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Isn't it based on the architecture name? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Nvidia_microarchitectures https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Nvidia_microar

Isn't it based on the architecture name? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Nvidia_microarchitectures https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Nvidia_microarchitect...

jsheard 5y ago
Yeah it is, but unless you've memorised the history of Nvidia architectures it doesn't tell you which is the newer one Fermi -> Kepler -> Maxwell -> Pascal -> Volta (HPC only) -> Turing -> Ampere -> Hopper (HPC only?) -> Lovelace?
- ksec 5y ago
  Isn't this the norm? Only AMD started the trend of naming the uArch with Numbers as Zen 4 or RDNA 3 fairly recently. With Intel it is Haswell > Broadwell > ..... Whatever Lake.
  - jsheard 5y ago
    Usually the architecture name isn't the only distinguishing feature of the product name, you don't need to remember Intel codenames because a Core 12700 is obviously newer than a Core 11700 Nvidia's accelerators are just called <Architecture Letter>100 every time so if you don't remember the order of the letters it's not obvious They could have just named them P100, V200, A300 and H400 instead
    - mywittyname 5y ago
      Intel was using Core i[3,5,7] names for multiple generations. A Core i7 could be faster or slower than a Core i5 depending on which generation each existed in. It is nice when products have a naming scheme where natural ordering of the name maps to performance.
    - bee_rider 5y ago
      I don't really mind the incomprehensible letters -- looking up the generation is pretty easy, and these are data-center focused products... getting the name right is somebody's job and the easiest possible thing. However, is the number superfluous at this point?
    - 867-5309 5y ago
      >you don't need to remember Intel codenames because a Core 12700 is obviously newer than a Core 11700 J3710, 7th Gen J3060, 8th Gen J4205, 8th Gen J4125, 9th Gen i3-5005U, 5th Gen N5095, 10th Gen i7-3770, 3rd Gen 3865U, 7th Gen N3060, 8th Gen
      - paulmd 5y ago
        And an AMD 5700U is older than a 5400U as well. A 3400G is older than a 3100X. 3300X isn't really distinctive from 3100X, both are quad-core configurations (but different CCD/cache configurations, which is of course the name doesn't really disclose to the consumer). It happens, naming is a complex topic and there's a lot of dimensions to a product. In general, complaining about naming is peak bikeshedding for the tech-aware crowd. There are multiple naming schemes, all of them are reasonable, and everyone hates some of them for completely legitimate reasons (but different for every person). And the resulting bikeshedding is exactly as you'd expect with that. The underlying problem is that products have multiple dimensions of interest - you've got architecture, big vs small core, core count, TDP, clockrate/binning, cache configuration/CCD configuration, graphics configuration, etc. If you sort them by generation, then an older but higher-spec can beat a newer but lower-spec. If you sort by date then refreshes break the scheme. If you split things out into series (m7 vs i7) to express TDP then some people don't like that there's a bunch of different series. If you put them into the same naming scheme then some people don't like that a 5700U is slower than a 5700X. If you try to express all the variables in a single name, you end up with a name like "i7 1185G7" where it's incomprehensible if you don't understand what each of the parts of the name mean. (as a power user, I personally think the Ice Lake/Tiger Lake naming is the best of the bunch, it expresses everything you need to know: architecture, core count, power, binning, graphics. But then big.LITTLE had to go and mess everything up! And other people still hated it because it was more complex.) There are certain ones like AMD's 5000 series or the Intel 10th-gen (Comet Lake 10xxxU) that are just really ghastly because they're deliberately trying to mix-and-match to confuse the consumer (to sell older stuff as being new), but in general when people complain about "not understanding all those Lakes and Coves" it's usually just because they aren't interested in the brand/product and don't want to bother learning the names, and they will eagerly rattle off a list of painters or cities that AMD uses as their codenames. Like, again, to reiterate here, I literally never have seen anyone raise AMD using painter names as being "opaque to the consumer" in the same way that people repeatedly get upset about lakes. And it's the exact same thing. It's people who know the AMD brand and don't know the Intel brand and think that's some kind of a problem with the branding, as opposed to a reflection of their own personal knowledge. I fully