Cpu war ?

[echo1 0]

I don't think that's an inherent problem with AMD, or even motherboards made for AMD CPUs (Yes, I get the distinction you were making about Intel motherboards) There are plenty of AMD motherboards out there that are as well designed as their Intel counterparts. Gigabyte's ones are favorites of mine.

[Pyronick 21]

I think the new generation of "superior" x86-based CPU's will be AMD. Why?

Well, they are slowly moving toward heterogeneous processing. Using two parallel integer units and a wide 128-bit FPU and in the future (2011-2012) the IGP for floating point operations.

Somewhat like the Cell Broadband Engine, only that flopped because there were no abstract languages like OpenCL or DirectCompute to use that power.

The only thing Intel has is Hyperthreading, which often doesn't work as it's not really parallel multithreading and needs too deep branch prediction pipelines.

Also the disadvantage of having a year of delay on production technology will be undone by the GlobalFoundries' fabs.

[echo1 0]

I think AMD is working on some form of hyperthreading. There's alot of chips out there that can support four or more threads per core, Intel's x86 chips aren't exactly leading the pack in that regard.

I know a guy who worked on the Cell at a professional level, apparently it handles pointers in some retarded way that makes it a bitch to write good code for. Shame, it seemed so revolutionary when it was announced.

[Pyronick 21]

I think AMD is working on some form of hyperthreading. There's alot of chips out there that can support four or more threads per core, Intel's x86 chips aren't exactly leading the pack in that regard.

The only reason why Intel is so big is due to foul play.

I think in the next 3 years AMD and VIA will finally "breakthrough".

I know a guy who worked on the Cell at a professional level, apparently it handles pointers in some retarded way that makes it a bitch to write good code for. Shame, it seemed so revolutionary when it was announced.

The Cell was revolutionary, as was the DEC Alpha. You can see that the way X86 CPU's are going, the future is fusion.

Unfortunately for Intel, they will need to invest in their graphics devision to keep up with that trend. And by the looks of it, they'll need to work hard on it considering Larrabee has been postponed.

[Madus_Maximus 0]

As with everything. It's down to the software more so than the hardware at the end of the day. The reason even IBM super computers run AMD CPU's is because most software is written for x86, not RISC. Even still, those IBM machines still run POWER CPU's along side the Opterons with a custom flavour of Linux that runs on both RISC and x86.

Multiple threads and cores on the desktop right now is a mess. There's not really much software out there beyond professional stuff that uses parallel programming properly. Looking at the Mac side of things with Snow Leopard, they have something called "Grand Central Dispatch" which is a set of API's for developers to piggy back onto that controls all the multithreaded workloads (so they don't have to code their own) to optimise performance. Then you have OpenCL which sllows GPU's to be used for the same tasks as CPU's. This is a MASSIVE performance improvement for things like video encoding, considering GPU's tend to be massively threaded and built for video specific tasks. A GeForce 9400 can perform as well as 2 Quad Core Xeons for video rendering... if the software takes advantage that is.

The big irony here is that x86 CPU's are now retrofitting a lot of the tech the RISC CPU's used all those years ago. Developers ignored RISC because they were harder (and there fore more expensive) to code for because of the multiple threads and so on, now we have that very same issue on x86. Interesting how things turn out eh?

Edited December 20, 2009 by Madus_Maximus

[echo1 0]

As with everything. It's down to the software more so than the hardware at the end of the day. The reason even IBM super computers run AMD CPU's is because most software is written for x86, not RISC. Even still, those IBM machines still run POWER CPU's along side the Opterons with a custom flavour of Linux that runs on both RISC and x86.

Do you mean that the code is optimized for operation on x86? Because nobody actually writes software in architechture-specific assembly code anymore, it's all in higher level languages.

[Madus_Maximus 0]

Do you mean that the code is optimized for operation on x86? Because nobody actually writes software in architechture-specific assembly code anymore, it's all in higher level languages.

Not so much that, but the way they're written to take advantage of the multiple threads and so on. Look at things like the SunSPARC CPU's, they have 64 threads per core and 2-4 cores per CPU (or something similar). On a single thread basis, something like a Core 2 Duo will decimate them in terms of performance, but if that software is written for true multi-threading rather than one or two at a time, the SunSPARC CPU absolutely obliterates any Intel (or AMD) on the market.

