AMD and GlobalFoundries, CES 2011
by Jarred Walton on January 7, 2011 3:30 AM ESTMore AMD Demos and Future Roadmap
One thing we didn’t see at AMD is Bulldozer, the CPU architecture intended to bridge the gap between the current K10.5 solutions and Intel’s Nehalem and Sandy Bridge offerings. We’ve discussed some of the specifics of Bulldozer in the past, but we still don’t have anything concrete to report in terms of performance. GF reports that 32nm production of Orochi is going well, and Bulldozer will show up later this year, but there was no hands-on time with BD at CES to report on. Estimates however are that it should provide a drop-in replacement on existing AMD servers that should boost performance by around 50%. If the desktop processors can get a similar performance boost, that ought to put Bulldozer into close competition with Sandy Bridge, and there’s no doubt that a 500GFLOPS GPU core (i.e. something similar to the HD 5600 series) will put paid to Intel’s HD Graphics 3000.
_thumb.jpg)
_thumb.jpg)
_thumb.jpg)
_thumb.jpg)
_thumb.jpg)
_thumb.jpg)
Also present was a single "Llano-like" laptop, but it was only used for a software demonstration from another company. That demonstration consisted of a 3D camera and video camera recording a scene, similar to the Xbox Kinect. The difference here is that the Presentation demo used OpenCL code to process the video signal, analyze the 3D information, and remove the background from the video stream in real time. The result was a sort of blue-screen effect without the use of a blue screen, and the software additionally interacted with a PowerPoint presentation to integrate the presenter with the content—useful for putting the human element into a webcast. The resolution of the 3D signal was such that the outline of the human was a little fuzzy, and the demonstration still tells us very little about Llano performance, but it was still a cool demo.
Brazos is certainly showing uptake at the show, and netbooks should become quite a bit more capable thanks to the design. Going forward, AMD has the Trinity APU that will meld 2-4 Bulldozer cores with a fast GPU core, providing even better performance and flexibility. Where the “Stars” CPUs releasing this year and the Trinity core next year will both use 32nm process technology, it’s interesting that AMD is using 40nm TSMC for production of the Brazos core right now. (This apparently is due to the amount of IP that AMD already has with 40nm GPUs.) Next year, Krishna and Wichita will drop 1-4 Bobcat cores into an APU, and they’ll make the shift to 28nm. We suspect that these chips will shift over to GlobalFoundries 28nm node, though it’s possible AMD could source such chips from both TSMC and GF. Also coming at the top of the CPU performance pile are Zambezi (4-8 Bulldozer cores), roughly in the middle of 2011. That will be followed by Komodo, sporting a full eight Bulldozer cores; neither offering will include an IGP, on the assumption that these high-end CPUs will be paired with discrete GPUs.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
72 Comments
View All Comments
Christobevii3 - Monday, January 10, 2011 - link
I've run an asus 790fx am2+ with sb600 for 3 years now. I can still update the bios and run a 6 core phenom now. It started witha 5000+ x2. To be able to still upgrade an intel this day you'd have to had waited for the x58 to be out which is nearing 2 years but dies pretty much now.Core 2's you had two busses unless you waited for the p35 or bought the expensive x48 board and again at most you probably got 2 years out of them.
I'll wait for bulldozer to see instead of intels sandy bridge serving up $170 mobos that only have 8x/8x pci-e configs.
azguy90 - Wednesday, January 12, 2011 - link
Bulldozer isn't any better for upgrading. Bulldozer CPUs are going to require an AM3+ motherboard; so your upgrade path is about the same as Sandy Bridge. You will be able to put older chips in the new boards, but not new chips in old boards.nuudles - Friday, January 7, 2011 - link
Bulldozer should have been released now, AMD showed how much it hurts if you are late to the party by getting a 6 month head start in dx11 and therefore completely dominating dx11 marketshare. Unfortunately it is much harder keeping up with Intel than Nvidia...Hopefully Llano is a homerun for them as the mobile space is more lucrative than desktops. Unfortunately they are even further behind with their mobile cpus thankfullythan the desktop ones. Hopefully power gating will show big battery life gains and the GPU will be strong enough to make anything other than top end discrete mobile cards obsolete (to make up for worse cpu perf between athlon ii + tweaks and sandy bridge).
Another beef is they should have had something to compete with optimus by now, they must have had 6 months to build support into the 6000 series! Either that or get their cards to draw rediculously low amounts at idle through power gating all but 1 alu or something like that (if that is possible).
medi01 - Friday, January 7, 2011 - link
It wasn't that nVidia was 6 month late, but that on top of being 6 month late, they created power hungry monsters with so-so performance.If Buldosers do perform well, delay won't matter much. If they don't, ouch, AMD (unlike nVidia who can simply punch editors harder, for better reviews, comparing stock clocked GPUs to cherry picked overclocked, cough) can't really afford that.
shtldr - Friday, January 7, 2011 - link
"Another beef is they should have had something to compete with optimus by now"I've had it for like half a year. It's called switchable graphics.
Acer 3820TG, switchable between HD 5650 and i5 integrated graphics.
nuudles - Friday, January 7, 2011 - link
yes it is switchable, but not dynamic like optimusYukaKun - Friday, January 7, 2011 - link
Asus K40AB line bro. 2009 and still kicking besides Optimus.AMD just fails hard at marketing and positioning their products sometimes =/
Cheers!
nuudles - Friday, January 7, 2011 - link
Luckily for AMD we are at a point where even a low to midrange cpu is fast enough for most applications, very few consumers would notice a performance difference between something like an Athlon ii x4 and an i5 2400 in most of their programs.Even in games the difference is not huge, so if they strike the right performance with the integrated GPU and let the GPU and CPU work well alongside each other (openCL on the gpu for big performance gains in highly parallel workloads) they might just have a winner.
I would much rather get athlon ii x4 or phenom ii x4 cpu performance levels together with hd5670/5750 gpu performance levels than i7 980 with hd 5450/5570.
sirmo - Friday, January 7, 2011 - link
"""Right now, GlobalFoundries is entering full production mode for 32nm, with AMD’s Llano chips scheduled to be the first market solution to use the process. Later this year, AMD will also launch their Bulldozer cores on the 32nm process."""Everything we've seen so far said Bulldozer was going to be first 32nm product in Q2 and Llano was going to be later? Why the sudden change?
JarredWalton - Friday, January 7, 2011 - link
Maybe in the past Bulldozer was coming first, but everything I've heard for the past few months was: Brazos first, Llano seconds, Bulldozer third. Probably the use of K10.5 with HD 5600 to make Llano on 32nm was easier than a completely new architecture. What really worries me is that there were some hidden undertones in conversations that make me think desktop Bulldozer may not even get out in force until 2012. I really hope I'm imagining things and they get the chips out more like Q3'11.