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AMD's Zen CPUs to feature up to 32 cores and 8-channel DDR4

As someone who's still chugging along with an FX-8350 and 8gb of DDR3 with a Raptor HDD, i'm really looking forward to my first big upgrade in a few years. Zen FX Cpu, 16gb DDR4, 1tb SSD.

They're just taking so damn long!

I gotta give you the shout out for still having a WD Raptor. Those things were pretty cray back in the dark ages before we had SSDs.

Intel has 8c16t chips, but they cost over $1000 each. If AMD can provide comparable performance at regular i7 prices or the 6c12t chip at i5 prices they'll be WAY more than just competitive.

The thing is AMD doesn't actually want to go bankrupt. There's no reason to assume they wouldn't price their CPUs pretty close to Intel, probably undercut by a small margin, if they had performance similar to Intel. AMD has been circling the drain for years financially, now they actually might have something that can compete with Intel, they would be stupid to not charge almost as much as Intel to maximize profits.

Just for fun, the cinebench comparison in the marketing materials can be extrapolated to mean the Zen 8C is around 5820K.

This is pretty impressive if true, but if AMD requires 8 cores to match the 6 core 5820K they will be starting behind the curve already since Haswell-E will finally be retired and replaced by Broadwell-E this year.
 

desu

Member
The thing is AMD doesn't actually want to go bankrupt. There's no reason to assume they wouldn't price their CPUs pretty close to Intel, probably undercut by a small margin, if they had performance similar to Intel. AMD has been circling the drain for years financially, now they actually might have something that can compete with Intel, they would be stupid to not charge almost as much as Intel to maximize profits.

So much this. It seems like everyone is expecting to get slightly below intels top cpu performance for a bargain price and I don't see why this should be happening if AMD can just price their cpus slightly below Intel.

Still hoping for a pretty strong Zen so that we finally get some real competition in the cpu market again, its direly needed.
 

Arkanius

Member
I keep getting hyped for Zen but I need to keep my expectations in check.

AMD is very much more consumer friendly and I really wanted Zen to be an all rounder powerful beast, but I doubt it will happen. Multi-threading still isn't ready.
 

Renekton

Member
So much this. It seems like everyone is expecting to get slightly below intels top cpu performance for a bargain price and I don't see why this should be happening if AMD can just price their cpus slightly below Intel.
Assuming GF yields are good (hah), they have to underprice it more than slightly because Intel has all the mindshare.
 
The thing is AMD doesn't actually want to go bankrupt. There's no reason to assume they wouldn't price their CPUs pretty close to Intel, probably undercut by a small margin, if they had performance similar to Intel. AMD has been circling the drain for years financially, now they actually might have something that can compete with Intel, they would be stupid to not charge almost as much as Intel to maximize profits.

If AMD tries to play that strategy then they're destined to fail. Their brand is too weak at this point to afford selling CPUs that are slightly worse than Intel's at prices that are slightly lower, since at that point most would probably just go for the Intel option. If AMD wants to make a splash with Zen, they need to significantly undercut Intel, otherwise they're just going to be ignored yet again.
 

Thraktor

Member
The thing is AMD doesn't actually want to go bankrupt. There's no reason to assume they wouldn't price their CPUs pretty close to Intel, probably undercut by a small margin, if they had performance similar to Intel. AMD has been circling the drain for years financially, now they actually might have something that can compete with Intel, they would be stupid to not charge almost as much as Intel to maximize profits.

I certainly don't expect them to sell 5960X-matching parts for the price of the 6700K, but their most profitable route isn't necessarily to only undercut Intel marginally. You have to keep in mind that in the two markets which Summit Ridge is targeting (mid/high-end gaming PCs and high-end desktops/entry-level workstations) AMD has literally zero marketshare. They don't have a single product in those categories at the moment, and unless they expand their market share substantially, it won't matter how high their gross margins are, they still won't be pulling in enough revenue for it to matter.

The bigger their price advantage over Intel, the quicker they can gain marketshare, so they have to balance this against their margins to maximise their overall profit. Coming from a standing start in a fairly high-margin sector, with the advantage of smaller dies with no IGP, and with a bias towards growth for long-term profitability, I can certainly see AMD pricing Summit Ridge very aggressively. Of course, this depends on the real-world performance of Zen, and wafer cost and yields on 14nm, so it may be that even with aggressive pricing the IPC gains aren't sufficient for gaming (which is still far from ideally multithreaded), but with near-trivial performance growth in Intel's consumer desktop CPUs over the past few years there's every opportunity for AMD to put out a product line which brings them back into the fold in this sector.
 

