SoylentNews

Pre-emptive MERGE: Interview with AMD CEO Lisa Su

takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

http://www.anandtech.com/show/11177/making-amd-tick-a-very-zen-interview-with-dr-lisa-su-ceo [anandtech.com]

Q5: How vital was it to support Simultaneous Multi Threading?

LS: I think it was very important. I think it was very complicated! Our goal was to have a very balanced architecture. We wanted high single threaded performance, and SMT was important given where the competition is. We didn't want to apologize for anything with Zen – we wanted high single thread, we wanted many cores, but sorry we don't have SMT? We didn't want to say that, we wanted to be ambitious and give ourselves the time to get it done.

[...] Q8: Do you find that OEMs that haven't worked with AMD are suddenly coming on board?

LS: I will say that we have engagements with every OEM now on the high-performance space. Twelve months ago, a number of them would have said that they don't have the resources to do multiple platforms. So yes, I think momentum helps in this space.

Q9: At Intel's recent Investor Day we learned that future chips will incorporate multiple dies on the same package. This allows a semiconductor firm to focus on smaller chips and potentially better yields at the expense of some latency. Given what we predict will happen, what is your opinion on having large 600mm2 silicon? Is there a future?

LS: There has been a lot of debate on this topic. I find it a very interesting debate. Certainly on the graphics side we view High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) and the ability to get that interconnect between the GPU and memory to be extremely differentiating. So certainly we will use that throughout our graphics roadmap. If you look at our CPU roadmap, I do think there's a case to be made for multi-chip modules. It depends on the trade-offs you have to do, the bandwidth requirements you have, but yes as the process technology becomes more complicated, breaking up the tasks does make sense.

The day of reckoning.

AMD Ryzen 7 Launches

takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

Reviews and benchmarks [anandtech.com] for AMD's Ryzen 7 8-core desktop CPUs flooded out at 9 AM EST/6 AM PST:

Along with the new microarchitecture, Zen is the first CPU from AMD to be launched on GlobalFoundries' 14nm process, which is semi-licenced from Samsung. At a base overview, the process should offer 30% better efficiency over the 28nm HKMG (high-k metal gate) process used at TSMC for previous products. One of the issues facing AMD these past few years has been Intel's prowess in manufacturing, first at 22nm and then at 14nm - both using iterative FinFET generations. This gave an efficiency and die-size deficit to AMD through no real fault of their own: redesigning older Bulldozer-derived products for a smaller process is both difficult and gives a lot of waste, depending on how the microarchitecture as designed. Moving to GloFo' 14nm on FinFET, along with a new microarchitecture designed for this specific node, is one stepping stone to playing the game of high-end CPU performance.

[How about a table here for Ryzen 7 chips, Ryzen 5 1600X, and maybe some Intel chips thrown in? I will make the table]

Ryzen 5 chips will be released sometime in "Q2", and are presumed to have 4 to 6 cores with hyperthreading enabled. One of these has been revealed: the Ryzen 5 1600X. It has 6 cores, and equivalent clock (3.6 GHz) and turbo (4.0 GHz) speeds to the $500 8-core flagship Ryzen 7 1800X. Ryzen 3 chips will be released in the second half of the year, and include quad-cores with no hyperthreading.

The Intel Core i7-7700K maintains a lead in single-threaded performance, but the Ryzen 7 chips lead in many multi-threaded benchmarks (sometimes beating the $1089 Intel Core i7-6900K).

Also at Tom's Hardware [tomshardware.com] (which includes gaming benchmarks, unlike the AnandTech review), Ars Technica [arstechnica.com] ("AMD Ryzen is an excellent workstation CPU—shame its gaming performance is weak"), PCWorld [pcworld.com], HEXUS [hexus.net].

Previously: New Details of AMD's Desktop Zen/"Ryzen" Chips Released [soylentnews.org]
AMD Ryzen Processor Hype is Building [soylentnews.org]

Original Submission #1  Original Submission #2