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This is pretty important for AMD because they've been having a terrible time matching Intel at per cycle efficiency. Basically, ever since the core i series sta

This is pretty important for AMD because they've been having a terrible time matching Intel at per cycle efficiency. Basically, ever since the core i series started, AMD has been behind at single threaded performance, especially when going clock for clock. They've been trying to make up for it by both offering more cores/threads than comparably priced Intel components, as well as trying to scale their clock rates. Unfortunately for AMD, their last few generations have actually been falling short on their attempts to boost clock rates, as a result, when comparing comparably priced AMD and Intel chips, while AMD would typically have a clock speed advantage, it would often not be enough to overcome Intel's efficiency. This product release is kind of an attempt to show that AMD can actually deliver on their planned strategy. As for why AMD is going for this route, rather than trying to beat Intel in per clock efficiency? Probably because AMD's resources are severely limited compared to Intel, and this approach offered lower risk at lower cost.

Freaky 13y ago
> As for why AMD is going for this route, rather than trying to beat Intel in per clock efficiency? Well, because clock speeds are something they can improve now, and not in $n years time when their next major microarchitecture is ready. Intel had the exact same problem with the Pentium 4, and they were similarly stuck with minor tweaks and desperately increasing clock rates for years before Core was ready.
- Lagged2Death 13y ago
  I wish I had a cite for this. It was my understanding that P-IV was originally conceived as an architecture that could be clocked up and up for years to come. Developing a new architecture is expensive and risky (see P-IV, Itanium), so the hope was to design something that would scale up so well as manufacturing improved that a few generations of architectures could be skipped, so to speak. They had hoped the P-IV would eventually reach 10GHz or so. Which made it OK that P-IV retried fewer instructions per clock than the P-III that came before. Scaling up like that isn't such a radical idea; the P6/i686 architecture behind the Pentium Pro, Pentium II and Pentium III had spanned a spectrum from 150MHz to 1.4GHz, after all, nearly an order of magnitude. But it turned out that somewhere between 3 and 4 GHz, things got really difficult. "Minor tweaks and desperately increasing clock rates" was more or less the P-IV plan from the get go. It just turned out not to work.
  - yk 13y ago
    Anandtech discussed this in their Bulldozer review: AMD's architects called this pursuit a low gate count per pipeline stage design. By reducing the number of gates per pipeline stage, you reduce the time spent in each stage and can increase the overall frequency of the processor. If this sounds familiar, it's because Intel used similar logic in the creation of the Pentium 4. http://www.anandtech.com/show/4955/the-bulldozer-review-amd-fx8150-tested/3 http://www.anandtech.com/show/4955/the-bulldozer-review-amd-... And since I read this, I really wondered what trick AMD has up its sleeves.
    - VladRussian2 13y ago
      there is no trick, just desperate attempts to survive. 10 years ago AMD had more efficient architecture, Intel - more GHz (remember 2.2 Athlons having 3700 "PR-rating"?). Intel's approach was commercially more successful - customers were still buying GHz, and AMD was trying to educate market about real performance while radiating impression of a looser who just can't get good process and fabs. AMD gave up and decided to pursue P4-like approach for their new architecture, while Intel hit GHz "sound barrier" and went efficiency way by resurrecting PIII style architecture which resulted in Core CPUs. AMD made a huge, strategic mistake 10 years ago. How the execs in charge of Bulldozer have been BS-ing their way inside AMD last 5 years - that is a typical everyday miracle of a big company internal life.
      - tacticus 13y ago
        There is also the billions intel spent making sure dell and hp and co. would never buy AMD
        zanny 13y ago
        I actually take notice of how many consumer laptops I see in a walmart / target / best buy are actually running AMD APUs. The big brands might not, but they see bigger numbers on the A6 than a Pentium and feel better about the buy even if the Pentium dominates it.
kristofferR 13y ago
It's also great for marketing purposes. A lot of people will probably be deceived by the high number, thinking that a higher number automatically always is better.
- SG- 13y ago
  Well they're already somewhat deceiving people with the 8 core claim.
voidlogic 13y ago
That is what steamroller will do, increase IPC. This is an interim fix. If they can run steamroller at these clocks and Intel doesn't do something radical, AMD will be "top dog" again for the first time since Athlon 64s were killing P4s.
yekko 13y ago
Mismanagement
puivert 13y ago
> This is pretty important for AMD because they've been having a terrible time matching Intel at per cycle efficiency. Bulldozer was always supposed to be a high clock long pipe machine, sacrificing some IPC. See eg http://www.anandtech.com/show/5057/the-bulldozer-aftermath-delving-even-deeper/2 http://www.anandtech.com/show/5057/the-bulldozer-aftermath-d... "Per-clock efficiency" is generally not goal in itself in CPU design, absolute performance and efficiency are. Where AMD has stumbled is getting the clock up, probably partly related to their unfortunate fab situation The speed-demon strategy has seen successes historically, Pentium 4's fate notwithstanding. See eg the DEC 21164 and the IBM z196.
- beedogs 13y ago
  There was a lot more wrong with the P4 (not the least of which was the absolutely abysmal chipset Intel married it to) that rendered it such a disaster.

