AMD Piledriver rumours ... and expert conjecture

[Reynod]

We have had several requests for a sticky on AMD's yet to be released Piledriver architecture ... so here it is.

I want to make a few things clear though.

Post a question relevant to the topic, or information about the topic, or it will be deleted.

Post any negative personal comments about another user ... and they will be deleted.

Post flame baiting comments about the blue, red and green team and they will be deleted.

Enjoy ...

 

[Cazalan]

IIRC Intel paid AMD $1.25BN in November 2009, about 2 years before BD was released. Unfortunately it seems AMD used most of that cash to pay off their first iteration of the senior notes debt, and maybe some to ATIC for the GF spinoff, and probably some golden parachute for Hector Ruiz as well.

And they're still 2 billion in debt after that payment.

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/ks?s=AMD+Key+Statistics

 

[fazers_on_stun]

And they're still 2 billion in debt after that payment.

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/ks?s=AMD+Key+Statistics

Very soon to be $2.5BN after they float more senior notes due in 10 years. Dunno how wise an investment like that would be 10 years down the road:

http://www.investorplace.com/2012/08/doomed-american-companies/3/

9 American Companies That Are Doomed
They're no longer leaders in their industries and likely will never be again

#8: Advanced Micro Devices

Advanced Micro Devices‘s (NYSE:AMD) latest quarterly report shows just how bad off the company is. Year-over-year revenue fell 10% to $1.4 billion. Non-GAAP net income fell from $70 million to $46 million. AMD was Intel‘s (NASDAQ:INTC) most direct competitor five years ago and held about 24% of the server and PC chip market in 2007. Last year, its market share fell to 19%. But that is not AMD’s single greatest problem. The company bought graphic chip maker ATI in 2006 for $5.4 billion. PC makers had begun to add more of these chips to their machines. AMD needed to keep pace with rival Intel and graphic chip maker Nvidia Corp. (NASDAQ:NVDA). The main result of the ATI transaction was that it saddled AMD with an unsustainable debt and did almost nothing to help AMD’s fortunes. AMD had revenue of $6 billion in 2007, while Intel’s was $38.3 billion. Last year, AMD’s revenue rose to only $6.6 billion, while Intel’s soared to $54 billion during the same period.

AMD has had three CEOs in the last five years and struggles to find a strategy for growth. The company’s greatest challenge may lie ahead as much of the personal computing market moves to tablets and smartphones. The chip used in the Apple iPad was designed by Apple and made by Samsung. The Apple iPhone 5 will probably be powered by a quad core processor made by Samsung, the same chip used in the Samsung Galaxy S III. The other primary designers of the current generation of chips are Qualcomm (NASDAQ:QCOM) and ARM Holdings (NASDAQ:ARMH). AMD’s products are almost nowhere to be found in this latest generation of portable devices.

BTW, their stock jumped nearly 9% today after the above 'analysis' hit the financial news

 

[gamerk316]

BTW, their stock jumped nearly 9% today after the above 'analysis' hit the financial news

AMD was up 2.9% last I checked a few hours back [up $0.19]...To be fair, 9% of $4.00 isn't THAT much though.

 

[jdwii]

pd doesn't look like a failure to me.
amd 'topped out' with phenom ii's cpu performance. with bulldozer, they took a new direction which didn't start where phenom ii ended, in terms of cpu performance. imo bd's performance peak is quite a bit lower than phenom ii's - which was a mature lineup. now amd is slowly climbing up the cpu perf ladder again with pd (higher perf than bd but not necessarily phenom ii). besides, high cpu performance isn't all that important anymore..... for most pc users.
may be steamroller is where amd will get substantial cpu performance increase, disregarding other factors and only comparing among amd cpus.
however, i think it's better to keep one's expectations low and not believe hypes too much.

Since we already saw the design we already know what piledriver is going to bring to the table 10-15% better IPC and probably 5-10% better Power consumption. and it looks like a small increase in clock speed, still Intel is not standing still and their newer designs are going to allow more performance with less power consumption.

