Selling Lawsuits AMD Vs Intel

[Amiga500]

If no other country ever finds Intel guilty of this OEM rebate stuff, would we still use it say 5 years down the road?

In 5 years this will probably not matter if AMD does the asset lite strategy and becomes seperate companies with a parent company controling it right?

Your second comment answers the first.


If AMD is to survive the next 5 years intact, then it will have to come up with market leading or at least competitive solutions. The splitting of the company into fabs and design is one avenue of approaching the problem. Basically, things cannot continue as they currently are.

 

[Hellboy]

Your second comment answers the first.


If AMD is to survive the next 5 years intact, then it will have to come up with market leading or at least competitive solutions. The splitting of the company into fabs and design is one avenue of approaching the problem. Basically, things cannot continue as they currently are.

Well, havent I been saying this all along...

 

[Amiga500]

Well, havent I been saying this all along...

Naw.


You've been ranting on about the greatness of the queen, gordon brown, cricket and the intel conroe March

 

[B-Unit]

Well AMD could remain on the low to mid range, that's where most of the income comes, right?

Its where they lived thru the 90's, I see no reason they cant hide out there for 2-3 years, get 45nm on lock and release a Fusion chip that actually lives up to the hype.

 

[yomamafor1]

Well AMD could remain on the low to mid range, that's where most of the income comes, right?

Actually, no. True, low to mid range is where the most revenues are, but not the most profit. As you can take a look at AMD's balance sheet:

http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/080417/20080417006230.html?.v=1

The revenue has increased, but not the ASP. The result? AMD is still in the hole it was in a year ago. AMD needs high end, competitive products.

 

[yomamafor1]

Its where they lived thru the 90's, I see no reason they cant hide out there for 2-3 years, get 45nm on lock and release a Fusion chip that actually lives up to the hype.

That's because the cost of developing a new marchitecture, and new process takes enormous amount of money, especially compared to a decade ago. Its simply not possible to sell mid to low range products at bottom prices, while developing top performance, next generation architecture.

K10 was a do-or-die product for AMD, and they screwed up so badly that their chance of survival is slim. Nehalem is on the horizon, targeting AMD's last source of high margin market, while Intel dominated almost all other markets. Fusion might be a good product for OEMs, but its still a low range products. It may not even be available before Intel's own offering (likely Q108).

R.I.P. the AMD we once knew.

 

[endyen]

You guys are both reading too deep for what I am saying. Most countries do have different laws. Yes some are the same but others are different. Like here in the US if you are caught stealing you end up with a slap on the wrists and if the people/company doesn't press charges you are good to go. Som countries will cut your hand off.

I am just saying that Japan finding Intel guilty has nothing to do with any other countries. Some might not find Intel guilty. That doesn't mean that the rest of the world should. Some countries are harder on some laws than others.

I just get sick of people bringing it up as a fact when in most countries there has been no conviction yet.

And you are right. Barcelona is just AMDs problem. And more testing? They delayed the chip for a year for testing it. They had plenty of time and probably had the R&D done long before they decided to buy ATI. I wouldn't be suprised if the chips R&D was completed in 2005 or earlier since AMD was to release Barcy in what 2006?

I just don't see relevance of the OEM rebate thing, especially when it was a contractual agreement between Intel and the OEM not Intel strong arming them, to AMDs current state.

Well, no, the evidence was that Intel had undertaken to act in a fashion
that contrivened internation law on monopoly competition.
Just because a diferent jurisdiction might say " okay Intel, you're our buddy so we'll let you go this time" does not change the fact.

I just don't see relevance of the OEM rebate thing, especially when it was a contractual agreement between Intel and the OEM not Intel strong arming them, to AMDs current state

The rebates were contingent upon the OEM screwing AMD, by buying few, or no chips at all from them. This is ilegal under U.S. anti-trust law, solely where the persons offering the rebate are in a monopoly situation.
In this case, Intel was saying the more A64s you buy, the more our P4s and xeons will cost you.

