AMD "Vega" Outsells "Previous Generation" by Over 10 Times

[btarunr]

At its Computex presser, leading up to its 7 nm Radeon Vega series unveil, AMD touched upon the massive proliferation of the Vega graphics architecture, which is found not only in discrete GPUs, but also APUs, and semi-custom SoCs of the latest generation 4K-capable game consoles. One such slide that created quite some flutter reads that "Vega" shipments are over 10 times greater than those of the "previous generation."

Normally you'd assume the previous-generation of "Vega" to be "Polaris," since we're talking about the architecture, and not an implementation of it (eg: "Vega 10" or "Raven Ridge," etc.). AMD later, at its post event round-table, clarified that it was referring to "Fiji," or the chip that went into building the Radeon R9 Fury X, R9 Nano, etc., and comparing its sales with that of products based on the "Vega 10" silicon. Growth in shipments of "Vega" based graphics cards is triggered by the crypto-mining industry, and for all intents and purposes, AMD considers the "Vega 10" silicon to be a commercial success.



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[eidairaman1]

So they dropped focus of gamers...

 

[xkm1948]

Mining really boomed for them.

At the same time if Fiji had 8GB of VRAM they will also make great mining cards.

I am hoping David Wang can finally get something amazing done to pull the plug on GCN.

 

[Jism]

Yep, they did a good job. Esp. when going for the console market for both biggest party's such as Sony and MS to have their architecture more and more optimized for games.

 

[RejZoR]

Well, in a way it's good to hear Vega was a commercial success for AMD. So they haven't entirely pissed away resources used to make it. But they really need to focus on gaming and get the 50% market share back. Because if they don't control a significant portion, game developers won't care optimizing games or using their new features apart from few exclusives where AMD shills it directly to a certain dev (like Bethesda). I don't care if AMD doesn't have the crown, they need to make cards that can compete and are reasonably priced (Vega wasn't either as Vega64 was basically more than GTX1080Ti which made next to no sense). Radeons were often tiny bit slower than fastest and greatest NVIDIA, but they were still selling like hot cakes because 5fps difference looks massive on review graphs, but isn't that big of a deal IRL, especially if price is tiny bit lower. And of course the FineWine which often closes that tiny gap anyway

 

[xkm1948]

Well, in a way it's good to hear Vega was a commercial success for AMD. So they haven't entirely pissed away resources used to make it. But they really need to focus on gaming and get the 50% market share back. Because if they don't control a significant portion, game developers won't care optimizing games or using their new features apart from few exclusives where AMD shills it directly to a certain dev (like Bethesda). I don't care if AMD doesn't have the crown, they need to make cards that can compete and are reasonably priced (Vega wasn't either as Vega64 was basically more than GTX1080Ti which made next to no sense). Radeons were often tiny bit slower than fastest and greatest NVIDIA, but they were still selling like hot cakes because 5fps difference looks massive on review graphs, but isn't that big of a deal IRL, especially if price is tiny bit lower. And of course the FineWine which often closes that tiny gap anyway

NOOOOOOOOOOOOPE.

My FuryX story taught me FineWine is a fu*cking lie. Don't bank your money on future improvements.

 

[RejZoR]

I have different experience from countless Radeon cards before R9 Fury. They've aged pretty well. I think Fury had other issues like underutilization of a huge number of shaders and they didn't sem to have any logic to address that with drivers. It was less apparent with older generations that weren't designed so "wide".

 

[kruk]

But, but, but: I have been reading here on TPU for almost a year now how this architecture is a complete failure ... it seems it's good enough.

Some people are going to be extremely bitter

 

[tfdsaf]

They were a success because of crypto mining, if not for that they would have been abject failure, even more so than Fiji. At least the Fury X was actually competitive in some games with the GTX 980ti, the Vega 64 could barely compete with the GTX 1080. AMD would have been in serious trouble if not for crypto, and considering crypto has slowed down immensly since then, I wouldn't bank on it again to help them through.

They can probably be competitive in AI, computing, etc..., but they need to refocus on high end gaming as well, otherwise they will forever loose to Nvidia and basically have less than 20% shares globally, while Nvidia holds 80% Not to mention the high end graphics are the most profitable, that is where the profit margins are the biggest.

Nvidia essentially created its lead with its high end models, which it sold at absurd prices, but there were absurd idiots willing to buy them.

 

[xkm1948]

I have different experience from countless Radeon cards before R9 Fury. They've aged pretty well. I think Fury had other issues like underutilization of a huge number of shaders and they didn't sem to have any logic to address that with drivers. It was less apparent with older generations that weren't designed so "wide".

Hmm, I don’t see you buying a Fury nor a Vega. If my memory served me you went from 980Ti to 1080Ti. Yet here you are singing praise for RTG again, claiming FineWine.

For me the FineVinegar is i lost HBM overclocking due to RTG actively blocking it. I got little feature updates as well as little performance optimization. FineWine my ass.

 

[kastriot]

You mean 9 cards for patetic miners and 1 for noob desktop gamer, how ironic..

 

[las]

You mean 9 cards for patetic miners and 1 for noob desktop gamer, how ironic..

More like 99 vs 1 - The PC gamer got better perf/value with 1060 because of overpriced RX 580's

I think AMD really liked the mining craze - GPU mining is pretty much dead now tho

 

[Vayra86]

You guys realize that Vega is not only being bought en masse by miners but now mostly gets moved as an IGP, right...

"Success'' is very relative here. The successes happen in all the places we don't really care about and none of them push (gaming) graphics solutions forward in a meaningful way. HBM? Irrelevant.

The fact they outsell previous gen by 10 times only speaks volumes of how shit Fury was. AMD did time it right - now that GPU mining is dying off again, there are APUs and they are really quite good.

