Who Controls the User Experience? AMD’s Carrizo Thoroughly Tested
by Ian Cutress on February 4, 2016 8:00 AM ESTNegative Feedback Loops: How To Escape the Pit
During my time with AMD, a few things came out as painfully obvious. Everyone seemed enthusiastic, jubilant, and willing to talk to the ends of the earth about the product, the design, the team and the ideas, even with that sense of humbleness and humility. Meetings easily stretched into hours, and there is a great positive vibe among the employees that they have good products to use and good people to hold on to. There was little pomp and show, and no-one seemed overly worried about AMD’s recent financial news or exploits, such as the sale and lease-back of property or the movement in and out of key personnel.
Everyone was excited to be in the moment, and one person who exemplified this was Raja Koduri, who heads up the Radeon Technologies Group (RTG). I wasn’t scheduled to meet with Raja during my trip, as APUs/laptops and graphics are different departments internally, but it was by sheer coincidence that he was in town for a couple of days while I was, and I bumped into him in my hotel. We shared an uber into the office, and I talked his ear off about AMD, the perception and the future. If I had my head screwed on I might have recorded the conversation, but it was clear in Raja’s responses that AMD is always looking ahead. While we are worrying about reviewing 2015 products, 2016 is almost done and engineers are working on 2017’s lineup and the march is set. Next generation parts, new process nodes, the whole lot – everyone seems to be excited to be designing new technology. It could be argued that every company is like this, but given AMD’s recent financial news I did not expect my conversations to be so buoyant, active, and everyone seemed to be happy to put in long hours where needed. The only thing they really wanted is more people – with more people they could do more things.
Having positivity, hope, and genuinely dedicated employees is one thing. Having the right product that sells is another, and more often than not it comes down to a single individual making one or two critical decisions that can affect a product line, a launch, or the perception of the company. One could postulate that the main goal for any company is to stay afloat, to keep the bank balance in the black (which provides a return for shareholders and increases the value of the company). This can be done in a number of ways, but typically it comes down to revenue, profit and margins. To put it another way, a company needs sales, efficiency and repeat business, which creates a positive feedback loop.
Specifically talking about AMD, AMD’s goal is to sell more products. This could be through diversification or innovation, but selling more at a higher efficiency keeps the company going. If users like the product, they keep buying the next one, and the next one. A user (consumer or enterprise) needs to buy a device from an OEM, and an OEM has the same goal – sales and efficiency. So they want both the cheapest option that will get the biggest margin. AMD needs to keep the OEMs happy as well, so they keep buying their products.
So Consider This
| Stage 1 | AMD has had two mobile platforms for several years. If we pick the last generation – Kaveri and Beema, these were two different platforms, using two different core sets, two different chipsets and two different designs. Kaveri and Beema addressed different markets, with a small intersection. |
| Stage 2 | A major OEM says designing two different platforms is expensive, meaning designing AMD systems is expensive. The OEM wants AMD to simplify costs to help their bottom line, and doing so would maintain a healthy relationship. This would allow OEMs to make one design for one chassis, and adjust the APU/firmware as needed without much effort and no need to design two motherboards, two sets of power delivery, and so on. |
| Stage 3 | AMD does this with Carrizo and Carrizo-L. The APUs are pin compatible, with Carrizo-L using Puma+ cores but limited in terms of TDP, memory bandwidth (single channel) and ultimately aims for lower cost. Carrizo can use dual channel, has the new Excavator cores and is the current high end mobile part. |
| Stage 4 | OEM creates one design, but ends up with Carrizo platforms that are physically limited by the Carrizo-L limitations. But it saves money, which is what their customers want. OEM builds a few products (some end up Carrizo only, some Carrizo-L only, but all limited by Carrizo-L). AMD saves extra work for the OEMs, OEMs increase margins. |
| Stage 5 | User buys product at the new low shiny price, but due to some of the cutbacks has a bad experience. The system is slow, and not performing as well. Perhaps the power delivery system isn’t suited for such a high TDP, or the chassis design causes throttling, or the low price means a TN panel with a mechanical drive. The low price may also be due to pre-installed bloatware subsidizing the material cost. |
| Stage 6 | Users do not like to be told they have spent their hard earned money on a bad device, and associate the bad experience with either the OEM, whose logo is on the device, or the CPU/APU manufacturer, whose sticker is next to the wrist pad. |
| Stage 7 | Either no resale to that user, or they attempt a different configuration, or they are stuck with a budget/contract that requires them to stay on the path. With any wiggle room, or when advising others who have budget, they advise against the anecdotal bad experience. |
If we had a poll system for our articles I would stick one in here – who is at fault? Is it AMD for simplifying the design, causing high end products to be put in cheaper designed platforms? Is it the OEM, asking for an easier solution to design, or for trying to gain sales in a race to the bottom? Or is it the end user for asking for a lower price, not willing to pay for that $30 upgrade, or being price constrained in the first place?