They delayed the chip for a year for testing it. They had plenty of time and probably had the R&D done long before they decided to buy ATI. I wouldn't be suprised if the chips R&D was completed in 2005 or earlier since AMD was to release Barcy in what 2006?

So you think that R&D was delayed a year because that department was soo rich? And no, R&D and testing does not finish until the last wafer of that design, starts.
Remember as well, had AMD's marketshare climb started 2 years earlier, they would have peaked much higher, would have had better profits, and
would still have +25% market share, and be in the black.
They would also be in a much better position to get software better optimized for thier marchitecture.

 

[Amiga500]

The revenue has increased, but not the ASP. The result? AMD is still in the hole it was in a year ago. AMD needs high end, competitive products.

Erm, the problem is that result is somewhat skewed with the trickle of B2 Barcelonas onto the market.


You could get them... just about. But there was definitely no high volume supply in this ultra high margin area.

 

[turpit]

EDIT: Forgot the links, fixed.

It's time for a history lesson.
AMD's suit was filed just after Intel had been found to have contravened Japan's anti-trust laws. The A64s had been in production for just over 2 years. The opteron was growing slowly, but had less than a 10% market share. The A64s were going nowhere. They had the same marketshare that the athlonxp chips had had.
Fab 30 was slogging along at ~ 7k WSPM.
Filing the suit put Intel under a lot of scrutiny.
In the six months following the filing, A64's market share jumped to 24%, while opterons crossed the 15% barrier, and AMD actually sold a recordable market share in laptop computers. Fab 30 was closing on 20k WSPM, thier theoretical limit, but fab 36 was just around the corner.
Turpit, any time you get above 75% of theoretical, it's acceptable to say you are at capacity.
With a few re-alienments, fab 30 was actually able to do almost 30k wafer starts per month, for the last few months before fab36 came fully online.
During the first two years of A64, Intel's anti-trust tactics screwed AMD out of about 10%+ of market share.
Maybe that extra $10B would have helped AMD's purchase of Ati. There might even have been enough to help out with R&D.

Click to expand

To begin, even though I just wasted 10 days of my lifes precious little spare time digging through the internet for reputable sources to provide the most accurate information for the above charts (read: NOT the Enquirer or Crapipedia) they are far, far from complete.
Some of the missing information includes but is not limited to:

1984 AMD opens fab 14
1985 AMD opens fab 15
1995 AMD fab 25 begins large scale production
Q4 1999 AMD opens Fab 30
2001 AMD initiates conversion of fab 25 to flash memory
Q3 2001 Gateway drops AMD
Q3 2002 AMD closes Fab 14 and 15
Q4 2005 AMD opens fab 36


That said, its time to for your history lesson. AMDs suit was filed 1 1/2 years AFTER the Japanese FTC raided Intels japan offices. That event which actually "...put Intel under a lot of scrutiny.", not AMDs suits
AMD simultainiously filed suits in both the US and Japan on 27 June 2005 and 30 June 2005 respectively, 3 months AFTER the Japanese FTCs ruling, not "....just after...", and, they filed those suits over 10 years AFTER the last major battle between themselves and Intel, the final ruling of which favored Intel to the tune of $40 mil. In other words, looked at from ONE perspective, "Once bitten, twice shy": AMD had their hands slapped once for sticking them into the proverbial cookie jar, and learned their lesson, but saw a favorable opportunity when it presented itself, and took advantage of it to try and sneak another cookie

As to the ":any time you get above 75% of theoretical, it's acceptable to say you are at capacity...", All I can say is I dont know where you got your education, but I see where you are getting this "...any time you get above 75% of theoretical, it's acceptable to say you are at capacity..." stuff. Let me just say, that when I earned my degree, 76% was NOT "at capacity", by any manufacturers standards. For a fixed base manufacturer, having 24% of their equipment idle is under capacity, and unacceptable, unless they are amortizing it or upgrading it. Even if that is the case, it is still costing them overhead while not producing revenue..in other words a net sum loss. Even if they are still taking write offs on depreciation. If equipment is not producing, it is costing. In the 90s, something like 12.5% idle was considered acceptable, but only for PMC. The last time I checked manproc pubs, 9~5% is the goal. Its been a few years, so that may have changed, but I am pretty confident that it hasnt droped to 1/4 or 24%. At no time in modern history has a quarter of the epuiment idling been considered either "at capacity" or acceptable......that is right up until the PR department aka proffesional liars step in to spin mode.


