News AMD Takes Jab at Intel Over LGA1700 Platform Longevity

[Admin]

In a new blog spot, AMD compares its AM5 platform against Intel's LGA1700 platform in terms of costs, longevity, and value.

AMD Takes Jab at Intel Over LGA1700 Platform Longevity : Read more

 

[Glock24]

LGA1151 may have been used for several CPU generations but you could not use the same motherboard as a new chipset was required for the newer CPUs. This was a totally artificial limitation though, as there are BIOS mods to use CF CPUs with 100 series chipsets.

 

[TechieTwo]

Intel forces consumers to buy a new mobo to please mobo makers. The AM4 or AM5 provides better value for the majority of consumers because these folks are not necessarily buying bleeding edge CPUs/APUs. Performance is important but so is TCO for many.

 

[peachpuff]

"The motherboard is one of the most expensive components inside a system"

Only if you have an am5 motherboard 😂

 

[Alvar "Miles" Udell]

Unless AMD decides to do what they did with AM4 and say "You know, we said support would be for all AM4 CPUs to work in all AM4 motherboards, but Zen 3 won't work in 300 series boards because we said so" until Rocket Lake came along and made them change their minds.

While saying AM5 is better than LGA1700 longevity is true, LGA1700 has already been around for a year and will be supported to sometime next year, or about 2 years in total. AM5 released this year and will be supported to 2025, only 3 years. Also, anyone stupid enough to be a Socket AM4 early adopter will likely have replaced their 300 series board with a 500 series if they were planning on going long on AM4, meaning only 2 years was kept on that board.

And finally, Raptor Lake is kicking Zen 4's butt in price and performance, especially at the total platform cost level, so AMD has absolutely zero ability to jab Intel at this point.

And yes, I say this as a high end Zen 3 owner, and aside from getting a 5950X which does not reach advertised and reviewer tested boost speeds, I also was a very early adopter and had a duff 1800X which was faulty.

 

[Sleepy_Hollowed]

Considering how connectors are becoming an issue, I’m going to agree with AMD.

TCO is king for consumers and enterprise, and as long as UEFI doesn’t change, they’re a solid choice for non-max performance hunters.

 

[purple_dragon]

There is no suck thing as future proofing. Every six to nine months some pc part could be upgraded to something marginally better. In the market as a whole the percentage of people that upgrade to a new cpu on the same platform is very minimal, those who do are enthusiasts. I prefer Intel for their more reliable software but I've also owned AMD computers. I'm mostly brand agnostic, whatever works better for me at the time I need to upgrade. I will say I was partially impressed with AMD AM4 longevity with the caveat that AMD had some usb issues that took quite a few bios revisions to iron out. Also, AMD only begrudgingly supported Zen 3 on 300 series mobo. Sure, it nice to have the option to keep the same board but most people don't upgrade that often and AM5 is only promised 1 year longer support than LGA 1700 so not that big a deal imo.

 

[RedBear87]

As a result, AMD provided an example of how a consumer who brought a Ryzen 3 1300 in 2017 can upgrade to a Ryzen 7 5800X3D, one of the best CPUs, in 2022 without hiccups.

Saying that it was without hiccups is a bit of an overstatement, series 300 motherboards weren't even supposed to receive Ryzen 5000 compatibility, IIRC because the motherboards' rom was supposed to be too small, eventually they solved this issue by deleting support for the few AM4 Excavator APUs, but it was no small coincidence that AMD happened to find a solution just after Intel released something of competitive (Alder Lake) after the Rocket Lake disaster.

In general I would never trust a company saying that they'll support something for X years unless it's a legally binding statement. They could either lie, if they can get away with it, or they could get forced by circumstances to change their plans, you can never be sure.

 

[InvalidError]

I upgrade at most once every four years (almost 10 years the last time around) and at the rate interface compatibility, stability, speeds, etc. are improving, I wouldn't want to hamstring a new CPU with an old motherboard.

 

[Zerk2012]

Who really cares with my upgrade times it don't even matter.
Being able to upgrade every year for 4 years is not a selling point to most users.

EDIT If you spend that kind of money on the latest and greatest every year then you buying a new motherboard has no effect.

 

[prtskg]

I'm sure AM4 has been a great platform for AMD but I doubt it was great for motherboard makers. They had to support cheap motherboards for quite a while.

 

[JayNor]

I kind of like Intel's approach, pushing out new Thunderbolt, WIFI and PCIE and DDR implementations as soon as they are ready.

I see the system in a package format is on its way, so AMD will have to find something else to jaw about.

Intel's compute element processor cards that plug into a backplane seem like something that could become more popular. Their NUC13 extreme box was presented recently, and looks like a clever design.

 

[Friesiansam]

I built a new PC in 2018, equipped with an R7 2700. Late last year I upgraded to an R7 5800X, a major performance upgrade that made a real difference in use and, the only other thing I needed was a tube of TiM.

I'm going to stay with AMD.

 

[RandomGuy2]

2 gen window is fine imo. Only don't launch new mobos everytime with a new gen. Perhaps only the high end models for the hobbyist.

 

[InvalidError]

2 gen window is fine imo. Only don't launch new mobos everytime with a new gen. Perhaps only the high end models for the hobbyist.