Perhaps this is a silly question, and no-one is at fault. This is sometimes how the race-to-the-bottom, or how a value proposition, works. In this scenario, it generates a negative feedback loop, one that can be notoriously difficult to get out of.
What Solutions are there?
| Solution 1 | Make a product that blows the competition out of the water. For the current climate in processors, semiconductors, software, architecture (x86), knowledge and application, as well as physics in lithography nodes, it becomes pretty much impossible without a fundamental paradigm change, and even then something like HBM (High Bandwidth Memory on AMD’s Fiji GPUs) required many years of research and collaboration with specific partners. If we consider the monitor space, the race-to-bottom on 1080p flat screen panels went on for 10 years, with monitors over 1080p being very expensive. Then a combination of cheap 2560x1440 Korean panels flooded the market, with three new disruptive technologies (G-Sync, FreeSync, 4K) hot on the heels. |
| Solution 2 | AMD makes their budget and mainstream platforms require different designs, similar to pre-Carrizo. This would mean OEMs have to have two design teams, but it would almost guarantee a minimum level of performance based on the platform you have. The obvious downside is that the OEMs would not like it, even though they already do it with other semiconductor firms and very few laptop lines are similar, so they’re making a few dozen already. The issue is that OEMs want to be efficient with the money and time, and AMD doesn’t want to lose the major contracts it has. |
| Solution 3 | OEMs fight against bad configurations. Unfortunately this is very difficult. Sales and requests from distributors govern future trends, so if a country requires 40% of notebooks to be under $400, then that is what the OEM will make. OEMs also have separate deals with IC manufacturers – perhaps they can save $0.01 per design by using a lower grade audio NIC that 95% of users won’t notice, or DRAM company XYZ is a long term partner so the OEM doesn’t want to disturb that partnership. Ultimately if a user wants 1TB of space and a 17-inch device but only has $400, it will end up with a mechanical hard-drive and a low quality 1366x768 screen. |
| Solution 4 | Distributors stock only certain models with quality controls. While noble, that won’t happen any time soon, because another distributor will just take the business. |
| Solution 5a | Distributors need to stock more models, or variants with better components (WiFi, screen). Again, this is difficult because distributors don’t want to sit on stock that might not sell, or deal with 450 variants of the same machine. The only people that can do this are the big OEMs that sell direct to customers. But if you’ve ever navigated HP’s website, trying to configure the exact system is a bit of a nightmare. Dell does this better than most big OEMs, but the options are still fairly limited. |
| Solution 5b | Distributors need to stock more models. If more people see the products on shelves, then arguably it would be part of the mind set when it comes time to buy. This has issues, aside from idle stock, but also many companies pay for space in brick-and-mortar stores, and advertising can be expensive. It’s hard to force a big marketing and distribution campaign without money. |
| Solution 6 | Users have to make informed decisions. That’s what places like AnandTech are for, so cutting through the FUD and presenting it in the best way is what we aim to do. But again, while we wish more people would read our analysis, most users end up getting advice from ‘the family friend that knows about computers’, or they are simply fighting budget constraints. |
| Solution 7 | The Killer App. Similar to solution one, but find a way that your product has the next must-have idea and still have a good user experience, e.g. a must-have app that greatly benefits from HSA. |
| Solution 8 | Deal with what affects user experience. Is it just about the quality of the components? Some of the devices we tested in this piece came with pre-installed bloatware, some of it scanning the hard drive so much that the CPU was being used and never allowed to idle. This bloatware is added because companies like Norton, or even Intel’s McAfee (even on an AMD system) pay the OEM to have their software preinstalled. So the OEM can save $0.02 per unit, increase margins, but it forces that negative feedback loop in a big way. |
Some companies in the past have dealt with contra-revenue, selling processors at below cost or with deals on multiple parts when purchased together. Very few companies, typically ones with large market shares in other areas, have access to this. Some members of the industry also see it as not fighting fair, compared to actually just pricing the parts lower in the first place.