On to the issue of "screwed AMD out of about 10%+ ", once again, the lack of understanding of the market rears its ugly head.
THE MARKET IS NOT FIXED.
-First, the market is, has been, and will, for the forseeable future continue to constantly expand, with total sales/demand continually increasing YoY
-Second, from the mid 90s as BOTH non x86 compatable and x86 compatable manufacturers withdrew from CPU market, those sudden voids in manufacturing, i,e, market share was consumed by BOTH AMD and Intel.

During that time, when AMD wasnt gaining share against Intel, or being 'screwed' "out of about 10%+", as you would have it, AMD was in fact expanding its production. Regardless of the fact that it was not gaining share (which arerelative sales) against Intel, its sales were increasing QoQ and YoY as other competitors withdrew from the market AND the market expanded. AMD was "screwed" out of nothing, in fact, given their total market share vs Intels during those times, their rate of expansion was comparable to Intels. There was no "extra $10 billion" as AMD was in a constant race just to keep up with itself.

The facts that they:
-Opened 3 fabs over 10 years (later converting the rapidily obsoleced fab 25 to flash memory production)
-Continually updated those fabs to both smaller lithographic nodes AND increased wafer diameters - all of which resulted in increased production
-went to an industry leading manufacturing process, APM, which allowed them to keep shipments up while Fab 36 was down

all demonstrate that AMD was experiancing ever increasing demand for its products. Even when the tech "bubble" burst in 2001, the overall market continued to expand, albeit at a reduced rate. The fact that the increased demand AMD experianced was only proportional rather than greater than Intels is moot as AMD was barely able to keep up with the demand they had courtesy of the above named growing market and market left open by bail outs, let alone produce enough over that to actually take market share from Intel. Frankly, considering how the market expanded, the fact that AMD was able to hold 15ish percent for so long (and even expand to the 20+ percent share during FY2000) is amazing in itself as well as a tribute to them. And that period included the K5 and K6 series, niether of which were barn burners.


Regardless of whether that may or may not have been amazing, as far as market share in those first two years of A64, you neglect to note that prior to A 64,:
A) AMD was producing K7.
B) Prior to K7, AMD was producing K6. Not exactly the CPU worlds greatest CPU nor a stellar reputation builder..though Im sure any AMD employee would argue that. In other words, AMD did not start to build its reputation as a "solid" CPU manufacturer until only 2 years prior to the release of A64. Prior to Athlon (K7), AMD was considered a "bargain basement manufacturer", for those who could do with.....less. (((K5 was no prize either, but thats another story)))
C) "Intel Inside" was in full swing
D) The enthusiast market, the only consumers who actually knew who AMD was, was infintesimally smaller than it is now, populated by a significantly greater percentage people who knew what they were doing, as opposed to the enthusiast segment as it exists today, populated by kiddies who make their choices based on the color of the packaging....i.e 'fanboys'

In other words, A64 had to build its own reputation in order to build its sales...a process which takes time. In this day and age of vending machine CPUs, it takes about 2 quarters, but back then, before the fanboys, it took much longer. And, back then, AMD was not exactly spewing forth the cash to combat Intels advertising with like kind.

Furthermore, recent AMD developements:
-Purchase of ATI
-Signature of a Memorandum of Understanding with SemiIndia in Dec 2005 to partner with the purpose of developing a $3Bil fab in India
-Contracting of Chartered Semi , which in june 2006 shipped its first AMD CPUs, to cover increased demands
-As of early 2007 was working with M+W Zander to move forward with plans for fab 4X in Luther Forrest, NY State

....reinforce that until only a short time ago, AMD was well established on the fast track courtesy of K7 and K8, and in spite of any alleged wrong doing on Intels part.

