© 2009 Bright side of news, All rights reserved. OPINION: Are all AMD fans

Scali is a fool by: Anonymous on 10/13/2010

What is funny is that Intel according to sources won't deploy FMAC - FPUs for x86 until 2013. AMD is forcasted for 2011. Sounds like AMD is 2 years ahead on that aspect. Amongst other things. So you can write about the past and make assertions based on that but how quickly the worm turns.

So it seems apparent to me that this piece above is strictly done for inciting the reader.

It is funny, I have chatted with Scali on his blog and he doesn't give AMD credit for deploying the IMC first amongst other things. Only because Intel came along later and did it better. Wow what a joke. So next year when AMD enhances their IMC will they get credit then? I am sure not accordding to Scali. He has an axe to grind and a motive here. The author isn't an idiot he is a fool. He makes his own rules to justify the garbage he writes. So basically you can't fix stupid so why bother.

re by: Anonymous on 9/25/2010

I do not know, maybe we are idiots but what I do know is that you are 100% idiot. The one who wrote this has no brain. Have you heard of the word monopoly? Unfortunately, I live in a country where almost all held monoplyst and I know what I'm talking about. You're smart, as it looks, and obviously you are not, the same AMD that spit and disparage, should kiss the ass just because they exist today. Enables us to buy excellent processors that have more power than the vast majority of the population should be at a good, normal price. Intel and now shouting with prices, imagine what would be the only producer. Sorry what do I need to tell you this, but only an idiot are you here.

by: Anonymous on 9/6/2010

Yes all know that AMD ran a distant second to Intel and thank god they were there to do so. But I take issue with one fact. The K6-2 500 ran my software faster than the Pentium 750. The K6-3 550 would have been huge but it was never released. The reason was the larger L1 and l2 cache. The Benchmark was on commercially available Chess software by Chessbase called Fritz. This benchmark had the K6-2 was just a bit faster than Pentium 750.

And of course the Athlon rocked.

AMD should have fan boys giving support. Because if they were not there to keep Intel honest we'd still be paying $1000.00 per cpu no matter the speed.

We are not only gratefull but eternally hopeful that AMD can keep the 900# gorilla in his cage.

Congratulations *bsn* you present great alchemist visions by: Anonymous on 8/16/2010

What's this? Some kind of weighted leverage to clean bsn "geeky site" reputation. This deep throat was pretty successful in building lego bricks castle, until he try to deliver his own blended vision with core2-Netburst-sse2-HT mixture .... It tastes like drinking waste water from aluminum recycling plant. Too many "expert words" and nothing really told, beyond "yet another geek experience" kind of story

bsn find better "experts" cause this one here served as smokescreen. Or was this main intention of this article.

Funny expert how do you explain EOL for HT(rev.2.0) project inside Nehalems and starting new HT3.0 inside Sandy Bridge (should be featured inside it or they'll just skip it?)

How to explain that 45nm Phenom II parts has better performance per watt (a little bigger die) when comparing equally clocked pii x6 with core i7 900 (quad-core parts)? Is K7 dead (khm--alive) just like P6 is?

ps. And yes AMD fanboys are idiots, just like Intels, nVidias wherever and whenever they exist.

by: Anonymous on 8/14/2010

bsn is dead to me

AMD by: Anonymous on 2/19/2010

Ok . Are we idiots ? Only fews words to speak about that .

AMD clients arent NVIDIOTS
AMD clients havent any processor INSIDE their ass .
AMD THES SMART CHOICE .

by: Anonymous on 2/19/2010

It is true that the i5 is Intel's best Phenom II price/performance contender, but it isn't necessarily obvious that the i5 is a better deal.
http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/819/1
The benchmarks here show the i5 750 and Phenom II 965 are pretty even in terms of performance (although there are a few things the i5 does better, like DivX encoding). And it is still a little more expensive than the Phenom (although not much).
There are other things to consider as well: the Phenom (black edition) is easier to overclock for novices; the i5 has lower power consumption; AM3 MBs should take 6 core CPUs but 1156 probably won't. Whether any of these matter to you is personal preference really.
Ultimately though, who cares? This is why this article is stupid. It really doesn't matter what CPU you buy as long as you are happy with it, and if someone else cares then maybe they should get a hobby. And if they are concerned with "idiots" on the internet talking crap, perhaps they should rise above it and not get involved because bigoted people will always be bigoted people. Honestly, get a life.

by: Anonymous on 2/18/2010

"Per the link it is clear that AMD provide exceptional price for performance and seems to be unbiased."

Did you read your own link?
Initially AMD looks good, but then comes the part where they factor in the full system price, rather than the CPU alone.
I quote:
"Whoa. Suddenly, you should buy a Core i5-750! That's more my kind of recommendation. Print this one out and show it to your spouse and/or boss, folks. In the context of a beefy system like this one, going with a cheap CPU like an Athlon II X2 255 or a Pentium E6500 doesn't make a heckuva lot of sense. You'd be paying relatively little more to get substantially higher performance from a faster processor."

So how is AMD 'exceptional price' when the Intel systems come out on top in a performance/price comparison?
Looks like neither AMD nor Intel is exceptional, they're pretty close.

The article sucks... Has no quantitative analysis.. by: Anonymous on 2/17/2010

The article sucks. It is just opinion dribble from an idiot.

See link. Here is something worth reading. It is a real quantitative approach and backs up much of what AMD fans say and feel. Per the link it is clear that AMD provide exceptional price for performance and seems to be unbiased. It is 100% better then some idiot who can only recite Wikipedia..

http://techreport.com/articles.x/18448/17

AMD keeping pace by: Anonymous on 2/16/2010

Maybe or maybe not. But they have available 6 and 12 core x-86 CPU out for production. See link.

12 - Core:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/cpu/display/20100215231002_AMD_s_Twelve_Core_Microprocessors_Available_for_Sale.html

6 Core:
http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/17683/1/

by: Anonymous on 2/14/2010

"it would seem that the original author is responsible for most of the "anonymous" replies here, at least those defending the original article"
...
"The opinion piece is - overall - decent enough, though."

So you are the original author?

by: Anonymous on 2/14/2010

"You know guys, it seems that the author has long moved on from this article (it was published months ago)."

Considering writing style and aggressivenes, it would seem that the original author is responsible for most of the "anonymous" replies here, at least those defending the original article :)

While I think AMD fanbois are silly (who cares about "OMG IT'S REAL MULTICORE INTEL SUX!" when it doesn't bring much performance-wise), going all intel-lovey-huggey and defending isn't the answer.

The opinion piece is - overall - decent enough, though.

by: Anonymous on 2/14/2010

You know guys, it seems that the author has long moved on from this article (it was published months ago).
Perhaps you should too.

by: Anonymous on 2/14/2010

"No, AMD fans are not shortsighted idiots. Without AMD, we would all be rocking Pentium4s with 32bit architecture with on-board graphics and paying over $2000 for an entry level computer, just like when Windows ME hit."

Excuse me, but statements like these pretty much define an idiot.
You have absolutely no idea what the world would look like without AMD.a
Presenting this far-fetched possibility as an absolute truth, the only possible outcome, is the sign of a seriously warped mind.

by: Anonymous on 2/14/2010

"There is a reason why most colleges don't allow students cite wikipedia. I have no problem with wikipedia, but you have clearly stated that it is your ONLY source for this information. Also, you didn't make any citations on your published article."

Nice try, but I don't think the last line means the author got his info from Wikipedia , but rather that he didn't exactly tell anything new, anyone could easily find it on Wikipedia (or various other sites).
As said before, the burden of proof is on you, if you try to attack the Wikipedia mark.
You can try various other sources, but you will find that they generally agree with the facts and dates that he put forward.

Aside from that, it's an opinion/blog piece, not an attempt at professional journalism. So nice try, but you failed.
Just accept what is written in the article, rather than trying to attack the author or Wikipedia...
What you are presenting is some complaints about what the writer DIDN'T put in the article, which has little to do with what he DID write.
Likewise, implying that Wikipedia is wrong is just a strawman argument.

Again, it's an opinion piece. The author is free to have an opinion, and free to present facts that are relevant in supporting his opinion. If you don't like it, don't attack him with a useles comment here, write your own opinion piece instead, and try to actually be coherent.

by: Anonymous on 2/13/2010

"Don’t take my word for it though, it’s all on Wikipedia."

There is a reason why most colleges don't allow students cite wikipedia. I have no problem with wikipedia, but you have clearly stated that it is your ONLY source for this information. Also, you didn't make any citations on your published article. That is a journalism no-no.

You left out the parts about Intel paying companies like Dell to only choose their products. Having lots of money from dirty sales sure makes it easier to increase the R&D budget. Also, doesn't Intel have over 20 times the total assets that AMD has? Seems like an apples to oranges comparisons when you compare the two companies. You are welcome to make product comparisons since those are obviously in the same category. But, comparing a company that is around 20 times smaller to another company and saying they haven't accomplished as much is like saying 2 is greater than 1. Yep, it's that obvious.

Yes, Intel is bigger, has a bigger R&D budget, and has the ability overpower competitors. If Intel was doing anything less than staying one step ahead of AMD, then they aren't doing what a company of their size should be doing.

No, AMD fans are not shortsighted idiots. Without AMD, we would all be rocking Pentium4s with 32bit architecture with on-board graphics and paying over $2000 for an entry level computer, just like when Windows ME hit.

But, I assume the only way you can attract readers is to have a selective memory and only use the facts that support your argument. Global Warming anyone?

I mean, god forbid that someone with actual knowledge of both companies' histories reads this and has to correct your shortsightedness. Maybe you should try to write a more complete article with facts other than selective copypasta from wikipedia.

by: Anonymous on 2/12/2010

"The only reason why you'd want to put them in the article explictly, is if you'd want to make AMD look better than it really is... Which is exactly what the article is arguing against."

If you insist on mentioning all of AMD's technological successes and contributions, and you want to be objective and fair, then you would also have to mention all of Intel's technological successes and contributions. The simple truth is just that Intel has a lot more of those, so it's always going to be mostly a one-sided story.

by: Anonymous on 2/12/2010

"4. AMD64....the instruction set that brought it all together."

The article seems to focus on how AMD fanboys try to rewrite history and distort facts.
It is undisputed that AMD64 is the instructionset that both Intel and AMD use in their 64-bit x86 architectures.
So this point, and various other points you mention are either beyond the scope of the article, or are actually already covered in the article implicitly.

The only reason why you'd want to put them in the article explictly, is if you'd want to make AMD look better than it really is... Which is exactly what the article is arguing against.

AMD Fans should be proud by: Anonymous on 2/11/2010

AMD is definitely not waiting on Intel to lead this path. Let’s see who gets there first. I will say I haven't taken much time researching Intel's APU release date. But apparently Google doesn't find anything with APU and Intel. So I surmise Intel hasn't followed AMD down that road yet. My guess is Intel will let AMD figure it all out and then follow AMD with some release later.

http://www.crn.com/hardware/222900063;jsessionid=RXS43A5ZJBH3VQE1GHPSKHWATMY32JVN

The mainstream PC processor, codenamed Llano, is the chip maker's first "Accelerated Processor Unit," or APU, said Samuel Naffziger, an AMD Senior Fellow presenting at ISSCC. Llano marks the first step in Sunnyvale, Calif.-based AMD's march towards a processor architecture that incorporates both x86-based central processor functionality and a graphics processor on the same CPU die, he said.

by: Anonymous on 2/10/2010

"So next time you want to give an opinion with misguided facts, check yourself..."

Oh the irony that quite a few 'facts' from your own post appear wrong... Many others appear irrelevant, since they fall outside of the scope of the article (it's not so much about AMD's or Intel's achievements itself, but rather the response of the people who buy and use their products).

by: Anonymous on 2/10/2010

"7. AMD introduced the first 6 core proc well ahead of Intel."

Did they? I think you forgot about the Intel Dunnington, a 6-core version of the Penryn architecture, in the Xeon series. Available since September 2008(!).

by: Anonymous on 2/9/2010

"If Scali was so smart why did he miss on IBM class CPU's?"

My guess is: because the story is about Intel vs AMD, which means that it's only about x86.
If we were to continue your line of argument... okay, you include IBM, and then? Go on about how you neglect ARM, MIPS, SPARC, Alpha, SH4, and whatever other architectures that have had their share of success in some or other market?

by: Anonymous on 2/9/2010

"6. AMD also was the first to have the first true dual and four cores procs. Intel's were merely two single/dual cores on the same die, with different caches. What what??"

The Athlon X2 design also was little more than two single cores on the same die. They shared only the memory controller, not the cache.

by: Anonymous on 2/9/2010

"4. AMD64....the instruction set that brought it all together. i64 worked ok, but it did not gain the support from the software industry as AMD64, which quickly became the industry standard, thus Intel decided to abandon i64 with its main processors and adapt AMD64. WOW...you definitely forgot that one in you history book."

Intel didn't abandon IA64, in fact, they released a new quadcore series yesterday:
http://www.intel.com/pressroom/archive/releases/2010/20100208comp.htm

by: Anonymous on 2/9/2010

"to imply that people who like AMD are idiots"

I think a fan/fanboy is a bit stronger than people just *liking* a certain brand.
But that was discussed earlier in the comments already.

by: Anonymous on 2/9/2010

"Yes, Intel was on top up through the P3 architecture. In my opinion, this was the last great architecture that they designed until the Core2 and i7."

Isn't that exactly what the article boils down to though?
The only CPUs in between the P3 and the Core2 are the Pentium 4 and its AMD rivals, the K7 and K8 derivatives.

AMD sux?? by: Anonymous on 2/9/2010

Scali, so according to you article you imply that all AMD "fanboys" are idiots.

You missed several key points and facts in your "opinion" article that I believe you left out...which happen to change a few things from you little history lesson there.

As one that "knows everything about CPUs ever" than, I suggest that you are not an idiot because you surely have a close-minded perspective and do not understand the importance of AMD.

Yes, Intel was on top up through the P3 architecture. In my opinion, this was the last great architecture that they designed until the Core2 and i7.

As an AMD preferred customer, I do like their products and company strategy, however I realize that they are not always on top. I like certain things that Intel has done, hence I've bought several Intel Atom dual cores. AMD did not have the Neo solution out at the time, so I decided to go with the Atom and am extremely happy.

However, to imply that people who like AMD are idiots, then you sir are the idiot.

Let me shed some light on your points with a few missing pieces that you forgot to mention:

1. AMD kind of did the reverse engineer thing for a while shadowing Intel, especially in the 90s.

2. Thunderbird really became the first major competitor of Intel P3s. I believe that is when the switchover occurred from pro-Intel to pro-AMD buyers.

3. Introducing the Athlon XP/MP....what a processor....this clearly overtook the crown from the P4s and Ds (D was a waste of time and development). AMD realized that they could do much more in a 13 long pipe rather than Intel's uberpipe. Intel's architecture got way to backed up with its 21 (correct me if I'm wrong) stage pipe.

4. AMD64....the instruction set that brought it all together. i64 worked ok, but it did not gain the support from the software industry as AMD64, which quickly became the industry standard, thus Intel decided to abandon i64 with its main processors and adapt AMD64. WOW...you definitely forgot that one in you history book.

5. Athlon FX....another awesome powerful processor that pulled way ahead with its integrated memory controller....Intel tried to add hyperthreading and

6. AMD also was the first to have the first true dual and four cores procs. Intel's were merely two single/dual cores on the same die, with different caches. What what??

7. AMD introduced the first 6 core proc well ahead of Intel.

8. AMD decided to buy one of the top two GPU manufacturers in 2006 making a power combination of development. This began their decline in stock value and sales, as Intel finally redesigned their incredibly long pipe architecture.

9. AMD did not decide to strong arm businesses such as HP, Dell, companies in the EU, and companies in Asia in order to sell their products. Hence Intel gave AMD 1.25 billion dollars out of court to shut them up....they did not shut up the Federal govt or the European Union which have filed charges as well.

10. AMD nor NVIDIA decided to create faulty code in motherboards that would make AMD or NVIDIA GPU cards run worse that they were supposed. Intel decided this would also be a good idea and did this in order to promote their new great video card (which has since been scrapped)....what a shame.

I could go on much longer....but I won't. I think you see my first point...leaving out key facts makes you guilty of spin trying to convince a perhaps unwise audience. I accuse you of douchebaggery.

The whole point of a successful capitalistic system in the IT technology development and sales is to come up with the best products for the lowest price....through COMPETITION. If you did not have this, neither AMD nor INTEL would be anywhere near where they are now.

So next time you want to give an opinion with misguided facts, check yourself...and most of all, look at the big picture, which you have clearly missed. When you accuse others of being an idiot, then perhaps the first person that you might want to check is yourself.

cheers

Intel fans could be idiots now by: Anonymous on 2/8/2010

Based on IBM's Power7 CPU I think we might have a good case where Intel fans are in the same boat as AMD fans are now. If Scali was so smart why did he miss on IBM class CPU's? Probably cause he is an idiot and doesn't know much about them. Yet of course he is off reading Wikipedia as I type so he can defend his position. What a moron.

http://arstechnica.com/hardware/news/2009/09/ibms-8-core-power7-twice-the-muscle-half-the-transistors.ars

sss by: Anonymous on 2/8/2010

Go fuck yourself with your idiot topics...motherfucker

by: Anonymous on 2/8/2010

idiot is your mother ...

i7 should be easily surpassed by AMD by: Anonymous on 2/5/2010

Don't get me wrong i7 is a solid and currently the best platform. But I believe AMD is heading down a productive road perusing CMP architecture over SMT. SMT can have benefits but it can also have draw backs. Depending on how bounded the application is by the L2 cache. I suspect AMD's core will be every bit as good if not better than the current i7 core, I suspect that Intel will also have something out that will be better as well. I attached links below that might provide good reads and where some of the sources of my above dialog.

http://blogs.amd.com/work/author/jfruehe/
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3683
http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~dp8x/ieee.pdf

by: Anonymous on 2/5/2010

"but hey you never know what AMD has up there sleavs!"

Yep. I guess we will just have to wait and see what Bulldozer can deliver. Hopefully it is more successful than the original Phenom. But it will have to be quite a leap to be competitive with Intel's 2011 lineup. Unless it is going to be aimed at i7... (which would also be no small task).

Im a "fan" by: Anonymous on 2/2/2010

Well I love AMD, but only cus they own ATI, there cpu's are not as fast as intels but hey you never know what AMD has up there sleavs!

by: Anonymous on 1/28/2010

"It is obvious that whoever at AMD set the MSRP for the Phenom II 940 made an oversight, and this was almost immediately corrected, as the price dropped to around $200 very shortly after release. Hence the price/performance balance was restored, and the i7 920 only appeared to dominate due to an error on AMD's part (you may argue that this is pure speculation, however the fact that the price was reduced so quickly, and by a large amount does indicate this)."

Yes, it's speculation. Here's some more speculation for you:
AMD wants to get as much profit from their products as possible. So they originally set the Phenom II at about the same price/performance as the original Phenom. They didn't see Core i7 920 coming (they probably figured that Intel would charge 'extreme edition' prices only), and were too late to correct the price before it hit the market.

by: Anonymous on 1/28/2010

"Yet the Intel bigoted friend we have conversing with us didn’t want to provide any facts until we pushed him on them"

Haha, you sound frustrated :)
Who says he didn't *WANT* to provide any facts? Looks like he didn't think it was necessary to state the obvious.
Don't forget that when asked, he actually DID produce these facts, which supported his case perfectly.
So who's the idiot here?
I think it's the guy who begs to be shown 'proof' for something that is terribly accurate, and after being shown these facts, he resorts to calling the guy names, because he doesn't like these facts.

by: Anonymous on 1/28/2010

"Is that not the point I was making?'

You said the title was wrong, I said that the title is right, but most people get the meaning of "AMD fan" wrong.

by: Anonymous on 1/28/2010

"After all, the Core i7 920 was the earlier release. It was at $284. AMD released the Phenom II at $275 less than two months later"

Apologies. I made a very general statement and neglected to ascertain whether or not it was directly applicable in this situation.

However, from:
http://www.pricetrace.com/?do=q&upc=730143267014&keywords=phenom+940

It is obvious that whoever at AMD set the MSRP for the Phenom II 940 made an oversight, and this was almost immediately corrected, as the price dropped to around $200 very shortly after release. Hence the price/performance balance was restored, and the i7 920 only appeared to dominate due to an error on AMD's part (you may argue that this is pure speculation, however the fact that the price was reduced so quickly, and by a large amount does indicate this).

by: Anonymous on 1/28/2010

"I think what you and most other readers have misinterpreted is that "AMD fan" == "Anyone who buys/uses AMD products"."

Is that not the point I was making?

"Nope, I think the title is perfectly fine. ... If you replace "AMD fans" with "people who think AMD's top products are as good as Intel's top products in terms of performance", the article makes perfect sense."

Again, that was what I said.

The point of contention here is really the word "fan" (as you correctly point out). It is obvious from the AMD responses that very few people agree with the definition given by the author (and you may very well argue that this isn't the point of the article, so these responses are totally irrelevant; but I don't think it's a crime for the discussion to go outside the scope of the article and elaborate somewhat on an idea that isn't directly arguing anything in the text).

No-one is saying he's wrong, and that the people he is describing as fans are correct though. A "fan" from the AMD perspective (here, at least) is someone who has bought and will continue to buy AMD products, not because they are deluded about who makes the best CPUs, but because the AMD CPUs fit their requirements.