expect that AMD will release 7000 series desktop processors this year or early next year, and exactly 0 people are going to think that a 7600 being newer than a 7702 is confusing in the way that we get all these aggrieved posts about Intel and NVIDIA. Yes, 7600 and 7702 are different product lines, and that's the exact same as your "but i7 3770 and N3060 are different!" example. It's simply not that confusing, it takes less time to learn than to make a single indignant post on social media about it. Similarly, the NVIDIA practice of using inventors/compsci people is not particularly confusing either. Basically the same as AMD with the painters/cities. It's just not that interesting, and it's not worth all the bikeshedding that gets devoted to it. </soapbox> Anyway, your example is all messed up though. J3710 and J3060 are both the same gen (Braswell), launched at the same time (Q1 2016), that example is entirely wrong. J4125 vs J4205 is an older but higher specced processor vs a newer but lower spec, it's a 8th gen Pentium vs a 9th gen Celeron, like a 3100X vs a 2700X (zomg 3100X is bigger number but actually slower!). And the J4125 and J4205 are refreshes of the same architecture with legitimately very similar performance classes. i3 and Atom or i7 and Atom are completely different product lines and the naming is not similar at all there, apart from both having 3s as their first number (not even first character, that is different too, just happen to share the first number somewhere in the name). Again, like with the Tiger Lake 11xxGxx naming, the characters and positions in the name have meaning. You can come up with better examples than that even within the Intel lineup. Just literally picking 3770 and J3060 as being "similar" because they both have 3s in them. The one I would legitimately agree on is that the Atom lineup is kind of a mess. Braswell, Apollo Lake, Gemini Lake, and Gemini Lake Refresh are all crammed into the "3000/4000" series space, and there is no "generational number" in that scheme either. Braswell is all 3000 series and Gemini Lake/Gemini Lake Refresh is all 4000 series but you've got Apollo Lake sitting in the middle with both 3000 and 4000 series chips. And a J3455 (Apollo Lake 1.5 GHz) is legitimately a better (or at least equal) processor to a J3710 (Braswell 1.6 GHz). Like 5700U vs 5800U, there are some legitimate architectural differences behind hidden behind an opaque number there (and on the Intel it's graphics - Gemini Lake/Gemini Lake Refresh have a much better video block). (And that's the problem with "performance rating" approaches, even if a 3710 and a 3455 are similar in performance there's still other differences between them. Also, PR naming instantly turns into gamesmanship - what benchmark, what conditions, what TDP, what level of threading? Is an Intel 37000 the same as an AMD 37000?)
    - numpad0 5y ago
      We need a canonical, chronologically monotonic, marketing independent ID scheme. Marketing people always tries to disrupt naming schemes and that’s the real problem.
    - yread 5y ago
      Xeons have that problem too. I guess some companies just assume they only sell their professional equipment to professionals who read the spec sheet before spending 10k+
  - kergonath 5y ago
    Intel is using generation numbers in their marketing materials. In the technical-oriented slide decks you’d see things like “42th generation formerly named Bullshit Creek” but they are not supposed to use that for sales. And then actual part names like i9-42045K. We keep using code names in discussions because the actual names are ass backwards and not very descriptive.
- modeless 5y ago
  Someone should make a game like "Pokemon or Big Data" [1] except you have to choose which of two GPU names is faster. Even the consumer naming is bonkers so there's plenty of material there! [1] http://pixelastic.github.io/pokemonorbigdata/ http://pixelastic.github.io/pokemonorbigdata/
neogodless 5y ago
You just blew my mind. That did not occur to me, but it is obvious in retrospect.
- Uehreka 5y ago
  Sure, but the way Nvidia names generations is far from obvious. It seems to be “names of famous scientists, progressing in alphabetical order, we skip some letters if we can’t find a well known scientist with a matching last name and are excited about a scientist 2 letters from now, we wrap around to the beginning of the alphabet when we get to the end, and we just skipped from A to H, so expect another wraparound in the next 5-10 years.”
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  - polynomial 5y ago
    Volta (2017) -> Turing (2018) Volta was HPC only while Turing was consumer line, I guess that may have something to do with the out of order naming sequence. Then we had Ampere which was dual market. And then split again with Lovelace on the consumer side and Hopper for data centers. Just guessing here, obvi.

