TomorrowThose are strong words - never going to be.

I stand by them.

Audio is a completely different domain to graphics, all the problems in digital audio were solved forever ago, it's now simply a case of "how small can you go" in terms of fabrication. There is very little fixed-function hardware, most of the processing can be done in software if need be. There is no change or innovation in the digital audio space, just companies making up different types of snake oil to sell to so-called audiophiles.

But graphics is continuing to grow and evolve at a phenomenal rate, and will continue to do so probably forever. That means more and more transistors and more and more dedicated-purpose transistors. That means no matter how many advances there are in transistor fabrication and node shrinking, GPU dies are going to continue to increase in physical size, power consumption, and heat output - even as they increase in efficiency. That makes them a poor partner for CPUs, where the current predominant considerations are currently decreasing power and heat.

Will we see iGPU performance continue to improve art a higher rate than overall GPU performance improves? Yes. But we will never see a point where iGPU performance meets or exceeds dGPU performance in the high-end.

I'm inclined to agree with you regarding the probable decrease in low-end GPU parts, but you also need to remember that a lot of corporates still insist on them for a simple reason: maintenance. If you have a system with an iGPU that dies, you have to replace that CPU - and if the system is a few years old (as they tend to be in corporates) then finding a replacement CPU is likely to be difficult and expensive, since your IT department isn't going to be able to have a whole bunch of CPUs from different sockets lying around "just in case".

On the other hand, replacing a dGPU is easy: go on Amazon, buy the cheapest one you can find, pull the bad one out of the PCIe slot, put the replacement in, done. You can also keep a couple of spare dGPUs around just for this scenario, which would minimise user downtime. In corporate land, that's important.

Yes, you can send a machine that fails back to the OEM in question if it's still under warranty, but again - that's time. If someone in accounting has their PC die on them just before month-end, you need them working ASAP, and shitty dGPUs facilitate that.

Yes we will likely never see iGPU matching high end dGPU perf with in the same generation. Im sure we will have RTX 2080 like performance in iGPU one day but dGPU's have also moved on my then.

My point was that on the low end everything costs money: VRAM, PCB, power delivery, cooler, packaging. iGPU does not have these costs. Hence why entry level dGPU's will always be more expensive.

When it comes to reliability CPU's and APU's are still far more reliable than dGPU's wnen it comes to failiure rate. Less components - less points of failiure.
Besides keeping extra dGPU's around actually consumes way more storage space than a tray(s) full of CPU's

I agree that changing a dGPU is easier but it also depends on the cooling solution deplyed on the CPU. If it's some hardline watercooling then absolutely. If it's some kind of stock cooler with clips or push pins then it's not that much slower to swap out the CPU.

TomorrowI agree that changing a dGPU is easier but it also depends on the cooling solution deplyed on the CPU. If it's some hardline watercooling then absolutely. If it's some kind of stock cooler with clips or push pins then it's not that much slower to swap out the CPU.

Not going to have high-end cooling solutions in a corporate environment.

AssimilatorNot going to have high-end cooling solutions in a corporate environment.

There are watercooled servers. Not hardline tubing ofcourse...

TomorrowThere are watercooled servers. Not hardline tubing ofcourse...

Ah, gotcha. But very few corporates have that sort of hardware on-premises, and when it's a $4,000-dollar Quadro that's failed, the OEM is definitely going to be made to carry the can.

TomorrowJoke's on you AMD. I already bought 4750G. Now i just have to hope for BIOS support lol...

Citing some recent tweets of mine, support is already in place for 500-series motherboards:

Actually Gordon, ASUS just revised their CPU QVLs today for their X570 and B550 boards listing support for the Ryzen 4000 series APUs.

Source:
www.asus.com/us/Motherboards/ROG-STRIX-X570-I-GAMING/HelpDesk_CPU/
www.asus.com/us/Motherboards/ROG-STRIX-B550-I-GAMING/HelpDesk_CPU/

Via:
Amd/comments/hv6xe7

Source:

I am told that the new ComboAm4v2PI series of AMD's AGESA provides explicit support for all these Ryzen 4000 APUs. That would bear out with the noted minimum BIOS version in the support notes.

