colinp :
de5_Roy :
amd wants reviewers to compare mobile kaveri with mobile i7. the point is to show how much of mobile i7's performance kaveri delivers and how favorably mobile kaveri compares to mobile i5. another one is to mock the hd4400-4600 igpu. notice that iris and iris pro comparisons are conspicuously absent, so were vce vs quick sync. this is a preview anyway, amd seems to have rushed the paper launch to counter haswell refresh and devil's canyon instead of polishing the software side (mantle, enduro, igpu etc).
Maybe the situation is different elsewhere, but aside from the Macbook Pro, laptops with Iris Pro are rarer than hen's teeth in the UK. Are they not also all 47W chips and stonkingly expensive?
For the price, you can usually get a high end Intel CPU with a high end Nvidia or AMD dGPU.
If you're thinking between an Iris laptop or a desktop, you can basically buy an FX 8320 with a 290x for the same price.
Mobile Kaveri is going to see a lot of $400 Intel being compared to $150 AMD and then people going "WOW AMD FAILED AGAIN!" Get ready everyone, it's coming.
As for the API discussion, it's important. AMD is making a very strong effort to add value to their hardware with software. It is the same type of thing Nvidia does with PhysX, CUDA, Shadowplay, etc. It's a very good strategy and if AMD found themselves in a position where they had a huge advantage in Linux gaming thanks to Mantle or whatever, it would at least move some chips.
I was reading on Slashdot this morning and someone put the Nvidia vs AMD GPU thing rather well. Nvidia is like Internet Explorer. It doesn't follow standards properly and it has lots of quirks people work around, yet it's the primarily supported platform. Meanwhile AMD is like Firefox, it follows the standards but it pays for that by not accommodating Nvidia's quirks. I'd even argue that Intel CPUs function the same way and AMD is in a position where they currently have to emulated Intel's quirks or get blow out.
AMD pushing software like they are is them trying to escape that position they're in. I forget if I've mentioned it here before, but Nvidia and Intel have AMD in a position where AMD has smaller R&D budgets yet they're forced to basically compete in a way where they have to one up Nvidia and Intel by doing what they do, just better. And when you have a smaller budget, sometimes by a huge amount, the odds of that happening are not so great.
So enter Mantle and such to try and save the day for AMD by letting AMD do software how they want. Yes it has problems, gamerk has mentioned them. Why optimize for AMD when it's the minority?
The idea is to offer provocative things to the developers to lure them in. Easy cross-platform ports is a big one.
AMD is even at a disadvantage here. Nvidia and Intel can gain support by paying people off. AMD really doesn't make enough money to go up to a company like HP and go "we'll sell you these chips for really cheap, meet your demand, and give you tons of support, but you can't put Intel in nice models" but Intel can (and does).
But AMD is doing what it can by offering people what they want. You can see the clear distinction in the way that Nvidia comes along and ramrods things down people's throats and then pays them to use those features while AMD gets developers to come to them.
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