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AMD Enters Desktop Memory Market
siliconbits writes "AMD has quietly released a new range of memory products and recycled the Radeon brand, which moves from graphics processing units to memory modules. According to the product page, AMD Radeon for systems are 'ideally' suited for the company's APU and CPU solutions and have been 'tested to the highest industry standards on AMD platforms.' Three different categories are currently on offer, roughly matching AMD's APU/CPU product categories; Entertainment, Ultra Pro and Enterprise. Oddly enough, the company is offering only 2GB modules with data rates at 1333.33MT/s and 1600MT/s, with 9-9-9 and 11-11-11 timings for the first two product ranges respectively."
But wouldn't it seem likely that AMD still owns some equity in GlobalFoundaries? It seems like AMD's move was to better utilize its facilities. Given that the company isn't public, this kind of information is hard to find but I can't imagine AMD would just spin it off if they would take a loss.
I do believe they kept 51%. They spun it off because they just didn't have the financial depth to keep up with the massive, massive investments involved in next-gen processing tech. Their competition is Intel and TSMC - which is also becoming a bigger and bigger behemoth. They simply had to scale up or get out, and this was their way of scaling up.
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The story in anandtech that you're quoting finds that higher bandwidth memory pushes up gaming performance when you're using the onboard video. That's certainly true, but the performance user willing to pay for performance memory is using a stand-alone video card. With a stand-alone card, the tomshardware results that I linked to are the relevant benchmark -- not the anandtech one you posted.
Don't get me wrong, AMD's on-die graphics are head-and-shoulders above even Intel's Sandy Bridge HD3000 graphics -- but they don't hold a candle to even basic video cards, like the Radeon 6670:
These APUs make for an ideal solution to replace entry-level PCs with crappy integrated graphics. And, they certainly could introduce a lot of graphics muscle to a segment historically light in that regard. If Llano catches a foothold there, the APU could impact peoples’ expectation of what a PC can do. Developers might start targeting a higher lowest common denominator in their games, and that’d of course be great news for PC gaming.
But once you reach outside of the budget basement and consider folks willing to use discrete graphics, the A-series’ utility is hamstrung. It’s easy to put an $80 Radeon HD 6670 in a cheap OEM box and walk away with something that easily trumps AMD’s product in both processing and graphics benchmarks.
Not necessarily. If they're working on a way of reducing the bandwidth bottle neck the way that I think they're going about it, this is likely to prove to be quite the wise idea.
As they've been moving more and more stuff on die, it's getting to the point where they really need a more tightly tied supply of RAM and I would be surprised if they aren't looking at how to get the RAM closer to the processor. They've been doing it for years and this would be one potential step to the logical conclusion.
As they've been moving more and more stuff on die, it's getting to the point where they really need a more tightly tied supply of RAM and I would be surprised if they aren't looking at how to get the RAM closer to the processor.
I just looked at my motherboard and the RAM is already so close to the CPU that it almost touches the heatsink. I'm not sure how much closer you think they can move it.
More seriously, if you're talking about building RAM into the CPU, we already have that: it's called cache. And since the amount of RAM you could add to a CPU die is never going to be enough outside of the low-end market, it would have to operate as a cache rather than a replacement for RAM on the motherboard.
Which I would argue simple wouldn't have happened if Intel hadn't bribed OEMs and rigged their compiler so that pretty much the only OEM AMD chips you were allowed for nearly a half a dozen years were bottom of the line Semprons/Durons. I mean when you have one of the CEOs admit that the Intel kickbacks were so good they were "like cocaine" and Dell had several quarters during the price wars where the ONLY profits were in the form of Intel kickbacks? It stinks and Intel should have been busted for antitrust.
As for TFA? i'm sure its just a rebrand, a smart idea for a rebrand I'd argue, but just a rebrand. I think we are down to only three, maybe four memory makers now, right? I'm sure one of them offered AMD a good deal to partner with them. If the chips are made to the same quality as Radeon GPUs I'd have no problem using them, especially if they begin listing which boards it is certified to work well with. It amazes me that in this day and age I'll still come across RAM that doesn't follow JEDEC with a bunch of funky timings.
So good luck AMD on your new venture, maybe you should get in contact with Tigerdirect to see about adding Radeon RAM to their AMD kits? Now if you'll excuse me I have to go set up a time to call Tigerdirect with a customer. It seems some dumbass there on their last "$199 AMD quad core!" deal fucked up and paired a 65w board with a 95w CPU. Oh well they are being good about it, just said for me to contact them with the customer who ordered it and they'll be happy to give him a label for free RAM shipping and they'll have a new board out ASAP.
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Just note that SIMM and DIMM are two distinct form factors for memory. SIMM packaging having largely been abandoned post 1990.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIMM
vs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DIMM
And they do make 8Gb and even 16Gb DIMMS:
http://www.amazon.com/Kingston-ValueRAM-240-pin-PC3-8500-registered/dp/B003C015ZY
But you will likely find that many (if not most) motherboard chipsets do not support them. This is a chipset and bios coding issue more than anything else.
As mentioned elsewhere in this thread, CACHE is usually SRAM not slower DRAM. Yes, it is RAM, but it is much faster than DRAM. IF they are pushing the proximity of DRAM to the chip package it would make sense. Especially if they can widen the bus to the DRAM and remove (or minimize) bottlenecks to the RAM.
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Nooooo, they kinda weren't. Do you think that after SIX YEARS of being completely shut out of the OEM market AMD only lost 1.25 billion? Oh please! If you figured up the amount of profits Intel made off the OEMs in that period of time Intel STILL made out like bandits while passing the costs of all those crappy P4s, with their higher electricity and cooling costs, right on to us.
No for Intel this was simply a cost for doing business, and would have been like telling MSFT if they would have just cut Netscape a check they could go right back to business as usual. I would also point out that Intel is STILL rigging their compilers, they just put a little "FYI" in the docs, buried half a dozen pages in IIRC. But if you take the latest compiler release and run the resulting code you'll find it will run a good 35-45% faster if it has the "Genuine Intel" flag on the CPU even if you fake the flag on an AMD chip.
So tell me how is that not worthy of antitrust proceedings?
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.