If you write the software properly from the beginning you get more out of it in the end, and those more powerful peices of hardware can be scaled more. Look how poor performance is (comparitively) on the i7's in most games, then look how a Core 2 Quad/Duo performs in the same game. They're more or less the same dispite the i7 being a much more powerful chip, but the software isn't made to take advantage of those extra cores and threads and so on, so it bottlenecks and dissapoints (then makes you think you wasted your money on it for a gaming rig lol).

One thing I find quite interesting with all this is that AMD are actually leading the way in terms of tech and architecture. Intel just happen to be able to implement AMD's ideas on a much larger scale than AMD because they have a much larger fab capacity. The "revolutionary" design of the Nehalem CPU's is VERY VERY VERY similar to the Opterons, Intel just manage to get them smaller and to the production stage faster and have much more marketing weight behind them. AMD have been focusing more on the server market recently, but when they start to focus on the desktop market again we'll see them slowly claw their way back up, much like they did with ATI. NVIDIA had a nice stretch with no real competition, now look at the 5XXX series.

[bangtail 0]

Not so much that, but the way they're written to take advantage of the multiple threads and so on. Look at things like the SunSPARC CPU's, they have 64 threads per core and 2-4 cores per CPU (or something similar). On a single thread basis, something like a Core 2 Duo will decimate them in terms of performance, but if that software is written for true multi-threading rather than one or two at a time, the SunSPARC CPU absolutely obliterates any Intel (or AMD) on the market.

If you write the software properly from the beginning you get more out of it in the end, and those more powerful peices of hardware can be scaled more. Look how poor performance is (comparitively) on the i7's in most games, then look how a Core 2 Quad/Duo performs in the same game. They're more or less the same dispite the i7 being a much more powerful chip, but the software isn't made to take advantage of those extra cores and threads and so on, so it bottlenecks and dissapoints (then makes you think you wasted your money on it for a gaming rig lol).

One thing I find quite interesting with all this is that AMD are actually leading the way in terms of tech and architecture. Intel just happen to be able to implement AMD's ideas on a much larger scale than AMD because they have a much larger fab capacity. The "revolutionary" design of the Nehalem CPU's is VERY VERY VERY similar to the Opterons, Intel just manage to get them smaller and to the production stage faster and have much more marketing weight behind them. AMD have been focusing more on the server market recently, but when they start to focus on the desktop market again we'll see them slowly claw their way back up, much like they did with ATI. NVIDIA had a nice stretch with no real competition, now look at the 5XXX series.

The 5 series for about another month before Fermi (and thats only the 448SP version) shows up and demolishes it. As far as AMD leading the way in CPU design, that's a very uninformed statement.

If there was any truth to it you can believe AMD would be suing left right and center. Intel's R&D dwarfs AMD's, that's the simple reason Intel have been ahead since the days of the DX4/100.

The only thing AMD has tried to sue Intel for lately is "unfair competition" (AKA : AMD are sore losers)

i7s yield very large gains over C2D/Q etc when it comes to CPU bound games such as RTS.

Edited February 16, 2010 by BangTail

[echo1 0]

As far as AMD leading the way in CPU design, that's a very uninformed statement.

See all the 'new' features in the Core i7? AMD had them almost a decade before Intel did.

If there was any truth to it you can believe AMD would be suing left right and center.

Situational awareness fail. AMD and Intel have had a deal since the 286 days whereby they share improvements to the x86 architecture with each other. That's why, to use one example of many, Intel has almost exactly the same 64-bit extensions that AMD came up with originally.

Intel's R&D dwarfs AMD's, that's the simple reason Intel have been ahead since the days of the DX4/100.

Two words: Pentium 4.

The only thing AMD has tried to sue Intel for lately is "unfair competition" (AKA : AMD are sore losers)

Yawn, troll/retard argument. There's no way you properly compete with a company like Intel when they engage in the sort of anti-competitive behavior that's been documented on previous pages here.

[bangtail 0]

See all the 'new' features in the Core i7? AMD had them almost a decade before Intel did.

And? What does it matter even if it were true. Intel still has the fastest CPU on the market and AMD is always behind when it comes to getting things to market these days.