If Amd does not show something great in the server market with the cloud then i'm sorry to say their not going to be making a good future and they need to get Arm and Amd going in a contract together and make some great APU's(for tablets and phones yes amd this is a big market!) with a arm CPU and radeon graphics but then again Amd might not want to make money

On top of this they need to treat their engineering department a lot better and go back to hand craft designs!

 

[fazers_on_stun]

AMD was up 2.9% last I checked a few hours back [up $0.19]...To be fair, 9% of $4.00 isn't THAT much though.

Well according to the latest rumors: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/amd-shares-rise-on-acquisition-rumors-2012-08-08?siteid=msn

AMD shares rise on acquisition rumors

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) - Shares of Advanced Micro Devices AMD+9.45% rose 8% to $4.34 late Wednesday on speculation that it is an acquisition target. Evercore Partners analyst Patrick Wang said Qualcomm QCOM+0.18% and Samsung have been mentioned as possible buyers, although he downplayed the significance of the rumors. He said there appears to be "a lot of short covering as volumes shot up in the afternoon." Wang added, however, that "I think it's unlikely they get a take-out offer."

I don't think the x86 license would transfer however so the only value would be in the graphics and perhaps SeaMicro parts..

 

[noob2222]

Not sure what would happen with the x86 cross liscence. If its bought out, then they buy all of AMD's liscenses with it. ie x86-64. Intel could try to shut down the x86 production but they would lose the 64 bit instructions in retaliation.

AMD being bought out doesn't automatically give Intel all of the tech thats currently being used. The opposite can be said as well.

This close knit tie makes any AMD buyout very difficult due to the monopolistic nature of Intel. Intel would rather AMD go bankrupt so the liscenses expire and they have 100% control.

Last thought: any AMD buyout would come with blue lawyers serving papers from day 1.

 

[gamerk316]

The X86 license is non-transferable, but the X86-64 license is whats REALLY important. Since the majority of new OS sales are 64-bit anyways, its not like loosing the X86 license is a major death blow. Plus, it gets Qualcomm or Sumsung in the desktop market, which they are totally irrelevant in.

 

[fazers_on_stun]

Aren't the X86-64 instructions an extension of X86? If so, the license might be useless without the underlying X86 license. I dunno much about the particulars, but am guessing based on the "X86" portion of X86-64..

Anyway, there's other ways to skin a cat than through an outright buyout, such as owning or controlling 51% of the stock and thus controlling the BoD. Then you could eventually force something like sale of the graphics unit or whatever part you wanted. Not saying this would happen, but merely is possible.

 

[Reynod]

http://www.coolaler.com/showthread.php/292963

 

[Cazalan]

This close knit tie makes any AMD buyout very difficult due to the monopolistic nature of Intel. Intel would rather AMD go bankrupt so the liscenses expire and they have 100% control.

You'd have a hard time convincing courts that Intel has a monopoly anymore. There's over 2 billion ARM core chips shipped per year. These have already cut into Intel sales.

Both Intel and AMD are losing sales in China due to their "home grown" MIPS based CPU Loongson. AMD even mentions it in their latest quarterly report.

ARM laptops are starting to ship and when the 64bit A15 cores hit the shelves there will be even stronger competition for Intel. People are more hooked with their cell phones and iPad's already, so that look and feel can easily extend to a larger screen/desktop for "real" work.

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Proof-that-ARM-Laptops-Exist-Rikomagic-MK802-Mini-PC-285776.shtml

 

[-Fran-]

Well, since "Personal Computer" now is more wide since Tablets and Smartphones are indeed personal computers nowadays, Intel won't be a monopoly in the eye of the definition I guess.

AMD would probably die before Intel gets "convicted" anyway 😛

But hey, let's not focus on killing AMD yet! 😛

Cheers!

 

[gamerk316]

Again, Intel and ARM are both swamped by PPC, which is the dominant processor architecture. So how is Intel a monopoly?