Durante

Member
Just for fun, the cinebench comparison in the marketing materials can be extrapolated to mean the Zen 8C is around 5820K.
If AMD can get even just close to a 5820k in realistic workloads with any of their desktop chips that will already be a huge shakeup for the CPU landscape. Over the past 8 years or so there simply hasn't been any incentive to go AMD on a desktop on the mid- to upper end of the performance ladder.

I remain skeptical simply because they haven't executed in that market for such a long time.
 

amardilo

Member
Is there any news on if Zen motherboards will support Thunderbolt and will have Thunderbolt headers?

I haven't built a PC since 2002 so I'm way out of the loop but I'd like to get back into it and I have a Apple Thunderbolt display and I'd like to keep my monitor (well I just don't want to buy a new one).
 

Thraktor

Member
Is there any news on if Zen motherboards will support Thunderbolt and will have Thunderbolt headers?

I haven't built a PC since 2002 so I'm way out of the loop but I'd like to get back into it and I have a Apple Thunderbolt display and I'd like to keep my monitor (well I just don't want to buy a new one).

If they do it's more likely to be Thunderbolt 3, which uses the USB Type-C connector and isn't likely to be compatible with your Thunderbolt display. You should be able to use anything with a DisplayPort output (via a DisplayPort to mini-DisplayPort cable) with your display, although you wouldn't be able to use the USB ports, etc., which are built into the display.

Edit: Or maybe not, looking online there seem to be conflicting reports as to whether you can run a DisplayPort signal into the Thunderbolt display. I'd do a fair bit of research (or simply test it with any device which has DisplayPort output) before going ahead with buying/building a PC which may or may not work with the display.
 

NeOak

Member
I keep getting hyped for Zen but I need to keep my expectations in check.

AMD is very much more consumer friendly and I really wanted Zen to be an all rounder powerful beast, but I doubt it will happen. Multi-threading still isn't ready.
It's happening. Consoles are forcing to multithread everything that can be due to the low IPC of the Jaguar cores.
 

SRG01

Member
Have you seen AMD financially? They are in way more trouble if Zen does not work out.

Yes, of course I have. http://www.streetinsider.com/ec_earnings.php?q=AMD

They've weathered their disastrous '15 results and have multiple design wins (and good news) coming down the pipe. Unless both Zen and Polaris are utter failures, AMD has considerable room to grow in both CPU and GPU markets.

I'm pretty sure Intel has new processors coming late this year.

Even if AMD manage to reach Intel in performance I guess they have some As to play yet.

New processors and absolute performance aren't the deciding factor anymore. With declining YoY computer and laptop sales, the deciding factor is the price/performance ratio along with efficiency.

Look at it from a growth perspective: Intel, as a monopoly power, is faced with a declining x86/consumer PC market. They can't win more market share -- they're a monopoly! -- and they've already attempted to stem the bleeding of the PC market for years. That's why they've attempted to branch off into many areas in the past five to ten years; they knew that they'll hit a brick wall eventually. The nightmare scenario is that the declining PC market hits them before they can find another revenue stream -- which did indeed happen as demonstrated by their last earnings call.

Contrast that to AMD: they're not a monopoly power and working from a smaller position. Even if the overall market declines, any increase in market share will be immensely beneficial. For instance, if AMD wins back even 10% more of the market, that's huge for them whereas it's the opposite for Intel.

If AMD can get even just close to a 5820k in realistic workloads with any of their desktop chips that will already be a huge shakeup for the CPU landscape. Over the past 8 years or so there simply hasn't been any incentive to go AMD on a desktop on the mid- to upper end of the performance ladder.

I remain skeptical simply because they haven't executed in that market for such a long time.

I think matching the 4970k would be good enough to shake things up. I can't imagine many use-cases that would have a noticeable difference with 5xxx or 6xxx processors over their 4xxx predecessors, aside from video encoding.
 

ZOONAMI

Junior Member
I gotta give you the shout out for still having a WD Raptor. Those things were pretty cray back in the dark ages before we had SSDs.



