Arstecnica, AMD irrelevant.

Op-ed: AMD may be facing irrelevance | Ars Technica

I was already worried when I heard about the switching of CEOs and the massive drop in stocks for AMD. It just seems bad news over and over. Bulldozer was a failure in that even similar priced, low end Intel could compete with Bulldozer 8 core and Piledriver not much better. Haswell is just going to destroy it. Intel will win the tablet market, it will beat out ARM, I have no doubt. Even in cell phones, I have faith Intel will eventually prove their low power x86 will demolish ARM. I hope this will make Apple's cores obselete in the next 2 years.

I think it's time maybe for AMD, they need to split the company. AMD Graphics and AMD Processors. No one is buying their parallel processing marketing right now, maybe if they can actually prove their parallel processing works, will give Intel run for their money. There is no doubt, the 7970M in my laptop is far more powerful than the Ivey Bridge, but it's a 3D polygon generator for me right now.

Makes me wonder what we'll be seeing from AMD in the next few years. I also see doom for Nvidia as well. Intel's improvements in graphics are incredible, in a few years I think Intel will have better graphics tech than nvidia and Nvidia can't compete for tablets/phones right now, Tegra is a joke.

 

Might have picked up a Trinity powered 11" to 13" notebook if they made a decent one but so far i have yet to see it.
High end screen at 1600x900, high end CPU and decent build quality is what im looking for.

Seems the new APUs are good for HTPCs if you only plan to do media center and light gaming though as Intel is still kinda wonky with the refresh rates on the IGPs.

 

Well the desktop 7900 series cards are still the way to go if you game on multiple monitors or above 1920x1200 imo.

 

"Intel's improvements in graphics are incredible, in a few years I think Intel will have better graphics tech than nvidia"

this will be the future without questions. not now but the improvement in integrated graphics are amazing. the newest ultrabooks are faster than a (msi) gaming notebook in 2007. the way from the gma950-hd4000 is not too long but the performance diference is stunning. (compared to another intel igp)

 

I could probably dig up a quote like that from 4-5 years ago too. IGP will never outperform a mid-grade dedicated GPU. Intel's HD 4000 IGP is already 3 years behind AMD's, and AMD's barely counts as a mid-grade GPU. Mid-grade GPU today is a 650m, it's no where near that performance. What WILL help however is DDR4 @ 2133MHz+. RAM speed has been a big bottleneck for the faster IGP's as of late.

The time difference from 8600 GT and 660m isn't too long either, but the 660m will demolish the 8600 and then some. Even if % improvement from Intel is bigger, it's still highly irrelevant. It's like saying you increased your income by 1000%, but when you only had $1 to your name, now you have $100. Whoop dee doo!

 

First, the HD 4000 is only slightly behind Trinity and Intel's next iteration (Haswell) is widely expected to surpass it at which point they will play leapfrog for a few years.

Second, you are right: the IGPs will never outperform discreet GPUs. This is by construction: both Nvidia and AMD have said that as the integrated parts get faster, their response will be to make faster discreet cards (they have no choice). However, the important thing for IGPs is not what other GPUs are out there, it's how well the IGPs play games and handle other GPU workloads.

4-5 years ago, this forum had a regular stream of threads asking "How do I get this game working on my laptop?" to which the answer was inevitably "You can't because it has integrated graphics and no, you can't upgrade your graphics card." Today, the IGPs can run most games at Medium. The next iteration will be able to run most games at High. At some point, it will not matter that the discreet mid-range card can crank up the AA to 16x and the IGP cannot -- most people will not be able to tell the difference.

All of that said, I don't think AMD is going away any time soon. That would actually be really bad because they're supposed to be what keeps Intel from raising prices (see this article for what happens when Intel has less competition). If they get in serious trouble, I think Intel will give them a break simply to keep the regulatory authorities from going after it.

 

Hardly. They've been able to have big performance increases with new iterations of their processors, but they still represent the weakest graphics option in the industry.

 

HD 4000 isn't even close to AMD Llano let alone Trinity GPU performance.

