AMD's Future Chips & SoC's: News, Info & Rumours.

[gamerk316]

Having all the multi-threaded libraries in the world do you little good if they account for only 20% of total CPU time not because you aren't using them but because they represent only that much of the application's total processing workload.

Amdhal's law in a nutshell.

Also guys, threading does not work the way you think it does. Games have been using multiple threads for multiple tasks for literally DECADES now; even DOS games were multithreaded to an extent. The primary reason why we're only seeing games have multiple threads doing significant work now is the graphical APIs support it.

In ye dark ages (prior to DX11), the primary rendering thread was the only thread that could render to the GPU. As a result, a good 60% of your total processing was bound to just one thread. The only other thread that would typically perform a lot of work was the main game executive. That's how you ended up with games that did a good 95% of their work in just two threads.

DX11 gave a limited ability to spawn multiple worker threads; you saw early Frostbite titles use this, and you ended up with two heavy threads and a bunch of lighter ones. A quad was still sufficient as just two threads were still doing the majority of the total workload.

DX12/Vulkan allows much more defined control of the GPU pipeline, so multi-threaded GPU rendering is now possible. So developers will now happily spawn a dozen or so GPU render threads, each responsible for one particular part of the GPU pipeline. While this gives a large amount of control of the rendering process, on CPUs with fewer cores you run into scheduling difficulties keeping the GPU fed (as it now wants to do multiple things at once instead of being a single-stage pipeline). That's one reason why quads are starting to have issues at the highest presets, as there aren't enough cores to process all those GPU threads, even if the total processing workload is identical to what it was several years ago.

In regards to RAM usage, the reason requirements on the PC side are going up so fast is games are now native 64-bit. There's no more 2GB or 4GB requirement on RAM usage. Which means, if there ever is a RAM leak (which as we all know will NEVER occur in a released product 😛), it will happily gobble several TB worth of RAM, instead of stopping at the 2GB or 4GB barrier.

 

[-Fran-]

View: https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/cdwm0e/pcpartpicker_data_a_picture_is_worth_many_words/


Heh.

Cheers!

 

[NightHawkRMX]

Pretty funny to compare that to oem market share.

Amd still has to work there.

 

[-Fran-]

Absolutely.

I'm hoping they will try and push APUs back into the mobile area with a bit more oomph as they've had a really awful track record on configuring them and pushing OEMs to, well, not suck donkey marbles in that area.

As for Desktop, I think they'll be fine for the time being until Intel can react. Which, according to that deafening sound coming from Intel, is not going to be soon.

Cheers!

 

[NightHawkRMX]

To be honest, i dont know why amd chios arent more desirable for mobile.

They pack a good gpu while still being small and easy to cool, allowing for decent 3d acceleration in a thin and light.

 

[-Fran-]

Brand perception is the main reason. Intel blocking them is another one. I'm still salty with AMD for taking the deal instead of pursuing the court ruling.

On the other hand, I think Microsoft could do something with an APU and their laptops.

Cheers!

 

[NightHawkRMX]

I agree.

I was talking to a friend that also is into pc gaming.

He used to own an fx+1060 6gb prebuilt and he got sick of amd. Between me and best buy helping him, he now has an i7 8700, 240mm aio, a new case, rgb fans, and the same 1060 and scaryish psu.

I was talking to him the other day and the conversation went like this.

Me: I can get a ryzen 5 3600 for $200 that will beat your i7.

Him: i just feel more comfortable with intel. I think ill get the i9 9900k later on now that im getting a water cooler.

Me: Why? You would be better off upgrading your 1060 first.

Him: A 2080ti costs 1200 but the i9 is only 500.

Some people just have always used intel or have a bad experience with amd and now fanboy over intel chips.

 

[NightHawkRMX]

On the other hand, I think Microsoft could do something with an APU and their laptops.

Cheers!

I was thinking about Microsofts surface thin and lights specifically. They market surface tablets to graphic designers and creators.If amd coild use there efficient 7nm lithography to produce powerfull apu thst consumes less than 10w it would be a perfect pairing in a surface tablet

 

[-Fran-]

I've had a similar discussion with some friends that bought an FX CPU and did not set expectations correctly (nor asked me). Bulldozer really did a lot of damage to AMD on the brand side which won't be easy to wash out from the masses. Specially when Intel has the capital to use aggressive marketing to counter the small performance gap (big value gap). Just by chance I was looking around the web and found how many "eSport" events are sponsored by Intel directly. It's like 2/3rds of them. I don't like it, but AMD is better off investing in more R&D than marketing for the time being. They need to surpass Intel in games with no second readings and they'll be able to get more brand recognition.

As for OEMs, oof... I don't even know what could make them tick.