What's in a title..? by: Anonymous on 1/28/2010

"So that must mean that he bought them because of better price/performance or similar reason, rather than speed alone." The author doesn’t specify why he bought them so you can only guess. The way I read it he is putting it in the article to pump up his credibility so he can seem unbiased, which may or may not be the case. It is hard to tell. Scali:"I myself have used a long list of non-Intel processors over the years, so I know all about the alternatives to Intel processors, and how they can be better.” If anything he implies buying them cause some or all of there features are better then Intel at the time.

I agree with the prior poster that his title is vague. Scali: “But I can't stand people who just don't bother to check their facts, ". I believe this last sentence here by Scali nails the heart of the article. So he really should have titled it "All AMD users who don't check their facts and then spew out false information are - Idiots?". I agree. SO the only true grief we have here is to make the title general enough to pull in unsuspecting readers

Yet, I would have to agree with the author here if so titled. It is frustrating when conversing with someone that doesn’t know there facts. That is why I have always tried to provide benchmarks or some 3rd party source for any supporting evidence. I guess I am not an idiot then although I consider myself a fan of AMD and there products. Yet the Intel bigoted friend we have conversing with us didn’t want to provide any facts until we pushed him on them. Yet we don’t have any Intel idiots… they don’t exist. Yeah right. They are all over the place just as frequent if not more so then AMD idiots I sumize.

by: Anonymous on 1/28/2010

Makes perfect sense, doesn't it?
To summarize:
The author says he has owned various AMD products.
The author argues that the AMD products were rarely the fastest on the market, including the ones he says to have owned.
Now the author probably doesn't consider himself an idiot, or an AMD fan. So apparently owning an AMD processor in itself doesn't make you an AMD fan or an idiot, according to the author.
Choosing an AMD product not because of better performance, but because of other reasons, such as better price also doesn't make you an AMD fan or an idiot, apparently.

No, the article is not about AMD itself, not about everyone who buys AMD for whatever reason... but about the people who constantly spout all sorts of nonsense about AMD's history, present and future (regardless of whether they actually own or use AMD products themselves).

Does it add up now, for everyone?

by: Anonymous on 1/28/2010

"The author obviously only thinks that there is no point owning anything but the fastest CPU, which is quite narrow minded"

Doesn't make sense, since none of the AMD CPUs he mentioned to have owned (Am486, Athlon) were the fastest on the market at the time. So that must mean that he bought them because of better price/performance or similar reason, rather than speed alone.

"The title of the article should really be: "Are people who think AMD's top products are as good as Intel's top products in terms of performance idiots?". That would then summarize his point in the article."

Nope, I think the title is perfectly fine. I think what you and most other readers have misinterpreted is that "AMD fan" == "Anyone who buys/uses AMD products".
I'm not sure where you get that from. Buying a product does not necessarily imply that you are a fan of that particular brand, does it?
If you replace "AMD fans" with "people who think AMD's top products are as good as Intel's top products in terms of performance", the article makes perfect sense.

by: Anonymous on 1/28/2010

"The author himself says that he has owned various AMD CPUs, which implicitly confirms that he agrees that AMD's products are worth buying."

The author obviously only thinks that there is no point owning anything but the fastest CPU, which is quite narrow minded, as for most people this simply isn't warranted or feasible (financially). This is what everyone replying in defense of AMD have been getting at.

The title of the article should really be: "Are people who think AMD's top products are as good as Intel's top products in terms of performance idiots?". That would then summarize his point in the article.

"I think you failed to grasp the article."

This kind of condescending response is getting annoying. I'm sure the Intel fans are finding the AMD defense (which is not directly arguing anything in the article) quite annoying as well. But I think this just shows the limited vision of the author in terms of actually understanding who AMD fans are, and what they look for when buying AMD products.

by: Anonymous on 1/27/2010

"I think AMD is making a strong case that its products are worth buying. This then dismisses the conjecture by the author that AMD fans are idiots."

The author himself says that he has owned various AMD CPUs, which implicitly confirms that he agrees that AMD's products are worth buying.
I think you failed to grasp the article.

AMD picking up share by: Anonymous on 1/27/2010

Yet I realize we will see market ups and downs over time. I think AMD is making a strong case that its products are worth buying. This then dismisses the conjecture by the author that AMD fans are idiots. Why would the market go anywhere but down if what the Author tries to imply in the title of the article is true.

Our Intel bigoted friend will be glad to see that this article supports his views on P2 vs i7. Yet it proves he is to narrow minded to see that price/performance could (and I said COULD) be in AMD’s hands at the moment.

See link for full posting. I cut and pasted the meat of the article below.

http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/17406/1/

According to IDC researchers, AMD has done a rather good job in 2009 and managed to steal back part of its lost market share from Intel. AMD's share has been shrinking for several quarters, due to a lack of competitive products, but it seems new processors offered at tempting prices managed to rekindle interest.

IDC reports x86 processor demand grew by record levels in Q4 2009, as shipments jumped by 31.1 percent sequentially. During the same quarter, AMD managed to recover some of its lost share. Intel's market share was 80.5 percent, while AMD managed to grab 19.4 percent. In Q4 2008, AMD shipped 17.7 percent of processors worldwide, so 19.4 percent marks a rather healthy recovery.

The IDC attributes AMD's comeback to aggressive pricing and a drop in demand for Intel's Atom processors in Q1 2009. It's also worth noting AMD managed to introduce several competitive products in 2009. While the new CPUs could not match Intel's high end Core i7 products, they offered good value for money in the mainstream and entry level markets.

by: Anonymous on 1/27/2010

"If nothing is better than a Radeon HD 5970, but a GTX 295 is better than nothing, does that mean the 295 is better than the 5970?"

A great example of flawless logic, but to stay on topic, that should really be:

If nothing is better than a Core i7, but a Phenom II is better than nothing, does that mean the Phenom II is better than the Core i7?

by: Anonymous on 1/27/2010

If Nvidia put Fermi in a box with TSMC and don't look inside, does that mean Fermi can be both dead and alive at the same time?

by: Anonymous on 1/27/2010

If a Radeon 5970 has its fan running at 100%, but no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?

by: Anonymous on 1/27/2010

""Are all AMD fans - idiots?"
Are all idiots - AMD fans?"

If nothing is better than a Radeon HD 5970, but a GTX 295 is better than nothing, does that mean the 295 is better than the 5970?

uhh, answer by: Anonymous on 1/26/2010

Yeah, pretty much dude. Ragers too. And they get everything backwards, like screaming nvidia is gonna lose big dollars when ati has double digit quarterly losses like forever going back to the overpaid amd doofus purchase of them.
Then they shriek a few bucks saved for some 2560 rez they don't even own a monitor for... while they give up cuda, physx, video editing and conversion and folding advantages as well as stable driver advantages without a bloated clumsy crashing CCC and dotnet req. install.
Yeah, dude, they are not only what you said, but they are ANGRY little reds, putting the hate out for nvidia and yaking their tarded lies about - they're haters man, so I'm glad they're stuck with the cheapo inferior billions in the hole, leafblowing electromigrating tiny wittle ati crammed full of heat core with the 4 dumb units and one C unit shader set that can actually do some math. (that's why they need 800 ! Just divide by 5 and figure 4/5ths of that is stupid anyway, and you'll get the correct view.
ATI cards take tiny little dummy instructions, that's how they get away with a teensy tiny unamerican core ! lol
Then they try to crank it up and cram it full, so you get those overheating vrms, the "powervirus!" hahahahha OCCT and furmark.. and they BLOW APART ! or suddenly come to a near haslt (5000 series) in the intense firefight areas of the games !
Duhhh... duhh. red rooster!

by: Anonymous on 1/26/2010

"Are all AMD fans - idiots?"
Are all idiots - AMD fans?

by: Anonymous on 1/26/2010

"I believe the majority of responses have been aimed squarely at the title"

The title is a question. The responses have clearly provided a confirming answer.

by: Anonymous on 1/26/2010

"Comparing launch prices of products released at different times doesn't really make sense when working out price/performance does it?"

There were less than two months in between.
That is not 'different times'.

"It is obvious that when new products come out aimed at a particular price point, products already at that price point will have the disadvantage performance wise, and so their prices will need to be reduced to maintain the balance. What you are saying is that to offer the same price/performance ratio AMD should have released the Phenom II 940 at $146. Why would they, when it is likely that there was nothing at $146 anywhere near the performance of the 940?"

Now you're turning it around.
After all, the Core i7 920 was the earlier release. It was at $284. AMD released the Phenom II at $275 less than two months later, while it doesn't have anywhere near the performance of the i7 920.
We were arguing about price/performance, remember? If AMD wants good price/performance, they need to release it at a low price. They didn't, and as such they couldn't match the price/performance of the Core i7. Instead they aimed at the price/performance of the Core2 Quad, which wasn't as good as what the Core i7 was offering.
So the point remains: the Phenom II did not offer the best price/performance.

"Price/performance NOW is all that matters, not whether both CPUs were launched at the same price (at different times!). "

I said that at the introduction of Core i7, Intel took price/performance leadership away from AMD with the i7 920. I was asked to provide proof, which I did. Now stop crying.

by: Anonymous on 1/26/2010

"And no, it isn't that easy to get data on prices at launch of the Core i7 now"

Try this:
http://www.pricetrace.com/?do=q&upc=730143267014&keywords=phenom+940

by: Anonymous on 1/26/2010

"If that were the case, this article should have had 0 responses"

I believe the majority of responses have been aimed squarely at the title, rather than the content, which is little more than a copy paste from wikipedia.

by: Anonymous on 1/26/2010

"Yes, that means AMD has good price/performance again NOW, but not when they first introduced the CPUs a year ago.
You see what I'm getting at here?"

I see what you are getting at, but I don't think your argument is correct. Comparing launch prices of products released at different times doesn't really make sense when working out price/performance does it?

It is obvious that when new products come out aimed at a particular price point, products already at that price point will have the disadvantage performance wise, and so their prices will need to be reduced to maintain the balance. What you are saying is that to offer the same price/performance ratio AMD should have released the Phenom II 940 at $146. Why would they, when it is likely that there was nothing at $146 anywhere near the performance of the 940?

It's like comparing the launch prices of say, a Radeon 4870 and 5850. Looking at that the 4870 ($299) would have a terrible price/performance ratio to the 5850 ($259) which is a more advanced and newer design. That would be why prices fluctuate depending on the competition of newer products.

Price/performance NOW is all that matters, not whether both CPUs were launched at the same price (at different times!).

by: Anonymous on 1/26/2010

Oh yea, before anyone complains...
I got the prices from Anandtech's reviews at introduction.
Core i7 920 here:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/intel/showdoc.aspx?i=3448&p=20
Phenom II X4 940 here:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3492

Funny enough, Core i7 920 still costs $289 on Newegg today... Phenom II X4 940 has dropped to $146.
That's the difference in price/performance right there. AMD had to take $130 off the original introduction price to be in line with the new price/performance that Intel set with the Core i7 line.
Yes, that means AMD has good price/performance again NOW, but not when they first introduced the CPUs a year ago.
You see what I'm getting at here?

by: Anonymous on 1/26/2010

"I don't think anyone can dispute a timeline of recorded events now can they?"

If that were the case, this article should have had 0 responses. The article just tries to educate the AMD people on the history of x86 CPUs, as they always seem to get it wrong.
Yet, even though the article cannot be disputed, we see a huge dispute. People are arguing straight in the face of cold, hard facts. Living in an alternate reality.

"You claim there are no Intel fanboys out there. Well, by the logic some of you have used to deduce some of these posts were made by AMD fanboys, it would stand to reason that you yourself are an Intel fanboy. You made a claim that i7 offered better price/performance than the Phenom II, without offering anything to back it up. When challenged, you claim that it is "apparent". If it were so apparent, you could easily have produced something tangible to support yourself, instead you turn it around on the other guy and make it sound like he is being stupid asking for "evidence". Yeah, that smells like hypocrisy alright."

It's a bit more complicated than that. Firstly, despite the article presenting only facts, there's a huge attack launched at it. Secondly only a handful of people actually defend the article/the Intel side. The majority is trying to rewrite history, trying to make excuses for AMD.
Lastly, the people defending the article/Intel are being attacked and insulted, just like you are doing right now.

And no, it isn't that easy to get data on prices at launch of the Core i7 now. The most common source seems to be Newegg, which always has CURRENT prices. We'd have to go back to November 2008 to get prices at Core i7's introduction.
We see that the Core i7 debuts at $284... In January 2009, AMD launches the Phenom II X4 940, at $275. Virtually the same price, but obviously the i7 920 delivers considerably more performance. So as far as the CPU goes, Core i7 has the best price/performance. QED.
Yes, initially the total platform cost was AMD's saving grace (but I was not talking about that, I was talking about the CPU)... but with the Core i7 8xx series, Intel not only introduced a cheaper platform, but the 8xx series CPUs were clocked higher and delivered slightly better performance than their similarly priced 9xx counterparts.

by: Anonymous on 1/26/2010

"there are no Phenoms at the same price as i7 920, so how exactly is the i7 offering more performance for the same price?"

Not now, but there were at introduction. Core i7 pushed prices down, obviously. Exactly because it had better price/performance.

by: Anonymous on 1/25/2010

"Of all the raving idiots that commented on this article, nobody even started to make a dent in anything he said."

What is there to make a "dent" in? He starts with quite a provocative title but then basically proceeds to give a history lesson on x86 CPUs. I don't think anyone can dispute a timeline of recorded events now can they?

I have to take issue with the phrase "raving idiot". Having read through the last several posts it is quite clear that these are coherently written, with decent spelling, punctuation and grammar, and as such they seem to be composed by individuals who are far from "raving idiots". Just because someone sees something differently to you does not give you the right to insult them in such a manner.

And it isn't as though this person was disputing a proven fact with you. You claim there are no Intel fanboys out there. Well, by the logic some of you have used to deduce some of these posts were made by AMD fanboys, it would stand to reason that you yourself are an Intel fanboy. You made a claim that i7 offered better price/performance than the Phenom II, without offering anything to back it up. When challenged, you claim that it is "apparent". If it were so apparent, you could easily have produced something tangible to support yourself, instead you turn it around on the other guy and make it sound like he is being stupid asking for "evidence". Yeah, that smells like hypocrisy alright.

by: Anonymous on 1/25/2010

"There's the insults again. Why do you need 'evidence' for something that is apparent?
Compare Core i7 920 to Core2 Quads or Phenoms at the same price. Clearly the i7 920 offers considerably more performance for the same price, QED."

Insults? The guy only asked you for evidence to back up your statement. I would hardly call that an insult, unless you are peculiarly sensitive. And what you said is not "apparent". In fact how you justify it is simply wrong: there there are no Phenoms at the same price as i7 920, so how exactly is the i7 offering more performance for the same price? The i7 CPU itself is about $100 (newegg) more than the Phenom II 965. Then think about MB and RAM...

Then, consider what you will be using the CPU for. Depending on the application (gaming; watching DVD, Blu-Ray; i.e. normal tasks) it is entirely plausible that the performance difference between the two is not noticeable, and as such the price/perfomance ratio of the Phenom will be better than the i7 (as it is considerably cheaper, incase that wasn't apparent to you). Even if you were to measure the performance difference, rather than judge it, you may find the Phenom comes out on top (I'm not saying in all apps). Regardless, the superiority of the i7 in this measure is not apparent, as you claim.

by: Anonymous on 1/25/2010

It's getting a bit tiresome when people post review after review, where the conclusion is always "in games it doesn't matter".
Yes we know, the GPU is the bottleneck there. That however doesn't mean that a Phenom II is actually as fast as a Core i7, and therefore it's not a good basis for price/performance reasoning.
Core i7 is simply a faster processor. Should Intel make it cheaper just because the extra performance can only be used in games if you have a high-end CrossFire or SLI setup?
There's a lot more to CPU performance than games, people.

by: Anonymous on 1/24/2010

"The core 2 and the Q9xs are still priced above the Phenom II 965 levels per newegg.com as of today. And from about all benchmarks I have seen, the Phenom II 965 performs very well if not better in most categories then those of the core2 and Q9xs."

Core2 Quad is in limbo. As I said, i7 920 gave us unprecedented price/performance. This goes for Core2 Quad aswell, obviously.
The problem is that Core2 didn't drop in price, and the replacements haven't arrived until recently, with the Lynnfield variation of i7, the i5 and i3.
Now the price/performance of the i7 920 (and better) is available to a much larger range of price brackets.

"You assume i7’s performance justifies the price making price/performance ratio worthy to give intel that crown. How do you determine this? You give no supporting evidence."

There's the insults again. Why do you need 'evidence' for something that is apparent?
Compare Core i7 920 to Core2 Quads or Phenoms at the same price. Clearly the i7 920 offers considerably more performance for the same price, QED.

"Are all Intel fans all idiots?"

Yes they are, or they would be, if they existed. That's the thing. There's tons of raving AMD fanboy idiots on websites everywhere... You rarely hear anyone talk about Intel's products, and certainly not the kind of revisionism that comes from the AMD crowd. The article is perfectly right in saying that it's mostly one-sided. All the more since obviously there are far more Intel users than AMD users in the world. One could say that AMD users are exponentially more vocal than Intel users. Pretty much the same can be said of linux vs Microsoft. There's an awful lot of noise being generated around an OS that only has a single-digit marketshare.

Oh, and you are not talking to 'Scali'. I don't think he's even bothered to follow the comments. And can you blame him? Of all the raving idiots that commented on this article, nobody even started to make a dent in anything he said.

by: Anonymous on 1/24/2010

"If AMD doesn’t respond with product then the only option they can respond with is price."

So basically AMD isn't making more profit and getting more marketshare because Intel is continually pushing AMD into ever lower profit margins.
I don't think that's evil, sounds like standard competition to me. Intel has the better technology, so they can make the same products cheaper (eg Intel is now selling 32 nm products vs AMD's 45 nm products in the same pricerange).

by: Anonymous on 1/24/2010

Scali: There's that one-sided view again. AMD doesn't always have better price for the same performance everywhere. (Your right, not all the time and not everywhere. But enough of the time in enough of the segments. Yet it is a constant dance AMD and Intel have, which I am surprised I have to tell you this. It generally plays out in sales and margins and new product releases. If AMD doesn’t respond with product then the only option they can respond with is price. Hence the price for performance schema changes once again on each and every adjustment. If they fail to respond they eventually shut the doors cause they can’t seel product. The fact that they haven’t shut the doors is general proof they know where and how to approach the market so that their products are attractive. This is why my generalization of that one sided argument you claim is not wrong but really more often the case or accurate.)

Scali: In fact, when the Core2 was introduced, for a few months AMD was by far the worst price/performance option. (Like you said for a few months but that changes and is difficult to quantify. But you narrow mindedly just consider the Phenom II to i7 comparison. The core 2 and the Q9xs are still priced above the Phenom II 965 levels per newegg.com as of today. And from about all benchmarks I have seen, the Phenom II 965 performs very well if not better in most categories then those of the core2 and Q9xs. Also what about all those other months, was AMD a better price for performance platform since you clearly delineate that for a few months they weren’t?)

Sali: Again, at the introduction of Core i7, the 920 had unprecedented price/performance. ( I think your wrong here. Check the posting of bench marks. Scali, You were fine up to this point, but this is where you show your true cards and your intel fanboyism blinders. You assume i7’s performance justifies the price making price/performance ratio worthy to give intel that crown. How do you determine this? You give no supporting evidence. You just make some faceless statement. Yet if that is incorrect and Intel does deserve that Price for Performance crown then explain Tom’s Hardware’s write up. See immediately below. Tom’s hardware sees distinct advantages for each platform. Also see conclusions on the other links for Legion and AnandTech. The reason you say this is the same reason you titled your article as you did. You’re the opposite of the AMD fanboy, you’re an intel bigot. Fair enough? This puts you on the same level as the people your criticizing. So when are you going to put out the OPINOIN peice “Are all Intel fans all idiots”?

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/overclock-phenom-ii,2119-10.html
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3619&p=1
http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=869&p=23

Per Tom’s hardware which I believe has done a non-biased and complete analysis.
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/overclock-phenom-ii,2119-10.html
(From conclusion page) The Core i7 and Phenom II seem suited to two different customers. Indeed, there will undoubtedly be gamers who go all-AMD and are willing to sacrifice a bit of speed in order to save money and Intel loyalists who adopt i7 at a bit of extra cost for its newer technology. We thus see distinct advantages to each platform.

One last point:
Scali: One of the biggest reasons why AMD doesn't have bigger market share is purely AMD's own doing: ( your wrong again, not purely, sure they are ultimately responsible for their place in the market, but many market factors are outside of their control. Like Intel’s business practices as one example. One of the previous posters, the one that showed the capitalization and revenue of each company really hits it on the head. The fact that Intel is over 10 times the size will give Intel probably proportional resources for R&D. This could explain why Intel can respond so quickly to AMD’s product rollout which gives Intel a huge advantage. As stated previously Intel’s inappropriate and monopolistic business practices, which is also impacting the market, advantage Intel. Also the fact that AMD doesn’t have the name recognition like Intel impacts AMDs market position because buyers that don’t know better typically buy brand names they are familiar with especially when it comes to tech products, another Intel advantage. So then ask yourself, guineas of the x86 architecture, How and the heck is AMD still alive. If they can’t out R&D, Sell, or produce Intel how in gods green earth are they still alive after all these years? The answer has to be Price for performance product offerings. Which is really the only card AMD can play!!!! So the One-Sided argument you hate must more often than not be true.

by: Anonymous on 1/24/2010

"Most people don’t want to dig that deep, they have better things to do with their time"

Fair enough. But the idiot-part is not in them not knowing something, or not wanting to dig that deep... The idiot-part is in them having an opinion on things they know nothing of, and posting that opinion on every website that they can.

by: Anonymous on 1/24/2010

"So I propose that AMD Fanism is much of what you say but more to do with the fact that you get good performance for a better price which then causes it to be more main stream and more of the general masses type product with less knowledgeable users gravitating to AMD. But that begs the question why doesn’t AMD have more market share. That gets into Marketing and illegal market practices by Intel and so on, which I don’t want to go there at this time."