Which brings us to why AMDs market jumped to 24%.....which had nothing to do with the suit, or any sudden change in alledged behavior on Intels part. It had to do with:
Performance
Reliability
Value
Reputation

All those things which AMD had acheived via K7 and K8.

Just as C2D struck a blow to AMD because it was a significant advance over then current products, A 64/X2 struck a blow to Intel because it was an undeniably better product, the general public (by the time of X2) was becoming alerted to the fact that AMD existed, and AMD was finally shedding their reputation as a "bargain" manufacturer. You, as someone who knows something about CPUs, should be well aquainted with the fact that in the early days of the publics "AMD awareness" the 'unwashed' didnt want to "risk" their money on "AMD, those other guys" CPUs. AMD chose to rebuild its public reputation the hard way, and once it did, its product sold.

To sum the history lesson up, that Intel "screwed" AMD is the easy "way out" of explaining AMDs woes, but not even remotely accurate. AMDs short history shows that prior to K7,
- they were a second rate manufacturer,
- they were generally unknown
- where they were known their reputation was at best, second fiddle
- they waited until very late in the game to fund advertising to combat that reputation
- they had to actually produce a processor which would allow them to combat that reputation
- they had to overcome consumer resistance from Intels highly successfull Intel Inside campaign
- they were constantly expanding, improving and increasing shipments yet they still lacked capacity to achieve their own goals of 30% market share (even though they put up 3 fabs in 10 years) due to the fact THAT THE MARKET ITSELF IS CONSTANTLY EXPANDING
- they were never in a position to generate revenue significantly greater than they did through increases in shipments


You can quote a few select parts of history to accentuate an opinion if you want, but all things considered, I disagree.


supporting links, in no particular order:

http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/20070131/amd-intel-shipments.htm
http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/20060727/intel-amd-marketshare.htm
http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/cpu/display/20080122223915_Intel_Gains_Market_Share_Thanks_to_Demand_Towards_Speedier_Microprocessors.html
http://www.news.com/Intels-market-share-rises-on-AMDs-problems/2100-1006_3-6178921.html
http://www.news.com/AMD-gains-market-share%2C-but-so-does-Intel/2100-1006_3-5557740.html?tag=nw.2
http://www.news.com/AMDs-market-share-gains-accelerate/2100-1006_3-5916167.html?tag=nw.3
http://www.news.com/Intel-gains-server-share%2C-AMD-gets-notebook-boost/2100-1006_3-6130795.html?tag=nw.4
http://www.news.com/AMDs-slow-but-steady-market-share-gains/2100-1006_3-5435391.html?tag=nw.5
http://www.news.com/Intel%2C-AMD-comfy-during-fourth-quarter/2100-1006_3-5152255.html?tag=nw.6
http://www.mdronline.com/mpr_public/editorials/edit12_15.html
http://www.my-esm.com/story/OEG20020125S0066
http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9584-6030509.html
http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/cpu/display/20070802231958.html
http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9584-5765844.html
http://www.itworld.com/Man/2699/intel-antitrust-history-080213/
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9004846
http://hkonline.blogspot.com/2005/12/fabrication-plant-wat-every-indian-has.html
http://www.eetimes.com/showArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=IWSF4RQ0GTWCKQSNDLQSKHSCJUNN2JVN?articleID=18306290

 

[turpit]

The losses are compounded down the line - its not a linear relationship. If AMD had enough income to open up FAB 36 a bit earlier, they would have had even stronger income. Its a snowball effect.




Endyen has pointed out just how near "capacity" AMD were for a considerable time period.

