AMD's Crossroads by RAM

Post by **MikeC** » Thu Jun 12, 2008 7:38 am

AMD's Crossroads by RAM -- an insightful series of interviews.

blackworx · Post by **blackworx** » Thu Jun 12, 2008 11:38 am

Excellent - cheers for the link Mike

colm · Post by **colm** » Fri Jun 13, 2008 4:47 am

"If ya can't beat 'em, turn it into a screaming lunatic."

That must be quoted from somebody at amd...

joking aside, as a regular shmuck who dove into pcs when they started becoming real for regular folks like myself, no intense phd necessary...
AMD's winner is the vid cards. The cpus, along with my friends opinion: there is something precise that goes a missing...
Anyway, optimistically,Why they never mention the video decode/encode is bizarre.That ought to be thier pride all by itself. A big os company could bridge it integrated...wallah. Billionarism in the sick world of pc hardware acheived..
Does anyone remember the rage lt pro with mpeg2/dvd support? its been 11 years since that card. That one ati maneuvre has kept my faith in the pc for 10 years...
Don't stop it now amd....
"Avivo" is the only thing left that has me going machine scrapping hog wild for an upgrade over anymore.
I may never trust the cpus ever again. (sorry)

MikeK · Post by **MikeK** » Fri Jun 13, 2008 10:21 am

I had a Rage LT Pro 8MB SGRAM with DFP (precursor to DVI) for my early model 15" LCD monitor

I played a lot of Quake on that believe it or not.

I agree about the video cards. I have always liked ATI better than nVidia and it has been odd to see nVidia held up by everyone as the best thing. AMD will be ok. They have some exciting things coming out for laptops with their Puma platform. Consumers may have some bias now towards Intel but the computer makers don't really care I think so they'll be back. There is also continuing news on fair trade issues with Intel giving big rebates to companies that made deals to use their chips exclusively.

azadian · Post by **azadian** » Fri Jun 20, 2008 1:28 am

I'm ticked off that it is practically impossible to actually purchase an AMD mobile CPU. It seems the only way to do it is to buy a laptop. So if I want to do something half-way creative like build a low-power, low-noise, desktop or server, AMD is effectively not an option.

They're in the business of building and selling CPUs, so I'm not interested in hearing a lot of executive-speak mumbo-jumbo about flat markets and strategic areas. I'd rather buy my CPU from them, but if they won't sell me one, then I have to go elsewhere. An object lesson in how to annoy your best customers.

MikeK · Post by **MikeK** » Fri Jun 20, 2008 6:15 am

Well, their best customer is probably Dell and the like, but I agree.

jaganath · Post by **jaganath** » Fri Jun 20, 2008 8:10 am

I'm ticked off that it is practically impossible to actually purchase an AMD mobile CPU. It seems the only way to do it is to buy a laptop. So if I want to do something half-way creative like build a low-power, low-noise, desktop or server, AMD is effectively not an option.

this is just nonsense. why exactly would you buy a mobile CPU when you can just undervolt a desktop chip? take something like a BE-2400 or 4850e (45W), undervolt it down to the lowest stable voltage at whatever speed is sufficient for the tasks the PC/server is intended to spend most of its time executing (~2GHz for most people), you can usually take the voltage sub-1.0V at this speed, a 20% reduction in voltage will reduce power consumption by 40% or more, so TDP is now in the <25W region, which is exactly the same as the mobile chips.

mobile on desktop (MoDT) is dead, desktop chips have caught up so much in performance per watt that the added expense and hassle of MoDT doesn't pass any sensible cost/benefit analysis.

Post by **MikeC** » Fri Jun 20, 2008 9:36 am

jaganath wrote:mobile on desktop (MoDT) is dead, desktop chips have caught up so much in performance per watt that the added expense and hassle of MoDT doesn't pass any sensible cost/benefit analysis.

Agreed.

The point of posting the link to these interviews is that they provide insights about AMD beyond the headlines about job cuts and AMD vs. Intel CPU benchmarks. It's obvious to me, reading the interviews, that they do have a plan they're sticking to, they will survive these turbulent times, and they will offer strong alternatives in desktop, server, mobile and video cards to Intel and nVidia in the market that counts the most -- the broad middle.

AMD's Crossroads by RAM

AMD's Crossroads by RAM

mobile CPUs