The thing is AMD doesn't actually want to go bankrupt. There's no reason to assume they wouldn't price their CPUs pretty close to Intel, probably undercut by a small margin, if they had performance similar to Intel. AMD has been circling the drain for years financially, now they actually might have something that can compete with Intel, they would be stupid to not charge almost as much as Intel to maximize profits.



This is pretty impressive if true, but if AMD requires 8 cores to match the 6 core 5820K they will be starting behind the curve already since Haswell-E will finally be retired and replaced by Broadwell-E this year.

Broadwell e doesn't offer much over haswell e from what I've seen.
 
Just for fun, the cinebench comparison in the marketing materials can be extrapolated to mean the Zen 8C is around 5820K.

I have a 5820k. Best bang for the buck amongst the haswell-e HEDT offerings. I seriously don't see myself upgrading for at least 3-4 years. If they can offer something that meets or exceeds 5820k at a lower price level then it should sell like hotcakes.
 
Good lord at that WCF headline...
Clickbait level >9000.

Thermalright Co., Ltd.

For all AMD fans out there, we have good news. AMD has just informed us, that the new ‪#*AM4‬ CPUs will use the standard mounting holes that has become the norm since AM2. This means, all Thermalright coolers will be compatible to the new ‪#*Zen‬ processors.
https://www.facebook.com/thermalright/posts/10153794924514102

Very nice, since i want to buy a AiO watercooler for my FX8350 and will be able to keep it when/if I switch to Zen.
 

chaosblade

Unconfirmed Member
Yeah, I don't think they ever planned to work with him longer than that. Just wanted him to help design something to get them going in the right direction that they can build off of.
 

AmyS

Member
http://www.fudzilla.com/news/processors/40945-amd-working-on-7nm-48-core-processor

AMD working on 7nm 48 core processor

Fudzilla warned you that AMD's 32core / 64 tread X86 processor codenamed Naples is coming in 2017 to a server near you, but it looks like AMD has a 7nm product called Starship which will arrive soon afterwards.

Naples, named after a city famous for its bottlenecks and drivers that explode for no apparent reason, uses 14nm FinFET and has 32 cores and 64 thread processors. After AMD has got that out of the way, it is not going to 10nm, but will go for 7nm. This is quite an aggressive roadmap.

This server chip will have 48 cores and 96 thread support. There will be versions with fewer cores that will make it into mainstream servers and desktop computers.

Starship is still a concept project and if all goes well, you might see it as soon as 2018. When a company tells you it is doing something for 2018, this probably means late 2018, but it still sounds rather impressive.

I think it would be great if consoles (after PlayStation Neo and Xbox Scorpio) could have "just" a 16 core/32 thread Zen CPU with lots of room left over for the GPU, on 7nm in Fall 2020.
By then, the more efficient HBM2 with around 1.2 ~ 1.5 TB/sec bandwidth should be relatively inexpensive, and HBM3 / AMD NextGen memory will be the high-end for PCs.
 

DonMigs85

Member
Hmm, wonder if I should get the 14nm Zen or wait for the 7nm one. Anyway good to see they may not get left behind by 10nm Cannonlake for long. It was agonizing seeing them stuck on 28nm for so long.
 

chaosblade

Unconfirmed Member
Hmm, wonder if I should get the 14nm Zen or wait for the 7nm one. Anyway good to see they may not get left behind by 10nm Cannonlake for long. It was agonizing seeing them stuck on 28nm for so long.

I seriously doubt 7nm is very close at all. Probably several years at best, around the same time or slightly after Intel hits that node.
 

DonMigs85

Member
I seriously doubt 7nm is very close at all. Probably several years at best, around the same time or slightly after Intel hits that node.

If they can get it out by 2018 or 2019 it would be amazing, since Intel will likely still be stuck on 10nm then (Tigerlake in 2019 is supposed to be 10nm).
 
Hmm, wonder if I should get the 14nm Zen or wait for the 7nm one. Anyway good to see they may not get left behind by 10nm Cannonlake for long. It was agonizing seeing them stuck on 28nm for so long.

You do realize that nobody is even looking at volume production of 10 nm until 2018?

7nm might realistically not be until 2020 or later, and around 10 nm is where you actually run into the laws of physics where pure silicon probably can't be used anymore and a new material must be found.

Intel is saying they will not use silicon at 7 nm, period. And Intel isn't likely to share with anybody else what they'll be using so Samsung, TSMC, GloFo, etc. will have to figure out their own replacement materials.