Cheers!

 

[InvalidError]

Some people just have always used intel or have a bad experience with amd and now fanboy over intel chips.

You don't need to be an "Intel fanboy" to shun AMD if you've had bad experience(s) with its products. I expect my PCs to be absolutely stable 24/7 for however many months there may be between Windows/driver updates that force me to reboot. If I ever upgrade to Ryzen, I will be expecting no less and if AMD fails to deliver, I'll probably be retired and not care for PCs anymore before I ever consider AMD again.

 

[NightHawkRMX]

First and second-gen ryzen are pretty solid reliable now. 3rd gen, not so much.

 

[-Fran-]

AMD has had way too many rocky starts and don't seem to learn the lessons from previous launches. You could argue there's no new CPU launch hassle free, but AMD has had big blunders with Ry1K and Ry3K (Ry2K didn't have a major one as it was just an increment, I think). The few last hassle free launches from AMD were Phenom II (can't remember anything) and Athlon XP. Athlon64 had issues thanks to 64bit being so new at the time for Windows; I had zero issues in Linux with it.

In any case, I'm just waiting now on APUs based of Zen2. Would that be Ry4K-G? xD

Cheers!

 

[NightHawkRMX]

Ryzen 2000 just had issues with people not knowing which older motherboards would work.

At least AMD fixed memory compatability for Ryzen 3000, but opened up a whole host of other issues with older boards, yet again.

 

[TCA_ChinChin]

You don't need to be an "Intel fanboy" to shun AMD if you've had bad experience(s) with its products. I expect my PCs to be absolutely stable 24/7 for however many months there may be between Windows/driver updates that force me to reboot. If I ever upgrade to Ryzen, I will be expecting no less and if AMD fails to deliver, I'll probably be retired and not care for PCs anymore before I ever consider AMD again.

I don't know your age, but shunning a company for decades(decade, years?) from a single bad experience? I don't know if I would do that for any company period, let alone a tech company. Maybe a generation or two. Does that work the other way? If Intel fails to deliver, then you won't consider Intel again until retirement?

 

[-Fran-]

I don't know your age, but shunning a company for decades(decade, years?) from a single bad experience? I don't know if I would do that for any company period, let alone a tech company. Maybe a generation or two. Does that work the other way? If Intel fails to deliver, then you won't consider Intel again until retirement?

I mean... I work with security and I won't touch Intel for a good while, haha.

The only people that can't work based on rationale/logic are fanbois and/or traumatized people. I have my own fanboisms, so I can understand that side at least. The distinction needs to be made though as it is important.

I remember taunting some old forum trolls with the "where did AMD touch you improperly?", as calling people fanbois is considered an insult here. And @Rogue Leader, I haven't done it in a good while; I'm clean! 😀

Cheers!

 

[InvalidError]

I don't know your age, but shunning a company for decades(decade, years?) from a single bad experience? I don't know if I would do that for any company period, let alone a tech company. Maybe a generation or two.

I'm still using an i5-3470, thought I'd give 3rd-gen a chance but scrapped that idea since AMD failed to clean up its launch-week act yet again. I have built a Ryzen 1700X system for a friend of a friend two years ago, ran into the dreadful memory compatibility issue and cannot be bothered to risk repeating the experience for myself until AMD achieves a clean launch.

At this point, I'm not expecting AMD to produce anything I'd be confident upgrading to until AM5, by which time my i5 will be nearly 10 years old. At that rate, that isn't many PCs even over a whole lifetime and I bet I'm far from being the only one on a 7+ years PC upgrade cycle thanks to how much slower price-performance is improving compared to what it used to be 10+ years ago. Unless one of my PCs blows up or there is a paradigm shift in the PC space calling for a drastic increase in household processing power, I'm at most three PCs from retirement.

 

[NightHawkRMX]

All of the memory kinks for first and second gen ryzen processors have been worked out and 2nd gen bios revisions are stable as can be.

Just because something is bad at launch wouldnt be a reason to rule it out at a later date.

I bought into ryzen 1000 in February of 2018, less than a year after ryzen launched. After a motherboard was rma my ram worked fine even with xmp on. Now with an oc i have gotten it to a stable 3333mhz c16 on the latest 2nd gen bios for my board.

 

[InvalidError]

Just because something is bad at launch wouldnt be a reason to rule it out at a later date.

Yes it is: if boards launched with bad BIOS on them, those bad BIOS will be on the market for several months or even years to come, which means that unless you can clear everything beforehand, you still have to keep in mind that you may need a contingency plan in case you get a bad combo regardless of when you buy.