Source:

medi01I'm lost in AMD lineups...

So what series will the Zen3 lineup be? 5xxx???

I was just thinking the same thing.

Anyhow, this looks good for everyone. The competition is getting really close.

TomorrowWhen it comes to reliability CPU's and APU's are still far more reliable than dGPU's wnen it comes to failiure rate. Less components - less points of failiure.

This is more of an aside, but in 25 years of being in the computer science research and industry, I've never seen or had even second hand information about CPU's failing. even guys that tried extreme overclocks ended up simply frying their motherboards. This is probably since the CPU's are completely passive, there is no power transformation going on, it's difficult to make the fail before other components.

BoboOOZThis is more of an aside, but in 25 years of being in the computer science research and industry, I've never seen or had even second hand information about CPU's failing. even guys that tried extreme overclocks ended up simply frying their motherboards. This is probably since the CPU's are completely passive, there is no power transformation going on, it's difficult to make the fail before other components.

True that. Only way i have seen damaged CPU's is when excessive voltage was used or external physical damage like bent pins on PGA based CPU's due to fall damage.

^ You guys have never seen the AthlonXP puff of smoke? I've seen CPU's fail. lol I earned it, but they failed HARD.:p:D

Nater^ You guys have never seen the AthlonXP puff of smoke? I've seen CPU's fail. lol I earned it, but they failed HARD.:p:D

That was ages ago. What's that - 20 years?

Still that was an exception rather than a rule. Where as dGPU's have failed across generations. In case of Nvidia:

FX5900 leafblower - dead fans
8800 series - solder cracking issue/bumpgate
2080 Ti - unknown DOA GPU and space invaders garbled output issue at launch.

Nater^ You guys have never seen the AthlonXP puff of smoke? I've seen CPU's fail. lol I earned it, but they failed HARD.:p:D

What, you didn't put the cooler on?

I am uber excited for these chips. I have had the pleasure of having both the 3300X and 3100X for daily use. Hands down the 3300X is faster than the 3100X in benchmarks, gaming and most importantly, feel. As I have stated before both of those chips OC to 4.5 GHZ @ 1.35 Volts. If they have an 8 core single CCX with refined architecture. The thing though is the TDP of both series of chips is 65 Watts. If they can get into the OEM market (WIndows 7 is no longer officially supported) things could get interesting as though mindshare is important AMD has been as PC World put it "Awesome". They just keep hitting home runs and triples. Intel brought in their closer to work an extra inning but AMD got some 5 star ready to play rookies that came in for the 8th inning. I for one will try my best to get one of these and hope they go the route of the 1600AF ($85 MSRP for a 2600) or 3500X.

AssimilatorI stand by them.

Audio is a completely different domain to graphics, all the problems in digital audio were solved forever ago, it's now simply a case of "how small can you go" in terms of fabrication. There is very little fixed-function hardware, most of the processing can be done in software if need be. There is no change or innovation in the digital audio space, just companies making up different types of snake oil to sell to so-called audiophiles.

It's true that many things are snake oil in the audio departments. But there is still crap out there. But there are 2 things in audio, quality of the signal, and quality of the reproduction and positioning.

Signal wise, we are there and there isn't probably much more to do in that area.

Quality of audio reproduction and positioning still have a lot of room to improve. The number of channels, reflection on materials, etc... and how to reproduce that properly to get accurate positioning is still an issue. There are still a lot of room to improve but sadly, good sounds isn't as sexy as good graphics. Also, improving the sound quality would requires a lot of computation power...

But the sound we have right now are good enough to not ruin our experience.

The Ryzen 4750g or 4650g saves around 500Kw of energy per year, compared to an Intel I7 with GTX 1050, for daily use of 10 hours.

eugeniovalencaThe Ryzen 4750g or 4650g saves around 500Kw of energy per year, compared to an Intel I7 with GTX 1050, for daily use of 10 hours.

Don't you think that's a bit excessive? And even then I assume these processors wouldn't be running full throttle all the time (those 10 hours).