 

[fazers_on_stun]

You'd have a hard time convincing courts that Intel has a monopoly anymore. There's over 2 billion ARM core chips shipped per year. These have already cut into Intel sales.

I don't think Intel is interested in seeing AMD go by the wayside - keep them at under 20% marketshare, sure, but not out of the x86 business. And IMO Ruiz is as much to blame for AMD's recent failings as anything else. Funny how that happened on Ruiz's watch and then he goes to be CEO of GloFlo until kicked out on the insider trading scandal. Where's all the money and profitability from selling the fabs? Must be on GF's end as we don't see any in AMD's balance sheets..

Both Intel and AMD are losing sales in China due to their "home grown" MIPS based CPU Loongson. AMD even mentions it in their latest quarterly report.

I'd bet those CPUs have a processor ID and maybe other identifiable signatures built-in, and not able to be turned off. Wasn't that the main reason the Chinese gov't sponsored their development, as a means of making sure everybody can be tracked?

 

[noob2222]

You'd have a hard time convincing courts that Intel has a monopoly anymore. There's over 2 billion ARM core chips shipped per year. These have already cut into Intel sales.

Both Intel and AMD are losing sales in China due to their "home grown" MIPS based CPU Loongson. AMD even mentions it in their latest quarterly report.

ARM laptops are starting to ship and when the 64bit A15 cores hit the shelves there will be even stronger competition for Intel. People are more hooked with their cell phones and iPad's already, so that look and feel can easily extend to a larger screen/desktop for "real" work.

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Proof-that-ARM-Laptops-Exist-Rikomagic-MK802-Mini-PC-285776.shtml

list an ARM computer that runs on windows and can play BF3, cyrsis, use photoshop, ect. Just because arm is similar does not put it in the same market. There are NO ARM desktops, servers, laptops... ya, except that ARM tablet with the fold up display.

Can you run a radeon or nvidia card on ARM? can you install your own memory on ARM? can you do anything high end on a 1.5ghz ARM computer(tablet)?

ARM is not directly competing with Intel. Intel is trying to enter the market where ARM is dominating, cellphones and tablets, not computers.

Lets see how many ARM products HP, Dell, Acer, ect offer.

 

[Cazalan]

list an ARM computer that runs on windows and can play BF3, cyrsis, use photoshop, ect. Just because arm is similar does not put it in the same market. There are NO ARM desktops, servers, laptops... ya, except that ARM tablet with the fold up display.

BF3 players are only a subset of the gaming market.

FarmVille has 100 million users. A simple web game.

ARM servers have shipped. ARM laptops have shipped.

http://www.boston.co.uk/solutions/viridis/default.aspx
http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/02/hp-and-calxedas-moonshot-arm-servers-will-bring-all-the-boys-to/


ARM desktops are on their way. Mostly waiting for Windows 8 and A15 cores.

 

[noob2222]

BF3 players are only a subset of the gaming market.

FarmVille has 100 million users. A simple web game.

ARM servers have shipped. ARM laptops have shipped.

http://www.boston.co.uk/solutions/viridis/default.aspx
http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/02/hp-and-calxedas-moonshot-arm-servers-will-bring-all-the-boys-to/


ARM desktops are on their way. Mostly waiting for Windows 8 and A15 cores.

Have fun with farmville. Internet games are not games. I'm pretty sure the original NES had better grapics than that junk, definately had better gameplay than click and wait for another webpage. In fact, most of thoe can work on a 386.

So you found one arm based server. What does it run on? Ice cream sandwich? 0.01% market share does not break a monopoly. Future products that don't exist dont count either.

It doesn't change the fact that there has to be a current player in the market. Trying to use the analogy that since intel made a phone that they are no longer a monopoly isn't correct. If someone had a monopoly on shoes and decided to make televisions doesn't change the monopoly on shoes.

Intel can't afford to lose or let amd be bought out. They are the only player in the market. They will fight any attempt. Heck they tried to kill amd when gf was spun off.

