AMD questions current multi-core trend

[HotFoot]

Article:

http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/12/14/amd_questions_multi_core_trend/

As I've said in a couple other posts, I really hope this type of thinking works out well for AMD. The first thing I thought of when I read about multi-core processors was how great this would be for Computational Fluid Dynamics, and now I'm looking at AMD's Fusion and thinking about how how nicely floating-point performance boost would do as well. Combine the two in a single package, and the average Joe can afford to build a workstation for serious number crunching.

Yes, this stuff is still way down the pipe, but what are the perspectives from you in the enthusiast and gamer segment? If K8L doesn't bring AMD back on top, will Fusion?

Edit: replaced typo "K9L" with "K8L"

 

[sandmanwn]

i would question it to if i didnt have a competative product.
they are just trying to stall so they lose market share slower.
the potential of multicore systems is great. my guess is they are forseeing supply issues by making multicore products and want to try to dodge the bullet

Interesting enough the same arguments were said about AMD during the Ghz war.

 

[shabodah]

the potential of multicore systems is great. my guess is they are forseeing supply issues by making multicore products and want to try to dodge the bullet

The potential is great in systems that can really use seriously multi-threaded apps. Despite the capability of more threads, the average home user really isn't going to know what to do with much more than 6-8 cores. Too many programs will need to be entirely re-written to properly take advantage of a general processor, where as a speciallized one could do a far better job at it's task. Cell might not look to good right now, but it's a decent start down a path I see no way to avoid.

 

[Julian33]

To some extent though AMD are right..... we can't keep on going the way we are with increasing core count, since SMP is in a way a specialised form of processing anyway. There will be some applications that can never realistically use multiple cores, and for others there will come a point where you can't utilise any more cores. Without a major paradigm shift in programming languages this will remain the case.

Personally I think AMD is along the right lines with suggesting having application specific processors in the future, only I would go further and would suggest looking into creating a CPU/FPGA hybrid, where there are a limited number of fixed general purpose CPUs on chip, with a large reconfigurable FPGA that could synthesise application specific processors on the fly depending upon the tasks you are currently executing.

 

[1Tanker]

Article:

http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/12/14/amd_questions_multi_core_trend/

As I've said in a couple other posts, I really hope this type of thinking works out well for AMD. The first thing I thought of when I read about multi-core processors was how great this would be for Computational Fluid Dynamics, and now I'm looking at AMD's Fusion and thinking about how how nicely floating-point performance boost would do as well. Combine the two in a single package, and the average Joe can afford to build a workstation for serious number crunching.

Yes, this stuff is still way down the pipe, but what are the perspectives from you in the enthusiast and gamer segment? If K8L doesn't bring AMD back on top, will Fusion?

Edit: replaced typo "K9L" with "K8L"

There is no K9L. AMD is going from K8L to K10. They probably foresee too many dog jokes(K-9).

Edit: Disregard due to OP's edit. LOL

 

[HotFoot]

I like the CPU/FPGA concept. Have there been any rumors of development in this direction?

 

[shabodah]

"K8L" is Intel's designation for AMD's "Stars" processors (and server/workstation quad-core cpu's). Why be fussy unless you want to get real fussy. lol. I'm still trying to figure out how the price difference between a 1900 and stream processor is so great, myself.

 

[TechnologyCoordinator]

I am very intrigued. This is something that AMD is doing right in my opinion. What if AMD pulls this off by the end of the decade and all Intel has to offer is more and more cores. AMD users could brag about how fast their system is and Intel users could brag about how many idle cores they have in their system.

I don't know what this will do for gamers though. I can definitely see some major advantages in low-end, midrange, and the mobile market.

 

[HotFoot]

Ah, yes... a major drawback I hadn't considered is the departure from x86 to accomplish this. Would it be possible to maintain the x86 arch in the general purpose cores and then have some smart drivers handle the extra processing units (FPGA)... the extra units would be slaves to the general cores.

