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CERN Engineer Details AMD Zen Processor Confirming 32 Core Implementation, SMT (hothardware.com)
MojoKid writes: AMD is long overdue for a major architecture update, though one is coming later this year. Featuring the codename "Zen," AMD's already provided a few details, such as that it will be built using a 14nm FinFET process. In time, AMD will reveal all there is to know about Zen, but we now have a few additional details to share thanks to a computer engineer at CERN. CERN engineer Liviu Valsan recently gave a presentation on technology and market trends for the data center. At around 2 minutes into the discussion, he brought up AMD's Zen architecture with a slide that contained some previously undisclosed details. One of the more interesting revelations was that upcoming x86 processors based on Zen will feature up to 32 physical cores. To achieve a 32-core design, Valsan says AMD will use two 16-core CPUs on a single die with a next-generation interconnect. It has also been previously reported that Zen will offer up to a 40 percent improvement in IPC compared to its current processors as well as symmetric multithreading or SMT akin to Intel HyperThreading. In a 32-core implementation this would result in 64 logical threads of processing.
So is this actually going to catch up to Intel? It'd be great to have meaningful competition in the CPU space again....
Cemil.
Just 90% there at 50% cheaper. I'm 100% happy with my A10 5800K for way cheaper of what it would have cost me to go with Intel. Late 2016 the year of AMD.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
They'll do research and try and raise clock speeds, but the amount of heat required and the amount of cooling required is proportional to the square of the clock speed. The faster you try and change the state of something (electric charge), the more heat is generated. They might be able to switch to optical computing then the heat problem goes away. Maybe they'll get more efficient CPU's with fewer transistors and more parallelization.
But, it's far simpler to just add more cores as transistor sizes shrink by a half every year or two. That's guaranteed.
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
640 cores should be enough for anybody
We are Dead Stars looking back Up at the Sky
Yes x86 is assumed to mean the 64bit version (x86_64) nowadays, which is a superset of the 32bit version and the 16bit versions of x86, all thanks to mode switching.
Don't forget the 8-bit processors. Some of us old timers cut our teeth on those 8-bit processors. Now get off my lawn!
Depends. They may only go through a reseller channel, meaning that you'd have to do the PITA quote/invoice/purchase order thing instead of clicking "add to cart". But eventually, someone like Newegg will become an authorized reseller, making the parts as easy to get as any other.
That's guaranteed.
Surely you weren't saying sizes shrink by half every two years is guaranteed. Intel is already saying they won't be able to reach the process shrink goal in 2 years this time around. Around 5nm the shrink will turn into a research project just as challenging as the clock frequency issue. You can't pack carbon atoms closer than ~0.2nm nevermind features. A small protein molecule is 3nm in diameter. A significant drought of Moore's law is coming.
They could simply go back to the larger die areas we had only 10 years ago. It just means performance won't be "free" as time goes on. If you want a better chip you need a bigger chip and it'll cost more because you get less out of a wafer. There's plenty of fucking room on ATX boards and micro ATX boards and even mini ITX boards. And if you want to stick with tiny footprints like the Intel NUCs or the Google/Amazon/Intel "stick it in your HDMI port" shits, you can stack vertically or incorporate your RAM into the die.
I have a suspicion AMD will produce a part with HBM 2 incorporated into the APU die, resulting in a product that is literally a system on a chip, and finally realizes the shit they've been harping on about with regards to HSA. The GPU and the CPU have buckets of memory and all live together holding hands, sharing resources, talking to each other openly, helping each other build a deck or patch some drywall or whatever else the program asks them to do. Mayb we'll see something at E3 2017.
8088 was 8 bits. 8086 was 16 bits so I assume x86 should mean at least 16 bits.
8088 was 16 bits with an 8-bit external bus, but otherwise code compatible.
SMP = Symmetric Multi Processing. "Symmetric" refers to the fact that all of the CPUs are considered "equal" by the OS and each has full access to DRAM, IO devices, etc.
SMT = Simultaneous MultiThreading. "Simultaneous" refers to the fact that a single CPU core can process multiple execution threads at the same time.
Someone from AMD's marketing department needs to take CPU architecture 201.
Which weren't x86 processors.
That depends on what you consider to be an 8-bit processor. Based on other comments, the devil is in the details regarding the 8086/8088 processors. I pointed out to another poster that the 80186 had an internal multiplexed 20-bit bus and available with an 8-bit or 16-bit external data bus. Unless someone changed the definition for a processor in the last 40 years, the data bus determines bit-width of a processor.
If so, then it's an 8-bit processor that implemented a 16-bit instruction set, then, just as the IBM System/360 Model 30 was an 8-bit processor that implemented a 32-bit instruction set and the Motorola 68000 was a 16/32-bit processor that implemented a 32-bit instruction set. From the programmer's point of view, the 8088 had 16-bit registers, 16-bit arithmetic instructions, and 16-bit "flat" addresses, just as the 8086 did.
What defines the bit width of an instruction set isn't connected to data bus width, as different implementations of the same instruction can have different data bus widths. "x86" isn't a processor, it's a family of instruction sets, including the original 16-bit 8086/8088 instruction set (with updates in the 80186/80188), the protected-mode 16-bit 80286 instruction set, the 32-bit IA-32 instruction set, and the 64-bit x86-64 instruction set. There was no 8-bit x86 instruction set.
180% of the performance at half the TDP, how horrible...
Oh, and the newer one has an integrated GPU
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Zen Opteron sounds pretty cool, especially if paired with coreboot and a mini-ITX form factor.
Power is linear with clock speed and quadratic with respect to voltage: P = \alpha V^2 f
In March 2000, Intel released the 1GHz Pentium III. In March of 1992, Intel released the 66MHz 486DX2. That's a huge difference. You could probably swap my 3770K for either the 920 or the 6700K and I probably wouldn't even notice. Even the power usage wouldn't be all that different, unless I left it on 24/7 running Boinc or something like that.
I hope this really works out, I need more processing power for my rendering jobs. With Intel suggesting new CPUs won't be faster just more energy efficient I have no one else to look at but AMD.