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AMD's Secrets Revealed
Techman writes "Three days ago AnandTech brought you a glimpse of Intel's plans for 2001. Now they're following up the coverage with AMD's roadmap for the next year and on into 2002. Does AMD have what it takes to continue their incredible winning streak, or will AMD return to the state they were in before their recent success?"
AMD have an impressive roadmap on paper. But then anyone can make anything look good on paper (Especially .coms!), so i'm not going to simply say "Good oh, good old AMD thrashing Intel! Yay!"
AMD have always had poor luck with their own processor designs, and seem to stuck following in the footsteps of Intel when it comes to inovation. They've created some compitition in the short term with their cheaper CPU's, sure, but thats only been in the last year or so.
The future is a little more murky. Their x86-64 architecture isn't compatible with Intels IA-64 architecture. Aside from the fact that the x86 instruction set is crap anyway, Microsoft have no plans to support x86-64, instead choosing their long standing partnership with Intel and focusing on the IA-64.
Now, i know that there are people working on Linux, *BSD ports to x86-64 etc. but that is not going to carry AMD into the next decade by any margin. Without industry standards and support for their architecture, they are going to die, pure and simple. We all know how poor Microsoft are at supporting anything other than Intel as well, so don't hold your breath for them (And others) to support two diferent systems.
At the moment, it's AMD 1, Intel 0. But thats going to change pretty quickly, and thats a fact.
T. Lee
It all depends on how soon Intel will release a DDR chipset, and whether it resembles the stability of the 440BX or the follies of the 820. If Intel can make a nice clean DDR chipset compliant with the DDR standards (as they have promised to do), then Intel could have the fastest desktop x86 setup out there. Of course, they already do, but cost is prohibitive and the demon Rambus has not yet been dispatched to the pits of hell. A price drop and a DDR chipset for the P4 could very well be the tolling bell for the Athlon.
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
The article mentions that AMD Duron isn't selling that well in North America, whereas in Europe the sales are "incredible". Why is that?
What difference would it make if AMD or Intel introduced a totally new processor (non-x86 compatable) or if you just had a look around at what other options are already available today?
The PowerPC is very nice processor. IIRC, IBM has released open "PC like" MB designs based on the PowerPC - with an invitation for anyone to manufacture them. Any takers so far?
Unfortunately, giving up on x86 binary compatability is still considered to big a risk for PC/MB producers. Even us open source OS users recognize that there will be that occasional binary driver or commercial software that we need to run and it's only available for x86.
Ever see NetBSD on a G4 cube? I did at Comdex/LBE and it's nice, reportedly much faster than equivalent Pentiums but expensive...
Better stuff is already out there, but it's the old cliche of BetaMax vs. VHS - the product with mass market appeal will continue to reign.
--Aaron Greenberg
When will VA Linux start selling AMD based systems???
However the question I have is... is either company looking into and/or developing something not based on x86 architecture?
Isn't there going to be some point where the developers have to sit back and realize that they've done all they can with it?
I realize that this will potentially cause huge problems both in hardware and software but I think both companies would be doing themselves a favor to start planning for that day now.
What I think's impressive is that they're actually meeting their demand. That was always AMD's biggest problem (besides the fact that every product was a direct Intel knockoff ;) - they could never turn out enough chips. Seems like they finally turned that around with the Athlon.
However, the article did raise at least one important point - for a "low end" processor, the duron's just not cheap enough! I'm assembling my own computer right now, and I chose to go with a celeron because the Duron chips and compatible motherboards were just more, and I preferred to put the extra money into some things that really enhance performance for me, like a SCSI card and more RAM.
Of course, as soon as DDR is budget priced, I see myself putting together a different system altogether...
Naturally, this applies somewhat differently to the /. kind of crowd. It is possible for someone to build their own box that has an Athlon chip in it that is still a quality machine. I just built my own machine and it has an Athlon 800 chip in it and a real 3Com NIC and a video card with it's own RAM. This however isn't the usual case when you buy a preassembled AMD machine. These are often the budget models that have a winmodem, shared video RAM and all manner of other shortcuts. This reflects badly on AMD and when combined with their lack of support for dual processors rules them out in the high end mass market.
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I don't want free as in beer. I just want free beer.
I think that's what they have done to a certian extent. When they launched the Athlon they wisely decided not to refer to it as K7. Not only did they change the name associated with their CPU but it was also the fastest chip on the market when launched. Now a little over a year later they've managed to look less like a Geo ("It'll get you there and back, but don't expect too much.") into more of a Chevorlet ("Quality, full featured automobile at a fair price."). Now with their recent development of dual processor capable motherboards they may be approaching something on the lines of a Pontiac ("Good performance, quality machine, low cost."). While Intel is starting to look more and more like an Oldsmobile ("A nice comfortable car for fuddy-duddies.")
My apologies to those of you who aren't from the US. I realize that these auto brands aren't exported very often and you might not be all that familiar with them. Also, I apologize for the slogans, it should be quite clear why I am in computer programming rather than advertising.
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I don't want free as in beer. I just want free beer.
Second is the 64 bit stuff. x86-64 is one of the lamest ideas to come out of a high tech company since boo.com, and everyone who so much as looks at the name knows it. The only way it could go anywhere is if the competition was, what, several years late, having difficulty ramping to high clock speeds, requiring major new compiler technology, and probably many more things as well. Since they've met the first few requirements, I'll hold off on judgement.
They are counting on Intel to screw up. From the past, this may work. It's not really a good thing to count on. Innovation often fails too, but I hope they don't just go into a holding pattern with the Athlon. That was a big win for them; to do well they have to follow it up with others now.
If you are modding me down because you disagree with me, use the "Flamebait" category, not the "Troll" one.
The truth is, Intel was one of VA's original financial backers, and Intel is still DEEP into VA's pockets. They have an "Intel Deal" and that's about all there is to it.
VA will tell you, "there's more to it than that, you have to realize that we make sure EVERY componant on a motherboard and system is FULLY functional in Linux before we aprove it for use. We have done a lot of software engineering for Intel systems, and it will take a lot of time to do it for AMD systems." But, that's bullshit. With all of VA's staff and resources, and the whole open source community porting to every bit of hardware under the sun, VA can't do an AMD system... Yea, ok... whatever...