A) The losses dont exist, nor did they ever. THE MARKET IS NOT FIXED, NOR HAS IT EVER BEEN. The market it self is constantly expanding, and AMD had to increses production just to maintain a constant share. Furthemore, as to getting fab 36 online sooner, AMD opend 3 fabs from 1985 to 1995, Fab 25, Fab 30 and Fab 36. They were not sitting on their behinds or being held back. Their descision to convert Fab 25 to Flash vs updating it for newer CPU manufacture was their own choice, and one which they themselves have touted as "the right choice". They limited their own capacity. At the same time, their implementation of APM allowed them to maximize their existing manufacturing plants, offsetting either the loss of fab 25 or the time delay of Fab 36s production....your choice. Either way, they INCREASED their shipments with the exception of mid 2002 when their share dropped to 12.4%

B) Endyens "point" of 76% is a PR point, NOT an manproc point. Any honest manufacturing dept manager would cringe at the though of calling 76% "at capacity"

 

[turpit]

I find myself agreeing with endyen ...

hellboy ... you don't have to suck up to the moderator.

Amazing how you always seem to find yourself in agreement with anything that presents AMD in a better light

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Let me ask this. Was AMD suffering in 2005? And before that? And time to make the decision to take them to court, sometime earlier than they actually did. Was C2D out? Who had the fastest processor? Whos market share was growing? Whos was shrinking? Motive? Motive? Motive? If they (AMD) were doing well, whats the motive? If they were capturing marketshare? Motive? And so, even with the diabolical idea that AMD is doing this simply to get money from Intel, it simply doesnt matter. Theres very little motive to begin with, other than maybe Intel did do some things that werent quite legal. If at the time AMD was doing good, why take Intel to court for no reason. I mean, theres no reason for AMD to have taken Intel to court right? Isnt that what everyones saying? Then what was AMDs motive? Somehow theyd mystically win some lawsuit for no reason at all? There has to be reasons. Whether theyre good enough to have Intel on the bad side of it, who knows. Whether its bad enough for Intel have to pay AMD for some kind of recompense, who knows? Something happened here, of that theres no doubt. Unless you can convince yourself that theres that mystical answer for AMD. Oh wait, thats right, no one does business with M$ anymore since theyve been cited sooo many times for their dealings....YEAH RIGHT lol. No, it isnt Hector going "Bad Intel, dont buy them , buy us" Something happened, thats all Ive got to say. Who knows how itll play out?

 

[turpit]

Let me ask this. Was AMD suffering in 2005? And before that? And time to make the decision to take them to court, sometime earlier than they actually did. Was C2D out? Who had the fastest processor? Whos market share was growing? Whos was shrinking? Motive? Motive? Motive? If they (AMD) were doing well, whats the motive? If they were capturing marketshare? Motive? And so, even with the diabolical idea that AMD is doing this simply to get money from Intel, it simply doesnt matter. Theres very little motive to begin with, other than maybe Intel did do some things that werent quite legal. If at the time AMD was doing good, why take Intel to court for no reason. I mean, theres no reason for AMD to have taken Intel to court right? Isnt that what everyones saying? Then what was AMDs motive? Somehow theyd mystically win some lawsuit for no reason at all? There has to be reasons. Whether theyre good enough to have Intel on the bad side of it, who knows. Whether its bad enough for Intel have to pay AMD for some kind of recompense, who knows? Something happened here, of that theres no doubt. Unless you can convince yourself that theres that mystical answer for AMD. Oh wait, thats right, no one does business with M$ anymore since theyve been cited sooo many times for their dealings....YEAH RIGHT lol. No, it isnt Hector going "Bad Intel, dont buy them , buy us" Something happened, thats all Ive got to say. Who knows how itll play out?

You bet your bippy there was motive, but just as important, there was opportunity, and timing
Motive: Money....the best motive for any corporation, regardless of their current finacial situation.
Opportunity: Jump on the shirt tales of JFTC, since the last time they tried they wound up losing $40 million (no small sum for them at the time) instead of winning the $2.2 billion they filed for.
Timing: What better time than when youre ahead, can afford the lawyers and eliminate the possibility of the 'sour grapes' defense.

Oh, and Im not saying that Intel did, or did not act as alleged, only that the alledged actions had zero impact on AMDs business, past or present.

 

[turpit]

I posted some where that we havent seen him for a while...

And you will continue to not see me. I only posted because
A) Im sick to death and tired of this quartely recurring croc thread
B) I had a little free time, as I was on a vacation directed by higher authority due to some exceptionally unpleasent tasking I had. "Get your head clear" time if you will.