Your claim isn't exactly a glowing endorsement regarding AMD's supposed ingenuity.

Situational awareness fail. AMD and Intel have had a deal since the 286 days whereby they share improvements to the x86 architecture with each other. That's why, to use one example of many, Intel has almost exactly the same 64-bit extensions that AMD came up with originally.

And yet, presently, Intel's i7 chips are considerably faster than anything AMD has on offer (as usual).

Two words: Pentium 4.

One chip, so what - should I list all of AMD's second (AKA Last) placers now?

Yawn, troll/retard argument. There's no way you properly compete with a company like Intel when they engage in the sort of anti-competitive behavior that's been documented on previous pages here.

Of course, as AMD did. If you can't win, whine that the guy who is repeatedly beating you isn't playing fair. Sour grapes and all that.

I'm getting a little sick and tired of you labelling arguments you don't happen to agree with as "retard" arguments. You might want to rethink that.

It isn't dependant on whether you approve of the level of discourse or not, just lose the ad hom attacks, they aren't necessary.

Thanks in advance.

/10 chars

Edited February 16, 2010 by BangTail
Clarity

[Madus_Maximus 0]

"Of course, as AMD did. If you can't win, whine that the guy who is beating you isn't playing fair. Sour grapes and all that."

That's the thing though, Intel WEREN'T playing fair. A €2billion fine by the EU courts goes some way to show that point, and they're being investigated by the US DoJ too for the same thing.

[bangtail 0]

"Of course, as AMD did. If you can't win, whine that the guy who is beating you isn't playing fair. Sour grapes and all that."

That's the thing though, Intel WEREN'T playing fair. A €2billion fine by the EU courts goes some way to show that point, and they're being investigated by the US DoJ too for the same thing.

There is no "fair play" in business.

The most ruthless and underhanded people always win, that's business for you.

If you have some misguided belief that business (or life in general) has anything to do with "fair", time to re-evaluate your assessment

Edited February 28, 2010 by BangTail

[echo1 0]

Don't agree with you at all. AMD is always behind when it comes to getting things to market and that's all that matters in the final analysis.

I present to you a fact. Your come back is "I don't agree" without explaining why. Is that a thinly-veiled concession of defeat, or are you really that clueless?

And so what if AMD did have these "new features", AMD's chips are still almost always inferior to Intel's.

Quantify 'inferior'.

And yet, presently, Intel's chips are considerably faster than anything AMD has on offer (as usual).

And yet Opterons have trashed Xeons in the server market in the past few years. Apparently there are more ways of quantifying the quality of hardware than in terms of how many FPS the computer can run Crysis at.

One chip, so what - should I list all of AMD's second (AKA Last) placers now?

The Pentium 4 was more than a second placer, it was a failure of truly epic and historical proportions. Nothing that AMD, or indeed just about any other CPU manufacturer ever made could compare with the cynical attempt to produce a deliberately inefficient design because it was easy to market. To make matters even worse, they continued to milk it for 2-3 after they came up with a laptop processor (Pentium M) that trashed it.

Of course, as AMD did, if you can't win, whine that the guy who is beating you isn't playing fair. Sour grapes and all that.

So you think that large companies who use their influence to bully small companies out of the market should be tolerated?

Im getting a little sick of you labelling arguments you don't happen to agree with "retard" arguments. You might want to rethink that.

I have no problem respecting people who have different opinions to me as long as they have some semblence of logic behind them. The fact is that you come in to a thread and accuse everyone of being idiots when if fact your own point of view is that of a 13 y/o Intel fanboy. 'comebacks' such as "I don't agree, lol" demonstrate that you really don't know what you're on about.

[Madus_Maximus 0]

There is no "fair play" in business.

The most ruthless and underhanded people always win, that's business for you.

If you have some misguided belief that business (or life in general) has anything to do with "fair", stay the hell away from business ;)

Yes there are, that's why there's laws governing it. Intel was and is a monopoly, there's even stricter laws they have to abide by due to that. They broke those laws, they got called out on it and are €2billion less well off. It's just a slap on the wrist compared to what they make, but short of splitting the company up or forcing them to cease trading there's not much else they can do.