There's that one-sided view again.
AMD doesn't always have better price for the same performance everywhere. In fact, when the Core2 was introduced, for a few months AMD was by far the worst price/performance option. Again, at the introduction of Core i7, the 920 had unprecedented price/performance.
Yes, in an absolute sense the i7 920 wasn't the cheapest option, but that's only looking at price. It was still sold at mainstream prices, and the performance it delivered was way better than the options that had been available at that pricepoint until then.

So really, your post was fine until this point, where you went back into the same fanboyism and Intel demonizing as all the other idiots.
One of the biggest reasons why AMD doesn't have bigger marketshare is purely AMD's own doing: They don't have the manufacturing facilities to serve a larger market. The same is happening with their GPUs. Theoretically the 5000-series should take the market by storm, it's an excellent product. But they cannot supply the market.

by: Anonymous on 1/24/2010

"AMD provides close to the Intel performance mark in some areas and that AMD price point puts near Intel performance in peoples grasps sooner or on larger scale that might not have the opportunity to otherwise."

Firstly, I think the difference in price/performance between Intel and AMD is far too small to really make a difference.
Secondly, how is this an excuse for the fanboy behaviour of idolizing AMD and demonizing Intel?

AMD Fanism by: Anonymous on 1/24/2010

Scali: But I can't stand people who just don't bother to check their facts, just like with the nonsense about Linux/Unix and how it was 'secure by design from the start', and all that. (Most people don’t want to dig that deep, they have better things to do with their time)

Also

Scali: I think the whole AMD fanboy movement started with the success of the Athlon. (Yes, but for the reason that AMD started to differentiate their product slightly from Intel’s) I bet most AMD fans never even heard of AMD before the Athlon, or in fact haven't even owned a PC before that time. (Why does this even matter) That is the only way in which I can explain their delusional idea that Intel and AMD are somehow each other's equals in a technological sense, and how they leap-frog over each other, trading the performance crown back and forth. (The leap frog thing, I think is as much to do with Marketing by AMD as it is by lack of knowledge or perspective. When AMD diverged it’s architecture path from Intel and came out with 64 bit to the mainstream x86 path you could make a case for this, albeit a small one. Who cares if Intel comes back around and out does it a short time later).

I think you miss understand or misrepresent the AMD fanism. As you state “Intel is that big corporation that people love to hate, and they're rooting for the underdog, which is AMD of course.” Which I am sure is part of it for some. Also consider this possibility. AMD provides close to the Intel performance mark in some areas and that AMD price point puts near Intel performance in peoples grasps sooner or on larger scale that might not have the opportunity to otherwise. If AMD is able to usurp Intel via price cause the performance is close, then AMD interjects there product where they otherwise would have not and it becomes a victory for AMD. Who doesn’t want to defend their purchase or why they bought something. Hence for the masses they start to warm up to AMD. Then these people, not being able to be totally objective, become fans of AMD. Also I propose that most people don’t want to or care to get to the knowledge level that you are at, and all they care about is… does it perform well enough for the price. Keep in mind they probably had some old Pentium that is well up in years, and was ready for the scrap yard years ago. Or is smoe 14 year old kid saving his money to build a new system cause Mom and Dads system stinks and has to get the best bang for there buck. I have run in to many of the later.

So I propose that AMD Fanism is much of what you say but more to do with the fact that you get good performance for a better price which then causes it to be more main stream and more of the general masses type product with less knowledgeable users gravitating to AMD. But that begs the question why doesn’t AMD have more market share. That gets into Marketing and illegal market practices by Intel and so on, which I don’t want to go there at this time. Leave that for another blog.

So when you roll up the Corporate haters and the kids that like to play games and the Mom’s and Dad’s that like the fact they can afford to upgrade while still able to feed Jimmy, and th 14 year old trying to scrap enough money together to make a build, I believe that is where you’re going to find the majority of your Fan boys. I am sure you probably didn’t want the article to get dragged into the fuzzy performance for price argument. But if you want to really face the truth about AMD fanism then I don’t see how you can avoid it. Cause the majority of people just care if it is cheaper and is good enough to run what they want to run.
See postings for performance conclusions that back what I am saying. I tried to pull out the points that support my point.

Post1
Per Tom’s hardware, review: (by Chris Angelini on 01/12/2009)
The Phenom II makes sense. After all, it’s able to handle every task nearly as well as i7 does. (Referencing the PII 940 vs i7 920)
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/overclock-phenom-ii,2119-10.html

Post 2
Per The Inquirer, review: (By Nebojsa Novakovic ); Tuesday, 3 November 2009, 14:57
Of course, with the right price coupled with some power usage reductions, the AMD Phenom II is still more than good enough for most desktop applications.
(PII 965 BE vs i7-870)
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/review/1560385/intel-core-i7-870-vs-amd-phenom-ii-965be

Post 3
Date: August 13th, 2009; Topic: CPU & Chipset ; Manufacturer: AMD; Author: Anand Lal Shimpi
As a gaming CPU, it's actually competitive with the i7s. If you exclude the FarCry 2 results, which I hardly believe are representative of most games, the Phenom II X4 965 is easily just as good of a gaming CPU as an i7 in today's titles. …
Overall application performance is very good from the 965's perspective. It's only in a handful of 3D or well threaded apps where we see the i7 really pull away. The 965 BE is competitive, just not faster.
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3619&p=1

Post 4
Author: Steven Walton; Editor: Kylie Perrin; Date: 25/11/2009
However when clocked at 3.0GHz and beyond, the Phenom II X4 really picked up the pace, and in many cases was able to outclass the Core i7.
http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=869&p=23

by: Anonymous on 1/23/2010

"I was attempting (and clearly failing) to demonstrate how AMD CPUs aren't necessarily copies of Intel ones; but perhaps they are (at the microarchitectural level), just with these "features" added."

AMD hasn't been making direct copies of Intel chips since the 486. I think everyone already knows that AMD designs their own architecture, and that they sometimes implement new ideas before Intel does. But AMD has never been able to get enough leverage to really become Intel's equal.
You see, if AMD vs Intel has taught us anything, it should be that it's not just about having certain technology first, it's about having the right technology at the right time. Intel may not have had an integrated memory controller, but their products were faster than AMD's anyway. Likewise, AMD may have had 3DNow! before Intel introduced SSE, but what did it bring AMD? Likewise, what good did it do AMD that it was their 64-bit x86 extension that got adopted by the masses? 64-bit software still isn't commonplace today, and AMD's advantage over Intel in that respect is long gone.

"What game was Intel playing here? Did they want a massive MHz race, and so design an arch that they could clock up as high as possible? It would have been clear to them that IPC was not on the same level as the PIII, but I suppose they didn't care, and went for a new approach. Bit them in the ass a little. Now they rule IPC, and AMD is struggling to compete in this area."

It takes years to develop a microarchitecture. Therefore I think the common explanation that Intel wanted to market AMD to death with higher clockspeeds is nonsense. They probably started development on Pentium 4 the moment that the Pentium Pro architecture was complete, if not sooner. This would have been in 1996. In 1996 there simply was no reason to get 'defensive' in terms of clockspeed, simply because Intel ruled in both clockspeed and IPC anyway, over their competitors. They couldn't have foreseen that AMD would acquire technology from the DEC Alpha architecture and use it to build the K7.

Therefore I think that around 1996, when the Pentium 4 project started, Intel's engineers were convinced that they could pull off these incredible clockspeeds. There were also some press releases about Intel having ALUs running at 10 GHz speeds in their labs.

Pentium 4 actually worked very well too, during the Northwood era. It wasn't until Intel shrunk the architecture to 90 nm, and ran into unexpected amounts of leakage, that it all started to fall apart. What a lot of people seem to have missed, because of Core2's success, is that Pentium 4 was also shrunk to 65 nm later, and power consumption was reduced greatly, and the CPUs became pretty good overclockers again. So the idea still worked, somewhat.

I think the genius of Intel is that they didn't panic. A lesser company would have panicked when they saw the Pentium 4 falling apart, and would go back to the Pentium III's pipeline.
Intel however calmly evaluated the situation, and figured that although the Pentium 4 may have overshot the target in terms of clockspeed vs IPC a bit, the 'sweet spot' was still somewhere between the Pentium III and the Pentium 4.
And with the Core2 and Core i7 they tried to hit that sweet spot, rather than just going for the 'safe spot' where Pentium III and Athlon64 were.
The result is that Intel's architectures have both better IPC AND better clockspeed scaling than AMD's.
A lesser company would probably just have come up with an Athlon64 clone.

"The title of the article is rather ambiguous, and as such I felt it was necessary to explain why people actually buy AMD."

Well, the article clearly states that the author himself has also bought AMDs:
"I actually had an early Am486DX2-66 back in 1994, and I've never had a Pentium 4 myself, I used Athlons through that era, before going back to Intel with Core 2, for obvious reasons."

So I really don't think you need to explain to the author why one would buy AMD products. He's an AMD customer himself.

by: Anonymous on 1/23/2010

"The subject 'Majority' is not plural"

True, and as such should technically take the singular verb. But I think when describing a set of individuals, it should use the plural verb.

Doesn't "The majority of people is..." sound weird to you?

Anyway, as far as AMD/Intel goes, perhaps I missed the point a little as to the target of this article, and as such was a little eager to defend the AMD position.

"[AMD] may have a technology sooner ... but Intel generally doesn't take very long to respond, and most of the time, Intel's stuff is just simply better."

This I don't dispute (how could you?). And maybe I should have said as much when listing the tech AMD introduced first. I was attempting (and clearly failing) to demonstrate how AMD CPUs aren't necessarily copies of Intel ones; but perhaps they are (at the microarchitectural level), just with these "features" added.

As far as the Athlon/P4 fiasco, are you saying that AMD's chip design model (follow Intel designs) 'lucked out' so to speak when Intel introduced an architecture, that in essence, couldn't compete with it's predecessor? Fair enough.

What game was Intel playing here? Did they want a massive MHz race, and so design an arch that they could clock up as high as possible? It would have been clear to them that IPC was not on the same level as the PIII, but I suppose they didn't care, and went for a new approach. Bit them in the ass a little. Now they rule IPC, and AMD is struggling to compete in this area.

The title of the article is rather ambiguous, and as such I felt it was necessary to explain why people actually buy AMD. However, I can see that this wasn't really the issue, and the author is only offended by people claiming AMD is in some way superior to Intel (with performance as the metric). Which, as many a benchmark will show you, they are not.

by: Anonymous on 1/23/2010

"I wanted to counter the arguments made in the article, namely "AMD architecture is always a generation behind", which is implying that all they do is follow Intel and don't make any headway in terms of innovation themselves. I accept your point about architectural/infrastructural, but nevertheless, as a company they still have shown that they can implement new design features first."

Why do you want to demonstrate this? Nobody ever argued the opposite.
The problem that AMD generally has... they may have a technology sooner (eg they were first with micro-op decoding/execution aswell, and they had floating-point SIMD before Intel's SSE etc), but Intel generally doesn't take very long to respond, and most of the time, Intel's stuff is just simply better.
The most painful recent example being the Nehalem architecture. On paper it's exactly what AMD has been doing since Barcelona. In reality however, even before Intel adopted a native quadcore design, shared L3 cache and an integrated memory controller, Intel's products already outperformed Barcelona, and now that Intel is on the same level as AMD 'on paper', there's a significant performance gap.
So in the end, AMD was still behind the whole time, despite their ideas being good.

"The fact is they didn't, and as such AMD's architecture at the time was more efficient."

Yes, but so were Intel's own Pentium III, Pentium-M and Core architectures.

"Hindsight is a wonderful thing. Here, the point I wanted to make was that Intel's design shortcomings (P4) were being portrayed as a failing on AMD's part for not moving on from PIII based arch. Which doesn't make sense."

You *almost* put 2+2 together, but not quite.
Let me explain the missing piece of the puzzle to you... For as long as AMD has been making x86 CPUs, they have closely followed what Intel was doing. Their 386 and 486 were direct copies of Intel's chips. Their K6 chips were not direct copies of the Pentium, but the design was very cloesly related. The K7 was very closely related to the Pentium Pro architecture.
Now, if AMD were to continue down this line, they would have come up with an architecture cloesly related to the Pentium 4.
Let's face facts here, if it wasn't for AMD's K7 being competitive with the Pentium 4, we would never have known how efficient or inefficient the Pentium 4 really was. It's all relative. If the only comparison was Intel's own Pentium III, Intel simply wouldn't let us find out because they would just not build faster Pentium III processors (which were about as efficient as the Athlon anyway).

So then AMD would most likely have followed Intel in going down the Pentium 4 path, after all, this is what they've always done.

""The majority of people is stupid and useless" [sic]. I think you evaluated yourself nicely there."

What do you mean, [sic]? The subject 'Majority' is not plural, if you thought it should say 'are' instead of 'is'.

by: Anonymous on 1/23/2010

"Anyone who says otherwise is quite obviously wrong (unless all the benchmarks for Core i7 are fake!)."

That's what the article says.

"So, this article is saying that people who buy these low end to mainstream systems are idiots."

That's not what the article says. It's amazing how many people get this out of the article, where it doesn't even remotely imply a link between buying AMD products and being an AMD fanboy idiot.
Reading comprehension isn't what it used to be.

by: Anonymous on 1/22/2010

"AMD was always about bargains, bang-for-the-buck, low-end to mainstream systems"

So what? There is a large market for that kind of system, there is absolutely nothing wrong with competing in that area. It is obvious that AMD is no match for Intel in the high end (R&D funding, anyone?). Anyone who says otherwise is quite obviously wrong (unless all the benchmarks for Core i7 are fake!).

So, this article is saying that people who buy these low end to mainstream systems are idiots. That seems a little harsh on those who aren't so affluent. (I am assuming "fan" means someone who continues to buy AMD products - which is quite applicable to those buying low end systems, seeing as how AMD is very competitive in that segment. Not "fanboys" who claim their AMD Phenom is better/faster than a Core i7 and make up some nonsensical reasoning to try to justify their position.)

by: Anonymous on 1/22/2010

I apologise if I came off as a little fanboy-ish. I am not, and that isn't what I was trying to achieve.

I wanted to counter the arguments made in the article, namely "AMD architecture is always a generation behind", which is implying that all they do is follow Intel and don't make any headway in terms of innovation themselves. I accept your point about architectural/infrastructural, but nevertheless, as a company they still have shown that they can implement new design features first.

"Had Intel continued to develop the older Pentium III architecture, they'd probably have arrived at something like the Core2 earlier, and AMD would not have caught up."
The fact is they didn't, and as such AMD's architecture at the time was more efficient. Hindsight is a wonderful thing. Here, the point I wanted to make was that Intel's design shortcomings (P4) were being portrayed as a failing on AMD's part for not moving on from PIII based arch. Which doesn't make sense.

Lastly, I gave reasons why people buy (and continue to buy) AMD, and why these people aren't "idiots".

As for the socket compatibility, well yes that was rather one sided of me, as in the past, both have had their no-no socket. But maybe we should stop living in the past?

Perhaps you cannot see someone playing Devil's advocate... The article itself made the case against AMD, so why should a balanced response be warranted when only the points for one side have been made?

As far as where I actually stand, if I were to upgrade right now I would probably get a S1156 Core i5 750 or Phenom II 965 depending on MB options (USB3, SATA 6Gbps etc). Leaning towards i5 for reasons of power consumption. I am not (despite what you may think) so stupid and blinded by fanboy-ism that I cannot see when Intel has a better product, and as long as price/perfomance measures aren't way off, why not go for Intel? For more low end systems though, I would have to say AMD offers the better solution, mainly for price and socket compatibility (who now would buy S775?).

Also, when you start with the derogatory remarks, that is hardly productive in terms of having a discussion, and that is precisely where all the fanboy stuff comes from. People insulting other people for no reason, rather than offering something constructive (which I believe you also did, so not all bad).

"The majority of people is stupid and useless" [sic]. I think you evaluated yourself nicely there.

by: Anonymous on 1/21/2010

"Oh, and AMDs socket backwards compatibility is nice too - you can get a cheap CPU in a cheap MB with a socket that isn't a dead end in terms of future upgrades."

Oh yea, that socket 754 was a real winner!

Please, why always this one-sided idiocy?
If you weren't the kind of idiot that this article points out, you woukd have acknowledged that backward and forward compatibility is flaky on both sides. They both had times when a certain socket/platform was supported for quite a while, or times when a certain socket/platform was abandoned almost immediately. But as we see, the majority of people on the internet is a bunch of stupid biased underdog-loving retards with no capability of logic or objective view. It's just human nature. The majority of people is stupid and useless. We stand on the shoulders of the few geniuses that made a difference.
The sad part about the internet is that the majority of morons is making so much noise that the people who have something to say can no longer be heard.

by: Anonymous on 1/21/2010

"You are saying that AMD's CPU was better because it wasn't as advanced, rather than Intel dropped the ball on their P4 design."

Nothing wrong with that. The Pentium 4 is clearly more advanced than the Pentium Pro/II/III family, which the Athlon was based on. It has far higher transistorcount than the other CPUs, contains various new technologies that the others don't have (HyperThreading, SSE2, trace cache) etc.
Clearly it is technologically more advanced.
That it didn't result in better performance is another story altogether. Had Intel continued to develop the older Pentium III architecture, they'd probably have arrived at something like the Core2 earlier, and AMD would not have caught up.

"As far as (recent) architecture goes it is possible to consider AMD being a generation ahead: implementing an on chip memory controller; giving up on the FSB architecture; pushing 64bit computing; offering dual core CPUs; Monolithic 4 core CPUs; now 6 core CPUs."

Those aren't architectural features though. Pentium 4 was a more advanced architecture. An Athlon64 was basically the SAME microarchitecture as the Athlon, just with 64-bit extensions added (which Intel also added to the SAME Pentium 4 architecture) and other changes that are of an infrastructural nature rather than an architectural one.

"To be fair, that isn't bad when comparing Intel's Q4 revenue of over $10bn to AMD's $1.5bn. Bearing that in mind, is it really fair to be expecting AMD to be competing head to head with Intel in high end performance?"

I don't think the point of the article is about what to expect... Rather that people glorify everything that AMD does, and put down everything that Intel does. I think that is the root of the fanboyism that this article is against.
It doesn't say anything about AMD itself, it also doesn't say or imply that anyone buying or using AMD is a fanboy (quite the contrary, as the author himself also uses AMD products). It's about the tons of people on internet sites everywhere, constantly raving about how great AMD is.
You're doing the same. Trying to come up with excuses. AMD doesn't need excuses. They're not as big as Intel, and as such they can't develop architectures as quickly and as successfully as Intel usually does. Fact of life.

But please, stop coming up with excuses. And stop going back to the Pentium 4. Yes, Intel dropped the ball, we all know that. But it was two generations of Intel CPUs ago, Pentium 4-based CPUs have long disappeared from the shelves, and AMD hasn't made a dent in Intel's product offerings since, so let's stop living in the past.

by: Anonymous on 1/21/2010

Perhaps comparing the market cap is better than revenue - some people may start saying that AMD doesn't make as much because they make CPUs that only someone who is stupid would buy.
Intel - $115bn
AMD - $6bn
AMD is a MUCH smaller company than Intel. So the fact that they are competing at all is something.

by: Anonymous on 1/21/2010

I don't believe AMD's architecture is always a generation behind. And using this to explain why they offered a superior CPU to Intel in the Athlon/P4 days is ludicrous. You are saying that AMD's CPU was better because it wasn't as advanced, rather than Intel dropped the ball on their P4 design.

As far as (recent) architecture goes it is possible to consider AMD being a generation ahead: implementing an on chip memory controller; giving up on the FSB architecture; pushing 64bit computing; offering dual core CPUs; Monolithic 4 core CPUs; now 6 core CPUs.

Alas, it is indeed very fair to say that they are (since Core 2) a generation (at least) behind Intel in terms of performance. But I don't believe that is entirely what you were saying.

To be fair, that isn't bad when comparing Intel's Q4 revenue of over $10bn to AMD's $1.5bn. Bearing that in mind, is it really fair to be expecting AMD to be competing head to head with Intel in high end performance?

As far as 'fans' go:
Someone buying AMD who is looking for no expense spared performance is stupid (think fanboy).
However, someone buying AMD for the price/performance ratio of the whole system is not stupid (i.e. AMD fans). Especially for gaming, where the CPU is not massively important compared to GPU. Money saved on CPU & MB (and RAM - dual channel vs triple channel) could go to a high end GPU.
Or someone buying for HTPC or home office - AMD offer very cheap CPUs with more than enough power for these uses, and combined with the fact that you can get a MB with the best on board GPU for not a lot of money makes AMD a winner here. Oh, and AMDs socket backwards compatibility is nice too - you can get a cheap CPU in a cheap MB with a socket that isn't a dead end in terms of future upgrades.

by: Anonymous on 1/20/2010

Wow, did anyone actually understand the article?
I see tons of posts on how AMD is great and Intel is evil, but the article isn't aimed at AMD at all.
It's aimed at the AMD fanboys. Which ironically enough is exactly what most posts are.

by: Anonymous on 1/19/2010

I have used both AMD and Intel. AMD are awesome and this is why.
Give me the ratios on how much man power and coin that AMD and Intel have used to create better technologies. Intel ofcourse have access to stupidly high resources. AMD is like this freaking SPARTAN that doesn't give up. For that they win. Why because they are running on the power of being super cool!