This is a Fudzilla article anyways so lol

If they can get it out by 2018 or 2019 it would be amazing, since Intel will likely still be stuck on 10nm then (Tigerlake in 2019 is supposed to be 10nm).

If you think anybody will beat Intel to anything you're dreaming. Everyone else talks big, Intel is always first to new nodes and has been for decades.
 

V_Arnold

Member
What did AMD ever do to you, Unknown Soldier? :D
If there were a law that "someone was ahead of the curve, therefore they ALWAYS will be ahead of the curve", we would still be using Netscape, SEGA consoles, would eagerly await the dominance of Quake IX, and could not wait to check out what MySpace has to offer next.
 

DonMigs85

Member
AMD was actually process-competitive with Intel even shortly after GloFo was spun off. It was really only once Ivy Bridge came out that they were getting left behind by a lot.
 
I have a 5820k so I'll be set for quite some time. But I'm really intrigued to see what AMD is offering this time around. They haven't had a CPU worth talking about in some years.
 

Fularu

Banned
AMD shipped Fury X without HDMI 2.0 (plus other unfulfilled hype), as he got a nice 4K TV.

Yeah no, Soldier has been a good nVidia marine for as long as one can remember. He shits every AMD thread to the point where one has to wonder is some 9800 pro kid didn't mock him to hell and back for his shitty GeForce at the time.
 

BlazinAm

Junior Member
Latest is Jan 2017 I think. At Computex it was leaked the MSI Z2xx mobo would be ready in Nov 2016, plus AMD and Intel will supposedly show their stuff at CES beginning Jan.

(all rumors)


Oops. I see.

I'm just going by how Skylake and Broadwell were released.
 

AmyS

Member
AMD’s Naples processor enters prototyping phase

Naples has been spotted on Zauba’s reliable shipping database. The Summit Ridge platform is AMD’s mainstream platform with Zen architecture and 8 Core dies. Naples on the other hand is the codename of the server platform; the very same platform which will be rocking Zen in 32 core flavors.

This is not to be confused with the Zeppelin platform which will include a 32 Zen Core/Vega based APU as well. The 32 Zen cores are tied together using AMD’s very own Coherent Fabric. The homegrown interconnect will support data rates of upto 100GB/s which is alot faster than what the PCIe interface sustains (around 15GB/s).

Thanks to AMD’s lego-like build philosophy even Naples will actually be fabricated in an 8-core base design, with 16 and 32 core chips being produced in an MCM (Multi Chip Module) format. Up till now however, we had seen no real evidence (apart from the usual documentation) that such a monster processor was actually on the charts in the near future. The shipping entry is marked 20th June 2016 and lists the Naples Test Board. It is marked FOC which I assume stands for ‘Full Operational Capability’ meaning AMD has achieved a significant milestone in its Zen roadmap. Just a few days ago, the company has also celebrated their Vega 10 roll out, and this news fits in nicely with that as well.

http://wccftech.com/amd-naples-32-core-zen/
 

DonMigs85

Member
The rumored quad core Zen sounds intriguing - if it's priced around Core i5-6500 levels I might get that. 8 threads, 2MB total L2 cache and 8MB L3. Base clock of 2.8GHz seems a bit low though.
 

thelastword

Banned
This is not to be confused with the Zeppelin platform which will include a 32 Zen Core/Vega based APU as well. The 32 Zen cores are tied together using AMD’s very own Coherent Fabric. The homegrown interconnect will support data rates of upto 100GB/s which is alot faster than what the PCIe interface sustains (around 15GB/s).
And that right there is what I've been saying is a huge benefit to closed systems, better and faster pipelines to memory/cpu/gpu. 100GB's is just insane and soon the limits of dedicated graphics and memory buses will somehow come into question, when games are made for said architecture. The PS4 interconnect also had higher bandwidth over a traditional PCiE bus and other pc pipelines, which has been one of it's strengths. Especially utilized by first party software......

Hopefully the iterative consoles can house a Zeppelin light with an 8 core zen APU w Vega, and remain compatible with prior consoles. That'd be a nice boost over the cpu's and gpu's in current consoles. It would also be nice that both iterative consoles ship with 12Gb's of ram, where a full 8Gb is dedicated to games and each manufacturer have 4Gb to do all things OS related. If that happens I can guarantee that games using much more Vram will be common going forward, hence my advice not to buy a 4-6Gb card in 2016. Memory is too cheap to not add an additional 4GB's atm.
 
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