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AMD's Project Quantum Gaming PC Contains Intel CPU

Posted by timothy on from the pride-of-place dept.

nateman1352 links to an article at Tom's Hardware which makes the interesting point that chip-maker AMD will offer Intel -- rather than AMD -- CPUs in their upcoming high-end gaming PC. (High-end for being based on integrated components, at least.) From the article: Recently, AMD showed off its plans for its Fiji based graphics products, among which was Project Quantum – a small form factor PC that packs not one, but two Fiji graphics processors. Since the announcement, KitGuru picked up on something, noticing that the system packs an Intel Core i7-4790K "Devil's Canyon" CPU. We hardly need to point out that it is rather intriguing to see AMD use its largest competitor's CPU in its own product, when AMD is a CPU maker itself.

13 of 138 comments (clear)

  1. The answer's simple... by beelsebob · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The i7 4790k is faster than any CPU AMD make, by quite a wide margin. They're trying to sell this as the ultimate graphics crunching box... That needs a faster CPU than they can produce.

    1. Re:The answer's simple... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The answer is even simpler than that.. They are offering a both, because they know the customer base is fickle and brand loyal.

      You'll probably see a lower priced version with an AMD CPU and a much higher priced Intel based model for the kids who want bragging rights. They win either way.

      They designed the product to actually compete in the market, not to show off their CPUs.

    2. Re:The answer's simple... by binarylarry · · Score: 4, Funny

      No, but my sources tell me they're planning an Intel+Nvidia second generation product that will totally blow this rig out the water!

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    3. Re:The answer's simple... by hairyfeet · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Exactly, why leave money on the table when you don't have to? Those that are care about gaming (instead of bragging rights) will pick up the AMD version and use the savings for increased RAM and SSD space which will make for a faster system overall (since games haven't been CPU bound in years) and those that want to brag "I got teh fastest of teh fastest!" can grab the Intel...and AMD gets paid either way, smart move.

      Just remember boys and girls do NOT buy your CPUs based on the benchmarks because Intel came right out and admitted they rigged them (which just shows you how toothless the DoJ is these days, I have zero doubt the CEO of Intel could walk out on stage and drop his drawers and tell the DoJ to kiss his ass and the only response would be the DoJ asking what color lipstick he preferred) and this is backed up by Phoronix which shows that with GCC you "magically" get a 30%+ performance boost and their numbers match up almost perfectly with Tek Syndicate who has the $140 FX8350 trading blows with Intel chips costing more than twice the price.

      I know I've got to try just about every Intel and AMD chip at the shop and using real world applications side by side and testing them? Yeah....you'll be lucky to get 8% difference in real world uses, sorry. Now sure if you buy a $1000 Intel chip you might get 20% higher....for an increased cost of 600%+, in my book that math don't work so good. I can say I was impressed enough with the FX chips I grabbed the FX8320E and I'm loving every minute of it, its a multitasking beast and even after 6 hours of transcodes I have yet to be able to break above 118F and paired with an R9 280 I can play all the latest games with all the purty and never have a skip nor shudder. If you want to build a badass gaming rig cheap? Go with the FX chips, you will NOT regret it!

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  2. What a fucking stupid submission. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What a goddamn stupid submission.

    Yes, companies that make one product do use products from competitors in some situations. Microsoft is a great example of this. Yes, they provide Windows, but you can also use Linux with Azure. There's nothing wrong with that. They're using a product that competes with Windows because that's what the Azure users want and need. It's the smart thing to do, for crying out loud.

    A much bigger problem is when an open source project like, say, Debian, ends up having to support systemd thanks to political skullduggery, even though systemd is not what Debian's users want, it is not good for the Debian project's quality, it causes many problems, and causes many Debian users to lose trust in the project and its software. That's a real problem. This AMD-using-Intel-CPU shit is totally a non-issue.

  3. AMD takes care of its customers? by Iamthecheese · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That's what I'm reading. That AMD is willing to go the extra mile to offer what its customers are looking for.

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    If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
  4. Yes by goldcd · · Score: 4, Interesting

    What's refreshing is that they've recognized this. I'm reasonably sure this choice was the output of some rather heated meetings - but so.. 'refreshing' to see that the correct decision was made, for those people wanting to purchase the product.
    Also gives a pretty good internal target for AMD - v2 of this box WILL have an AMD CPU in it (or else we're getting out of the CPU market).

    1. Re:Yes by AK+Marc · · Score: 3, Insightful

      They've always recognized this. If you want 80% of the best for the lowest price, you want AMD. If you want the top 20% at any price, go Intel. I remember the marketing from 5, 10 and 15 years ago, and it seems to me that AMD always knew that. They may not like it, but they knew it.

      --
      Learn to love Alaska
    2. Re:Yes by serviscope_minor · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Um, that's utter crap.

      No it ain't. AMD at that point had an actually scalable architecture using hyper transport and could scale in multi socket boxes way, way better than Intel. It made a huge difference.

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      SJW n. One who posts facts.
    3. Re:Yes by Mike+Frett · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's not crap. The Athlons crushed the Pentium 4's. I remember that very clearly. Slashdot people should know this unless you were born yesterday.

  5. Precisely. by goldcd · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This decision underlines that AMD wanted to make something great, that people would want and would buy - rather than being a vanity project for the company.
    Been with nVidia for the last batch of GPUs and for last few CPUs - but I'm still rooting for them. The plucky, power-guzzling underdog :)
    Maybe my next upgrade will switch me back to them, maybe it won't - but this decision at least shows me they've not lost their minds, and should still be considered.

  6. Wait, AMD is selling a Computer? by WilCompute · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I am still waiting to see the part were this was anything more than a promotional and inspiration design from AMD. Nowhere has AMD said they are going to sell this, or any, boxed PC.

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  7. Re:Not just a CPU company anymore by dbIII · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Actually their multicore server CPUs are somewhat awesome and vastly cheaper than the Intel ones at this point, so mediocre doesn't fit.