[[frl]myke 14]

stuff

Ok, Intels i7 are mosters, performancewise. Have to agree to that, no doubt. AMD hasn't a CPU that can compete with those.

But how about comparing them in the same wightclass? In this case, better called price segment?

Let's see....AMD's actual Topmodel being the Phenom II X4 965. For the same price you'll get a Intel Core i5 650.

Ok, let's search them here:

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

The AMD you'll find on rank 42 with 4257 points. For the Intel you may have to scroll down...rank 90 with 3129 points.

So you get a better CPU from AMD as you could get from Intel for the same price. Thats how CPU's should be compared.

Or would you also compare a flyweight Boxer with a heavyweight Champion? I guess not.

And don't forget: Athlon XP was superior at it's time, Opteron was superior to Intel at it's time. AMD released the first native Dualcores while Intel just glued 2 Singlecores together. AMD released 64bit tech to the wide public prior to Intel. AMD moved memory controller to the CPU long before Intel catched up.

And also remember that with a AM2 Motherboard, chances are good that with a BIOS update, you can use a todays AM3 CPU. And this Socket was introduced in May 2006. How are chances to find a new CPU for a Intel socket mainboard from the same time?

But i'm sure, where you live you get Motherboards for free. ;)

[echo1 0]

...on a lighter note.

Last week saw the announcement of the latest generation of the Intel "Itanic", released a mere two-three years later than promised. From the press release -

"Intel is continuing to drive the economics of Moore's Law into mission-critical computing with today's Itanium 9300 processor"

"Customers need a flexible technology infrastructure that can efficiently and quickly meet changing mission-critical demands"

Translated into English -

"Oh dear God we've wasted so much money on these, can someone other than HP please buy this shit?!"

Edited February 16, 2010 by echo1

[bangtail 0]

I have no problem respecting people who have different opinions to me as long as they have some semblence of logic behind them. The fact is that you come in to a thread and accuse everyone of being idiots when if fact your own point of view is that of a 13 y/o Intel fanboy. 'comebacks' such as "I don't agree, lol" demonstrate that you really don't know what you're on about.

Actually, it seems as though you do. This is illustrated by your insistence on trying to use insolence as opposed to discussion and respecting someone's right to a different opinion.

I never called anyone an idiot. I labelled one person's comment "a very uninformed statement", which, IMHO, it was.

I'll concede that claiming "AMD is always behind" is a bit unfair and not always true, so I'll retract that contention.

Most of the reviews I have seen regarding Opteron vs Xeon are a pretty mixed bag and there is nothing that suggests the outright "thrashing" you've been alluding to.

Lastly, in line with your inability to quote properly, I never said "I don't agree lol".

I said "Don't agree with you at all" and I still don't. Even if Intel copied AMD's architecture nm for nm (and I don't think that's been conclusively proven), AMD is still the runner up in the CPU wars (for now).

Whatever AMD may or may not have had does not compete well with Intel's flagship CPU (i7). I hope that makes what I said a little clearer to you. I certainly was not conceding the point.

Finally, you don't afford people courtesy based on your biased assesment of their opinions. I have not insulted or berated you, so show me the same courtesy.

We are having a discussion, we probably won't agree on much, but we can keep it civil.

Resorting to calling me a fanboy is equally puerile as I could say the same thing about you. I've owned plenty of AMD (and ATI) in my time and I would be more than happy if AMD produced a real contender to battle the i7.

Competition is always good for the consumer at the end of the day.

Cheers

Edited February 17, 2010 by BangTail

[Deadfast 43]

AMD always was more of the economical choice, rather performance-based one.

Why throw all your money away on the best thing on the market when you can buy something slightly less powerful for marginally less money.

[Herbal Influence 10]

....

Competition is always good for the consumer at the end of the day.

Cheers

Yeah, but Intel tried heavily to ERASE competition and got fined for it.

Maybe they just had Microsoft as an idol for such behaviour.:o

New marketing trick from Intel, announced in Germany today (heise.de) is:

Sponsor some OpenSource projects:

The community of computer specialists are typically Linux fans.

They decide in every company which cpus to buy.

That's my opinion after Intels years of close cooperation with Microsoft which has to invest in Malaria-Fighting for regaining good reputation (because OpenSource sponsoring wouldn't pay out for them :p ).