 

Yes, it is. At Medium settings, it's roughly equal to Llano and 20% behind Trinity. At higher settings, the discrepancy is somewhat greater (but the games tend to become unplayable in any case). Haswell should beat Trinity.

 

No it isn't.... lol. I'll believe my own tests over someone else's.

 

Please stop trolling. Alternatively (if you really believe that) please inform yourself.

If we was in a time bubble and no new games would come out, yes. I don't think that's realistic. We still have lousy physics and semi-rigid gameworlds and as the GPU will increasingly be used to enhance those areas the performance will have to increase too just to compensate. But even the graphics itself can be enhanced needing even more GPU performance.

I'd hope Intel gets in trouble. Their conduct where they paid e.g. Dell not to use the superior AMD chips seriously hurt AMD and thus the market. That Intel got off as easy as they did is IMHO incredible...

(Disclaimer: I have used Intel processors in my last 4 computers and will buy a Haswell machine as my next)

 

Medium settings isn't a universal metric. Although you can find benchmarks where intel's recent parts close in on llano, overall, intel's parts still fall short.

I'm with you 100% based on my experience. There are too many games where Llano runs fine on low or medium and Intel's latest parts cant offer anything more than a slideshow. And then there's trinity.

 

Fair enough. I, however, will believe the results of a professional review site over those of a random person on the internet. There are a lot of things that can go wrong when doing such tests.

New games are coming out, but they are not substantially more demanding than old games, at least not up to the point of diminishing returns. Sure, you need the discreet card for all of the bells and whistles... but there are far fewer people who care about that than those who want to play the game.

They've already paid AMD off for that one and I don't think they can use that as a pretext for paying them off again. AMD needs to step up its CPU performance (maybe with Steamroller?).

 

Their graphic department is doing just fine. I do wonder how much they sell compared to Nvidia? Anyone who have some numbers?

CPU department, not so great. AMD don`t have a solid foundation like Intel have with their Core series. Intel can just improve and improve while it seems that AMD is trying to find something that works. And another bad thing is that Intel have probably the best foundry out there in the industry. AMD rely on other companies to make their chips. So Intel have a huge advantage here.

All above considered, it doesn`t look very bright considering the stocks and such. But I don`t think they will disappear.

 

Nvidia tends to sell very slightly more graphics chips. Just looking at sales figures for Nvidia/AMD, it's about 55/45. Almost equal.

The Steam hardware survey shows about 56/44 if you're just looking at Nvidia/AMD. That's probably the number you're looking for.

I think for Steam, legacy support is a major reason Nvidia has a slight edge. There are a lot of folks still using 8 series graphics cards, but AMD folks aren't really hanging onto graphics cards older than the 4000 series which came out a few years later.

As far as current sales figures, I believe the 55/45 number includes Nvidia's sales in other graphics card markets, like tegra sales in smartphones, so it doesn't really compare 1:1 with AMD's sales figures. I think that modern sales figures for desktop/laptop GPUs are even closer to equal, possibly even favoring AMD slightly. The already established consumer base appears to lean slightly towards Nvidia.

 

Ok thanks.

Nvidia must have a pretty good grip on the market especially since they are more expensive than AMD.
I guess they are prefered by OEMs in general, hence why Nvidia sell more hardware? The same thing is also happening with the mobile CPUs. Way to little OEMs include AMD CPUs in their notebooks, Intel seem to be prefered.

 

I really wish AMD would just abandon the bulldozer/piledriver concept and go back to its older cores which were MUCH closer competitors.
(4-6 cores with 4-6 FPU instead of 4-8 mini cores with 2-4 FPU)

A focus on making their older Phenom II cores more power efficient and ramping up clock rates along with design efficiencies and a few developments would likely serve them better.

An OC'd Phenom II x4 black edition is STILL a better overall processor than anything the new generations have accomplished.

No I don't think they'd catch Intel, but they don't need to... They just need to keep making excellent value alternatives.


Another thing I wish AMD would push is asynch crossfire. Wouldn't it be great if you could buy an AMD APU and simply ADD that power to any AMD GPU you bought? I realize there are challenges to this design, but AMD controls and designs all of the components. Realize if AMD ever pulls off even a slight performance gain (say even 5-10%) to AMD APU + AMD GPU it may very well have a winner on its hands.