Unless AMD (and Intel) put some sort of universal core component support to ensure any motherboard of any generation is at least functional enough with any CPU regardless of the installed BIOS to update the BIOS to whatever version is required for full CPU support, we will always need new motherboards for each new CPU generation just to guarantee out-of-box support for new CPUs even if it is nothing more than an existing model with updated model number and stickers to reflect the updated factory-installed BIOS.

 

[TJ Hooker]

Unless AMD (and Intel) put some sort of universal core component support to ensure any motherboard of any generation is at least functional enough with any CPU regardless of the installed BIOS to update the BIOS to whatever version is required for full CPU support, we will always need new motherboards for each new CPU generation just to guarantee out-of-box support for new CPUs even if it is nothing more than an existing model with updated model number and stickers to reflect the updated factory-installed BIOS.

Apparently AMD has done something very close to that, introducing a universal USB BIOS 'flashback' feature for AM5. Unfortunately motherboard makers aren't required by enable though, so there's still a possibility they'll reserve it for more expensive boards for the sake of up-charging.

 

[Ogotai]

Unless AMD (and Intel) put some sort of universal core component support to ensure any motherboard of any generation is at least functional enough with any CPU regardless of the installed BIOS to update the BIOS to whatever version is required for full CPU support, we will always need new motherboards for each new CPU generation just to guarantee out-of-box support for new CPUs even if it is nothing more than an existing model with updated model number and stickers to reflect the updated factory-installed BIOS.

actually, AMD had a solution for this. when i bought my X570 board and the 3900x, i needed a bios update for the board to work, contacted AMD's warranty department, and they sent me a cpu that i then used to upgrade the bios, swapped cpus, made sure the 3900X worked and was detected fine, then put the cpu AMD sent, back in the box, and sent it back. bios issue semi solved, just took an extra 2 weeks i think it was before i was able to use the new cpu, which was fine. FIAK, intel doesnt even have that, do they ?

 

[bit_user]

I kind of like Intel's approach, pushing out new Thunderbolt, WIFI and PCIE and DDR implementations as soon as they are ready.

You say that like it's a trend. With PCIe, you're extrapolating from a single data point. They were very late to the PCIe 4.0 party.

Intel's compute element processor cards that plug into a backplane seem like something that could become more popular.

Except they've been around for years and yet there's very little selection in 3rd party enclosures, when last I looked. Seems to me like it missed the mark, for whatever reason.

 

[bit_user]

Who really cares with my upgrade times it don't even matter.
Being able to upgrade every year for 4 years is not a selling point to most users.

Not every year, but on year 3 or 4 it might be.

 

[KyaraM]

I upgrade maybe every 5 years minimum, rather later than sooner; current CPU expectation is 7-8 years; maybe 6 if some really major shift comes up. At that point I will need a new board regardless. I don't give a hoot about their system longevity bs and I think I stated often enough that imo hamstringing a new CPU with a severely outdated MB is... not the smartest thing. Besides, really, AMD? Already forgot your own bs with the 300-series boards? Are all old boards even able to take 5000 series chips already?

 

[Ogotai]

Are all old boards even able to take 5000 series chips already?

i remember reading that part of the problem was because the bios chips were just too small to fit all the code for every cpu for am4. they even removed the code for the phenom cpus to make more room in some boards for the Zen based cpus.

either way regardless whether you think its a good thing or not, at least AMD gives that as an option, if a person would like to, while intel, MAKES you get a new board every 2 years, no matter what. some would consider that a pro, not a con.

 

[InvalidError]

either way regardless whether you think its a good thing or not, at least AMD gives that as an option

And also the headache of figuring out which BIOS version you need to upgrade/downgrade to before swapping the CPU to avoid needing to borrow a CPU to unbrick your motherboard if you put the wrong support version on or your old new-in-box board has an old BIOS on it.

I suspect less than 5% of all upgradable PCs ever see a CPU swap, albeit an extremely vocal 5%. I don't personally know anybody who has bothered with a CPU upgrade in the last 20+ years.

 

[bit_user]

I suspect less than 5% of all upgradable PCs ever see a CPU swap, albeit an extremely vocal 5%.

Agreed. Somewhere in that ballpark.

I don't personally know anybody who has bothered with a CPU upgrade in the last 20+ years.

I upgraded a CPU in a workstation I use at my job, because the standard spec machine ordered at the time had some low-end Xeon. I was able to achieve a substantial upgrade, just by getting the fastest retail Xeon (also a generation newer, IIRC) that would fit the socket.

At home, I'm eyeballing an upgrade to Raptor Lake. However, I'm intrigued by the "Raptor Lake Refresh", on the roadmap slides. So, what I might do is ebay a used i5-12500 for $166, and just use that until the Refresh CPUs launch. Maybe I can even get most of my money back, if I turn around and put the original CPU back on ebay. Plus, it eliminates the risk of getting a W680 mortheboard with BIOS that doesn't support Raptor Lake (we now know Intel won't be releasing a W780, which would've been another solution to that problem). Even though the i5-12500 is just a 6-core CPU, they're all P-cores and it's still a lot faster than my 4-core Sandybridge.

The main holdup in the plan is still the lack of ECC DDR5 UDIMMs.