Without AMD a large percentage of us would not be able to afford decent computers. Fact. So please Intel FANBOY let the AMD freak flag fly!

SMART PEOPLE HATE INTEL by: Anonymous on 1/18/2010

SMART PEOPLE HATE INTEL.. response.

Your 100% correct. Which gets back to why I bash Scali.

We need to support the underdog otherwise we all get screwed in the long run

by: Anonymous on 1/17/2010

"Scali is a moron since he can’t even recognize that without AMD pushing Intel and forcing Intel’s hand to improve it’s architecture such as i7, which follows AMD’s architecture it released back in 2007, he would still be 32 bit Pentium platform."

SCALI IS A SHAME FOR HUMANITY,HAVE YOU EVER HEARD ABOUT TILERA'S CPUS AND INTELS PLANS TO DESTOY IT AS THEY WANT TO DESTROY AMD ????? WHY FOR STOPPING CPU EVOLUTION AND TAKE THE LEAD IN MONOPOL AND HAVE ALL THE MONEY GENERATED FROM THIS INDUSTRY THIS IS THE TRUTH THAT'S WHY SMART PEOPLE HATE INTEL,IT'S NOT ALL ABOUT PERFORMANCE IT'S ABOUT INTEL'S WHO PALNS TO SELL YOU A CPU WITH MORE THAN 1000$.SORRY FOR BAD LANGUAGE.

by: Anonymous on 1/14/2010

"There's more, but the point is that AMD wasn't even Intel's main competitor, until after all other competitors had given up. I have to give AMD credit for being so persistent, though."

Taken from the article...

Enough said by: Anonymous on 1/12/2010

I don’t like calling Scali derogatory terms but the man needs to be somewhat objective before, in my opinion, can have any credibility. So calling him a moron fits. On defense of AMD fanboys they support the underdog. That is a good thing. AMD has produced quality products so much so they are one of the few x86 providers left that have withstood years of unfair business practices by Intel. Don’t believe me about the unfair business practices read the EU’s ruling. The fact that the The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has filed suite on Dec 16, 2009 and NY’s AG filed a major anti trust suite against Intel around the first of Nov 2009 is serious signs that Intel has serious business practices on the elimination of its competitors. And the fact that AMD is still around to fight that uphill battle and the other market issues is very impressive. So you go AMD.

Scali.. I know you read this stuff.. So why are you so stupid....??

You read the Article? by: Greg442 on 1/9/2010

I didn't get past the title. I really don't care whats in the article. Its offensive, and this jerk should be "FLAMED" to no end.

by: Anonymous on 1/8/2010

You can attack Wikipedia all you want, but Wikipedia isn't the issue here.
It doesn't matter where he got it from, it is either correct or it isn't.
Just because it is on Wikipedia doesn't MAKE it incorrect. The burden of proof is on you. If his information is incorrect, provide the proof and correct it. So far nobody has managed to prove any of the info in this article wrong.

And yes, he is an M.Sc. in computer science. He has mentioned it on one of his other blogs, but he doesn't brag about it like you do doesn't need to.

by: Anonymous on 1/8/2010

"Scali is a moron since he can’t even recognize that without AMD pushing Intel and forcing Intel’s hand to improve it’s architecture such as i7, which follows AMD’s architecture it released back in 2007, he would still be 32 bit Pentium platform."

No, you are the moron.
What he does is present facts.
What you're doing here is launching some fantasy about what the world would have looked like without AMD.

Scali is a moron!!! Intel fanboys are the same as AMD fanboys by: Anonymous on 1/7/2010

Scali is a moron. He is just some idiot out there trashing someone because he has the platform to do so. He is an idiot and a moron cause he is so one sided. Just about all of the items he outlines on why he hates AMD fanboys in P-4 and P-5 of his article above are the same arguments you can make against Intel fanboys. So why exclude them? Are they somehow better? Do we have a bit of favoritism here? I think so.

Also just because he can read Wikipedia and talks some register info makes him some kind of an expert. If he is so smart why did he leave out items like System Bus Timing and Interupt priority management, state stepping or general Memory organization, or stack flow operations. What technical training did he have or complete? Did he get a BS in Comp Sci or Computer Engineering? I know I did, BS-CoE and BS-EE form Univ of Missour 91. No of course not or he would have included that in his massive resume. No he just graduated form a two day training course of Wiki-U. Wow I bet that was tough. Oh so the fact that he has owned many other x86 CPUs somehow makes him impartial too or an expert of. Not a chance. Remember his extensive knowledge from all we can tell is wekipedia. Wow, the same source that isn’t considered a reliable source since just about anyone can modify or add to it.

I don’t like calling Scali derogatory terms but the man needs to be somewhat objective before, in my opinion, can have any credibility. So calling him a moron fits. On defense of AMD fanboys they support the underdog. That is a good thing. AMD has produced quality products so much so they are one of the few x86 providers left that have withstood years of unfair business practices by Intel. Don’t believe me about the unfair business practices read the EU’s ruling. The fact that the The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has filed suite on Dec 16, 2009 and NY’s AG filed a major anti trust suite against Intel around the first of Nov 2009 is serious signs that Intel has serious business practices on the elimination of its competitors. And the fact that AMD is still around to fight that uphill battle and the other market issues is very impressive. So you go AMD.

Basically Intel is a bully and from that perspective I am glad that I own 6 AMD CPU’s in my house. More people need to take notice and have a spine for what is right.

All Scali sees is his distain for AMD users and for why…. Because we think we might know something about CPU – x86 Architecture. Who cares regardless if we do or do not? Let them be delusional. Grow up Scali.

Scali is a moron since he can’t even recognize that without AMD pushing Intel and forcing Intel’s hand to improve it’s architecture such as i7, which follows AMD’s architecture it released back in 2007, he would still be 32 bit Pentium platform.

by: Anonymous on 1/5/2010

It seems like the author isn't a moron, he's thought about the Intel Compiler issue aswell:
http://scalibq.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!663AD9A4F9CB0661!238.entry

He seems to have thought it through better than
"This looks like a victory for AMD. If we read "any Intel product" as Intel's compilers and function libraries, "any Third Party" as programmers using these compilers and libraries, and "Artificial Performance Impairment" as the CPU dispatcher checking the vendor ID string; then the settlement puts an obligation on Intel to change their CPU dispatcher"

Too many if's and but's there... don't you think?

I guess you Intel heads can't comprehend by: Anonymous on 1/5/2010

You Intel moron's didn't read the article. I can tell by your response.

You apparently aren't as intelligent as the lawyers. Read the 2.3 section of the settlement.

The settlement says:
#######################
2.3 TECHNICAL PRACTICES

Intel shall not include any Artificial Performance Impairment in any Intel product or require any Third Party to include an Artificial Performance Impairment in the Third Party’s product. As used in this Section 2.3, “Artificial Performance Impairment” means an affirmative engineering or design action by Intel (but not a failure to act) that (i) degrades the performance or operation of a Specified AMD product, (ii) is not a consequence of an Intel Product Benefit and (iii) is made intentionally to degrade the performance or operation of a Specified AMD Product. For purposes of this Section 2.3, “Product Benefit” shall mean any benefit, advantage, or improvement in terms of performance, operation, price, cost, manufacturability, reliability, compatibility, or ability to operate or enhance the operation of another product.

In no circumstances shall this Section 2.3 impose or be construed to impose any obligation on Intel to (i) take any act that would provide a Product Benefit to any AMD or other non-Intel product, either when such AMD or non-Intel product is used alone or in combination with any other product, (ii) optimize any products for Specified AMD Products, or (iii) provide any technical information, documents, or know how to AMD.
########################################
Rebuttal:
This looks like a victory for AMD. If we read "any Intel product" as Intel's compilers and function libraries, "any Third Party" as programmers using these compilers and libraries, and "Artificial Performance Impairment" as the CPU dispatcher checking the vendor ID string; then the settlement puts an obligation on Intel to change their CPU dispatcher. I will certainly check the next version of Intel's compiler and libraries to see if they have done so or they have found a loophole in the settlement.

by: Anonymous on 1/5/2010

By that logic of "preventing fair competition", basically it is unfair to buy AMD processors, because then you're not buying Intel processors, and vice versa.
It's very simple: the Intel compiler is meant for maximizing performance of Intel processors. That the code even runs at all on other brands is merely a side-effect of other companies licensing Intel's x86 instructionset.
If you want maximum performance on Intel processors, you could consider using the Intel compiler.
If you just want your code to run well on other brands, use another compiler.
It's that simple.
Heck, there's even free alternatives, such as gcc.

by: Anonymous on 1/5/2010

"Preventing fair competition"?
Oh please... Just because Intel builds a compiler to support their own products doesn't mean they're preventing fair competition.
Is Intel forcing developers to use only their compiler? No they aren't.
Is Intel preventing other compiler developers from selling their products, or is Intel sabotaging other compilers by modifying their CPUs or anything? No they aren't.
Is Intel bundling their Intel Compiler with their CPUs? No they aren't.
Does Intel have a considerable marketshare in the compiler market? No they don't.

I don't see how the existence of the Intel Compiler prevents fair competition in any way.
I think you guys need to contemplate the meaning of "free market" and "competition" for a while.
This is getting ridiculous.

Intel just sucks by: Anonymous on 1/4/2010

It is a shame that Intel, this mighty chip maker, attempts to criple it's competiton at every turn.

It shows that Intel isn't interested in providing the best product. They just want to provide the minimum and prevent others from providing better. Thank god for AMD or we would all be using single core 32 bit Intel Pentiums.

I could be wrong here but I think Intel's dirty laundry is starting to catch up with them. HAHAHA

See link:
http://www.agner.org/optimize/blog/read.php?i=49

Will Intel be forced to remove the "cripple AMD" function from their compiler?

Unfortunately, software compiled with the Intel compiler or the Intel function libraries has inferior performance on AMD and VIA processors. The reason is that the compiler or library can make multiple versions of a piece of code, each optimized for a certain processor and instruction set, for example SSE2, SSE3, etc. The system includes a function that detects which type of CPU it is running on and chooses the optimal code path for that CPU. This is called a CPU dispatcher. However, the Intel CPU dispatcher does not only check which instruction set is supported by the CPU, it also checks the vendor ID string. If the vendor string says "GenuineIntel" then it uses the optimal code path. If the CPU is not from Intel then, in most cases, it will run the slowest possible version of the code, even if the CPU is fully compatible with a better version.

This looks like a victory for AMD. If we read "any Intel product" as Intel's compilers and function libraries, "any Third Party" as programmers using these compilers and libraries, and "Artificial Performance Impairment" as the CPU dispatcher checking the vendor ID string; then the settlement puts an obligation on Intel to change their CPU dispatcher. I will certainly check the next version of Intel's compiler and libraries to see if they have done so or they have found a loophole in the settlement.

Interestingly, this is not the end of the story. Only about one month after the AMD/Intel settlement, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) filed an antitrust complaint against Intel. The accusations in the FTC complaint are unusually strong:

So the idiot is the guy that keeps buying Intel and is supporting the company that is preventing fair competition.

I am an AMD fan - response.. by: Anonymous on 12/30/2009

I'm an AMD fan. My last several systems (including the one I'm typing on now, and the one next to it,) are AMD based... response:

It is good to see realistic people out there. I like AMD for the same reason. I just purchased an AMD 925 which replaces my AMD 9500 and I will OC to 3.4 and it will run everything fast. I also have an AMD 940 and a 920 Phenom. When you have a family of kids and we like to LAN party it is nice to be able to have three or four PC that perform well and don't break the bank.

Would I like to buy Intel. Sure!!! but I have a hard time doing so when they always ask that 20% - 30% premium because you are buying Intel. Rather take that and put it toward something else.

i5 are NOT faster then Q95 and 9650 by: Anonymous on 12/30/2009

when Intel has Core i5 and Core i7 CPUs on the market that are faster AND cheaper than the Q9550 and Q9650....

response:
not all i5's are faster then Q9550 or 9650. Accroding to Passmark.com benchmarks. http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

According to Passmark the i5 750 is just under the Q9550.

So is the rest of the crap your spreading is that false as well?

Personally I think based on performance the comparison of Q95 and Q96 to Phenom is relevent since they are relevent CPUs that Intel is still shipping.

Idiots? by: Anonymous on 12/30/2009

No. AMD fans aren't idiots. Neither are Intel fans. "Fanboys," however, those who want to get into fights over whose chip is "best" (not discussions, fights) ... are.

I'm an AMD fan. My last several systems (including the one I'm typing on now, and the one next to it,) are AMD based. I like where they usually sit on the balance of price and performance. However, I'm also a realist - and looking at performance, price and the rest, the case that's sitting about ten feet from me right now is slated for an Intel (and AMD - sorry nVidia, but they're shipping silicon) solution to serve me for the next 3.5 to 5 years.

All "fanboys" - not fans - are the ones to look out for. The only thing I'll rabidly defend is my right to get the best bang for my buck - not just now, but while I upgrade a system over the next several years.

by: Anonymous on 12/27/2009

"The reality is that AMD has lots of debt, and isn't making any money. They live off investments from rich Arab consortiums and the Intel settlement."

Retards like this idiot make up most of the stupid-clueless BS Intel clowns love to spread ...

FYI: AMD *IS* making PROFIT already and those "investments from rich Arab consortiums" (sic! What an idiot!) went into a foundry that's shaping up already to be one of the biggest players (they just added Chartered to it).

Stupid clueless fucks like you really annoy me.

by: Anonymous on 12/25/2009

A moron is someone who tries to compare the outdated/EOL Q9550 and Q9650 to AMD Phenom II, when Intel has Core i5 and Core i7 CPUs on the market that are faster AND cheaper than the Q9550 and Q9650.
Outdated/EOL CPUs are always more expensive, as their prices are no longer adjusted to the market.

Why do you always need to make unfair comparisons to try and make AMD look good?
That's exactly why all you AMD fans come off as idiots.
All you do is come up with broken logic and insults... Everyone who doesn't agree with you, must be working for Intel.
Yea right.

by: Anonymous on 12/25/2009

It's just a matter of time until AMD surpasses Core i7... But it's a moving target.
Just look at the past. It was 'only a matter of time' until AMD could compete with Core 2 Quad. Problem is, by the time AMD did, Intel had a Core i7 920 out, which had better price/performance than any Core2 Quad... So AMD was once again behind the times, and it wasn't AMD who drove prices down, but rather Intel itself. With the introduction of Core i7, the high-end Core2 Quad line was repositioned as mainstream.

By the looks of it, history will be repeating itself. Intel will move to 32 nm soon, and release 6-core and 8-core variations of the Nehalem architecture, again raising the bar for AMD.

Is that "Intel bigoted"? I think it's just reality.

Merry Christmass to all.. by: Anonymous on 12/24/2009

We all owe AMD a big thank you. If we didn't have AMD to force Intel to come down in price and improve on design, we all would still be buying Prescott and paying through the nose.

So thank you AMD.

On another note.

I will say this to my Intel bigoted buddy on this forum. Your right AMD doesn't have anything that can, performance wise on a single die, compete with i7 currently. But AMD will surpass i7. It's just a matter of time. What will be interesting to see is what will be AMD's and Intel’s price point when they do.

Merry Christmass to all.. by: Anonymous on 12/24/2009

We all owe AMD a big thank you. If we didn't have AMD to force Intel to come down in price and improve on design, we all would still be using Prescott and paying through the nose.

So thank you AMD and Merry Christmas.

On another note.

I will say this to my Intel bigoted buddy on this forum. Your right AMD doesn't have anything that can compete with i7 currently. But AMD will surpass i7 eventually. What will be interesting to see is what will be AMD's and Intel's price points when they do.

Back at you.. by: Anonymous on 12/24/2009

Oh does the truth hurt..? That is why you Intel heads get all worked up about AMD. You’re to stuck on Intel to be willing to try anything else. My guess you work for Intel so you’re blinded from objectivity.

At least I provide analysis with performance benchmarks and cost figures..

All you can do is just call people morons with out anything supporting it. That is because if you attempted to compare apples to apples, like I did previously, between Intel and AMD you always come up short.

So you try to create an unequal comparison so that you can prop up Intel and make them look good.

So try again moron...

by: Anonymous on 12/23/2009

A moron is someone who writes an article in this fashion :/

A-S

The Intel fan boys are morons... by: Anonymous on 12/22/2009

Her is another look at why AMD is so much better then Intel.

The Phenom II 965 is slightly better then Intel’s Q9550 and just under the Q9650 per the following SysMark and Passmark bench marks. Which both Intel CPUs are excellent CPUs and have all the horse power you need in a CPU for the existing applications we currently have available to the PC today.

See links:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3619&p=3
http://cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

Yet the Phenom II 965 is 26% cheaper than the Q9550 at $250 per Newegg as of 12/22/09, and 43% cheaper than the Q9650 at $325 per newegg. Also based on the performance gap between the 965 and the Q9650 Passmark and Sysmark test show the 965 has a 6% and 2% lag respectively behind the Q9650.

So the real morons are the Intel people that keep trying to compare Phenom with i7 when we all know there is disparity in performance yet don’t then consider the price difference as well. That is like comparing a Ford F150 to a Ford Mustang.

Also who wouldn’t want basically Q9650 performance for only 57% of the cost. So who is the moron? I say the author is and all you Intel heads that don’t get it.

Best thing yet response... by: Anonymous on 12/17/2009

AMD's next CPU is going to be the best thing since sliced bread..

Nobody said that in this forum.... Man you really need to have a beer. Chillax man....

AMD is architecturally making significant changes as well... Do a little research... But I am sure you won’t since you are so confident Intel is the answer to everything I bet you won’t bother. So let me help you. You might enjoy it.

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3683&p=2
most floating point workloads would be moved off of the CPU and onto the GPU. At that point you could even argue against including any sort of FP logic on the "CPU" at all. It's clear that AMD's design direction with Bulldozer is to prepare for that future.

http://anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3674
A single Bulldozer core will appear to the OS as two cores, just like a Hyper Threaded Core i7. The difference is that AMD is duplicating more hardware in enabling per-core multithreading.

The HT thing I am guessing might not been available to AMD prior to the most recent legal settlements. My guess it would have been locked up in a patent issue. I am sure that AMD if legally open to could have implemented HT just like Intel. This stuff really isn't that hard to do especially when your competitor has laid out how to implement.

So lets wait and see. It's no big thing that AMD is pushing Intel to do better. That what AMD did in the past 64Bit and imbedded Mem controller and we are all the beneficiarys, especially you Intel idiologs.

by: Anonymous on 12/17/2009

Codename Beckton (Nehalem-EX).
Expected: Q1 2010.

by: Anonymous on 12/17/2009

Oh yea, AMD's next CPU is going to be the best thing since sliced bread!
Haven't we heard it all before, in the many months before the launch of Barcelona?

I'll believe it when I see it.

As for 8 and 12 cores... Intel can play that game too (and they can do it better, becasue they are about to go 32 nm). Unless AMD significantly improves their cores, Intel will easily outperform AMD with a CPU with the same number of cores.
In fact, currently Intel's 4 cores with HT outperform AMD's 6 cores.
And no sign of AMD offering HT on their future products yet...

Phenom isn't AMD's end game by: Anonymous on 12/16/2009

Well then you haven't been paying attention to AMD news realeases have you. They will have the 8 and 12 core opterons out in 2010. I believe q1 is the forcast.

But honestly why do you Intel guys seem to hate the AMD crowd so much. Who pissed in your soup? Is it that i7 looks architectually alot like Phenom? You guys jelous that AMD did it right before Intel. Albeit not as good as Intel. Usually the copy cat tends to have the advantedge since they didn't have to do the heavy lifting up front.

Are you upset you have to pay more for Intel but get less?

Why the anger and hostility????

by: Anonymous on 12/16/2009

A moron is someone who compares a top-of-the-line Phenom II with a top-of-the-line Core i7 on price.

by: Anonymous on 12/16/2009

The reality is that AMD has lots of debt, and isn't making any money. They live off investments from rich Arab consortiums and the Intel settlement.
Once that money is burnt up, AMD needs to have new CPUs, because Phenom II isn't profitable, and this will only gets worse as Intel continues to release newer, faster CPUs and cuts prices further.

If you're really a fan of AMD and want to buy their CPUs a few years from now, then you should be wishing for newer, better technology from AMD aswell, because if they can't come up with anything better than Phenom II, they'll be gone soon.

I don't care about price.. what a laugh by: Anonymous on 12/16/2009

I don't CARE about the price argument....

And like wise most AMD users think your argument the be all end all is performance only, is just as stupid and We/I don't care.

Here is why the AMD price for performance matters regardless what you think. If you need 3 well perfoming pc and If my CPU, MOBO and Mem for the top of the line AMD runs about $370 a pop for a 965 and to get the top of the line Intel cost $1270 which is almost 3.5 times the cost of the AMD then it is a no brainer to buy AMD. Because.. because!!! there isn't really anything that Intel does that AMD can't do. Why does it matter if it takes just a fractional second longer for AMD to finish the same thing the Intel system does? What, do you have to go off and create the cure for cancer... ?? If so, you sure suck at it.

