Join us For A Tom's Hardware Ask Me Anything With AMD, Thursday April 6th

[cleeve]

What exactly do some of these software optimizations for Ryzen entail? The performance optimizations for Ashes of the Singularity, for example, were pretty significant, and at least in Tom's benchmarks brought performance of the Ryzen 1800x slightly above that of the 7700k in their tests. Certainly part of it is the game's heavy use of multithreading at play, as evidenced by the 6900k's performance over the 7700k there, but that particular round of optimizations improved performance on Ryzen without doing the same for Intel's chips to a simlar degree, and in a way that didn't seem to simply show a preference for more cores.

I've heard that communication between cores on the same CCX might be significantly faster than it is across different CCXes, so is this partly a matter of keeping threads that communicate often on the same CCX, to avoid that increased latency? If it is, could that also be something that affects communications with graphics driver threads, and might there be ways for graphics driver developers, such as the Radeon team, to make sure their driver is operating on the same CCX as the thread that's communicating with it the most? It seems like something like that could potentially improve performance even for games that don't get specifically optimized for Ryzen.

Its all over the map, there's no silver bullet, even though that's what people want to hear. The CCX latency is there, but it's not that bad and it's not responsible for the outliers.
I'll give you an example of the kids of things that are holding Ryzen back: a developer found that their game code automatically assumed that AMD CPUs had all-physical cores, because we didn't have SMT before now. Once the game was guided to behave as it does on Intel hyperthreaded CPUs, we saw a notable boost in performance.
it sounds simple, but this is what happens when a new architecture is introduced. It sounds trivial, once you know what's happening it can be easy to attack, but finding it takes work.

 

[cleeve]

how soon will the bios and ram speed bugs and scheduling issues ect will be fixed cuase I wanted to get a ryzen cpu but was waiting for the bugs to be ironed out?

- Ram is improving all the time. We have a huge BIOS update enabling 3200 MHz DDR4 that should hit most boards April 11th, and another one scheduled for May.

As for scheduling issues, there aren't any 'issues' per se. Windows is doing what it's supposed to do. The balanced power plan wasn't working optimally and we fixed that with an updated plan you can download on AMD.com ( https://community.amd.com/community/gaming/blog/2017/04/06/amd-ryzen-community-update-3 ).

That's not to say we can't work with Microsoft to make the schedulers work better in the future, but there's no problem right now... it's working as designed.

 

[cleeve]

What is the IPC improvement you are looking for between Zen and Zen2?

Personally, I'm looking for as much performance uplift as possible!

We haven't disclosed anything yet. But I'm quite optimistic.

 

[cleeve]

How fast can the infinity fabric clock theoretically? Will we see it on an iteration of ryzen where it'll still be present with ddr5 and the higher speeds?

Amd can boy have been since the 486 days. Its so hard not pull the trigger, just waiting on r5 reviews

I'm not aware of an infinity fabric ceiling. That's not to say there isn't one, but it's never come up as a limitation in the meetings I've been a part of.

I can't comment on memory technologies that don't even have a defined specification yet. I can say that AMD has comitted to keeping the AM4 platform around for years to come, and we're very committed to the Ryzen brand, so we'll have to see if that collides with the consumer release of DDR5.

 

[cleeve]

Are there plans to release 8-Core Zen CPU for Laptops this year?

We haven't publically released the specifications of our Ryzen-based laptop APUs, so I can't comment.

 

[cleeve]

Probably too late

but why didn't you guys name it R4/6/8/12/16?

It's a higher number than intel for one, and it scales perfectly with the amount of cores each chip has, for example an R7=R8 meaning 8 cores.

We did a ton of research and found that the vast majority of people just want a good/better/best brand segmentation scheme. They value the simplicity and clarity of it. good=Ryzen 3, better=Ryzen 5, best= Ryzen 7.
Boom! Done.

Personally, I'm a PC enthusiast, and I hear you. Naming a model after the number of threads it has is very appealing to me. But it doesn't make sense for the brand segmentation, so we didn't go that route.

 

[cleeve]

Do you ever miss writing reviews?

Sometimes...

...but not nearly as much as I miss playing with all the new hardware that used to come across my desk. 😀

The opportunity I miss most is reporting on the VR industry when the Rift and Vive got released. I was there before it started, I made a polarized 3D projector before you could buy them, I tested the crap that was out before the first Rift dev kit, I met Palmer Luckey in a tiny hotel room at CES where he showed me the first DK1. I'll always feel it's a story I never got to delve in to as much as I expected I would.

 

[XaveT]

I am somewhat surprised no one has asked this, maybe it's a dumb question, but I'll live even if it is!

Are there any plans to release a low-power processor (say 25w or less?) based on Ryzen in the same vein as the Athlon 5300-series? I love those little workhorses, and am hoping to see an AM4 version with PCIE 3.0 and DDR4 support. Any chance of us seeing this?