 

[gamerk316]

list an ARM computer that runs on windows and can play BF3, cyrsis, use photoshop, ect. Just because arm is similar does not put it in the same market. There are NO ARM desktops, servers, laptops... ya, except that ARM tablet with the fold up display.

Irrelevant. I got news for you, Unix, not Linux or Windows, is still the dominant OS. The fact one segment of the market is dominated by Intel/MS is irrelevant as far as Anti-trust law is concerned. Between, ARM, PPC, SPARC, and even more specilized CPU architectures, X86 makes up a very small market segment.

And I note that technically you can use ARM on open OS's that support it [Linux/BSD OS's], then run Windows apps through Wine.

EDIT

Nevermind being able to run games through a Virtual OS running on another platform.

 

[Cazalan]

Have fun with farmville. Internet games are not games. I'm pretty sure the original NES had better grapics than that junk, definately had better gameplay than click and wait for another webpage. In fact, most of thoe can work on a 386.

So you found one arm based server. What does it run on? Ice cream sandwich? 0.01% market share does not break a monopoly. Future products that don't exist dont count either.

I agree they're not games, but for billions of people the only gaming they do is on their cell phone or tablet. Older folk and kids love these web based games. Apple is making a killing on a low power tablet that personally I have zero use for.

ARM servers are limited now because they didn't have the muscle or backing to pull it off. Now they do with players like HP, Samsung, etc. There will be more by the end of the year and 2013/2014 will see significant gains.

 

[guskline]

Well the dog days of summer are upon us. What is the last official AMD announcement of the Piledriver production schedule? Will the highest end Piledriver be designated 8350?

 

[Cazalan]

Well the dog days of summer are upon us. What is the last official AMD announcement of the Piledriver production schedule? Will the highest end Piledriver be designated 8350?

Q4 is the latest news. There's nothing 100% official.

FX-8350 is slated as the highest speed 8 core.

http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/Bulldozer/AMD-FX-Series%20FX-8350.html

 

[guskline]

Thank you, Cazalan.

 

[mayankleoboy1]

http://www.obr-hardware.com/2012/08/biggest-amd-liar-john-fruehe-was-fired.html

Remember biggest "Bulldozer performance liar" John Fruehe, AMD server "guy"? Was finally fired from sinking ship AMD. This is great news, because he was a shame of that company. AMD is funny company now, desktop Trinity has serious design bug, Vishera was posponed to December. Radeons nobody buys ...

PS. ES sample of AMD FX 2 CPU (Vishera) is going to me, will test it soon a publish, stay tuned!

John Fruehe : was he the same guy on Toms who used to post in the BD thread ?

also, this : http://www.obr-hardware.com/2012/08/why-are-gigabyte-boards-worst-ocers.html

 

[de5_Roy]

fud....
"Qualcomm not buying AMD anytime soon "
http://www.fudzilla.com/home/item/28339-qualcomm-not-buying-amd-anytime-soon
"AMD fires China SVP, Taiwan VP "
http://www.fudzilla.com/home/item/28336-amd-fires-china-and-taiwan-vp

@obrhardware.. why all the amd hate? their articles read like they're all really angry when they type. may be change the a.c. and get a more ergonomic chair or something...
they also need better spellcheckers and/or proofreaders.

 

[esrever]

FUD and OBR hates AMD and is pretty much known.

 

[fazers_on_stun]

http://www.obr-hardware.com/2012/08/biggest-amd-liar-john-fruehe-was-fired.html

Remember biggest "Bulldozer performance liar" John Fruehe, AMD server "guy"? Was finally fired from sinking ship AMD. This is great news, because he was a shame of that company. AMD is funny company now, desktop Trinity has serious design bug, Vishera was posponed to December. Radeons nobody buys ...

PS. ES sample of AMD FX 2 CPU (Vishera) is going to me, will test it soon a publish, stay tuned!

John Fruehe : was he the same guy on Toms who used to post in the BD thread ?

also, this : http://www.obr-hardware.com/2012/08/why-are-gigabyte-boards-worst-ocers.html

Yes he was (JF-AMD), and if true that's a shame.