a 6C/12T or even a 8C/16T could be a nice upgrade path for many gamers. One can only hope.
which were completely unnecessary as you could overclock higher on fsb
AMD is, basically, a badly run company; and that trickles down to the tech departments.
Remember Rover?