Isn't it based on the architecture name? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Nvidia_microarchitectures https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Nvidia_microarchitect...

jsheard 5y ago

Yeah it is, but unless you've memorised the history of Nvidia architectures it doesn't tell you which is the newer one Fermi -> Kepler -> Maxwell -> Pascal -> Volta (HPC only) -> Turing -> Ampere -> Hopper (HPC only?) -> Lovelace?

ksec 5y ago
Isn't this the norm? Only AMD started the trend of naming the uArch with Numbers as Zen 4 or RDNA 3 fairly recently. With Intel it is Haswell > Broadwell > ..... Whatever Lake.
- jsheard 5y ago
  Usually the architecture name isn't the only distinguishing feature of the product name, you don't need to remember Intel codenames because a Core 12700 is obviously newer than a Core 11700 Nvidia's accelerators are just called <Architecture Letter>100 every time so if you don't remember the order of the letters it's not obvious They could have just named them P100, V200, A300 and H400 instead
  - mywittyname 5y ago
    Intel was using Core i[3,5,7] names for multiple generations. A Core i7 could be faster or slower than a Core i5 depending on which generation each existed in. It is nice when products have a naming scheme where natural ordering of the name maps to performance.
  - bee_rider 5y ago
    I don't really mind the incomprehensible letters -- looking up the generation is pretty easy, and these are data-center focused products... getting the name right is somebody's job and the easiest possible thing. However, is the number superfluous at this point?
  - 867-5309 5y ago
    >you don't need to remember Intel codenames because a Core 12700 is obviously newer than a Core 11700 J3710, 7th Gen J3060, 8th Gen J4205, 8th Gen J4125, 9th Gen i3-5005U, 5th Gen N5095, 10th Gen i7-3770, 3rd Gen 3865U, 7th Gen N3060, 8th Gen
    - paulmd 5y ago
      And an AMD 5700U is older than a 5400U as well. A 3400G is older than a 3100X. 3300X isn't really distinctive from 3100X, both are quad-core configurations (but different CCD/cache configurations, which is of course the name doesn't really disclose to the consumer). It happens, naming is a complex topic and there's a lot of dimensions to a product. In general, complaining about naming is peak bikeshedding for the tech-aware crowd. There are multiple naming schemes, all of them are reasonable, and everyone hates some of them for completely legitimate reasons (but different for every person). And the resulting bikeshedding is exactly as you'd expect with that. The underlying problem is that products have multiple dimensions of interest - you've got architecture, big vs small core, core count, TDP, clockrate/binning, cache configuration/CCD configuration, graphics configuration, etc. If you sort them by generation, then an older but higher-spec can beat a newer but lower-spec. If you sort by date then refreshes break the scheme. If you split things out into series (m7 vs i7) to express TDP then some people don't like that there's a bunch of different series. If you put them into the same naming scheme then some people don't like that a 5700U is slower than a 5700X. If you try to express all the variables in a single name, you end up with a name like "i7 1185G7" where it's incomprehensible if you don't understand what each of the parts of the name mean. (as a power user, I personally think the Ice Lake/Tiger Lake naming is the best of the bunch, it expresses everything you need to know: architecture, core count, power, binning, graphics. But then big.LITTLE had to go and mess everything up! And other people still hated it because it was more complex.) There are certain ones like AMD's 5000 series or the Intel 10th-gen (Comet Lake 10xxxU) that are just really ghastly because they're deliberately trying to mix-and-match to confuse the consumer (to sell older stuff as being new), but in general when people complain about "not understanding all those Lakes and Coves" it's usually just because they aren't interested in the brand/product and don't want to bother learning the names, and they will eagerly rattle off a list of painters or cities that AMD uses as their codenames. Like, again, to reiterate here, I literally never have seen anyone raise AMD using painter names as being "opaque to the consumer" in the same way that people repeatedly get upset about lakes. And it's the exact same thing. It's people who know the AMD brand and don't know the Intel brand and think that's some kind of a problem with the branding, as opposed to a reflection of their own personal knowledge. I fully expect that AMD will release 7000 series desktop processors this year or early next year, and exactly 0 people are going to