 

[cleeve]

Cleeve! Y u no GPU review?!

Seriously, it is awesome to see you back answering questions for AMD. I am looking forward to seeing what the R5s can do since my 8320 is getting long in the tooth.

Thanks man, so great to be here. Ryzen 5 will not disappoint you!

 

[cleeve]

We do data processing using single and dual Xeons.

We actually know very little about AMD and the new Ryzens, as we are more Intel/NVidia users.

Would the Ryzens and their related motherboards have anything to offer us, as what we require is high core count with hyper-threading, at the quickest frequency if possible with AVX/AVX2 and auto-overclocing, and DDR4 RAM?

Thanks.

Well, right out of the gate, I can tell you:

- Ryzen has single-threaded IPC comparable to Intel's Broadwell-E. Clock for clock, we're about 6% behind Kaby Lake, Intel's best.

- At the same time, we offer colossal multithreading advantages over the competition. Our 6-core/12 thread Ryzen 5's start at just over $200 USD. Our 8-core/16 thread Ryzen 7s start at just over $300 USD. The $499 Ryzen 7 1800X offers multithreading performance about 9% better than the Core i7-6900K, which costs over $1000

- Ryzens can use ECC memory, but Intel consumer CPUs cannot (althoguh Ryzen boards are not qualified for this)

- Ryzens use DDR4 RAM. It's a new platform so we're ramping up memory, but we're stably at 3200 MHz and making fast progress with BIOS updates.

- If you use Xeons, though, do some research on AMD's upcoming Naples server parts. Quad-channel RAM, unholy amounts of I/O bandwidth, 32-core/64-thread CPUs. Absolutely killer server value coming your way.

 

[cleeve]

I am somewhat surprised no one has asked this, maybe it's a dumb question, but I'll live even if it is!

Are there any plans to release a low-power processor (say 25w or less?) based on Ryzen in the same vein as the Athlon 5300-series? I love those little workhorses, and am hoping to see an AM4 version with PCIE 3.0 and DDR4 support. Any chance of us seeing this?

Nothing we've announced specifically. Although we're making mobile Ryzens in the future, so that's some indication. 😉

 

[cleeve]

I will be in the market for a new processor soon(actually as soon as the R5 drops) Which processor do you recommend for strictly gaming at a price of under $250? I don't really play anything besides LoL and WoW but would like to try out quite a few new games and I know my FX will not be up to the challenge. I am currently using a RX 480 8gb card. Thanks in advance!

PS: There are no words that can describe my excitement towards AMD's current path and new developments!

Strictly gaming... well, assuming your 'strictly gaming' goal doesn't include gaming & streaming to twitch (which can really take advantage of the 12-threaded Ryzen 5 1600X and Ryzen 7 processors), I'd steer to the Ryzen 5 1500X I think. High clocks and the most XFR clock rate headroom in the Ryzen stack so far (up to 200 MHz over the Precision Boost spec with capable cooling), four cores and 8 threads so it has enough resources to take advantage of the games that value moar cores. $189. Sweet little part, basically a Core i7 equivalent in a lot of ways, but for about half the price.

 

[cleeve]

Did you have a party once the first Ryzen chips rolled off the line to celebrate?

I work from home in Canada, I wasn't at the AMD campus when they had the Ryzen launch party.

 

[cleeve]

As the process matures an get's tweeked an refined, are you's expecting to start hitting, higher an higher speeds ?

I heard the tech was designed to go very fast. Could be wrong bout this actually..

I know it's new tech an it's maturing right on front of our eye's, but will it ever hit speeds like Kaby Lake does when overclocked or even close for that matter..?
j

Until we have new silicon spins, anything I say is speculation. But we're all quite optimistic about how fast we got this first architecture/process to go in its first go round, and bolstered that we have a lot of opportunity to crank up the clocks.

 

[Nope 1151]

Quick question.

Will you ever go back to the green AMD logo? 😛

 

[Evilwumpus]

I know you won't be able to say much and maybe this was asked:

Can we expect a significant performance difference of Vega or the Polaris refresh when used in conjunction with Ryzen 7 vs, say a 7700k? All settings, configuration, and speeds being equal...

 

[XaveT]

I am somewhat surprised no one has asked this, maybe it's a dumb question, but I'll live even if it is!

Are there any plans to release a low-power processor (say 25w or less?) based on Ryzen in the same vein as the Athlon 5300-series? I love those little workhorses, and am hoping to see an AM4 version with PCIE 3.0 and DDR4 support. Any chance of us seeing this?

Nothing we've announced specifically. Although we're making mobile Ryzens in the future, so that's some indication. 😉

This gives me hope. Thank you!

 

[cleeve]

I was just wondering if you could tell us a little about Ryzens development, as in, how long ago was it that it was started? Was it before the bulldozer release? Shortly after? I know these things can take a great amount of time to go from concept to release, so i guess I'm curious about how long Ryzen spent to make it.