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Mostly agree with you there about the company direction, products etc, but more money does offer more paths, and we honestly dont know how much money this was , if it is true, or enough to have even had an impact in company direction regarding AMD. Like I said, I dont believe they just are out there hoping this happens, I believe theres something to it. Now, if its enough to cause a courts decision, who knows

 

[endyen]

Turpit, I guess we live on different planets.
Where I live, the standard is expand or die. When you build a major facility, you build in room for growth. You have a max theoretical capacity, and you have a running capacity.
Your staffing, materials, and even some equipment is based on your operating (running) capacity. You leave room to grow. As you expand, your capacity grows, thow that growth is slightly slowed by staff training , and equipment reorganization. You have a rolling capacity.
As to the marketshare that you showed, well, there was a reason why I deliniated desktop, x86server and laptop marketshares.
Up to the opteron release, Intel held almost 100% of the x86 server market, and over 90% of the laptop market. They also had ~ 83% of the desktop market.
On the other hand, if you throw those and the geode, the cell, and all the other chips into the mix, it really does a good job of hiding what chips AMD was actually selling.
No matter how you look at it, the Desktop chips only took off after AMD filed thier suit. I know what I see, and it does include Intel interference on launches, and other big news events. You see it how you choose. The judgement is up to the court.
Oh, by the way, that $40m judgement was what AMD paid to get unhindered use of x86. A bargain, if you ask me.

 

[iluvgillgill]

Yes, I think your comming out of the Intel closet.

well let see you come up with some facts and figure then!i think that can make me shut up.but what you said is not going to change the fact that the Core 2 family is way better then the Phenom processer(in fact all AMD product).

poor manage AMD has insufficient fund which cause developments stop slow aned poor output.not enough staffs to make good progress in driver development thats why the supposedly "highend" HD3870 which is more powerful on papar is competing with the mid-hi 9600GT!it all adds up to a big failure!from the day of HD2900 and Athlon 64 X2.

 

[iluvgillgill]

Its where they lived thru the 90's, I see no reason they cant hide out there for 2-3 years, get 45nm on lock and release a Fusion chip that actually lives up to the hype.

only if they got the money and live that long!!!$380million lost in the Q1 2008.anymore million to loose AMD???

 

[MU_Engineer]

<snip>

Its quite possible if not probable that prior to K7 Intel did hold AMD back, however, looking at AMDs success since the advent of K7, in spite of any wrong doing on the part of Intel, (alleged or factual) about the only thing Intel could be succesfully accused of doing to hurt AMD was to develope a better CPU than netburst, the C2D.

I think your post pretty well hit the nail on the head, although I'd put the line at "prior to K8 Intel did hold AMD back." The original K7 Athlons walked over the PIII Coppermines and literally everything else beat the horrible P4 Willamettes, especially the ones that were not socket 478 with the DDR version of the 845 chipset. But yet AMD's market share really didn't go up much during those time periods, and in some cases went down. AMD's market share certainly did go up when the Athlon 64s and Opterons hit the market in 03/04 and pounded nails in NetBurst's coffin. So I think somewhere between 2002 and 2003 Intel changed its tactics with OEMs. If you look at AMD's lawsuit, they allege that most of the wrongdoings happened prior to 2004, which sounds very reasonable.

However, I do not believe AMD's marketing department when they say that Intel still is hurting them with anticompetitive measures. The years from K8 onwards show AMD gaining a bunch of market share at the expense of Intel as well as gaining supply contracts with previously Intel-only firms like Dell. One might accuse Intel of abusing its market position by "dumping" its products at a loss to intentionally damage AMD, but that's wrong on three fronts. Yes, Intel took a big loss in 2006 by selling the old NetBurst chips at fire-sale prices, but you could very easily say that was getting rid of inventory. Dumping is a continual process but Intel is making quite a bit of money and has been since the beginning of 2007. You can't usually do that when you're selling products at a loss. And lastly, the really big danger of a monopoly is that the monopolistic company will charge exorbitant amounts of money for their products and stifle innovation. Intel has been churning out new products left, right, and center and has been selling that at very competitive prices. That sounds like what we *want* to see in the marketplace, right?