This thread started with:

If you are an informed, democratic, free thinking customer: Think twice before buying or promoting Intel who tried to erase sober competition.

Edited February 16, 2010 by Herbal Influence

[bangtail 0]

Yeah, but Intel tried heavily to ERASE competition and got fined for it.

Maybe they just had Microsoft as an idol for such behaviour.:o

New marketing trick from Intel, announced in Germany today (heise.de) is:

Sponsor some OpenSource projects:

The community of computer specialists are typically Linux fans.

They decide in every company which cpus to buy.

That's my opinion after Intels years of close cooperation with Microsoft which has to invest in Malaria-Fighting for regaining good reputation (because OpenSource sponsoring wouldn't pay out for them :p ).

This thread started with:

If you are an informed, democratic, free thinking customer: Think twice before buying or promoting Intel who tried to erase sober competition.

I'm all for competition. If Intel uses dirty tricks, then AMD must do the same. What's good for the goose etc.

The "Intel is buying Nvidia" rumour has been floating around again. Intel wants into the GPU market and Larabee won't cut it so better to just purchase Nvidia.

Intel rarely, if ever, enters or remains in a market where it can't maintain dominance.

Edited February 17, 2010 by BangTail

[echo1 0]

I never called anyone an idiot. I labelled one person's comment "a very uninformed statement", which, IMHO, it was.

Actually, you replied to a statement of merit with a load of ones that did not. Then when I picked you up on, you said it was irrelevant. Talk about moving the goalposts.

Lastly, in line with your inability to quote properly, I never said "I don't agree lol".

Welcome to Internet Humor. Lurk moar.

I said "Don't agree with you at all" and I still don't. Even if Intel copied AMD's architecture nm for nm (and I don't think that's been conclusively proven), AMD is still the runner up in the CPU wars.

What does that mean? Last I checked the CPU wars are still going on. There's nothing to stop them releasing an i7 killer tomorrow.

Resorting to calling me a fanboy is equally puerile as I could say the same thing about you. I've owned plenty of AMD (and ATI) in my time and I would be more than happy if AMD produced a real contender to battle the i7.

Well, given claims that AMD were 'sore losers' for complaining against Intel's anticompetitive behavior, one could be forgiven for thinking that you were an Intel fanboy.

And if you read some of the stuff I've posted on previous pages on the thread, you'd realize I'm no AMD fanboy.

[bangtail 0]

Well, given claims that AMD were 'sore losers' for complaining against Intel's anticompetitive behavior, one could be forgiven for thinking that you were an Intel fanboy.

And if you read some of the stuff I've posted on previous pages on the thread, you'd realize I'm no AMD fanboy.

I'm no fanboy of any brand. I want the fastest/best and I don't care what logo is on the box.

I suspect some of the arguing on the last page was just crossed wires, so let's just move on :)

Edited February 16, 2010 by BangTail

[echo1 0]

New marketing trick from Intel, announced in Germany today (heise.de) is:

Sponsor some OpenSource projects:

The community of computer specialists are typically Linux fans.

They decide in every company which cpus to buy.

I don't think Linux users are that stupid. The reality is that a lot of big companies support open source software in order to provide the groundwork for the proprietary stuff. Hell, even Microsoft has contributed code to the Linux kernel so that Linux will work better with their virtualization techs.

I suspect some of the arguing on the last page was just crossed wires, so let's just move on

Agreed.

Edited February 16, 2010 by echo1

[Herbal Influence 10]

I don't think Linux users are that stupid.

[\QUOTE]

Neither do I, considering myself as one of them. :o

There is no need to be stupid to fall for professional marketing methods.

They (Intel, Apple, Microsoft, etc.) employ psychologists, sociologists, lawyers and splatter us all over with that kind of marketing that is needed for the very group adressed.

And that 24h/7days with millions of Dollars.

Professional marketing even achieved to sell toxic papers to (quite?) well educated bankers all over the world.

Well, I put under this term also: Illegal or close to illegal competition practises, I must admit.

They work on your decision to buy (45 min?) a 24h/7days.

Edited February 17, 2010 by Herbal Influence

[echo1 0]

Oh noes, I better go wrap my Intel-powered laptop in tinfoil.