Off the top of my head, I believe it was 4 or 5 years ago now, around 2012. Before my time at AMD, I started my tenure here at the beginning of 2015. The promise of the Zen architecture is one of the reasons I came to AMD in the first place.

I have recommended many CPU's and GPU's when helping people on these forums over the years, I do my best not to have any bias for any company over the other, but the benchmarks I have been seeing for Ryzen 7 have made it difficult to know exactly which product to recommend. There are 4 SKU's out to challenge Intels. Is there a chart or list you have that show exactly what your intended CPU vs CPU matchups are? I know 1800x vs 6900k, but what is the 1800, 1700x and 1700 targeting? (Note: With GPUs it's much easier as pricing and performance go head to head, but AMD is offering the 1800x significantly below the targeted 6900k.)

You can compare on price or on ability. The Ryzen 7 1700X ($499) actually also beats the Core i7-6900K in a lot of multi-threaded benches, but on a price standpoint it's closer to the Core i7-6800K, which it dominates.

We usually pit the Ryzen 7 1700 ($330) and the i7-7700K because their price is so close. Prom a productivity rendering/encoding/encrypting standpoint the 1700 kicks the crap out of Kaby. The 7700K does have higher clocks and IPC, so there's a 1080p gaming advantage... but once you raise resolution to 1440p the gaming advantage is very muted. At 4K and in VR, it barely shows up in benchmarks. So if you're spending over $300 on a CPU, I think the Ryzen 7 1700 is an easy choice because folks in this segment would be buying 1440p or higher resolution monitors. You're not giving up any real-world game performance at 1440p and above, but you're getting colossal application advantages.

The new Ryzen 5 1600X ($249) is 6 cores/12 threads and priced similarly to the Core i5-7600K. Literally 3x the threads on Ryzen, this is the easiest battle for us. Productivity is on a different level entirely, while some modern games really appreciate more than 4 threads and the 7600K can suffer significantly compared to the 7700K. So games trade blows at 1080p. No real argument to choose Kaby lake here, IMHO.

The Ryzen 5 1500X ($189) is priced opposite the Core i5-7500. With twice the threads of the core i5, the Ryzen 5 1500X is a good gaming part for people who like the idea of Core-i7-class productivity for half the price, should they ever want to exercise that power. And games are becoming more threaded all the time thanks to DirectX 12 and Vulkan.

That's should give you a good start I think.

 

[cleeve]

Any update on the wraith coolers and avalibility to buy e.g. The Wraith Max, might it be available to purchase at R5 Launch.

Also will stock RGB coolers be able to be brought separately, thanks.

We're very aware of the demand from AMD customers for standalone wraith coolers. We haven't announced anything publicly. I personally think it would be very cool if they were offered as a standalone item.

 

[Aris25]

is the 1600x manufactured as a 3x3 or is it a 1800x with one core on each side turned off or is it an 1800x with one core that failed on each side then was turned off or something else all together?

 

[cleeve]

How has developing/updating the BIOS process been different then supporting previous AMD sockets or Intel sockets?

I've noticed a lot of updates since release on my Killer board. At what point do you think active BIOS development stop, e.g. when will the BIOS stop being updated several times a month? Not that I don't love the progress I am seeing, but more a question on when do you think the BIOS will be "done".

On any new platform, there's going to be more development than usual. It happens with every major socket update, on both AMD and Intel for those who have been around long enough to remember a number of turnovers.

But we're making really good progress, and very quickly. My gut feeling is that the upcoming April update gets us to a place where people are generally satisfied, and then we'll hone that edge in the months to come.

 

[cleeve]

is the 1600x manufactured as a 3x3 or is it a 1800x with one core on each side turned off or is it an 1800x with one core that failed on each side then was turned off or something else all together?

The 1600X is essentially an 1800X with one core disabled per CCX (a 3+3 configuration).

All 16MB of L3 cache is still enabled, BTW.

 

[cleeve]

I know you won't be able to say much and maybe this was asked:

Can we expect a significant performance difference of Vega or the Polaris refresh when used in conjunction with Ryzen 7 vs, say a 7700k? All settings, configuration, and speeds being equal...

From a CPU perspective, we try to be graphics-agnostic so everyone can enjoy Ryzen regardless of their choice of GPU.

 

[cleeve]

Quick question.

Will you ever go back to the green AMD logo? 😛

Your answer lies within (your username)

 

[cleeve]

Would the Athlon brand still be active? With the R7 for Enthusiasts, the R5's for mainstream high computing and the R3 for mainstream computing, how do you see the Athlon fit in with all the APU's still not in tow.

Athlon will be used for CPUs that sit below the Ryzen 3 brand, just as it sits below the current FX brand.

It will live next to A-series APUs in the same segment.

Bristol-Ridge-based APUs and Athlons will be available for Socket AM4 motherboards at an undisclosed date. Stay tuned!