So who is the moron. The guy that buys the porche or the guy that buy's the ford, the boat and the apratment on the beach...? I would rather have the boat and the beach. And 99% of all sane and logical people would as well.

You really need to get back to reality on what really matters to the user community.

by: Anonymous on 12/16/2009

No, the thing is that I don't CARE about the price argument. It's too easy.
What all these AMD morons don't understand is that AMD can't do better than Phenom II. They have nothing faster... They have no direct competitor to Core i7. They just can't deliver that level of performance.
Ofcourse it's cheaper, that's the only way that AMD can possibly still sell SOME products. If they were selling them at Intel's prices, nobody would buy them, because obviously Intel would easily win any price/performance comparisons.

So all AMD has going for it is price. Core i7 wipes the floor with Phenom II in every other way.
I already said that too. That's why you AMD people are such retards. Even when you concede the price advantage, they continue arguing. You're idiots, you understand nothing about technology and performance. Who cares about price? Price isn't going to get AMD back in the race. If things keep going this way, AMD will have to give their CPUs away for free in a while.

Core i7 wipes the floor with Phenom II response.. by: Anonymous on 12/16/2009

Yet lets get back to reality. If AMD asked for $1,000 for a Phenom II 965 then I would say yeah your right Phenom II gets destroyed. But AMD hasn't entered that price point market therefore do not have a presence. Which means your general comparison is false or irrelevent.

Which is what all AMD people are saying and what seems to elude you. AMD is smart enough to realize they can't price against it since it doesn't perform as well, so AMD prices against Intel's lineup where Phenom II wipes Intel.

It's a price point comaparison. Otherwise I coulds say that the Cray xt5 wipes the floor with Intel systems that are equivelent.

http://www.top500.org/lists/2009/11/press-release
PORTLAND, Ore.--The Six-Core AMD Opteron™ processor-based system “Jaguar” is the world’s supreme supercomputer according to the TOP500 Organization, which today released its bi-annual list of the highest performing systems in the world.

by: Anonymous on 12/16/2009

Sales persons would push Intel because they push whatever they can get the most money out of. AMD has always had supply problems. A lot of the time they were selling Intel simply because they couldn't supply AMD.
Better supply means you can move more units and move them faster, hence more money.

Enthusiasts were all over AMD though. Pentium 4 was flamed off the internet by the same raving fanboy idiots that are now crying because Core i7 wipes the floor with Phenom II in every way, and try to hang on to bottlenecked benchmarks to try and defend AMD.
Give it up, you idiots. The only good thing about Phenom II is that it's cheap. Performance, power consumption, features... Intel has it beat in every other way.

by: Anonymous on 12/16/2009

The GPU bottleneck is very easy to understand... And whether it's caused by the actual GPU itself or by the PCI-e bus, is not really relevant.
Look at the results. Generally all results for Core i7 over 3 GHz get the EXACT same framerate.
We know from other benchmarks that it is not the CPU that doesn't get faster when you go past 3 GHz. Performance generally keeps scaling with higher clockspeeds.
When it doesn't do this in games, clearly there is a bottleneck.

If you push the clockspeed of a Phenom II far enough, then it too will run into that bottleneck, and you get the same framerates.

Does that mean the Phenom II is just as good for gaming then? Yes.
Does it mean that the Phenom II is just as fast a CPU as Core i7 is? Not at all.

You can hold the same argument for the Core2 Quad for example, or a Core i5. It just doesn't go faster because of a bottleneck.
Whichever is the cheapest CPU to run into the bottleneck is the 'winner', in terms of value for money. But only in situations where this bottleneck applies, obviously. As already said, there's more to CPUs than gaming.

GPU Limited Benchmarks response by: Anonymous on 12/16/2009

GPU Limited Benchmarks response from 12/2

Tell me how in the world do you figure the 5970 was in some way limited and there by causing GPU bottleneck. The only limiting factor I could see is the BUS. But the author does not seem to suggest that so why should you. So then wouldn't both Intel and AMD have plenty of head room to seperate.

Therefore if the Legion stats are true then Phenom II is just as good as i7 920 from a games perspective in the 3.8 GHZ and above range.

not wanting to settle response by: Anonymous on 12/16/2009

When Athlon64 was faster than Pentium 4, people were saying you should only buy AMD processors....

I could be wrong on this issue. But during those years it still seemed the Sales people would typically push the Intel brand.

I don't recall ever a time where the majority seemed to push AMD over Intel.

But I could be wrong.

by: Anonymous on 12/16/2009

"I just get tired of the mentality that to get great performance you can only buy Intel. From the benchmarks for games that is clearly not the case. Yes I have looked at productivity software bench marks and AMD lags but not far behind."

That's just how it is. When Athlon64 was faster than Pentium 4, people were saying you should only buy AMD processors. Must be human nature, not wanting to settle for second-best.

gaming and i7 response.. by: Anonymous on 12/15/2009

...it's not like it's a bad thing that Intel makes these Core i7 processors....

Your absolutely right. It is a good thing. I am glad that the i7’s are here. It will just push AMD to respond.

I just get tired of the mentality that to get great performance you can only buy Intel. From the benchmarks for games that is clearly not the case. Yes I have looked at productivity software bench marks and AMD lags but not far behind.

http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=869&p=23

Also I am tired of the moron mentality that since Intel has the fastest CPU then nothing else matters or that AMD hasn’t influenced the market. If that is the case Porche vs Ford is the same stupid argument. Which is dumb, since Ford has made a legitimate mark on the Auto industry in its own way. People that buy Fords typically don’t need or want a Proche for good reason.

Lets give AMD the credit where credit is due, no more and no less.

Also we must not forget that most people that purposefully by AMD realize that they maybe sacrificing a very minimal amount of performance but in return they are getting a more cost effective PC. It’s like buying a v6 or a v8 without the trubo. Intel folks that haven’t tried AMD systems don’t know what bang for the buck AMD provides. The only reason I see benefit to Intel is that it allows me to make a HackinTosh PC ie a hacked version of Macintosh. I haven’t been successful in getting that done on a Phenom and am tired of trying. Other then that I don’t know of anything my Phenom can’t do that Intel can. So to me what is the diff. Just as long as I can run Ubuntu and Windows I am good.

The thing that I love about the AMD Intel relationship is that we, the consumers, have greatly benefited. AMD can't go toe to toe with Intel since they are a fraction of the size. But I think it is fair to give AMD credit, were credit is due, being they have had positive impact on the x86 development and have kept Intel on there toes so to speak.

So I can’t wait to see what is coming down the road from both vendors.

Responce to gaming.. by: Anonymous on 12/15/2009

it's not like it's a bad thing that Intel makes these Core i7 processors.

Your absolutely right. It is a good thing. I am glad that the i7 are here. It will just push AMD to respond. The thing that I love about the AMD Intel relationship is that us consumers have greatly benefited. AMD can't go toe to toe with Intel since they are a fraction of the size. But I think it is fair to give AMD credit, they have had positive impact on the x86 development and have kept Intel on there toes so to speak. I am looking forward to what is coming down the road.

by: Anonymous on 12/15/2009

"I would feel bad if I bought an i7 when it comes to gaming...."

And you should. There's more to computing than gaming... and there's more to gaming performance than a fast CPU.
Core i7 is the fastest x86 CPU available on the market today, but that doesn't guarantee that games will actually run faster. It's a phenomenon widely known as the "GPU bottleneck".

Benchmarks show that there are cases with extreme SLI or CrossFire configurations, where Core i7 will make a difference... but with most games and most single-GPU configurations, the GPU determines gaming performance. You should obviously research your potential buys first, and then you would find this out before you buy a Core i7.

Then again, the world doesn't revolve around gaming alone, so it's not like it's a bad thing that Intel makes these Core i7 processors.

by: Anonymous on 12/15/2009

"The Athlon 64 made its debut on June 23, 1999."

Uhh, no, that's the regular Athlon.
You were looking for:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athlon64
But to be fair, Opteron was released earlier:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opteron
"The Opteron is AMD's x86 server and workstation processor line, and was the first processor to implement the AMD64 instruction set architecture (known generically as x86-64). It was released on April 22, 2003"

And obviously AMD beat Intel to market with x86-64, because x86-64 was in direct conflict with Intel's plans for the migration to 64-bit computing: Itanium.
If AMD hadn't put x86-64 on the market, Intel wouldn't have supported it at all. If AMD had failed with x86-64 in the marketplace, then Intel wouldn't have supported it at all.
We'd be using Itanium-based 64-bit CPUs in that case.

I would feel bad if I bought an i7 by: Anonymous on 12/14/2009

I would feel bad if I bought an i7 when it comes to gaming....

Read the article. I am sure most of you i7 fans out there will refuse to believe because that would mean you would have to admit you mad a bad choice. But the author seems legit to me...

http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=869&p=23

Hey Mister by: Anonymous on 12/14/2009

Hey mister... "AMD didn't embrace 64-bit before Intel did. Ever heard of the Itanium?" No I had not heard of Itanium, but for good reason. They are obscure. Yet Intel may have started development before AMD on 64 bit but AMD beat them to market with 64x86 which Intel followed suite.

Per Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athlon
The Athlon 64 made its debut on June 23, 1999.

Per Wikipedia
After a protracted development process with many delays the first Itanium processor, codenamed Merced, was released in 2001, and more powerful Itanium processors have been released periodically. HP produces most Itanium-based systems, but several other manufacturers also offer systems based on Itanium. As of 2008[update], Itanium is the fourth-most deployed microprocessor architecture for enterprise-class systems, behind x86-64, IBM POWER, and SPARC.[1] Intel released the current Itanium version, codenamed Montvale, in November 2007.[2] The follow-on, a quad-core processor codenamed Tukwila, was itself originally planned for release in 2007 but is now announced to ship to OEMs in the first quarter of 2010.[3]

When first released in 2001, Itanium's performance, compared to better established RISC and CISC processors, was disappointing. Although remaining in development and having reached a limited success in the niche of high end computing, it had been hoped to evolve into a replacement for lower end applications of the original x86 architecture. Instead, emulation to run existing applications and operating systems proved to be a costly obstacle. AMD chose a different direction designing the less radical, and compatible, x86-64 extension to which Microsoft had committed — leaving no choice for Intel.[4] These designs can natively run legacy code by taking a switch, and offer 64 bit performance and memory addressing without special compilers.[5]

Also note:
while the 32-bit x86 architecture continued to grow into the enterprise space. With economies of scale fueled by its enormous installed base, x86 has remained the preeminent "horizontal" architecture in enterprise computing.

Only a few thousand systems using the original Merced Itanium processor were sold, due to relatively poor performance, high cost and limited software availability.

Does it matter. by: Anonymous on 12/10/2009

Personally I have always used intel and my current machines both have I7 Chips. However given that intel recently just recieved a record breaking fine for their practises I will be looking long and hard and AMD for my processor next time around. I think the people posting here one way or another are pretty much deluding themselves. Technologically its been a long time since there has been any paradigm shift in fundamental technology. Technologically you can take your pick particularly if your not going for the very top of the range model it just doesnt matter in practise. Personally I will make my choice based upon the lesser of 2 evils in terms of the sort of company I am happy to do business with. One of them appears to behave in a very similar business model to organised crime so I will avoid that brand next time I make my decisions.

no AMD fan here... by: Anonymous on 12/9/2009

...just hate intel (or any quasi-monopoly bully)

just ask ftc, nvidia et al.

by: Anonymous on 12/7/2009

Sure, all fanboys are idiots.
The thing with Intel fanboys is that it's mostly a theory.
While clearly Intel outsells AMD's products by a large margin, the majority of fanboys on the internet are supporting AMD.
I rarely see anyone standing up for Intel, let alone in the pathetically poor ways with broken arguments and wrong 'facts' that the AMD fanboys use to try and defend 'their' AMD.

Same goes for linux vs Windows fanboys. Has anyone ever seen a Windows fanboy at all? I think most people don't even dare to admit they like Windows in public. So OS wars tend to be mostly raving linux fanboy idiots, much like the AMD crowd.

Be careful what you ask for by: Greg442 on 12/7/2009

The writer in this case deserves all the personal attack he/she/it gets. Since the title of the article is a personal attack in and of itself.

by: Anonymous on 12/6/2009

I suppose it's better to comment on such a blog with nothing but personal attacks at the writer, and try to disguise it as 'advise', is it? :)

by: Anonymous on 12/6/2009

can't you just say, "fanboys are idiots" ..? The endorsement or participation in any form of fanboyism is idiotic. you could've made the article a quarter of the length and twice as interesting, had you not inserted all the inane BS about yourself. So basically, no one in your personal life can stand to listen to you blather about this nonsense, so you just barf it all over the web every time you get a stick up your butt. leave snarky comments, don't rageblog.

Scientia and Abinstein prove that AMD fans are idiots by: Anonymous on 12/3/2009

Not only is Scientia so stupid he doesn't know how to overclock an i5-750(he thinks the CPU will work better without a heatsink fan), but he and Abinstein met in very unusual circumstances as the below video shows

http://www.ebaumsworld.com/video/watch/80782447/

Regards

Chad Boga

by: Anonymous on 12/3/2009

I can careless who is the fastest...I usually purchase AMD, for best bang for buck. If I know my computer will A.Not go up in price over time. or B. Will prolly be upgraded in a year or 2 anyways(depending on how much I can overclock). AMD is the way to go...
The 2 products that I purchase that go down in value and not worth the $$$ investments are Cars and Computers....
First time for me.. I purchased a 5870 for 379.00. Price has increased to 409.00. This is the first time i have seen Computer parts go up in price after release.... So I know I'm not the only one purchasing the same way I do.(looking at demand)

by: Anonymous on 12/2/2009

Mister "I have 5 years of programming experience" (lol)...
AMD didn't embrace 64-bit before Intel did. Ever heard of the Itanium? It may not have become the success that x86-64 has, but it most certainly was a 64-bit architecture, and it most certainly was on the market a few years before AMD's was.

As for L3 cache... Intel beat AMD there aswell. Look up the Xeon core with codename "Tulsa". Up to 16 MB of on-die L3 cache, shared by both cores.

It's funny... people like you try to find fault with the article (which by the way doesn't claim that using AMD in itself means you are a fan, let alone that you should only use Intel), and in the process, you make an idiot out of yourself.

by: Anonymous on 12/2/2009

The real idiot is the one who believes that GPU-limited benchmarks somehow mean that Phenom II is as fast as Core i7, let alone faster.

So who is the idiot??? by: Anonymous on 12/1/2009

Per Legion Hardare:

http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=869&p=23

When operating at lower clock speeds, the Phenom II X4 did not fair all that well, as we saw a sharp decline in performance. However when clocked at 3.0GHz and beyond, the Phenom II X4 really picked up the pace, and in many cases was able to outclass the Core i7.

While we hardly expect there will be many users trying to pair a $600 US graphics card, such as the Radeon HD 5970, with a budget processor, it is nice to see that the sub-$200 US processors are up to the task. The Intel Core i7 920 proved to be more than powerful enough at $280 US, while the AMD Phenom II X4 955 will work just as well at $165 US, giving users plenty of great options.

by: Anonymous on 11/30/2009

The idiocy here is the initial classification of AMD fans being idiots or the implication of that from the title. As per Annadtech below, which is a respectable source for Tech news, indicates that AMD has led Intel in certain improvements. Being an AMD fan myself and also being a Computer Engineer with background in Intel 8088/8086 processor archetecture, with 10 years of professional IT experiance and 5 years as a programer, I understand more about CPU architecture then the average person. I find that AMD's benefit-to-price ratio is much kinder to my wallet which nullifies the need to buy Intel unless i7 performance is needed. Yet I doubt that 98% of all users truly NEEDs the i7 Extreme performance. So you should ask your self, Who is the idiot hear... the Author most likely, but what about the Intel fan boys..?? If your dumb enough to only buy Intel cause they make the fastest CPU and you believe the authors statement, then under that logic anyone who doesn't buy a Porche or a Lamborghini is also an idiot. On another Note. AMD users might not realize there are other x86 providers out there but that is irrelivent to the authors main point. Yet as one of the few x86 providers still standing in the wake of Intel's illegal trade practices, it just amplifies the fact that AMD provides a quality product for a fair price. If AMD didn't, AMD would have also disapeared as many of the other x86 providers have.

Per Annadtech:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3683

In recent history AMD's architectural decisions have predicted, earlier than Intel, where the the microprocessor industry was headed. The K8 embraced 64-bit computing, a move that Intel eventually echoed some years later. Phenom was first to migrate to the 3 level cache hierarchy that we have today, with private L2 caches. Nehalem mimicked and improved on that philosophy. Bulldozer appears to be similarly ahead of its time, ready for world where heterogenous CPU/GPU computing is commonplace. I wonder if we'll see a similar architecture from Intel in a few years.

by: Anonymous on 11/29/2009

I believe it's a mistake thinking that all the ppl who use AMD are fans . From this opinion this is the main problem . All so called "fans" know how to read the reviews and see the difference. This with amd intel fans wars it's a little bit childish. All of us wants best in our cpu and of course from the reality this is blue one. BUT not all of us are working on some fancy sites with a lots of tests bench and free samples for everyone. For us, for me making part of the so called "fans" the MONEY $$$$ makes a big difference in choosing the CPU yea because I just want to buy one and I found AMD selling a AM3 cpu like the 965 who enter in my AM2+ mobo with a 200 Euro. I buy a cpu who work 15%-20% lower that a I7 core who cost me with mobo and memory about 300% more. I understand it's better but I really need it? Speaking what are you doing better on your I7? really not the bench, real life what because I am confused . And for what are you calling us idiots? because we are using lower tech? MAYBE we dont need right now the boost intel offering. And the core2duo user what are they doing? change the rig... and give a boost . me i can change it in time now cpu, later mobo and ram. You see my point. And yes AMD boys playing games and I, really, for the 400 euro difference I just brought a 5870, why? because IM AN AMD IDIOT FAN:)

intel and amd by: Anonymous on 11/29/2009

lol true to form, intels usualy outperform amd, but its by how much that i worry about. is it really a big deal if a phenom 2 955 performs a little less than an i7 920, if it costs half as much? something to think about.

by: Anonymous on 11/25/2009

Wikipedia actually supports his story, not yours.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Am486 -> 486DX40 introduced in April 1993
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/80486 -> Many faster 486 than 40 MHz introduced before April 1993, including the DX50, DX2-50 and DX2-66.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentium -> Introduced March 1993.
That's right, Pentium beat AMD's 486 by a month.

The article doesn't say that DX2/DX4 are overclocked chips, nor that Intel didn't have DX2/DX4 chips.
I think the article means that the Am386DX40 and Am486DX40 are basically 386DX33 and 486DX33 that are overclocked. I would tend to agree with that, since Intel sold them without a heatsink, and the AMD CPUs have a warning on them that a heatsink is required. If one were to mount a heatsink on an Intel 33 MHz model, I'm quite sure they would also run at 40 MHz.

P.S. by: Anonymous on 11/25/2009

BTW... Intel did NOT steal anything from AMD or viceversa. They've been having cross-license agreement for.... ages!

Trust me.... I started my IT life when affordable CPU were all 8 bits: my first one was a Z80@4Mhz, 16 Kb RAM... lot of things have come and passed since!

Yeah but.... by: Anonymous on 11/25/2009

..... but there's ONE big inaccuracy. Actually, AMD launched a 486-40 BEFORE the launch of PI. I can tell for sure, because I swapped the the 486-DX33 on my m/b and put in and AMD 486-DX40. There was an Intel DX50, but it had huge bus speed issues.
Also, it's not true that Intel didn't launch DX2-DX4 cpus... they did, but it's true that they stopped at DX4/100.
Also, DX/2 and DX/4 versions were NOT overclocked DX chips, they only had a multiplier inside the CPU, something that's fairly common nowadays but was quite new at the time (bus speed was equal to CPU speed).
Apart from that, I do not share the the views of the blogger.... so I will forgive him/her for not mentioning that P1, apart from a ridiculous price premium on the CPU, also meant a transition from ISA/VESA to PCI; and the transition was far from smooth (at least in my experience).
But since he/she quoted Wikipidia, he/she should have checked it before posting!

Intel Dodgy dealing by: Anonymous on 11/21/2009

Well of course laptops used Intel CPU's, Intel bought/stole patents from AMD, and then forced the OEM's to use their products. Simple. Business as usual, regardless of how good Barcelona was/is, Nehalem was forced upon the industry, and even after the lawsuit was closed for 2+b, the fact remains that AMD should be a much larger company right now, but the lack of funding previously has left them with a poor infrastructure to build on,and a much low brand awareness than Intel.

Intel's size has nothing to do with their quality.

Roadmap by: Greg442 on 11/21/2009

Well since Intel followed AMD K10 roadmap of course they avoided the potholes. Yes they improved the design, I admit that... now its time for you Intel fanboys to admit where the original design came from? AMD

by: Anonymous on 11/21/2009

Intel didn't 'just start' with memory controllers... It's not like it's rocket science to move it from the chipset onto the CPU.
Same with HyperTransport... it's just a bus. Intel has been doing buses for ages.
They don't need AMD for that.

It's AMD that needs to revamp their technology to keep up with Nehalem, and its successors. Not bad for Intel's 'first try' of something that AMD has been doing for years, eh?

All Intel Fan boys are idiots too by: Anonymous on 11/21/2009

According to Fudzilla:
http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/16473/1/

Since this is a two way street, AMD will also give some patents to Intel and make the competition less exciting. Nehalem looks much like AMD’s Barcelona and AMD will concentrate on catching up with Intel and bringing innovations that should help the company in 2011 to introduce some cool products such as Fusion as well as its Bulldozer savior core.