 

[shabodah]

It's not a AMD specific Idea, lol. Intel plans the same thing, in about the same timeframe. They just need to cattle-prod their GPU team(s).

 

[shabodah]

??? Everything I've seen shows Intel somehow leaked the K8L name. AMD was undecided between using Roman Numerals "V" for five as in K8.5 and "L" for fifty, K8.50. I still think they'd should have used K9 myself. That's kickass!

 

[chunkymonster]

This is another example of AMD thinking out of the box and anticipating the realities of the future. A similiar move by AMD resulted in two things; 1) AMD went with the IMC because they saw they limitations and eventual demise of the north bridge/front side bus design, and 2) chose to integrate Hypertransport as the interconnect standard. Say what you will about this strategy but remember that Intel is moving to an IMC as well as their own high speed hypertransport-ish interconnect standard.

I imagine that the Fusion design is going to open a lot of doors and create a number of revenue streams for AMD. It will be interesting to see how these chips are implemented in consumer electronics as well as computers.

 

[TechnologyCoordinator]

??? Everything I've seen shows Intel somehow leaked the K8L name. AMD was undecided between using Roman Numerals "V" for five as in K8.5 and "L" for fifty, K8.50. I still think they'd should have used K9 myself. That's kickass!

K8V is used in motherboard names, that's why L was chosen.

K9 would have been awesome, WOOF!

 

[Julian33]

Not to my knowledge - I've come up with the idea myself as I've done quite a bit of work with FPGAs. One development that makes this more viable now is that you can now partially reconfigre FPGAs, which would make it easy to reprogram a specific part of it. If I've come up with the idea though you can be sure the boffins at Intel and AMD will be investigating it - the 80 core demo Intel did a while back was on an FPGA.

@beerandcandy - I dont see how this is proprietary any more so than the K8 and Core 2 are proprietary - both accept x86 instructions, as would the CPU/FPGA hybrid, just the internal implementation would be different. For example, if you were executing a lot of SSE instructions, a controller on the CPU would detect this, and synthesise some co-processors that can handle SSE instructions more effectively. It's still processing x86 instructions, the same as current CPUs.

You'd need a fancy network on chip architecture to deal with this, I've had a think through some ideas myself but it's not an easy problem to solve. The potential performance speedups you could get if the really smart guys at AMD/Intel get it working though could be huge.

 

[BaronMatrix]

Article:

http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/12/14/amd_questions_multi_core_trend/

As I've said in a couple other posts, I really hope this type of thinking works out well for AMD. The first thing I thought of when I read about multi-core processors was how great this would be for Computational Fluid Dynamics, and now I'm looking at AMD's Fusion and thinking about how how nicely floating-point performance boost would do as well. Combine the two in a single package, and the average Joe can afford to build a workstation for serious number crunching.

Yes, this stuff is still way down the pipe, but what are the perspectives from you in the enthusiast and gamer segment? If K8L doesn't bring AMD back on top, will Fusion?

Edit: replaced typo "K9L" with "K8L"

I totally agree with that assessment. I mean you can only add so many cores to a die before you need more bandwidth and wider data paths and more power.

By modularizing it is possible to use the same basic parts to build different levels of computational power.

I'm sure this doesn't mean that there is no possibility of an 8core AMD bvut it will more likely consist of 4 CPU cores and 4 GPU cores.

As far as Barcelona I can only say that in Sept AMD said it was 60% faster and then in Dec AMD said it was 70% faster than Opteron.

I guess next month it will be 80% faster. I wonder if they will hit 100% faster by July. That would definitely be close to Clovertown. Fusion won't help with desktop and productivity apps, but only HPC type apps (CFD, FEA, CAD, etc), though those are the best use of a server so I'd have to say that with the combination Intel is back in the back seat of perf.

I would love to see AnSYS running on QFX or Agena FX. I bet MicroStation would fly too.

I guess you're a MechEngr?