So in summary, I don't disagree with the lawsuit but I disagree with the timing. AMD should have filed it years ago when they were still being affected by Intel, not well after the fact but need the money. Filing it earlier could very well have brought an injunction to stop further damage from occurring, rather than now just trying to look for fines after the fact.

 

[LukeBird]

well let see you come up with some facts and figure then!i think that can make me shut up.but what you said is not going to change the fact that the Core 2 family is way better then the Phenom processer(in fact all AMD product).

poor manage AMD has insufficient fund which cause developments stop slow aned poor output.not enough staffs to make good progress in driver development thats why the supposedly "highend" HD3870 which is more powerful on papar is competing with the mid-hi 9600GT! it all adds up to a big failure!from the day of HD2900 and Athlon 64 X2.

Riiiiiiiight...
Firstly, Core 2's are 'better' than AMD proc's, define 'better'... If you mean performance (which is what I assume) then yeah, bang on, they perform better in pretty much anything than an AMD proc (bar memory intensive tests which are more server-based). But price/performance AMD are still very much in touch. I can get a quad-core machine (in component form) for less than an Intel system, so that is 'better'. AMD X2's tend to be very good proc's in HTPC (especially coupled with the fantastic 780G chipset). If I needed an HTPC it would be a Toliman triple on a 780G. Which Intel doesn't have a competitor for!
Secondly, 'progress in driver development'... can you tell me who has released new video drivers this year!!!... oh yeah, AMD. Nvidia have thoroughly neglected all users (bar 9series users) and the only drivers I have run beyond 169.21 (which were the latest the last time I checked) are beta's. Whereas AMD have been releasing drivers consistently. So you're completely wrong on that point.
Thirdly, the only reason the 3870 is outclassed is because Nvidia had MS move the goalposts with regard to DX10. Nvidia couldn't get a card to render effectively in DX10, so they had MS change the DX10 requirements. In effect DX10.1, should be DX10 and DX10 should be DX9.5. Currently DX10 offers not a lot more than DX9 and DX10.1 looks like offering far more than DX10 did. The bigger company (in many ways quite rightly and in other ways wrongly) had the rules changed leaving ATi with a crippled card due to a fundamental change in the way objects are rendered. For reference, did you see the "Assasins Creed DX10.1" thread, the link there showed a 20% improvement (AFAIR) using DX10.1 instead of DX10. So if DX10 had been released as originally proposed (instead of the cutdown version Nvidia forced...) then the 3870 would easily be on a par with the 8800GT if not further ahead.

 

[iluvgillgill]

I remember that the Phenom does really well in rendering something or rather and almost beat a QX6700. For everything else (apart from HT) the Phenom is alright (but the Core 2 45nm rox).

the AMD processor only excel in memory latency and memory speed as they have the intergrated memory controller in the CPU so less latency and overclock along with the HT speed.but this is due to change to intel when Nelahem release with the built in memory controller just like the AMDs

 

[B-Unit]

well let see you come up with some facts and figure then!i think that can make me shut up.but what you said is not going to change the fact that the Core 2 family is way better then the Phenom processer(in fact all AMD product).

poor manage AMD has insufficient fund which cause developments stop slow aned poor output.not enough staffs to make good progress in driver development thats why the supposedly "highend" HD3870 which is more powerful on papar is competing with the mid-hi 9600GT!it all adds up to a big failure!from the day of HD2900 and Athlon 64 X2.

Not trying to change that fact. Never said that Phenom is better than Core2. What I'm saying is that if Intel broke rules, they should have to face the consequences.

You just want to rant and rave how badly AMD/ATI sucks, and that my friend makes you a fanboy.