Radeon is everywhere... except where it matters.

I have different experience from countless Radeon cards before R9 Fury. They've aged pretty well. I think Fury had other issues like underutilization of a huge number of shaders and they didn't sem to have any logic to address that with drivers. It was less apparent with older generations that weren't designed so "wide".

By now we know that AMD cards don't age well, they just got their optimization VERY late, and there is no sign of that being a repeating event. If you want to reminisce the old fine wine be my guest but it couldn't be further from the truth these days, and there is no sign of it getting better within the GCN architecture.

 

[Imsochobo]

You mean 9 cards for patetic miners and 1 for noob desktop gamer, how ironic..

Vega 56 isn't bad for gamers, I know a few who have it and vega 56 is a popular card and people snap it up whenever they can.. for gaming.

 

[mad1394]

Nvidia does do one thing amd does not...and everyone is ignoring it: they sell msrp gpus themselves. I would like to see them get more credit for that.

 

[RejZoR]

Hmm, I don’t see you buying a Fury nor a Vega. If my memory served me you went from 980Ti to 1080Ti. Yet here you are singing praise for RTG again, claiming FineWine.

For me the FineVinegar is i lost HBM overclocking due to RTG actively blocking it. I got little feature updates as well as little performance optimization. FineWine my ass.

It wasn't because the cards were inferior, it was because they were so absurdly late. RX Vega was announced in July 2017 I think and the first RX Vega aftermarket cooled card was released in December 2017 I think. That's just stupid. I've waited 1 month after RX Vega official reveal and all they had were crappy reference cards that sucked balls. AiO was on my radar, but later decided I'd have mounting issues in my case. I now have a stupid oversized AORUS GTX 1080Ti in which place RX Vega 64 in aftermarket cooled form would work just fine. But it was just so damn late and I couldn't wait longer because of issues I had with my GTX 980. So, there's that. You can't just dismiss my experience with Radeons just because I didn't own R9 Fury or RX Vega. What about HD7950, HD7870, HD6950, HD5850, HD4850, x1950 Pro and R9600 Pro that I had before for years and had nothing but great experience with all of them (except the HD6870 Toxic which I think was something wrong because it was stupid loud and hot). I don't hold any grudges towards either company. If they'll make something interesting and worthwhile, I'll buy it. That's what happened with GTX 980 and GTX 1080Ti. I literally bought them for lolz. RX Vega would fall into same category if it wasn't so late and I needed a new graphic card at that moment.

 

[bug]

Nvidia does do one thing amd does not...and everyone is ignoring it: they sell msrp gpus themselves. I would like to see them get more credit for that.

Nvidia sells cards? I guess I missed that.
And yes, of course it outsells Fiji 10:1, Fiji hasn't seen much availability to begin with. But hey, if that's what they need to pat themselves on the back, who am I to argue?

 

[Vya Domus]

I have been reading here on TPU for almost a year now how this architecture is a complete failure

Yeah but what you've been reading are comments from random fanboys who ain't got a clue.

By now we know that AMD cards don't age well, they just got their optimization VERY late

Actually that's not quite right , Nvidia transferred certain on-chip logic to software when they made the transition to Kepler whereas AMD did the opposite. They don't receive any late optimization , the hardware itself doesn't need as much work on the driver side hence it holds up better as time passes by.

 

[stimpy88]

Nothing like fudging the numbers to make a purse out of a sow's ear. It's only a "success" because AMD practically give it away to Sony and Microsoft.

I wonder if it's true that nVidia have got the next Sony console? nVidia must actually be paying Sony to use them if that's the case!

 

[jabbadap]

Nvidia sells cards? I guess I missed that.

They do, FE models for all with free shipping. 1080ti seems to be out of stock, but others have stock. And that is depending on region, at the Finnish site 1080ti is in stock but Titan Xp ain't.

And yes, of course it outsells Fiji 10:1, Fiji hasn't seen much availability to begin with. But hey, if that's what they need to pat themselves on the back, who am I to argue?

Well it's not that Vega's have been any better with availability, I remember Fury nano been quite popular here because of it's relative cheap price from asus(399€).

 

[Vya Domus]

It's only a "success" because AMD practically give it away to Sony and Microsoft.

No Vega inside any console currently.

 

[bug]

They do, FE models for all with free shipping. 1080ti seems to be out of stock, but others have stock. And that is depending on region, at the Finnish site 1080ti is in stock but Titan Xp ain't.

Ah yes, how could I have forgotten about FE Thanks for setting me straight.

Well it's not that Vega's have been any better with availability, I remember Fury nano been quite popular here because of it's relative cheap price from asus(399€).

Yeah, it's not more available as a dGPU, but it's been embedded in a series of things Fiji wasn't.

I wonder if it's true that nVidia have got the next Sony console? nVidia must actually be paying Sony to use them if that's the case!

Yeah, because consoles typically go for the worse perf/W parts

 

[FordGT90Concept]

Fiji didn't sell well because 4 GiB VRAM. It was also isolated to the dedicated GPU where Vega is in Raven Ridge and dedicated GPUs (where it's perpetually sold out).

 

[bug]

Fiji didn't sell well because 4 GiB VRAM. It was also isolated to the dedicated GPU where Vega is in Raven Ridge and dedicated GPUs (where it's perpetually sold out).

Whether because its HBM usage or because it was difficult to manufacture, it didn't have much availability even with 4GB VRAM. Oh well, different times...

 

[jabbadap]

Fiji didn't sell well because 4 GiB VRAM. It was also isolated to the dedicated GPU where Vega is in Raven Ridge and dedicated GPUs (where it's perpetually sold out).

Read the article again. But yeah Vega 10 is more places than Fiji, Mi line, macs...