 

[CaptRobertApril]

i would question it to if i didnt have a competative product.
they are just trying to stall so they lose market share slower.
the potential of multicore systems is great. my guess is they are forseeing supply issues by making multicore products and want to try to dodge the bullet

Maybe AMD should change its name to OCD:

"We've got 65nm... no 90nm... Quad FX is the way to go... but we want to 'Fuse' the GPU... do you have any chocolate... what time is it in Nepal..." :lol:

 

[qcmadness]

i would question it to if i didnt have a competative product.
they are just trying to stall so they lose market share slower.
the potential of multicore systems is great. my guess is they are forseeing supply issues by making multicore products and want to try to dodge the bullet

From K8's experience, AMD has headed the right direction, leading Intel for 3 or more years.

Hypertransport and integrated memory controller are proved to be better than traditional front side bus and external memory controller, especially in server space.

Also, multi-core symmetric processing is heading to its end.
The second fastest computer in the world now is consisting two types of processors already.

 

[CaptRobertApril]

This quote from the article worries me:

"If AMD has its way, than we could be going from a universal computing device today to very specialized and targeted hardware by 2009 and beyond."

I don't want specialized targeted hardware. That means that the system I buy to work on won't be the one I play on or the one I watch media on. I'm spending enough money on computer equipment as it is. That is the exact opposite direction that should be taken. Like the average buyer, I don't care if it's Fused CPUs/GPUs or calculating squirrels on crystal meth that are making my PC go. I want it to do everything I can throw at it, I want it to do it fast as lightning and I want it to cost less than my alimony!

 

[shabodah]

I can't think of much that a computer consisting of one quad core cpu, one decent "stream" processor, and one Ultra Sparc, couldn't do. And that would probably be somewhat feasable if you could afford the silicon for it.

 

[CaptRobertApril]

I can't think of much that a computer consisting of one quad core cpu, one decent "stream" processor, and one Ultra Sparc, couldn't do. And that would probably be somewhat feasable if you could afford the silicon for it.

Not doubting that one bit. In fact your description's got me drooling on the keyboard. But what is this deal with AMD going to ultraspecialized hw?

 

[VBDude]

AMD questions current multi-core trend? Pfft. Multicore APU FTW!

Come on, this is just another short-term answer to a long-term problem of maintaining Moore's Law. Though I think AMD is right on with that, I want more news about moving off of silicon.

 

[elpresidente2075]

Yeah, a brand new architecture destroys one that is nearing half a decade old. Good job Intel.

 

[Myopic]

I don't thonk AMD's going the way of ultra specialized proccess so much as allowing mix and match choices for the consumer. That way the end user gets to integrate whats aplicable to him/her. After seeing how many programs it takes to stress 4 or 8 cores, and considering the lag in multi-threaded programs available, and the complexity of programming for even more cores, it makes more sense in the near term (4-5 years) to streamline the platforms/CPUs for whats realistic (here come the flames) and extract the most performance with proccesses available now.
IMO it boils down to more choices, more power, and hopefully less money wasted for things I don't use(or can't).
BTW, Any idea how many manhours it takes to program threads for 8 CPU as opposed to 4, anyone?
Then again what do I know. I'm a noob.

 

[elpresidente2075]

BTW, Any idea how many manhours it takes to program threads for 8 CPU as opposed to 4, anyone?

With the current trends toward multi-cores, they should be developing tools that can dynamically allocate processes to different cores automatically very efficiently, so it (hopefully by that time) take the exact same amount of time. But when you talk about the software development of today, I have no idea. Twice as long? Four times as long?

 

[qcmadness]

From K8's experience, AMD has headed the right direction, leading Intel for 3 or more years.

Hypertransport and integrated memory controller are proved to be better than traditional front side bus and external memory controller, especially in server space.

ok if what you say is true then please explain these benchmarks.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/07/14/core2_duo_knocks_out_athlon_64/page12.html

clearly intel still using its old limited bandwitdth FSB destroys amd

Would you mind re-reading my post?