We are quite sure that Intel will want to take a deeper look at AMD's memory controller and Hypertransport, the two things that AMD does for years and Intel just started doing.

by: Anonymous on 11/20/2009

If Intel's Nehalem is just a copy of AMD's K10, then why is Nehalem so much better?

Nehalem "Opti-clone" by: Greg442 on 11/20/2009

If you take a look at Intel’s almighty Nehalem architecture you’ll find, there’s nothing essentially new about Nehalem’s core design and most of it was borrowed..wink wink from AMD. The basic specs of the Nehalem “Opti-clone” are exactly the same as the Barcelona (K10) architecture from AMD? It is natively quad-core and has three levels of cache, a built-in memory controller, and a high-performance system of point-to-point interconnections for communicating with peripherals and other CPUs in multiprocessor configurations. Intel has also added SSE instructions to Nehalem, specifically the SSE 4.2, components which appear to also be “borrowed” from AMD’s K10 micro-architecture. Next Nehalem integrated memory controller was “borrowed” from AMD who’s been using as they’ve been using integrated memory controllers for years with the K8.

So if Intel’s engineers are so busy copying of ideas that AMD originally pioneered, aren’t they the real idiots?

Look it up on Wikipedia

/burn

by: Anonymous on 11/20/2009

That's not the point.
Any user can edit it, doesn't mean that the info in Wikipedia is wrong.
You're attacking Wikipedia, while you SHOULD be attacking the points raised in the article. Which you can't, because both the article and Wikipedia are right, as can easily be verified by many other sources.

The whole Wikipedia thing is nothing but a strawman. Only an idiot would try that strategy.

Wikipedia? by: Greg442 on 11/20/2009

dude you're not seriously defending wikipedia that any moron with a computer can edit

by: Anonymous on 11/20/2009

To everyone attacking the Wikipedia-remark:
Firstly, I think it's supposed to mean: "It's very easy to look this info up for yourself, rather than continuing to wade in a sea of misinformation".
Secondly, you realize that if you attack Wikipedia, the burden of proof is on you.
Now, I've looked around, and couldn't find a lot of strange information in the subjects that the article refers to. The exact same information (clockspeeds, introduction times etc) can be found all over the web on various review sites etc aswell.

So really, nothing but anoter failed attempt from the AMD idiot crowd.

by: Anonymous on 11/20/2009

To everyone attacking the Wikipedia-remark:
Firstly, I think it's supposed to mean: "It's very easy to look this info up for yourself, rather than continuing to wade in a sea of misinformation".
Secondly, you realize that if you attack Wikipedia, the burden of proof is on you.
Now, I've looked around, and couldn't find a lot of strange information in the subjects that the article refers to. The exact same information (clockspeeds, introduction times etc) can be found all over the web on various review sites etc aswell.

So really, nothing but anoter failed attempt from the AMD idiot crowd.

by: Anonymous on 11/19/2009

Love the last line.

'Don’t take my word for it though, it’s all on Wikipedia.'

Must be 100% true and not possibly tainted by bias, opinion or errors.

Heloooo AMD fans? by: Anonymous on 11/19/2009

This is what I don't like about AMD fans. Immature childish behaviour, name calling, ignoring arguments and facts... and zillion hordes of answers like numbers will give you an edge? big LOL! You think that you can twist and turn the truth if 4125142561 of you post here your bullshit? Bunch of pathetic losers. With fan base like this AMD has rightly deserved to go to hell.

Who Payeth the Piper? by: Anonymous on 11/18/2009

Admit all financial links or employee affiliations to either Nvidia Corp or Intel Corp on this site.
I trust this site as far as I'd enjoy ingesting a mythical GT300.

by: Anonymous on 11/17/2009

Love something is a nature. AMD Fanboy love AMD is nature for they and AMD. I think you are very jealouse with they and write this article to this site for hide your jealouse. Love is everything from anyone to anything and nothing to talk again loser

by: Anonymous on 11/15/2009

Read some of this, Greg:
http://www.anandtech.com/mobile/showdoc.aspx?i=2663&p=14
Apparently Anandtech thought Core Duo was pretty good.

You have to realize that back in the days of Athlon vs Pentium 4, the battle took place only on the desktop. Performance increased at an amazing speed, but so did power consumption.
Notebooks were left either with 'mobile' variations of these CPUs that consumed so much power that they really weren't mobile anymore, because the battery life was less than an hour (not to mention the battery was huge and the whole machine was heavy)... Or you got good power consumption, but nowhere near the same performance as a desktop system, with only one core.

Core Duo gave notebook owners a dualcore, decent performance, and very good power consumption.
And where was AMD in all this?

by: Anonymous on 11/15/2009

There was nothing 'flawed' about the Core Duo's design, Greg.
What you don't seem to understand is that the Core Duo was a mobile part, aimed not at performance, but at minimizing power consumption. It was very good at that, since the Core Duo gave you two cores with a level of power consumption that was previously only possible with a single-core.
In absolute terms, the performance wasn't that impressive, but in terms of battery life and user experience, it was great.

Core Duo remained on the market for 2 years alongside Core2, also including LV and ULV variations, which were used in small form factor and embedded units, such as the Mac Mini.

And Intel sold CPUs with a broken core? Oh no! AMD would never do that, right? Oh, except for the X3 line ofcourse.

Really Greg...

Core Duo Flawed by: Greg442 on 11/15/2009

I have one of those not so great Core Duo laptops. So you can appreciate I was kinda pissed when I learned core duo was replaced, or if you prefer, updated, within 6 month of core duo's release. If the design wasn't flawed, there wouldn't have been a need to change it so quickly. It was, and remains, a flawed design. They even sold the core duo's with a failed core as "core solo", can you freaking believe that? The fact it was widely used doesn't negate the fact it was flawed. However, industry standards are such that B-Stock always ends up in the lower price product.

by: Anonymous on 11/14/2009

Lol, I wonder how many of those guys raving about x86-64/AMD64 are still running a 32-bit OS (and as such effectively only using Intel's x86 portion of the instructionset).

At any rate... who cares? It's just an instructionset. It's not such a big deal anymore these days, as everything gets translated into custom micro-ops anyway, CPUs don't run the instructionset natively anymore.
Back in the 70s/80s it was a bigger deal, when hardware implemented the instructionset directly, and it had a larger impact on performance (and Intel's x86 wasn't among the better instructionsets in that respect, to put it mildly).

by: Anonymous on 11/14/2009

Still wrong, Greg442.
Core was a mobile chip. It was never on the desktop. While Core2 was also available in mobile versions, they were strictly high-end mobile parts, with Core being the low end. For a long time, the majority of notebooks sold were Core-based, not Core2-based.
It's much like Duron and Athlon. Duron wasn't a 'failure' just because it was slower than Athlon, and Athlon wasn't Duron's 'replacement'. Duron was just the low-end part, Athlon was the high-end part.

Chad by: Greg442 on 11/14/2009

1961 IBM release the first 64 bit CPU. Intel's first 64bit CPU was in 2001, but was an epic failure. AMD introduced its AMD64 architecture in 2003 which is the first x86 based 64 bit processor architecture, which Intel eventually "COPIED"

MS gave AMD x86-64 by: Anonymous on 11/14/2009

People should be aware that Microsoft helped out AMD in designing x86-64, just like AMD got Hypertransport from Alpha.

So the fact that you get all these AMD diehards going on with incredible nonsense about AMD being some kind of great innovator, indeed proves that AMD fans are idiots.

Kind Regards

Chad Boga

Correction by: Greg442 on 11/14/2009

Core duo is correct. I mentioned it because it was a failed effort lasting all of 6 months, before being replaced with core 2 duo's

Current... by: Anonymous on 11/13/2009

...any article about the history of AMD which doesn't mention AMD64* is seriously deficient.

*The currently ubiquitous CPU architecture, developed by Inte... erm, AMD.

by: Anonymous on 11/13/2009

Greg442, sounds like you are confusing Core Duo with Core2 Duo.
There never was a 'Core2' before Core2 Duo. There was a 'Core' however, which was a chip aimed at the notebook market (never released on the desktop, so it never competed directly with Athlon X2/FX). Core is actually the chip that got Apple on the x86 bandwagon.

Wow. by: Anonymous on 11/12/2009

Maybe as an nVidia investor you might wanna extend your RFD towards the Geforce later on then?

Pathetic.

Core 2, and Core 2 Duo by: Greg442 on 11/12/2009

Core 2 is the often forgotten first born of what became Core 2 Duo. Core 2 was epic fail

by: Anonymous on 11/12/2009

The TLB errata for Phenom are FAR different from the Core ones.
Check your facts.
Any CPU has errata. Doesn't mean that they all have the same severity. Most of them never pose a practical problem, because they cannot occur in everyday use. Phenom's TLB bug did, and caused stability problems.

by: Anonymous on 11/12/2009

Uhhh, Athlon X2 doesn't 'wipe the floor' with Core2 at all. Check your facts.
Not only does Core2 have about 20-40% advantage over Athlon X2 in terms of IPC, they were also released at higher clockspeeds. And then we don't even get into power consumption... 125W TDP vs 65W TDP.
The result was that Athlon X2/FX didn't stand a chance against Intel's Core2, and prices of AMD processors dropped at a tremendous rate. AMD's flagship 6000+ model dropped from about $1000 to about $300 in only a few weeks time, because it had to compete with the 'midrange' Core2 Duo E6600.

And then obviously Intel introduced a quadcore in the Core2 series, which AMD didn't have an answer for AT ALL, for a long time.

And while AMD is now trying to catch up to Core2 with Phenom II, Intel has already released Core i7, which again is well out of AMD's reach.
Call Core i7 a ripoff all you want, because that's what it is. However, it doesn't chance the fact that Intel did it a hell of a lot better than AMD did.

It seems that AMD fanboys keep having to come back to how great AMD was back in the Pentium 4 era. Just idiots living in the past.

Check your facts? by: Anonymous on 11/11/2009

At what point since like 2004 has AMD ever been behind a generation of intel? AMD completely wiped the floor with intel with their athlon x2 dual cores (true native dual cores) while all intel had was a ducktape solution of two pentium 4 extremes taped together. When core 2 was released AMD X2 cpus were still wiping the floor with them with the top models still to this day the high end athlon x2 AM2 version and the fx-60 still compete head to head with core 2 duos, also core i7 like all you intel fan boys love to love and call it innovative and a generation ahead is nothing but a complete rip off of All of amd's hard work, integrated memory controller = amd first, hypertransport link (qpi) = amd first, native quad core = amd first, im sorry but my phenom 2 still wipes the floor with the core i7 920 and the other mid model, the only one that best it is the top model.. Athlon chips still destroy most of intels chip from the same generations, I have a single core athlon socket 939 as a server that destroys any pentium 4 - pentium D i have come across. When intel makes something innovative instead of rebranding a pentium 4 with netburst 2 and throwing all of amds hardwork into it and calling all the hardwork that amd has had for years their own INNOVATIONS then i will buy another intel chip but untill then I will enjoy my underpriced amazing native quad core chips with l3 cache that also amd came up with first... oh and just one last note, the so called amazing i7 you speak of has the same TLB errata that the original phenom chips where bashed for having by all the intel fan boys... but i dont see any intel boys bashing the company they love for hhaving the same error.

by: Anonymous on 11/9/2009

1% better performance for 50% higher price... pfft.
Guess you haven't been around reality for a while.
Try reading some buyers guides:
http://www.anandtech.com/guides/showdoc.aspx?i=3563
Both price and performance between the various AMD and Intel systems they've put together are pretty well-matched.

Amazing by: Anonymous on 11/9/2009

If some one puts me to gun point, I might consider confessing that Intel chips deliver about 1% better performance at 50% more price.
So within a end consumers capped budget, I will always be buying AMD!

by: Anonymous on 11/7/2009

I have to be fan only of the best ones?????
Didn't know about that rule...

Amazing by: Greg442 on 11/6/2009

AMD fan boys, like me, acknowledge that at the moment Intel has the fastest CPU lineup. However, that fact alone isn’t enough to convince me to buy Intel. As for the article, who’s exactly bragging about 486? In my opinion the article was written by an Intel fan boy and was specifically designed to insult AMD users. Personally I found it offensive. I think Intel is an unscrupulous company, and for me to buy Intel, they’ll need to be twice as fast as an AMD chip and half the price. Instead of insulting AMD users, maybe you should try an convince Intel to clean up their thuggish mannerism, then, just maybe, people wouldn’t hate them, in a Microsoft kind of way.

Communist method by: Anonymous on 11/6/2009

Scali have i say psychology problem ,less problem with hardware ,but i am suprise why BSN permit them to wrote this .This is typical communist attack ,upset one social group (who like Intel ,with other social group who prefer AMD)result is that Scali rule or who knows...

by: Anonymous on 11/6/2009

The article doesn't say anything about buying AMD (or Intel for that matter).
I didn't see anything that said that you shouldn't buy AMD hardware.

It's about how AMD fans are twisting the facts.
I think the article pretty much says this: "I don't care if you buy AMD products, but I'm tired of listening to garbage about how AMD had the fastest 486 ages ago".
There must be a point to it, considering the influx of AMD people on this site, insulting the author, the site, and various other things. They're still living in the past.

LOL @ this "article" by: Anonymous on 11/5/2009

"Greetings,

When commenting, refrain from personal attacks and sticks to the discussion at hand. Two comments that personally attacked a member of our staff were just deleted for violating our ToS policy.

Keep it civil.

Ed."

This entire article was a personal attack on people who purchase AMD products. If this is what passes for "discussion" on this site, you can be sure I won't be back to give you hits.

Scali is an Intel shill that does such things as brag on the Beyond3D forums that the x3100 graphics chip now has DX11 drivers. As though it mattered, since it can barely run DX8 applications with any speed, never mind, 9, 10 or 11.

This is an "expert opinion"?

by: Anonymous on 11/5/2009

Banned at hardforum?
But Community Guru at asmcommunity.net.
I think I know which of those sites consists mostly of idiots :)

Scali is the idiot by: Anonymous on 11/5/2009

Lol, this guy Scali is a big AMD hater and troll, he was permanently banned from Hardforum, just search for his posts under the name Scali2 on Hardforum. He also predicted that AMD would be doomed since Intel "put" a 60 days ultimatum on AMD after the AMD split up to create Globalfoundries. Well the 60 days has long gone and AMD is still there to stay.

by: Anonymous on 11/5/2009

roflmao. So 7 years of offering technology that's equal or greater to Intel's top of the line tech is all of a sudden an anomaly? Hell, if you want to go back to the K6-III offering superior performance to the pre-coppermine PIII's we could stretch it to 8 years. 1998 to 2006.

It's funny how this intel fanboy offers up SSE2 and Hyperthreading as important technologies that everyone will use for decades to come, but doesn't mention x86-64, because that would actually give credit to AMD for innovating for once.

You can try and call netburst an anomaly, but if it wasn't for AMD's innovation we'd still have shitty IPC, high TDP furnaces in our towers. I mean wasn't Tejas supposed to scale to 5GHz and beyond? Intel didn't keep P6 based things around with banias and other P-M based cores, they HAD to resurrect a short pipelined CPU to be able to compete on the mobile front. Intel's Core based offerings are a direct result of AMD kicking their ass on the performance/watt front and the IPC front for a good 5 years.

Yes and No by: Sean Kalinich on 11/5/2009

Intel's failure at that time was to AMD's benefit. However, the problem goes deeper than just going back to business as usual. The failure of AMD to move to 65nm from 90nm put them way behind Intel at a time when they could have made major leaps. Then the ATI purchase sucked more money and resources from them. This was due to extremely poor management rather than any technical failing on AMD's part. They had the engineers and the ability to product products but upper management tied their hands. At the same time their PR and legal machine when into overdrive and started all of the lawsuits again taking more money and resources from their engineering teams.

The article says that AMD is technologically and architecturally behind Intel. But that was not the case with the P4 years and the A64. At that time AMD actually had a technological lead in terms of architecture and design. They failed to keep that due to abysmal management and a failure to innovate. Now they are playing catchup with products (CPUs and Chipsets) that are almost a full two generations old.

It is sad really, they have to chose to stop running to mom and get back in the innovation game or things will continue to look bleak for them in the CPU and chipset world.

by: Anonymous on 11/5/2009

Intel's failure is AMD's success, right?
After all, Intel still had the advantage in manufacturing process technology, and they still had a larger team of engineers, and a larger budget.
Given those advantages it could be considered a failure to even be competing directly with AMD anyway, let alone losing the competition.
It's something that never happened before, and hasn't happened since.

Anomaly by: Sean Kalinich on 11/5/2009

The way I read the article is that Intel's failure with netburst was the anomaly.
My comment was meant to say that AMD (with A64 x86-64 and X2) actually came up with something new and did jump ahead in terms of performance. They took an entirely different direction from where they were heading. However, that having been said there are patterns in AMD's behavior that are being repeated. When the Athlon (Slot A) first came out AMD did not include Cache on the CPU they sat on extremely slow (for the time) cache chips on the card. It took them quite a while to get the cache onto the CPU. then once they did it was still slower than what Intel was using. To their credit the next generation of Athlons (thunderbird) used a more advanced caching architecture than Intel did. (4-way exclusive cache Vs Inclusive) Still if you look at AMD and the way they deal with cache on the CPU they are still trying very hard to remove it. I am not sure what their deal with on-die CPU cache is but, you can see that pattern repeated since the introduction of the First Athlon (which we were told could have up to 12MB of Cache)

by: Anonymous on 11/5/2009

"I am not sure that it was an anomaly. I think for once AMD did have the upper hand."

AMD having the upper hand for once *is* the anomaly the article speaks of, right?

I was happy with my Athlon 64. by: Anonymous on 11/4/2009

I had two P.C.s with AMD processors. The first had a 1.33Ghz AMD 'Thunderbird' processor, which rivalled the Intel equivalent processors (Pentium III's?) and beat them in many benchmarks. I think I got that machine in June 2001.

My second P.C. with an AMD processor had the 2.6 Ghz Athlon 64 'Clawhammer' processor, which served me well. I did some of that CPND\BBC Climate Modelling project for a while. At the time, it was the fastest single-core desktop processor for number crunching on that project. Each climate model was single threaded and it was only when the Core 2 Duo’s arrived, that we saw faster number crunching than that produced by a high speed Athlon 64.

Eventually I could see advantage of a multi-core processor and so I finally upgraded to a P.C. with an Intel 'Penryn' 45nm quad-core processor.

I had no complaints with my AMD processor P.C.s, they gave very impressive performance at comparatively low power consumptions. From the Athlon ‘Thunderbird’ until the launch of the Core 2 Duo processor, AMD had very competitive products. But I wouldn't call myself a die-hard fan of AMD products.

Intel hit with another antitrust suit by: Anonymous on 11/4/2009

http://www.techspot.com/news/36825-intel-hit-with-another-antitrust-suit-for-competing-unfairly.html#comments

Intel hit with another antitrust suit for competing unfairly .

Intel is back in the hot seat after being nailed with a record $1.45 billion antitrust fine in the EU earlier this year. The chipmaker has been sued by New York Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo in an antitrust case with similar grounds.

Anomaly by: Sean Kalinich on 11/4/2009

I am not sure that it was an anomaly. I think for once AMD did have the upper hand. They it seems they felt that Intel could not answer that product. Intel did try several times to fix netburst. It was just a very bad move. In my opinion they got complacent, they wasted money on things like the ATi merger, and all of their lawsuits instead of spending that money developing to keep the lead or at least keep pace.

by: Anonymous on 11/4/2009

X2 running circles around the Pentium D wasn't the point.
It's rather obvious that if a single K8 core runs circles around a single Netburst core, that two K8 cores run circles around two Netburst cores.
Hence, X2 outperforming Pentium D is part of the anomaly that the K8 architecture outperformed the Netburst architecture, rather than a second anomaly. After all, both X2 and Pentium D are dualcore variations of the K8 and Netburst architecture.

Interesting by: Sean Kalinich on 11/4/2009

The A64 X2 ran rings around the Pentium D. It was a simple fact. At the time Intel's design and implementation was not as good. You can vilify the X2 all you want and it wont change that.

At the time AMD had the better product.

Now the opposite is true, Intel has the better design and product hands down. The Lynnfield and Nehalem are without question better products per clock cycle than the Phenom II or Athlon II.

This trend started with Conroe and the performance gap has only widened since. As it stands AMD's current products are only competing, in terms of performance, with Intel's older Socket 775 CPUs.

by: Anonymous on 11/4/2009

The Pentium D Smithfield (8xx) was also single-die.
Aside from that, as already said... the difference between crossbar and FSB comes from the fact that AMD had an on-die memory controller. Apart from the memory controller and the HT vs FSB difference, both Athlon X2 and Pentium D simply used two independent execution cores that were identical to the ones found in the Athlon64 and Pentium 4 respectively.
Neither developed a new architecture, they just fit two cores from their existing architecture on a single die.
You can try to glorify Athlon X2 all you want, with vague terms like 'native' dualcore (yea, 'native' quadcore worked great for Barcelona aswell, right?), but in the end, the latency with core communications speaks volumes. Athlon X2 had pretty high latency with core to core communication. It was virtually no better than two single-core Opterons. It can't be compared to a 'true' native design like Core Duo or Core2 Duo, where the shared L2 cache drastically improves core to core communication.

If there's no improvement, it's still a Frankenstein CPU to me. It doesn't actually exploit the fact that both cores are on the same die, since it's little more than some copy-paste work of two singlecores.