think that a 7600 being newer than a 7702 is confusing in the way that we get all these aggrieved posts about Intel and NVIDIA. Yes, 7600 and 7702 are different product lines, and that's the exact same as your "but i7 3770 and N3060 are different!" example. It's simply not that confusing, it takes less time to learn than to make a single indignant post on social media about it. Similarly, the NVIDIA practice of using inventors/compsci people is not particularly confusing either. Basically the same as AMD with the painters/cities. It's just not that interesting, and it's not worth all the bikeshedding that gets devoted to it. </soapbox> Anyway, your example is all messed up though. J3710 and J3060 are both the same gen (Braswell), launched at the same time (Q1 2016), that example is entirely wrong. J4125 vs J4205 is an older but higher specced processor vs a newer but lower spec, it's a 8th gen Pentium vs a 9th gen Celeron, like a 3100X vs a 2700X (zomg 3100X is bigger number but actually slower!). And the J4125 and J4205 are refreshes of the same architecture with legitimately very similar performance classes. i3 and Atom or i7 and Atom are completely different product lines and the naming is not similar at all there, apart from both having 3s as their first number (not even first character, that is different too, just happen to share the first number somewhere in the name). Again, like with the Tiger Lake 11xxGxx naming, the characters and positions in the name have meaning. You can come up with better examples than that even within the Intel lineup. Just literally picking 3770 and J3060 as being "similar" because they both have 3s in them. The one I would legitimately agree on is that the Atom lineup is kind of a mess. Braswell, Apollo Lake, Gemini Lake, and Gemini Lake Refresh are all crammed into the "3000/4000" series space, and there is no "generational number" in that scheme either. Braswell is all 3000 series and Gemini Lake/Gemini Lake Refresh is all 4000 series but you've got Apollo Lake sitting in the middle with both 3000 and 4000 series chips. And a J3455 (Apollo Lake 1.5 GHz) is legitimately a better (or at least equal) processor to a J3710 (Braswell 1.6 GHz). Like 5700U vs 5800U, there are some legitimate architectural differences behind hidden behind an opaque number there (and on the Intel it's graphics - Gemini Lake/Gemini Lake Refresh have a much better video block). (And that's the problem with "performance rating" approaches, even if a 3710 and a 3455 are similar in performance there's still other differences between them. Also, PR naming instantly turns into gamesmanship - what benchmark, what conditions, what TDP, what level of threading? Is an Intel 37000 the same as an AMD 37000?)
  - numpad0 5y ago
    We need a canonical, chronologically monotonic, marketing independent ID scheme. Marketing people always tries to disrupt naming schemes and that’s the real problem.
  - yread 5y ago
    Xeons have that problem too. I guess some companies just assume they only sell their professional equipment to professionals who read the spec sheet before spending 10k+
- kergonath 5y ago
  Intel is using generation numbers in their marketing materials. In the technical-oriented slide decks you’d see things like “42th generation formerly named Bullshit Creek” but they are not supposed to use that for sales. And then actual part names like i9-42045K. We keep using code names in discussions because the actual names are ass backwards and not very descriptive.
modeless 5y ago
Someone should make a game like "Pokemon or Big Data" [1] except you have to choose which of two GPU names is faster. Even the consumer naming is bonkers so there's plenty of material there! [1] http://pixelastic.github.io/pokemonorbigdata/ http://pixelastic.github.io/pokemonorbigdata/

neogodless 5y ago

You just blew my mind. That did not occur to me, but it is obvious in retrospect.

Uehreka 5y ago
Sure, but the way Nvidia names generations is far from obvious. It seems to be “names of famous scientists, progressing in alphabetical order, we skip some letters if we can’t find a well known scientist with a matching last name and are excited about a scientist 2 letters from now, we wrap around to the beginning of the alphabet when we get to the end, and we just skipped from A to H, so expect another wraparound in the next 5-10 years.”
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- polynomial 5y ago
  Volta (2017) -> Turing (2018) Volta was HPC only while Turing was consumer line, I guess that may have something to do with the out of order naming sequence. Then we had Ampere which was dual market. And then split again with Lovelace on the consumer side and Hopper for data centers. Just guessing here, obvi.