In the case of that Ryzen 1700X I built, we ended up going back to the shop the guy bought his parts from and the shop ended up trying multiple different motherboards, multiple different CPUs and multiple different DIMMs until it found a combination that worked before it could update the BIOS. As far as user experience is concerned, that's worse than DOA in my book.

 

[NightHawkRMX]

Any B450 board WILL have a bios that nearly eliminates any memory or stability issues. B450 boards are cheap too.

No reason to avoid a 2nd gen cpu paired with a b450. No major flaws at all.

 

[InvalidError]

No reason to avoid a 2nd gen cpu paired with a b450. No major flaws at all.

Zen+ is still picky on RAM, albeit significantly less so than first-gen. That aside, the greatest 'flaw' of them all is I'm still happy enough with my i5, which means I am under no pressure whatsoever to accept any compromise on what I'm going to upgrade to yet.

Another thing that bugs me about 3rd-gen is how AMD is threatening to take PCIe4 away from board manufacturers who did their own qualification on 400-series boards. I wasn't planning to buy 400-series for 3rd-gen but it still pisses me off on principle. What board manufacturers qualify their boards for is none of AMD's business.

 

[NightHawkRMX]

That aside, the greatest 'flaw' of them all is I'm still happy enough with my i5, which means I am under no pressure whatsoever to accept any compromise on what I'm going to upgrade to yet.

I agree. I have no need to upgrade my GPU any further for 60hz 1080p in my current games.

I play a lot of GTA and my cpu could use an upgrade as it likes to stutter a bit. Not buying anything now tho.

Generally, it has bee a while since saw an issue regarding zen+ and no boot due to incompatible ram.

AMD didn't just threaten to take away PCIE4, it is my understanding they made them. I heard with all future bios updates PCIE4 will be removed from all non-x570 boards. You can run an older bios with ryzen 3000 and PCIE 4 support, but it might be unstable.

 

[TCA_ChinChin]

I'm still using an i5-3470, thought I'd give 3rd-gen a chance but scrapped that idea since AMD failed to clean up its launch-week act yet again. I have built a Ryzen 1700X system for a friend of a friend two years ago, ran into the dreadful memory compatibility issue and cannot be bothered to risk repeating the experience for myself until AMD achieves a clean launch.

At this point, I'm not expecting AMD to produce anything I'd be confident upgrading to until AM5, by which time my i5 will be nearly 10 years old. At that rate, that isn't many PCs even over a whole lifetime and I bet I'm far from being the only one on a 7+ years PC upgrade cycle thanks to how much slower price-performance is improving compared to what it used to be 10+ years ago. Unless one of my PCs blows up or there is a paradigm shift in the PC space calling for a drastic increase in household processing power, I'm at most three PCs from retirement.

So if for Ryzen 4000, AMD's RAM problems go away, you would consider AMD? Does that mean when X99 came out, it was also worse than DOA for consideration? I'm guessing the way that you qualify products for your own personal reasons differ from what a lot of other people consider good enough, but that's to be expected cause different people have different expectations.

 

[InvalidError]

So if for Ryzen 4000, AMD's RAM problems go away, you would consider AMD?

RAM isn't a major problem with 3rd-gen, lack of A/B500-series motherboards and lack of clearly identified older-gen boards with out-of-the-box compatibility is, much like it was for 2nd-gen. The beta-state of launch-week BIOSes (three AGESA updates in one week) and AMD wanting to stop board manufacturers from enabling PCIe 4.0 support on older-gen boards doesn't help with inspiring confidence either.

Months ago in this thread, I wrote that I'd upgrade to 3rd-gen if rumors turned out to be true. Rumored pricing turned out to be off by a whole tier and I lost interest - not enough bang-per-buck for me to bother with. Since AM4 will be EOL next year and AMD is more interested in inflating profits than pressuring Intel, I'll most likely skip to AM5 (brand-new socket designed from the ground up with chiplets and 20+Gbps HSIO in mind) before considering AMD again. (And I'm not considering Intel either until 10nm+ or better goes mainstream.)

 

[NightHawkRMX]

AMD wanting to stop board manufacturers from enabling PCIe 4.0 support on older-gen boards doesn't help with inspiring confidence eithe

I do not like AMDs choice to do that.
However, i understand they want to entice more people to buy newer boards.

This is still loads better than what intel does by making new chips intentionally nonfunctional on older boards that could hapily work with newer chips.

 

[InvalidError]

This is still loads better than what intel does by making new chips intentionally nonfunctional on older boards that could hapily work with newer chips.

Happy being relative. Most people don't have spare older same-socket CPUs lying around and end up in a smelly creek without a paddle when they combine a new-gen CPU with a new older-gen board. Where the "upgrade path" is concerned, a four years socket lifespan isn't going to mean much when most people go more than five years between upggrades.