A64 X2 by: Sean Kalinich on 11/4/2009

The X2 was still a single Die Vs two separate cores like the original Pentium D.
The cores were also able to talk directly to each other through the crossbar.

Either way the original X2 design was superior to the one that Intel used. Yohan and Conroe, were superior to the X2. But again, AMD has a thing about large amounts of L2 (and shared) cache. They have always liked to remove it. Look at the performance differences between the X2s with 1MB Vs 512KB.

Even now they are having issues with the large monolithic shared L3 on the PII and Magny Coures.

by: Anonymous on 11/4/2009

X2 is about as Frankenstein as Pentium D is.
Intel connected the two Pentium 4 cores at the FSB, since the FSB protocol already supported bus snooping and all that (multicore Xeon systems based on Netburst used the same technology).

Since AMD's topology is slightly different, they couldn't literally paste two singlecores together, but they removed the memory controller from one of them, and used a crossbar to join the HyperTransport links internally.

Aside from that, it's the same idea: Both use two completely independent cores, each with their own dedicated caches, and they communicated with eachother in the same way that a multi-CPU system would.

The Core Duo was the first 'real' native dualcore x86, where the cache was shared between the two cores, and they could not be 'separated'. It was also the first time that the 'native' aspect was actually being used as an advantage, by sharing data in L2 cache. Both X2 and P-D couldn't really do anything that a dual-CPU system with two single-core Opterons or Xeons couldn't do. They were little more than a single-socket version of a dual-CPU system.

To top it off, the original Pentium D 8xx series was also a single-die solution. It wasn't until the 9xx series that Intel started implementing the MCM strategy.

Althon X2 by: Sean Kalinich on 11/4/2009

This was not two K8 cores on a single socket. It was a native dual core.

The Pentium D was two Pentum CPUs on the same packaging they were bolted together the were still using netburst (networst)

The Athlon X2 was a native Dual core with the cores connected directly to each other on one die. They were used interconnects to talk to each other and shared the IMC.

The two are very different, AMD's implementation was significantly better than the "Frankenstein" version that Intel used.

by: Anonymous on 11/4/2009

Yep. It's true, AMD fans are nubs.

Pentium D by: Sean Kalinich on 11/4/2009

I personally do not agree with the comment that AMD has always been a generation behind (except in process technology).

What I think happened is that after the success of Opteron, A64, x86-64, X2 etc AMD sat back and did not think they needed to innovate. It seems they sat back and did nothing more than small updates (adding DDR2).

Then they bought ATi which used up a ton of their operating and R&D money that should have been put to better use improving their products.

Understand the Opteron and A64 were amazing CPUs. It is what AMD did (or more to the point did not do) after Conroe that is what has disappointed me most. I think if they did not hype up Barcelona so much it would have been different.

On the GPU side AMD is doing quite well since the 38xx series they have been making steady gains in performance without sacrificing image quality (where AMD/ATi has always shined) The 5xxx series is great and looks to be an excellent competitor. The problem there is supply. This is due to an issue with TSMC though and not completely AMD's fault.

I would like to see AMD stop dumping money down lawyers throats and return to innovating again. The millions of dollars they have spent on their countless complaints and lawsuits do not help make their products run faster. In the end no matter how much Intel is finned the consumer is the one hurt because AMD cannot spend that money on making a better product, it is wasted and R&D potential lost.

by: Anonymous on 11/4/2009

AMD x2 beat Pentium D, like K8 beat P4?
Gee, what a surprise, since Athlon X2 is two K8 cores on a single socket, and Pentium D is two P4 cores on a single socket.
Just a continuation of the same anomaly.

And the Pentium D vs AMD X2? by: Anonymous on 11/4/2009

AMD x2 beat Pentium D, like K8 beat P4.
x2 outperforming P4 was so painful for intel, that made intel show Core2 arquitecture in a few months, not years as intel wanted to do.
Two anomalies?
Amd makes intel innovate, without AMD we will have P4 at 4Ghz now with 500W. This is the painful truth.

Deletion of comments by: Theo Valich on 11/4/2009

Greetings,

When commenting, refrain from personal attacks and sticks to the discussion at hand. Two comments that personally attacked a member of our staff were just deleted for violating our ToS policy.

Keep it civil.

Ed.

@Greg442 by: Sean Kalinich on 11/4/2009

DDR3 is realized in dual channel as well.
The problems with DDR3 has always been latency

CPUs with an IMC are more affected by latency than they are with the RAM speed. This was even seen with DDR2. Now that DDR3 is coming with a more reasonable latency you can get the speed you should with it.

On older socket 775 systems (like the P45) DDR3 was not quick due to issues with the way the northbridge was setup. However systems with the X48 chipset did give you good realized speeds with DDR3. Most memory manufacturers knew this but had a hard time tightening up the latency. This was also a big issue with the move to DDR2 and the AM2 CPUs.Intel is now in the same boat with their IMC. Where they have a slight advantage with DDR3 is with triple channel and their large amounts of L3 cache. While AMD is busy removing cache from the CPU Intel has been adding it to counter the issues with DDR3 latency and the IMC.

It was also one of the ways they overcame the issues with the outdated FSB design on the socket 775 Duals and Quads. More cache means more information kept on the CPU and not transferred back and forth from memory to the CPU.

Nope, AMD indeed surprised the real idiots by: Anonymous on 11/4/2009

I can't recall AMD's SIMD-FP, cooper interconnects, x86-64, point-to-point links and integrated memory controllers being "one generation behind" Intel. Is this a deep throat or the mother of all FUD?

DD3 in Dual Channel? by: Greg442 on 11/3/2009

I could be wrong, but aren't the benefits of DD3 realized in triple channel? I believe the 1156 Motherboards are dual channel.

by: Anonymous on 11/3/2009

Do they really? I had a Penryn quad-core system and I was still using DDR2 RAM. It made no sense for me to buy an intel motherboard that had DDR3 RAM support when it didn't make a difference in performance from DDR2 on a Penryn quad-core system.

Only with Nehalem did it really become worthwhile to upgrade to DDR3, so your price comparison has some serious problems.

@ A Few Things by: Sean Kalinich on 11/3/2009

TO get DDR3 you have to bump up to AM3. With Intel most users would have DDR3 already and lower their upgrade cost. The Phenom II X4 955 and 965 would perform even worse with DDR2 behind it.

As for those prices they were as of today

PII X4 955 $175.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103674

Core i5 750 $199.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115215

AM3 FX790 Board $109.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=40000022%201070947010&Description=AMD%20FX%20790&name=AM3%2fAM2%2b%2fAM2

DDR3 1066 $82.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=40000022%201070947010&Description=AMD%20FX%20790&name=AM3%2fAM2%2b%2fAM2

AM3 with DDR3 Upgrade adds $192.98

P55 Mainboard GIGABYTE GA-P55-UD4P $169.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128400

This makes the Core i5 750 upgrade less than an AM3 with DDR3 upgrade.

AMD Upgrade (955) $386.97

Core i5 750 Upgrade $369.98

Can't Register by: Greg442 on 11/3/2009

Okay, the verification box below the send button was confusing.. had to go back up to press send, rather than just hitting enter from the verification box.

Can't Register by: Anonymous on 11/3/2009

Not the poster that called you a liar, but I've tried to register on this site, and it didn't work. Not sure whats going on there

A Few Things You Forgot by: Anonymous on 11/3/2009

Yes recently newegg did offer the AMD 955 for $175, and assuming you're correct the the core I5 750 can be had for $25 bucks more, you forgot a few very important facts. Since this article is about AMD fanboys, an upgrade to the 955 would be a cpu drop-in and maybe a bios update in a lot of cases, since this chip is backward compatible with AM2/AM2+ socket. I'm sure AMD fanboys wouldn't be running Intel, if they we're, then they're not AMD fanboys. On the other hand Intel and AMD users converting to a core i5/i7 will include buying a 1156 motherboard which up's the price another $100-200+ bucks, assuming they have all the other needed hardware, if not, add another 2-3 hundred to the price of that build. So for the AMD fanboy would the small performance boost of i5/i7 be worth rather the large price tag of going to the enemy? I think not. FYI with all the money I saved on my AMD build I can add an AMD/ATI 5870, which is designed to run with AMD hardware. Dragon Platform FTW.
Where's the Intel answer to the 5870?(the fastest single GPU in the world). Oh never mind Intel doesn't make graphics cards, they rely on third party solutions like Nvidia,(who's suing them) and AMD. So all you Intel fanboys its okay to secretly buy AMD graphics. I won't tell anyone. lol

Credibility Part III by: Sean Kalinich on 11/3/2009

You have also made a false and baseless accusation.

you say
"I seem to recall that same guy at Lost Circuits found out that in gaming comparisons you did with AMD 940 vs intel I7-965 that the intel rigs were using 3 graphics cards and the AMD rigs using only 1."

I have never done anything like this with any review I have ever performed. This is a blatant lie on your part and I am calling you out on it.

I am commenting and replying under my name yet you hide behind anonymity. If your are certain of your facts please register and come out of hiding. Links to validate your claims would also be in order as would naming the magazine you are talking about.

@ Credibility Part II by: Sean Kalinich on 11/3/2009

Hmmmm seems like you missed the rendering bench

http://www.lostcircuits.com/mambo//index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=63&Itemid=42&limit=1&limitstart=12

They show the 955 and 965 performing worse than the i7 750

They use True Space which is a multi-threaded rendering test.

The i7 750 beats out the 965 by full 8 seconds and the 955 by 10. that is quite a bit in terms of frame rendering.

@ Credibility by: Sean Kalinich on 11/3/2009

Right from the article

Test Systems and Comments

Our test systems are shown below:

Core i7 1366
Intel Core i7 920, 965 and 975
ASRock X58 Extreme (P130 BIOS)
6GB Kingston KHX12800D3T1K3/6GX
Zotac GeForce GTX 285 1GB
Kingston SSD Now M (Intel X25 SSD)
Cooler Master UCP 1100
Cooler Master Hyper 212 CPU cooler with extra fan
Windows 7 Ultimate x64 (RTM)

Lynnfield (LGA 1156) Core i5 and Core i7
Intel Core i7 870, Intel Core i5 750
ASRock P55 Deluxe (P130 BIOS)
4GB Kingston KHX12800D3T1K3/6GX
Zotac GeForce GTX 285 1GB
Kingston SSD Now M (Intel X25 SSD)
Cooler Master UCP 1100
Intel Supplied Cooler
Windows 7 Ultimate x64 (RTM)

AMD Phenom II X4 955
Asus M4A79T Deluxe
4GB Kingston KHX12800D3T1K3/6GX
Zotac GeForce GTX 285 1GB
Kingston SSD Now M (Intel X25 SSD)
Cooler Master UCP 1100
Cooler Master Hyper 212 CPU cooler with extra fan
Windows 7 Ultimate x64 (RTM)

Other than the obvious Motherboard and CPU differences we used identical hardware between the systems.

The methodology is sound and has been proven over and over to be so.

by: Anonymous on 11/3/2009

Sean.
Where do you get your results because they don't tally with anyone else except x-bit labs? (That's a surprise)
A guy at the Lost Circuits forum has done a graph showing 50 something reviews and the two outliers are yours and xbit.
I was reading a renowned PC magazine yesterday and their benchmarks show that the 965 keeps up with the I7-860 with intel winning the singlethreaded apps portion of their benchmark not surprising with turbo mode then the 965 winning the multi threaded portion. That's in line with my personal experiences. Maybe you need to check your benchmarking methodology.
I seem to recall that same guy at Lost Circuits found out that in gaming comparisons you did with AMD 940 vs intel I7-965 that the intel rigs were using 3 graphics cards and the AMD rigs using only 1.
If you run your benchmarks like that then I'm sorry but there's nothing to dissuade me that you are simply a shill.
You have lost any credibility in your field.

by: Anonymous on 11/3/2009

hey scali i think you logged into the wrong account for that comment

vvv

@ Real World by: Sean Kalinich on 11/3/2009

And you have the tests to prove this?
I tested them side by side using the same software including real world tests and the 955 we had could not keep up.

The 965 used by many others was also not able to keep up.

The PII X4 955 is $175.99 at newegg and is a 3.2GHz CPU

The Core i5 750 is a 2.66GHz CPU for $25 more that runs rings around the 955.

http://www.brightsideofnews.com/news/2009/9/7/intel-lynnfield3b-core-i5-750-and-core-i7-870-evaluation.aspx?pageid=3

Where is the better value?

@Sean Kalinich by: Anonymous on 11/3/2009

You are a retard writer. Intel is using ambint temperature to fool the consumers with Core I5 while in the real world the expected performance could not be realized.

SATA 6G and USB 3.0 by: Sean Kalinich on 11/3/2009

The issue with SATA 6G and USB 3.0 is larger than Intel putting it off.

The P55 only has Gen 1 lanes, (each capable of 250MB/s) SATA 6G and USB 3.0 really needs PCI-e Gen 2 lanes to run properly (each can handle 500MB/s)

It will take a redesign of the P55 to get enough bandwidth and/or the bridging of multiple Gen 1 lanes to the controllers.

These things take time. It is funny that AMD and NV are talking about that when they are not going to have SATA 6G and USB 3.0 in their chipsets until late 2010 or 2011 either. In fact NV will not be making any chipset for Intel (Core i5 or i7) or AMD any time soon.

I think that AMD has lost their way recently, they have (in the past) made great CPUs (A64, A64x2 etc) but when they started down the AM2 and ATi buy out path something went wrong.

They seem to have lost their edge. The GPU side if the only thing holding them up right now. As for price performance the Core i5 out performs faster and more expensive AMD Phenom IIs (i.e the Phenom II x4 965) While the Athlon II X4 might be less expensive it still cannot compete in terms of performance per clock cycle.

by: Anonymous on 11/2/2009

OPINION: Could your child be POISONED??? Tune in tonight for Action 10 News for a cure!!!

nice one bsn

by: Anonymous on 11/2/2009

Great first article for your next assignment make sure you follow the MLA style guidelines and use at least 5 sources one of which has to be a newspaper and one a personal interview

by: Anonymous on 11/2/2009

Great article dude I'd love to read more of your work what's your LiveJournal

Not red heads by: Anonymous on 11/2/2009

I don’t understand the anger speech or the need to classify a group of consumers as idiots. It is well documented the type of consumers that rely on AMD product. Yet for all of us competition is good. It benefits us all. The more AMD can compete the more the Intel folks will benefit. If AMD fell by the wayside like the rest then we would get more of the same as quoted below. Below is a quote from TG Daily from Nvidia spokesperson Brian Burke. It is a perfect example of what the PC industry would become if not for AMD and other Intel competitors didn’t exist. So bottom line, be thankful for your AMD brothers. Don’t treat them like read headed step children. They purchase on price/performance ratio’s and that is AMD’s bread and butter.

We [have also] learned that Intel is postponing USB 3 introduction until 2011. With no competition in chipsets, it seems Intel has decided that innovation is not needed for USB any time soon," said Burke. "With no one to push Intel to innovate, PC enthusiasts are left with Intel chipsets and the features and performance they deliver, or lack there of."

http://www.tgdaily.com/hardware-features/44493-nvidia-our-nforce-chipsets-are-qbetterq-than-intels

wow, what ignorance by: Anonymous on 11/2/2009

Simply, AMD has always been more bang per buck. While Intel fanboys were paying top dollar for P4s we were enjoying much faster amd64s and we were paying less money for it.

Stating that AMD is always at lest one generation behind is wrong as well.

AMD was the first to use the memory controller on the CPU die with their Opterons in 2004. Intel moved their memory controller to the die in 2008 with i7.

Intel also made the Itanium while AMD made the x86_64 extension. Which one won?

The only thing Intel has been traditionally ahead on is their fabs, they simply have more cash to throw at their fabs and they have a lot of them so generally Intel is 6 months to a year sooner to move to a smaller process then AMD.

Another reason I try to stay away from Intel CPUs is because they don't offer their VT extensions in all their CPUs. AMD-V is supported by their entire line of CPUs.

AMD is light years ahead on the GPUs though. GMA950 is pretty much the worst on board video solution.

I have used Opterons and Xeons at home by: Michael A. McKenney on 11/2/2009

I had several Tyan based AMD Opteron workstations. The memory bandwidth was better than my Xeon workstation but the choice of boards was limited. I switched to Xeons because I wanted a better selection of boards. I would go back to AMD, if they had better board selection. Who has the best product for my needs.

A well researched article by: Anonymous on 11/2/2009

"Don’t take my word for it though, it’s all on Wikipedia"

Nuff said.

Chad Boga by: Anonymous on 11/2/2009

[Quote]AMD fans identify with 2nd rate companies like AMD, because that at best, is all they are or can be.

At the end of the day, you have emotionally disturbed and retarded individuals from AMDzone going around spreading a mountain of BULLSH|T everywhere they go.

This was a great opinion piece article and I hope to see much more like this.

Regards

Chad Boga [/quote]

What's up Chad?
You a bit sore because you were banned for trolling? Some things never change huh?

It's a cruel world....

No such thing as Communism by: Anonymous on 11/1/2009

Because whats known as Communism now a days is a twisted version of what it actually is.

Just because a company is funded by Iraq or any other country does not reflect the actual company in any way.

It's called business and smart investing.

I was over in Iraq as well for a short stint. Whoever the Military guy was he must of been a Marine and not a Army grunt as I was... sounds a bit too bloodthirsty.
Seriously, you need to be medded out with that problem. Too much hate towards people who did nothing to you directly.

Honestly with me, I use whatever I can afford, AMD or Intel, doesn't matter. I guess you can call me swiss cause I don't take sides in the tech wars, I just feign ignorance and play blissfully unaware as its better than trolling and flaming on the intarwebz.

Arguing on the internet is like being in the special Olympics.
Even if you win, You're still retarded.

Long live AMD! by: Anonymous on 11/1/2009

Yes, the article is right: AMD is about bargains, bang-for-the-buck, low-end to mainstream systems. That's good enough for almost everybody, except for those who enjoy paying inflated prices for high-end gear.

And if it wasn't for AMD, how much would these mainstream Intel processors cost?

I make it a point to buy and recommend AMD to help the underdog keep on fighting.

by: Anonymous on 11/1/2009

hopefully my message will get through to some people with commen sence if not maybe you or your kids will be fighting them and not make it back home!!! dont support any company that has ties with the arab until they act like human beings!! and stop acting like animals

by: Anti-DRMintosh on 11/1/2009

Al Qaeda is a Mossad/CIA operation.

I personally will never buy anything connected to that real terrorist state of Israel and a 3 time convicted anti-consumer unrepentant monopolist.

Intel has been convicted by Japan, South Korea and the entire EU. There is also a US investigation going on. Intel is one of the worst a$$hole corporations on this planet, so much so that they make microsoft look like the good guys by comparison.

Yet so many brainwashed people defend them to the death.

I often wonder how many pro-intel posters are just shills paid to post on forums, as is the norm nowadays in business PR.

Intel cheats like hell in benchmarks, in compiler-trickery (like removing SSE/SIMD optimizations when it detects an AMD cpu), they have tons of paid-for review sites, etc.

Pure and utter scum they are.

They will never see a penny from me and other equally well-informed people.

Racism Knows No Color Barrier by: Anonymous on 11/1/2009

If you really believe all arabs are part of AL-Qaeda you Sir are a racist. Regardless of the fact that you're african-american. I appluad you're military service, but I feel you're in serious need of professional help, please report these racist feelings and hatred against all arabs to your Commanding Officer, as I feel you're a danger to yourself and fellow soliders. I believe they call this combat fatigue. Good Luck to You

im not racest by: Anonymous on 11/1/2009

First of all im black that made that comment because I was over in afgan fighting for our country and can tell you first hand what it was like and second of all maybe all you KIDS should realize what we are in store for me personally i will never support a company that has ties with Arabs/Al-Qaeda. go over there and get out from behind your computer and see the real world!!!!!!

im not racest by: Anonymous on 11/1/2009

First of all im black that made that comment because I was over in afgan fighting for our country and can tell you first hand what it was like and second of all maybe all you KIDS should realize what we are in store for me personally i will never support a company that has ties with Arabs/Al-Qaeda. go over there and get out from behind your computer and see the real world!!!!!!

really? by: Anonymous on 11/1/2009

This whole article is a joke.

Yeah and the best part is the ending:

"Don’t take my word for it though, it’s all on Wikipedia."
- HAHAHA, god I feel sorry for the poor guy.

Title - big flamer.
contents - very little connection to the title. Some irrelevant history, calling names, no reasoning.

"One often hears the fairytale that AMD sold much faster 486 derivatives than Intel, so AMD must have had a technological advantage over Intel." - I have never heard/read such thing.

I don't think this is real. This must be some fabrication to get clicks. The more absurd, personal and offending the more views/reactions you get.

I guess the other anomaly would be... by: Anonymous on 11/1/2009

"Don’t take my word for it though, it’s all on Wikipedia."

BSN, it's on Wikipedia.

Intel + Israel by: Anti-DRMintosh on 11/1/2009

http://desertpeace.wordpress.com/2008/07/25/intel-inside/

http://www.inminds.co.uk/boycott-intel.html

Another victim of Intel propaganda by: Anonymous on 11/1/2009

So if I buy Samsung wash machine i throw a stone at people who buy Whirpool wash machine.Obvios Intel fanboy who wrote this text want one producer of wash machine.Guys find more interesting theme than this.

by: Anonymous on 11/1/2009

Fanboyz are idiots not the firms !