 

[iluvgillgill]

Riiiiiiiight...
Firstly, Core 2's are 'better' than AMD proc's, define 'better'... If you mean performance (which is what I assume) then yeah, bang on, they perform better in pretty much anything than an AMD proc (bar memory intensive tests which are more server-based). But price/performance AMD are still very much in touch. I can get a quad-core machine (in component form) for less than an Intel system, so that is 'better'. AMD X2's tend to be very good proc's in HTPC (especially coupled with the fantastic 780G chipset). If I needed an HTPC it would be a Toliman triple on a 780G. Which Intel doesn't have a competitor for!
Secondly, 'progress in driver development'... can you tell me who has released new video drivers this year!!!... oh yeah, AMD. Nvidia have thoroughly neglected all users (bar 9series users) and the only drivers I have run beyond 169.21 (which were the latest the last time I checked) are beta's. Whereas AMD have been releasing drivers consistently. So you're completely wrong on that point.
Thirdly, the only reason the 3870 is outclassed is because Nvidia had MS move the goalposts with regard to DX10. Nvidia couldn't get a card to render effectively in DX10, so they had MS change the DX10 requirements. In effect DX10.1, should be DX10 and DX10 should be DX9.5. Currently DX10 offers not a lot more than DX9 and DX10.1 looks like offering far more than DX10 did. The bigger company (in many ways quite rightly and in other ways wrongly) had the rules changed leaving ATi with a crippled card due to a fundamental change in the way objects are rendered. For reference, did you see the "Assasins Creed DX10.1" thread, the link there showed a 20% improvement (AFAIR) using DX10.1 instead of DX10. So if DX10 had been released as originally proposed (instead of the cutdown version Nvidia forced...) then the 3870 would easily be on a par with the 8800GT if not further ahead.

Intel is better because it offer better performance/watt thats why any cpu intensive system(APPLE MAC) use intel processor because Mac is mostly used by professional in graphics design and music production.does that make sense to you?i dont see a Apple Mac on sale thats fitted with a AMD processor!why?because its not as good as Intel's.simple!

and about DX10.1.DX 10 took 1 year to make it mainstream along with Windows Vista.so really when DX10.1 become the mainstream something better from not only Intel but also AMD could come up with DX11.plus Nvidia could add DX10.1 compatible to its forthcoming GT200 just delay for a while since its not going to hurt them very much.and Assasin's Creed is the only game that support DX10.1.so its going to take time before other game developers using that technology.

and since Nvidia is not compatible on paper but it doesnt mean it cant render DX10.1 graphics as review has shown.so Nvidia card will handle just fine.about that 20% performance difference.now Nvidia is performaning better then AMD card in most games by more then 20% so that will offset or compensate the performance difference in DX10.1 rendering.plus Nvidia is known to be good with their driver development.they might come up with a new driver that convert the DX10.1 render instruction to DX10 to reproduce the graphics.

AMD's so called "consistantly" release drivers doesn't mean they are good drivers and offer impressive improvement in frame rates to reflect the impressiveness of the card you use.lets look at it this way back in the HD2900 and 8800GTX was released which card had a better driver?which one that keep bugging and crash in game.and it actually taken almost a year before the card offer some impressive results but most user have already upgraded.

AMD never exist in the high end setup.the 780G you mention is low end product.and Nvidia has better product in all areas.the new 8300 mobo have lower power consumption and will have better graphics power then the 780G.I struggle to find the "top-end" spider gaming system by OEM on google.only a few alienware(http://www.alienware.com/product_pages/desktop_all_default.aspx).inside that website is all system build on Intel platform event the Xfire system which is an Intel X38 mobo.what does that say again?Intel is better or AMD havent got any money to build anything?lol

i sure time will tell after everything have be resolve or someone(hint hint) gone bankrupt.

 

[iluvgillgill]

Not trying to change that fact. Never said that Phenom is better than Core2. What I'm saying is that if Intel broke rules, they should have to face the consequences.

You just want to rant and rave how badly AMD/ATI sucks, and that my friend makes you a fanboy.

tell me do you think that people will buy more AMD system then Intel?will you?

 

[iluvgillgill]

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/249738-10-amid-losses-restructure

i think you can go into the thread above and see what i comment i have post.and not many can really reject what i have posted.because its just pure facts that i put up.