 

73% use Intel CPUs. 27% use AMD CPUs. Yikes.
36% use AMD GPUs. 47% use Nvidia GPUs. 11% actually use IGPs

 

I don't think Intel's going to win the mobile market so easily. Pretty much all smartphones are ARM based and the company grew by ridiculous amounts because of the explosion of demand for their designs, so they have more and more funds to develop new architectures. Also the mobile market is ARM's main focus, so I don't think Intel would be able to overtake them by the sheer amount of money it pumps into development.

On the other hand, while Intel is still quite significantly behind the new ARM based chips in most aspects, it is visible that it will continue to close the gap and can definitely become a big player in the industry, it just won't overtake ARM straight up.

 

The only reason I would consider AMD is because I can go to Microcenter and pick up an unlocked Phenom II x4 and motherboard for under $100.

 

I can't believe how well the intel does in games that can't be used with the 7970m.

...tapatalk...

 

Hey! 11% here!

 

The difference between intel IGP and AMD IGP is really the updating drivers and moderate performance gap. It just that intel had been dominating and it probably not going to change soon. Also APU is kind of niche right now. I would consider there are 3 different groups in consumer market,
1. People who just need a computer.
2. Price/performance ratio chaser. (this can be split to low end and mid end )
3. Enthusiast

Imo, the only segment where APU can sell now is the low end p/r ratio.

Nvidia wise, their amount of R&D probably matches intel if not ahead. Look at their professional line offers...

 

I wouldn't the IGP figures too seriously - they may or may not be accounting graphics switching tech. The CPU figures seem correct. Intel is basically putting out a better product. There are a few of us who like AMD phenom ii x4/x6 parts, but only because they're dirt cheap. Intel CPUs are just better right now for gaming and people should be using them.

 

Steam had put out a bulletin about that one or two HW surveys ago, and said they adjusted their methods to account for things like that. It is possible those numbers are indeed accurate and don't count Intel parts when a dedicated GPU is available.

Also a fun little gem in the hardware survey. Current survey shows that in spite of AMD price cuts, nVidia still has more high end sales among Steam gamers.

DirectX 11 GPU Breakdown
GTX 680, May = 0.56%, June = 0.73%, July = 0.90%, August = 1.07%, Sept = 1.24%
AMD 7970, May = 0.50%, June = 0.49%, July = 0.54%, August = 0.60%, Sept = 0.60%.

Then there are threads like this, where reviewers that cover GPUs and computer parts for a living are getting tired of AMD driver bugs. Not to mention the whole Enduro thing for which even Anandtech has thrown a few bad words towards AMD.
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1708626

I'd say AMD isn't irrelevant so much as they are, from a driver and design standpoint, incompetent. Otherwise their GPU products wouldn't be so bad. Their CPU products? I don't think you can match Intel's R&D...its simply a matter of numbers. Unless AMD comes up with some novel new approach to x86 architecture (they did it before...) I do think AMD is going to stay on a downward trend for consumer computing.

 

I've heard lots of issues about the GPUs ever since AMD took over. Americans babbling about how they're smarter etc... Put the GPU on the CPU. ATi said no, put the CPU on the GPU. People ended up getting cut from the orginal ATi team and AMD moved in. Pretty sad really...

 

Oh AMD has had issues for a very long time. The ATI/AMD 5870 was a great product (first triple monitor gaming card) yet they killed it with bad drivers (I ditched my GTX 275 SLI setup to get one and so badly disappointed that I sold the GPU at a loss not even a year later to buy a GTX 570). Bad drivers that still exist today and plaque the 7970's and the rest of the Southern Islands architecture.

Even their OpenCL software stack is a pale shadow of CUDA. Been down that road, worked with both, and saw a number of companies simply refuse to consider AMD for GPGPU after getting their first taste of the development tools.

Before that ATI had issues of their own. Their TV tuner cards were trash (I had one) and the GPUs back then had driver quirks as well. I'm sure when AMD bought ATI the core driver code, and all its flaws, were recycled over and over again into the current drivers we see today.