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 ...

 

[cgner]

Open your eyes
That list of multihreaded programs I listed is only part of it
many games are using two or more cores already
and if you are like me and use your computer for more than gaming then you would realize how many
applications are multhreaded
I am a PC tech and work as a Technical Sales Consultant for a HP Channel Partner
Currently working on my Servers and Enterprise Storage certification
I configure server racks and blades all the time and deal with needed system requirements for workstation and server applications
even apps that are used for home use like Photoshop and Handbrake take advantage of many cores
Gaming is the least important use for a computer LOL
In the real world with real apps more cores matter

as a professional tech this quote of yours "They have all the power we need, but its spread out into different cores."
absolutely makes no sense whatsoever
Are you in the IT field Cgner?
What is your background in computers?

Using 2 cores was a new thing in 2005. I talked about HIGHLY multithreaded games, meaning those that use all 4-8 cores, not just 2. I already clarified and you come again with the same list? I think you still can't comprehend simple sentences LOL. SPreading power means a single bulldozer CPU has plenty of power in one chip, but because it has 8 threads, getting all that power requires the right programming on software part. Jeez man.

Oh and since gaming is least important to you, then why do you even talk about gaming? What do you know? Have you played every single game you brought on that list and the ones I named? I suppose not.

 

[king smp]

Are you in the IT field Cgner?
What is your background in computers?

 

[jdwii]

Not only performance but you can do more in a game that supports more cores i'm not saying this so Amd performs better i want all games to run butter smooth on Intel or Amd. The fact that Skyrim uses only 2 cores is just plain bad programming their is know way a game that big cant use more then 2 cores.

 

[jdwii]

Using 2 cores was a new thing in 2005. I talked about HIGHLY multithreaded games, meaning those that use all 4-8 cores, not just 2. I already clarified and you come again with the same list? I think you still can't comprehend simple sentences LOL. SPreading power means a single bulldozer CPU has plenty of power in one chip, but because it has 8 threads, getting all that power requires the right programming on software part. Jeez man.

Oh and since gaming is least important to you, then why do you even talk about gaming? What do you know? Have you played every single game you brought on that list and the ones I named? I suppose not.

Kinda a dick to him if you ask me to get offended like that. Game dev's need to stop being so lazy when 1 or 2 cores are being used beyond 30-50% they need to code the game more efficiently to say games cant use more then 2 cores or don't need more then 2 cores is stupid.

 

[obsama1]

It's because of the consoles. When the new ones come out with better processors with more cores, we'll get better games that are multi-threaded.

 

[viridiancrystal]

It's because of the consoles. When the new ones come out with better processors with more cores, we'll get better games that are multi-threaded.

Very true. You design an engine to run on PC first you can get a lot of threads used well. Source and Frostbite 2 are both good examples. Both can use ~6 cores fairly well.

 

[Smeg45]

Pray for consoles to use 4 standard x86 cores and everybody will be much happier. No Cell or PowerPC, just standard x86. Then you'll see quad become standard.

 

[cgner]

Are you in the IT field Cgner?
What is your background in computers?

Let's just say I have long gaming and computer building experience plus some college education in the area. Your field is entirely irrelevant to games.

"I am a PC tech and work as a Technical Sales Consultant for a HP Channel Partner
Currently working on my Servers and Enterprise Storage certification
I configure server racks and blades all the time and deal with needed system requirements for workstation and server applications "

Servers and workstations use many cores, so your MOAH COARS is very much relevant for them. With games, you have no idea what you are saying. Sorry if I came off rude.

Kinda a dick to him if you ask me to get offended like that. Game dev's need to stop being so lazy when 1 or 2 cores are being used beyond 30-50% they need to code the game more efficiently to say games cant use more then 2 cores or don't need more then 2 cores is stupid.

Not only performance but you can do more in a game that supports more cores i'm not saying this so Amd performs better i want all games to run butter smooth on Intel or Amd. The fact that Skyrim uses only 2 cores is just plain bad programming their is know way a game that big cant use more then 2 cores.

