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But these still come with the Management Engine?

phkahler 9y ago
When I slip on my tinfoil hat I wonder if that's the reason for this. There's nothing here that AMD couldn't offer on it's own so why combine their graphics with Intel CPUs if not for the ME?
- eropple 9y ago
  ...because Intel will pay them money, which can be exchanged for goods and services, for letting them do so?
  - phkahler 9y ago
    Any customer who would buy this would probably buy an AMD APU instead and AMD would take home more of the money without giving their competitor anything. AMD also has the capability to produce almost the exact same product using their own processor instead of Intel, so again why help your competitor by sharing the profits? I'd say either AMD doesn't have the production capacity for whomever the customer is (Apple?) or its something more nefarious like preserving ME. Given that AMD is still a close second in graphics, maybe it really is a way to increase volumes for their GPUs. But that still suggests there's some reason they can't deliver the same with their own CPUs.
    - subwayclub 9y ago
      Intel has more of the existing partnerships with OEMs, and that isn't going to reverse immediately with a strong showing from AMD. The new Ryzen Mobile notebooks are low-to-midrange entries and groundbreaking in their category, but Intel still covers that higher end segment. It's easier to see this from Intel's perspective: Intel's biggest threat is from the onrush of GPU-driven computing, and Nvidia is the market leader there. The classic play is to starve them of oxygen by leveraging existing channels to get them out of the gaming notebook market. Thus comes this weird saga with AMD and Raja which is a win win deal in fact: Intel gets ammo to fight Nvidia now and a key hire for their own development later, and AMD gets another source of cashflow and marketshare plus a graceful exit for what has been reported as shaky, conflicted executive management at RTG. Although they've delivered decent hardware and software recently, there have been numerous PR flubs from the group and the business unit performance is questionable overall. There is an open question of what happens to RTG later on, but perhaps the answer is simply to survive in Intel's shadow again.
      - phkahler 9y ago
        I can buy that. I didn't know there were issues at RTG. The point about OEMs not switching quickly is also a reality. It still seems really strange. The next move could be nVidia making their own high performance CPUs to integrate with their GPUs. Think risc-v here, they've already embraced it and the potential and freedom to innovate are wide open.
- mkl 9y ago
  This is nonsense. AMD already has its own equivalent of Intel's ME: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14803373 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14803373
turblety 9y ago
Yeah exactly. No one who values their security or privacy should even consider buying one of these. Especially businesses/corporations as you have no idea what is running in that hidden operating system. [1] 1. https://libreboot.org/faq.html#intelme https://libreboot.org/faq.html#intelme

When I slip on my tinfoil hat I wonder if that's the reason for this. There's nothing here that AMD couldn't offer on it's own so why combine their graphics with Intel CPUs if not for the ME?

eropple 9y ago
...because Intel will pay them money, which can be exchanged for goods and services, for letting them do so?
- phkahler 9y ago
  Any customer who would buy this would probably buy an AMD APU instead and AMD would take home more of the money without giving their competitor anything. AMD also has the capability to produce almost the exact same product using their own processor instead of Intel, so again why help your competitor by sharing the profits? I'd say either AMD doesn't have the production capacity for whomever the customer is (Apple?) or its something more nefarious like preserving ME. Given that AMD is still a close second in graphics, maybe it really is a way to increase volumes for their GPUs. But that still suggests there's some reason they can't deliver the same with their own CPUs.
  - subwayclub 9y ago
    Intel has more of the existing partnerships with OEMs, and that isn't going to reverse immediately with a strong showing from AMD. The new Ryzen Mobile notebooks are low-to-midrange entries and groundbreaking in their category, but Intel still covers that higher end segment. It's easier to see this from Intel's perspective: Intel's biggest threat is from the onrush of GPU-driven computing, and Nvidia is the market leader there. The classic play is to starve them of oxygen by leveraging existing channels to get them out of the gaming notebook market. Thus comes this weird saga with AMD and Raja which is a win win deal in fact: Intel gets ammo to fight Nvidia now and a key hire for their own development later, and AMD gets another source of cashflow and marketshare plus a graceful exit for what has been reported as shaky, conflicted executive management at RTG. Although they've delivered decent hardware and software recently, there have been numerous PR flubs from the group and the business unit performance is questionable overall. There is an open question of what happens to RTG later on, but perhaps the answer is simply to survive in Intel's shadow again.
    - phkahler 9y ago
      I can buy that. I didn't know there were issues at RTG. The point about OEMs not switching quickly is also a reality. It still seems really strange. The next move could be nVidia making their own high performance CPUs to integrate with their GPUs. Think risc-v here, they've already embraced it and the potential and freedom to innovate are wide open.
mkl 9y ago
This is nonsense. AMD already has its own equivalent of Intel's ME: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14803373 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14803373

turblety 9y ago

Yeah exactly. No one who values their security or privacy should even consider buying one of these. Especially businesses/corporations as you have no idea what is running in that hidden operating system. [1] 1. https://libreboot.org/faq.html#intelme https://libreboot.org/faq.html#intelme