Unfortunately, no matter how much positivity AMD has, that negative feedback loop is hard to get out of. It is not one person’s fault, and every solution is a double-edged sword that requires one part of the chain to take the hit – either AMD, the OEMs or the buyers. Chances are it won’t ever be the last two, which puts AMD in a precarious position of either trying to define their position at the risk of angering their partners, or continuing down an uncertain road.
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ImSpartacus - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
Holy shit, I haven't seen that many pages in a long time. You don't see this much content very often. Gotta love dat chorizo.close - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
ImSpartanus, they're just writing a comprehensive article. I'm sure they put in good work with all of them.ImSpartacus - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
I think this article provides a pretty delicate and nuanced treatment of chorizo and its place in the market (both potential & actual). There's no doubt that the circumstances demanded it. This was not business as usual and I'm glad Anandtech recognized the need for that additional effort.We're fooling ourselves if we pretend that any journalistic entity puts the sane amount of effort into every project. We're talking about living, breathing humans, not robots.
fmcjw - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
I found the language convoluted, verbose, and difficult to read, compared to, say, Anand's straightforward and logical writing:"Nonetheless, Intel’s product line is a sequence of parts that intersect each other, with low end models equipped with dual core Pentiums and Celerons, stretching into some i3 and i5 territory while still south of $1000. In this mix is Core M, Intel’s 4.5W premium dual core parts found in devices north of $600."
"south of/north of"... can't you just put in "below/above"? And all that "intersecting of parts", can't you just say from the Atom to Pentiums, Celerons, i3's, and i5's....
The whole thing reads like they're paying you to score a high word count. Lots of information to extract here, but it can be 3 pages shorter and take half as long to read.
Cellar Door - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
That is why Anandtech has video adds on their main page - designed for people like you. Who simply lack reading comprehension past 8th grade and find it hard to understand. Just watch watch the video on how to loose weight that auto-plays on the side.Or... try Tom's Hardware - they cater to your demographic.
ImSpartacus - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
There's no question that Anand had a powerful way of writing that was uniquely simple yet educated you nevertheless. And for a layman that reads this sort of stuff to learn new information, that's very attractive and I kinda miss it (along with Klug).However, I give Ian a pass because he at least attempted to use other brand of conveying his ideas. In certain sections he used special table-like fitting to separate "parallel" sections/stances so that the rader would be more apt to compare them. So there's at least some effort, though he surely could do better.
10basetom - Saturday, February 6, 2016 - link
fmcjw does have a point, but in all fairness it is much harder to explain techical stuff in layman terms than it is to be long-wordy. Carl Sagan was the master of it on TV, and Anand was excellent at it on paper.JMC2000 - Sunday, February 7, 2016 - link
I didn't find anything wrong with the language Ian used, as this is piece is still on a technical level, but can be understood by the layman that knows a bit more than just what the stickers on the outside tell.To me, the phrase "parts that intersect each other" lays out that there is a myriad of options where configurations overlap, where as saying "from the Atom to Pentiums, Celerons, i3s and i5s" indicates that there is a pricing structure that is related to general CPU performance, which there really isn't when it comes to low-end machines.
plonk420 - Monday, February 8, 2016 - link
"south of/north of" sounds better than "greater than/less than," which is more correct than "below/above"Sushisamurai - Thursday, February 11, 2016 - link
yeah, colorful language is nice. Dumbing down adjectives or descriptions can often construe the true message IMO. This way, it paints a more descriptive/colorful picture.Keep up the good work Ian.