Yes and yes. Programming is to blame, but what is the point of buying an 8 core CPU just to have 1/4 of it work? See my point? Those 5-8 core cpu's are not fully utilized in vast majority of games. I know it because I own 1100T myself and see how it is not fully used.

 

[obsama1]

But everyone will want compatibility with Xbox 360 and PS3 games. Would you be able to run those on a different architecture, like x86?

 

[cgner]

Very true. You design an engine to run on PC first you can get a lot of threads used well. Source and Frostbite 2 are both good examples. Both can use ~6 cores fairly well.

True, so true. Rewriting a game while porting takes effort. Programmers don't really care because PC games that they port will mostly be pirated anyways. Sad.

 

[obsama1]

What? It's not because of pirating. There are a ton of console pirates. It's because while there are a lot of PC gamers, most gamers play on consoles. Consoles bring in more money than PC, so they spend more time optimizing for consoles, not PC's.

 

[king smp]

hey cgner I was just messing with you
no hard feelings
just a friendly intellectual dispute

I enjoy gaming very much
I am playing Battlefield 2 Bad Company 2 for the first run through while listening to Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon on my Creative HS-1200 digital wireless headset

but I will say this I am not an expert gamer
I usually only manage to get a few hours in on the weekends when I am off
most of the time on a computer is for work or studying
I am the project manager for implementing a Managed Print Service for my company
I also do sales quotes on servers,workstations,network printers etc
I even help out with my companies website (mainly grunt work entering in data into Excel workbooks and loading jpegs for product)
In my off time I enjoy doing video work and have been teaching myself video editing and work on my Youtube channel which is almost at 10K views

So a 1100T is a great CPU for me for how I use the computer
I also use a Xeon I5-2400 equilavent as a 24/7 folding at home machine mainly on a performance per watt reasoning

My argument came from the point of view of total computer usage and not just strictly gaming
from a gaming viewpoint no more than a good quadcore like a 2500k or 980BE is needed at this point in time

 

[Smeg45]

True, so true. Rewriting a game while porting takes effort. Programmers don't really care because PC games that they port will mostly be pirated anyways. Sad.

Don't bring up that piracy rubbish. How about developers actually producing a proper PC game built for PC that lasts longer than your lunch break and actually takes advantage of a PC's power? That is part of the problem there.

 

[noob2222]

Skyrim is still dual core only. Skyrim 1.5 has added optimisations for some functions that make it work much better than Skyrim 1.4. But its still dual core only.

IIRC, in starcraft2 you had to manually edit some config file to add support for more than 2 cores.
BF3 in single player too is quite heavy on more cores. My Q6600 @3GHz had 95% usage.

AFAIK, Metro2033 doesnt gain any FPS from quad core over dual core. And, a dual core at 2ghz and 3.6ghz had the same FPS at 1080p.


@ Truegenius :
Multithreading != Multiprocessing.

really, 2 cores? might want to actually look next time you play

as for metro 2033, if you run multiple gpus, yes it can. The problem is the game is soo efficient you have to force a CPU bottleneck wich isn't easy for that game. There will be a massive difference between dual core and quad with 4x gtx 680. Don't consider a game not gaining fps doesn't mean it won't go there with more graphics. I have screenshots of that too, single card 6970 pushes 2 cores, dual 6970 pushes 3 cores.

 

[cgner]

hey cgner I was just messing with you
no hard feelings
just a friendly intellectual dispute

haha ok then, no probs.

What? It's not because of pirating. There are a ton of console pirates. It's because while there are a lot of PC gamers, most gamers play on consoles. Consoles bring in more money than PC, so they spend more time optimizing for consoles, not PC's.

yep, thats true. I remember reading that only 5% of total cod copies sold were for PC. Sad to see PC gaming slowly decline.