Al-Qaeda exist only on the paper and the news !

You can know only you had knowledge others is just belief !

I hate the racist race ! :D

People that buy Intel are Racist Idiots? by: Anonymous on 11/1/2009

Dude every arab in the world isn't member of Al-Qaeda; all black people don't eat watermelon; all asians don't know karate, all mexicans aren't named Jesus; and beleive it or not white men can jump. Stop the hate now!

Intel propaganda by: Anonymous on 11/1/2009

That Arab group also invest in Airbus ,so if u fly with Airbus u also give money to Arab.Arab buy Global foundiries not AMD.9/11 and AMD??? so u are nothing but Intel
propaganda ,shame on you.
I AM NOT BUY ANY INTEL PRODUCTS ,CLEAR ?

by: Anonymous on 11/1/2009

First of all im not a intel or amd fan but what I am is a realist AMD/ATI were given money by an arab company/person they invested in AMD and and pretty much saved them and now own a good part of that company, the arabs are a very good part of why we are fighting Al-Qaeda they find there operation and the arabs were a big part of 9/11 because of that.... we already give the arabs enough money through oil stop supporting them through AMD/ATI buy anything but there products or any arab company they invest in. Im sure this post will be taken down but hope it get to some before it is!!

Always AMD by: Anonymous on 10/31/2009

Always AMD,so Intel is not interesting for me ,because overprice their product.For same perfomance AMD is always cheaper than Intel.

by: Anonymous on 10/31/2009

CHINA DOESNT SUSPORT Al-Qaeda

by: Anonymous on 10/31/2009

AMD may not be the absolute greatest at the moment but I continue to support the for 2 main reasons
1. With the monitor I have (which I have no intentions of replacing) and the software that I use (mainly games) what is the difference between 100 fps and 200 fps? When you cannot see the difference, why bother? I still can only type so fast, and from time to time you still need to get up to eat and drink. The speed of the system is not the limitation.
2. I stick with AMD because of price, reliability, but mainly so there continues to be choice. Sure I could opt for an Intel system with similar results but I for one do not wish to see Intel become an absolute monopoly of everything. Every couple of years I want to be able to choose not only what parts I buy but also which manufacturers. I would hate to live in an Intel only world!

post below by: Anonymous on 10/31/2009

are all intel fans that ignorant?

Intel has Fabs in China by: Anonymous on 10/31/2009

Intel has fabs in Communist China, so by the previous post reasoning, Intel=Communism

amd sucks by: Anonymous on 10/31/2009

IF YOU BUY AMD/ATI YOU SUPPORT THE ARABS/Al-Qaeda WE ALREADY GIVE THEM ENOUGH MONEY FOR OIL AND THEY ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR FUNDING A GREAT DEAL OF Al-Qaeda NETWORKS. THE ARABS INVESTED A GREAT DEAL OF MONEY TO BAIL THEM OUT AND NOW OWN THERE FAB COMPANY... AND THE ARABS WERE A BIG PART OF 9/11. WISE UP PEOPLE.

by: Anonymous on 10/31/2009

Hahaha scali old intel fanboy son of a bitch. Nice to see you are doing good.

Hey you got banned from [H] what a looser dude! seems that your fanboyism has no limits, you are on the big leagues! doing articles in shitty side of news!

Man you are going to the top congratz!!

by: Anonymous on 10/31/2009

I'm such an idiot AMD 'fanboy' that I just build a $500 computer able to COMFORTABLY run any current game at max settings on my 1080p big screen.

I feel like SUCH a loser.

Monopolies Are For Retards by: Anonymous on 10/31/2009

It's because of posts like the one below that I will do everything I can to NOT buy Intel.... Ever.

Monopolies are for retards. If you haven't figured out why yet then take some more time to figure it out. We know you are slow.

AMD Fanboys by: Anonymous on 10/31/2009

AMD fanboys are indeed idiots as the comments here do prove.

Both 1156 and 1366 sockets have clear upgrade paths to 32nm CPUs. Socket AM3 does not.

The 2.66GHz Core i7 is still more than a match for AMD's 3.4GHz Phenom II with it's 140W TDP. Core i7 keeps up despite a 25% clockspeed disadvantage. Even the little baby i5 750 is enough to crap over a 140W toaster oven Phenom 965. 95W vs 140W. Doesn't that 95W include the full northbridge Intel integrated too? AMD can't catch a break in that department either.

What does AMD have coming on the desktop next year? Six cores at 45nm with reduced clockspeeds over the quad core CPUs to keep within a 140W TDP? These CPUs will still end up slower than i7. We've all seen the benchmarks on the server side. The Xeon 5500 quads easily beat out the Opteron six core CPUs on the majority of server workloads.

Yes for enthusiasts I'm afraid that's all AMD has for you in terms of new CPUs until the second half of 2011 when the mythical Bulldozer architecture is supposed to appear. But hey, that's already been delayed from 2009 until 2011 so perhaps a few more delays are in order?

What does Intel have coming? 32nm CPUs with graphics on the CPU on package more than a full year before Fusion vaporware is set to appear. Gulftown 32nm CPUs for servers and high end desktops. Six core without sacrificing any clockspeed thanks to 32nm. They also have expanded L3 caches and updates to the core as part of the shrink.

As if all that wasn't enough to make AMD weep Intel already showed off the next generation Sandy Bridge architecture running at IDF last month.

By the time Bulldozer appears AMD will be facing off against a revised 22nm shrink of Sandy Bridge. Poor old AMD just can't catch a break.

In notebooks the situation is even more grim for AMD. 3 year old Core 2 Duos still have better performance and performance per watt than AMD's newest CPUs. How utterly embarrassing for AMD.

My old QX9650 system I built back in 2007 is still a good match for all of the fastest Phenom II CPUs that AMD has today. What a bloody embarrassment that is for AMD.

About the only interesting products AMD has are the Radeon HD 5850 and 5870. But they fucked that up too since you can't buy one anywhere. Since you can't actually buy one and my two Geforce 8800 GTX cards are still fast enough I guess AMD won't get my cash for that upgrade either.

AMD. They're just a fucking embarrasment. We heard all the grandiose nonsense from them. Native quad core, Barcelona 40% faster across a wide range of workloads. Multi core for dummies. Yadda Yadda. All bullshit. They got cocky and arrogant and now Intel is pulverizing AMD into the ground. Good riddance.

AMD by: Anonymous on 10/31/2009

AMD bankrupt ASAP. Good riddance.

AMD fans identify with 2nd raters by: Anonymous on 10/31/2009

AMD fans identify with 2nd rate companies like AMD, because that at best, is all they are or can be.

At the end of the day, you have emotionally disturbed and retarded individuals from AMDzone going around spreading a mountain of BULLSH|T everywhere they go.

This was a great opinion piece article and I hope to see much more like this.

Regards

Chad Boga

All fanboys are idiots by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Doesn't matter if they are a fanboy of AMD, Nvidia, or Intel.... all fanboys are idiots.

BS by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Are you going to trust an ignorant Intel fanboy? Hell no, except if you are one yourself.

CPU today is not like CPU before 5 or 10 years by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Scali forget that AMD is also company who made very successful GPU.Little by little CPU go on margin.Encoding ,render now GPU do faster than CPU.So compare old 486 etc.. who care about that.Yes today Intel have now faster CPU ,but CPU today is not like CPU before 5-10 years.Fact is that with today software u dont need more than 4-5 threads.Threads help for example in h264 encoding,but u can encode in h264 faster with Ati Avivo.

Why I became an AMD fanboi... by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

www.reghardware.co.uk/2005/12/16/amd_wins_jftc_evidence_access/

***
In March 2005, the JFTC (Japan's Fair Trade Commission) ruled that Intel had indeed engaged in anti-competitive behaviour, and told the chip giant to change its ways or face the court.
***

http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/146737/korea_fines_intel_25_million_for_antitrust_violations.html

***
The Korea Fair Trade Commission has fined Intel a reported 26 billion won (US$25.42 million) for abusing its dominant position in the microprocessor market, [...]
***
(2008)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/14/business/global/14compete.html

***
The European Commission fined Intel a record 1.06 billion euros Wednesday for abusing its dominance in the computer chip market
[...]
Ms. Kroes ordered Intel to stop offering rebates that were conditioned on buying less of a rival’s product, or not buying them at all, which she said had helped Intel maintain a share of at least 70 percent of chip sales market from October 2002 to December 2007.
***

A similar investigation in the US is still on its way:
http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2008/06/06/intel_amd_delay/
To my knowledge Intel hasn't won a singe antitrust case yet.

AMD should design faster chips? Well, that costs money and their only competitor keeps them from getting it by means which seem to be illegal in all major economies.
Intel has the fastest x64 CPU on the planet? Intels annual R&D budget is almost 10B$, AMD had to slash it's budget to under 1B$. Great job from Intel to be 20% faster...

I don't like AMD because they are the best company ever and so on, I just want competition on the CPU market and I strongly dislike Intels way of killing competitors. Maybe that makes me an idiot...

All fanbois are idiots. by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Getting into religious wars over who's tech is better is just plain ignorant and shortsighted.
It's one of the reasons I never read tech forums anymore, they're full of idiots on both sides, armchair EE's and "experts" who know nothing about chip design and the theory and practice behind it.
This type of argument is on the same level as who's sports team is better and why. Just a complete waste of time.

Wow by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

This article is about as biased as Charlie's articles. You're taking a little part of the truth without realising that AMD, for most parts, do not even compete in those areas. AMD does what is necessary for them to survive. They have recently cut their losses, they have launched new graphics cards, they are expanding into new areas, and you believe that just because they don't have a competing processor to a 975EE that comprises of about 0.1% of all PC shipments that they will be bankrupt? I understand that AMD is in a financial hardspot right now, but I have supported them before and I will continue to. For those who have supported AMD through the phenom period, myself included, the current AMD lineup are alot better and more diverse than that of 2007.

Big surprise by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

I see a whole lot of whining and personal attacks, I don't see anyone refuting the facts or history.

Maybe he has a point.

Great by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Wow ... that's the greatest article I have ever read on BullShitNews. Keep going this road guys :)

author has strong bias by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Hmmmm Im an AMD fan and user, and I knew all of that information. What that blatant Intel fanboy, is trying to say is that AMD wasn't faster than Intel in the early 90s and therefore you shouldn't buy Phenom IIs. He probably doesn't know that Intels power comes from the fact that software isn't compiled for optimization for AMD CPUs. And as for the Phenom II not competing with i7 + i5 you only have to look at sales and performance figures to tell you the opposite, Phenom II is a great CPU and is held back limited software optimization.

Intel is not the only innovator in CPUs, for example there have been many players like DEC, Cyrix, Motorola and IBM Power PC, not to mention AMD. AMD didn't/couldn't use anti-trust practices like Intel has done in the past, and still manages to make good processors, sell them for a low price and generally compete against Intel. In my opinion, if you thought like the author of that article you could easily say that Intel fans are idiots, for exactly the same reasons he gave.

by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

OPINION: Are all Intel fans - retards?

DISCLAIMER: The views presented in Deep Throat section represent only the personal opinions of the authors. Members of BSN*may or may not agree with the statements expressed in this article.

Deep Throat - Are all Intel fans - retards?

If Intel fans had their way we would have a total x86 monopoly with Intel as the winner. We would still be paying 4000 dollars per cpu and chipsets would be similarly priced. Floating point bugs would have to be fixed in software because there would be no other suppliers resulting in no recalled defective products. We would also be stuck on 32 bit x86 because of course 64 bit would only be necessary for business class hardware. Also memory controllers should stay on the chipset where they belong.

Most importantly, if Intel fans had their way we would only have once choice of hardware because having to pick and choose between paper and plastic at the supermarket is, you know, for suckers. Might as well keep the choice simple so our brain doesn't overload. After all it is a good thing when a corporation pays the distribution channel to effectively limit competition.

Idiots.. No, don't think so by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Are AMD Fans idiots…? I would say No to that question.

I learned about AMD back when I was getting a BS in Computer Engineering at the Univ. of Missouri at Columbia 87-91. At that time they just provided low cost generic x86 Intel copies. I didn’t think to much of them until they where the first in the industry to release a 64 bit architecture. That in it’s self is bold. From what I have learned Intel has followed suit on similar things although it is common knowledge that AMD can’t go blow for blow with chipzilla on all technology fronts. No big loss. Based on AMD price points they and benchmark tests they compare very respectively if not better in same price point comparisons to Intel. Which are all we as consumers really care about. I used to only go Intel since I lived on Intel MP Architecture my junior and senior years in college. Yet there is no shame in being an AMD fan boy. I find it interesting that Intel for the i7 architecture followed AMD lead on using an integrated memory controller and utilizing a similar memory interface architecture that AMD deployed in prior Opteron architectures. So from that perspective you could say there is some leap forging going on here. Yet plain and simple is AMD lacking against Intel’s best. Sure but when the rubber meets the road and I can build a rock solid gaming and entertainment PC for a fraction of what I can buy a i7 975 extreme with near performance bench marks once I have OC’d my Phenom what is there not to like about AMD.

But bottom line, isn’t it all about cost vs. performance. I would rather OC my Phenom and get an SSD then pay the same for an i7 960 with a typical SataII drive. I am confident my Phenom with an SSD will seemingly outperform the other since there is more then one IO bottle neck then just what the CPU can resolve.

by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

THIS ARTICLE REINFORCES THE FOLLOWING SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH:

Intel Users Less Intelligent Than AMD
Thursday, 29 March 2007 21:54 Maxit

In a recent survey, a study of over 5,000 computer users concluded that people who use Intel powered computers have a lower IQ than their AMD counterparts. The study took place over a six month period and involved computer users with Intel and AMD powered computers of various specifications.

The test subjects were asked to complete a series of written and hands on tests covering basic computer skills up to more advanced tasks. The survey found that over 69% of people with Intel powered computers had greater learning difficulties and found computer related tasks more difficult compared with 31% of AMD. A whopping 78% of novice computer users with Intel processors inside their computers could not transfer and resize an image from a digital camera even with the the step by step instructions in front of them.

http://www.maxitmag.com/loose-wires/articles/intel-users-less-intelligent-than-amd.html

by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

I dont give a shit honestly if Intel is anti-competitive, I just get AMD processors because they work fine for general processing and don't cost an arm and a leg.

Just like NVIDIA, I think Intel's own capitalist hypocrisy will be it's undoing.

by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Maybe people don't want to support an a$$hole monopolist PO$ like Inte£?

I've been Inte£-free for 9 years and i'm never going to give my money to an unrepentant predatory anti-consumer monopolist like Inte£

AMG Fanboy by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

I like AMD so I guess I'm an idiot. But if you like Intel, then you’re you Sir are no rocket scientist! Intel is the Microsoft of CPU makers that also releases inferior products only a couple months later to scrap them.. Remember core 2 which became core duo? Can I say Celeron? Or is that word banned by the FCC? Then there’s the stupid socket fiasco 775, i7/1366, i7/1156, i5/1156, also an i9 and i3 hanging around somewhere and the i4137…okay that last one was a joke, but you get the point…what’s a viable upgrade plan with Intel? No one knows because at any time we could see a new socket or new chip set or both, and all that X58, P55 crap you brought at a premium price point could be worthless next year. Then there’s Intel school yard bully mentality trying to force Nvidia out of business, while using Nvidia cross licenses in every CPU it makes? If I were Nvidia I’ll do the exact same thing they’ve done, sue Intel for contract violation, and take my cross licenses and go home… where would Intel be then? Without a pot to pee in, or a window to throw it out of. I will agree however that at the moment Intel has the fastest, most expensive CPU’s, having said that AMD Phenom II’s aren’t far behind and are fast enough for silly ole me and cheaper, and lets not forget the Dragon Platform, paired with the AMD/ATI 5800, the fastest single GPU in the world and its “Badass.” What do you Intel Cheerleaders have to say about that? Oh never mind Intel doesn’t make graphic cards, well at least I don’t think Larrabee is a graphic card, but I could be wrong. (/giggle) Now lets dissect the i7 1366 for a moment A failed server chip, who’s TDP was too freaking high for server use, so with AMD nipping at Intel Core 2 duo heals with the Phenom, some half-wit Intel engineer had an epiphany to cut down the failed i7 1366 server CPU design for desktop use, TPD problem solved and it could combat the AMD Phenom’s. Brilliant! Now I know some of you are going to say that the 1366 isn’t a server chip, but why else would it have a QPI interface that was designed for servers and high end work stations? Need more evidence? Notice the 1156, QPI is gone downgraded once again to DMI. So to all you “idiots”…cough.. I mean people that brought i7 1366 I really feel sorry for you that there’s not a viable upgrade path for you guys, well maybe taking out a second mortgage to buy Gulftown which will be 1366, but maybe not X58, I bet that’s going hurt? Any who so basically i7 1366 is at EOL status 1 year of its inception, and you’re calling AMD fan boys idiots, that’s laughable, my AM3 socket looks pretty dam good right now. Now let me back up a moment to this graphics war with Nvidia and tell you why that was a really stupid move by Intel. Notwithstanding the cross licenses, from what I read about Fermi, it’s a computational GPU so is the ATI 5800, hell then dam things are superior to supercomputers from just a few years ago. Why is this revel ant? You see with GPU taking on traditional role of CPU, how long do you think it will be until the CPU is obsolete? See where this is going Intel Cheerleaders? Now why did you throw the paddle from the boat? Idiots

Wikipedia? by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Granted that wikipedia has tons of great info and "facts" but seriously it's getting a little silly that supposed "informed opinions" are referencing wikipedia as a source! Any middle school, high school or college kid can tell u that wikipedia cannot be used as a valid source in a paper because it's too suceptible to changes by anyone with an account. True this isn't a traditional paper but it's still a article that is making claims and stating facts that aren't being backed up by my multiple sources let alone a single solid one. I expect better of tech sites. Example of good ones in my opinion Are Techreport, Anandtech, arstechnica

by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

All fans are idiots. We need to stop treating everything like sports teams. Just buy the better hardware for the price range you want.

you haven't got a clue by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

just like on [H] where they banned your sorry backside, you haven't got a clue here either. Try investigating a little thing called anti trust and you might develop a slight insight into why your so called fanboys despise your beloved intel. But yes, if given any affordable dollar value, I would chose AMD over Intel any day of the week since I will get more for my money from AMD. It has always been that way and if you find it more attractive to pay more money than necessary, then I think that says all that needs to be said about your 'intel fanboy' status...

opteron by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

of course the opterons, amd64, hypertransport, integrated memory controller, etc... have been accidentally omitted

AMD fans are not idiot by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

But those from AMDZone are :)

Netburst by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Must have been netburst that was the cause of the PIII's being so far behind, oh wait, they didn't use it.
Wow, seriously?
I know this site gets ragged elsewhere but I occasionally found some interesting articles here. This was not one of them.

Oh on that note i've had more intels than amds (chipsets used to suck, and amd recently hasnt been great at the top end)

yes by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

short answer. yes. They quote AMD's marketing guys blather as gospel.

S_Hit by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Is this c*rap site kissing intel and Noobidia a*ss.

AMD by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Idiot: mentally deficient person, or somebody who acts in a foolish, self defeating, uneducated or counterproductive way. ((no comment who would look like one))

AMD, Cyrix, ST . . . several x86 vendors were there

Was I an idiot buying AMD or Cyrix or IBM? I bought what was best insite the designated budget. Most often AMD was the way to go in the 386/486 days, same was true for K6/P2, same for Athlon/P3, same for Athlon/P4, A64/P4, C2 changed the picture, but AMD had some space. AMD is always there, it is not about fanboys it is being an alternative and having some niches you can fill.

Question to the bright: very cheap PC with integrated graphics, capable of a random game. Idiot to take AMD? Unwise not to be open minded I say.

Uroshi

((oh, this level of articles will just lead trolls to the site))

OPINION: Is Scali - an idiot? by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Yes.

And this article is a huge troll.
Keep your opinions to yourself in the future.

A new low for this site... by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

... which is, in it's own right, an absolutely outstanding achievement!

Keep the excellent work, Mr Valich: technology humor sites of this level are few and far between.

Hilarious by: Radu M. Cosma on 10/30/2009

Now, do one about Apple fanboys! :D

great by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Very good article. Thank you :)

AMD sucks big time. Never again will buy anything from AMD. Never.

Historically accurate but still a little bias by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

Yep, AMD only pulled ahead of Intel because Netburst sucked. That much, in my opinion, is true. But what is missing from the story above is the story of how AMD has gained on Intel. Is AMD still behind? Yes, but not as far behind as they used to be.

The other thing this guy hasn't wrapped his head around is that there are a lot of "AMD fanboys" out there that only have a problem with Intel because of the company's business practices.

AMD does need to put up or shut up though. It's 3.5 years since Core 2 debuted and AMD still has not caught up in terms of instructions per clock.

Are all Intel fans really ARM lovers? by: solidusprime on 10/30/2009

Strange article not really compelling enough to convicne anyone excpet maybe sooth the authors giant ego.

"So, basically Netburst was just an anomaly" this is the kind of quote that proves Scali is jumping to conclusions. Intel put a lot of money and hope into Netburst it was a mistake by Intel and mistakes can and are (Larabee) still happening. Intel is facing pressure from AMD with bulldozer and more an more upward pressure from ARM, being an Intel fan is not so easy anymore so they have to re-trench to not get scared. The articles existance is proof enough Intel is feeling the pressure.

by: Anonymous on 10/30/2009

I'm with AMD since k6. They are cheap and very reliable. You have to be an idiot fanboy not to use AMD.