Don't bring up that piracy rubbish. How about developers actually producing a proper PC game built for PC that lasts longer than your lunch break and actually takes advantage of a PC's power? That is part of the problem there.

Again, very that most developers halfass their work of porting games over to pc and often release it with no graphical options (dead island, rage), mediocre graphics, and like a 5 hour campaign+pathetic multiplayer. However, being an avid gamer who hangs out with the community, I must shamefully admit that 4/5 PC gamers pirate games. I personally prefer steam sales. Convenient, easy, legal, cheap 😀

 

[noob2222]

+1 for steam. no CDs, no codes to keep track of, it just works. I keep an eye out for the 75% off deals, picked up most of my games that way.

 

[obsama1]

@cgner

It's because most PC gamers play BF3.

 

[Smeg45]

+1 for steam. no CDs, no codes to keep track of, it just works. I keep an eye out for the 75% off deals, picked up most of my games that way.

Except for the fact you are tied to one piece of software and one company and one account, which is ridiculous. What ever happened to installing a game and just playing?

 

[king smp]

I am working on BF2:Bad Company 2 right now LOL
stuck running through a snowstorm looking for shelter
real tempted to get BF3 but I wont do it until I finish BC2

 

[obsama1]

Steam is just so convenient. Keeps your games together, and you can download the game over and over again, and there's no install limit. It's a pain migrating your games to a new PC. Steam is good.

 

[skitz9417]

yea steam is hell good

and so much better than games for windows live

 

[gamerk316]

Whats is the motivation for game developers to use more than 2 cores ?
Games are mostly GPU bottlenecked. I dont see how adding support for more cores is going to help that.

As I've said MANY times: You can't simply choose to use more then X cores. You need threads that meet the following conditions to benefit:

1: Thread must be parallel
2: Thread must be high workload (otherwise, you don't notice because your running at 1% CPU)
3: Thread management must NOT decrease performance when sending data to other threads (MAJOR issues here)

The main issues are the 1st and 3rd. Its trivial for me to create more threads. But if the work isn't parallel, whats the point. Hell, I could make every instance of a class its own thread if I wanted. Problem is, performance would fall off a cliff, as I spend all my time communicating between threads rather then doing something useful.

When the new consoles come out, and graphics don't get better, and games don't scale beyond a few cores, I will be the only one on the internet saying "I TOLD YOU SO".

 

[cgner]

Having dealt with EA Origin, Ustore, games for windows live I can honestly say Steam is the last hope for humanity lol. I always keep an eye out for 75% sales. $5 for a game that came out like 4-8 months ago is very hard to pass. As for one account for all games, what's so wrong with that? No need to remember password and stuff for every game you play online, no hassle of saving single player files, no hassle of patching, no need for no-cd files. Just install and roll. 100% legal and safe.

BF 3 is meh, I still play BC 2 even though I own both games, alongside BF 2142 and BF2.

 

[jdwii]

I'm lame i can't wait for the new Sim city game! That and Resident evil 6 and GTA5. I wish Microsoft would make Age of empires 4 but i'm pretty sure that game is dead.

 

[viridiancrystal]

As I've said MANY times: You can't simply choose to use more then X cores. You need threads that meet the following conditions to benefit:

1: Thread must be parallel
2: Thread must be high workload (otherwise, you don't notice because your running at 1% CPU)
3: Thread management must NOT decrease performance when sending data to other threads (MAJOR issues here)

The main issues are the 1st and 3rd. Its trivial for me to create more threads. But if the work isn't parallel, whats the point. Hell, I could make every instance of a class its own thread if I wanted. Problem is, performance would fall off a cliff, as I spend all my time communicating between threads rather then doing something useful.

When the new consoles come out, and graphics don't get better, and games don't scale beyond a few cores, I will be the only one on the internet saying "I TOLD YOU SO".

You'll probably be the only one. It has already been proven that games can scale 6 cores well, and do wonders in the process.