Freaky 13y ago

> As for why AMD is going for this route, rather than trying to beat Intel in per clock efficiency? Well, because clock speeds are something they can improve now, and not in $n years time when their next major microarchitecture is ready. Intel had the exact same problem with the Pentium 4, and they were similarly stuck with minor tweaks and desperately increasing clock rates for years before Core was ready.

Lagged2Death 13y ago
I wish I had a cite for this. It was my understanding that P-IV was originally conceived as an architecture that could be clocked up and up for years to come. Developing a new architecture is expensive and risky (see P-IV, Itanium), so the hope was to design something that would scale up so well as manufacturing improved that a few generations of architectures could be skipped, so to speak. They had hoped the P-IV would eventually reach 10GHz or so. Which made it OK that P-IV retried fewer instructions per clock than the P-III that came before. Scaling up like that isn't such a radical idea; the P6/i686 architecture behind the Pentium Pro, Pentium II and Pentium III had spanned a spectrum from 150MHz to 1.4GHz, after all, nearly an order of magnitude. But it turned out that somewhere between 3 and 4 GHz, things got really difficult. "Minor tweaks and desperately increasing clock rates" was more or less the P-IV plan from the get go. It just turned out not to work.
- yk 13y ago
  Anandtech discussed this in their Bulldozer review: AMD's architects called this pursuit a low gate count per pipeline stage design. By reducing the number of gates per pipeline stage, you reduce the time spent in each stage and can increase the overall frequency of the processor. If this sounds familiar, it's because Intel used similar logic in the creation of the Pentium 4. http://www.anandtech.com/show/4955/the-bulldozer-review-amd-fx8150-tested/3 http://www.anandtech.com/show/4955/the-bulldozer-review-amd-... And since I read this, I really wondered what trick AMD has up its sleeves.
  - VladRussian2 13y ago
    there is no trick, just desperate attempts to survive. 10 years ago AMD had more efficient architecture, Intel - more GHz (remember 2.2 Athlons having 3700 "PR-rating"?). Intel's approach was commercially more successful - customers were still buying GHz, and AMD was trying to educate market about real performance while radiating impression of a looser who just can't get good process and fabs. AMD gave up and decided to pursue P4-like approach for their new architecture, while Intel hit GHz "sound barrier" and went efficiency way by resurrecting PIII style architecture which resulted in Core CPUs. AMD made a huge, strategic mistake 10 years ago. How the execs in charge of Bulldozer have been BS-ing their way inside AMD last 5 years - that is a typical everyday miracle of a big company internal life.
    - tacticus 13y ago
      There is also the billions intel spent making sure dell and hp and co. would never buy AMD
      - zanny 13y ago
        I actually take notice of how many consumer laptops I see in a walmart / target / best buy are actually running AMD APUs. The big brands might not, but they see bigger numbers on the A6 than a Pentium and feel better about the buy even if the Pentium dominates it.

kristofferR 13y ago

It's also great for marketing purposes. A lot of people will probably be deceived by the high number, thinking that a higher number automatically always is better.

SG- 13y ago
Well they're already somewhat deceiving people with the 8 core claim.

voidlogic 13y ago

That is what steamroller will do, increase IPC. This is an interim fix. If they can run steamroller at these clocks and Intel doesn't do something radical, AMD will be "top dog" again for the first time since Athlon 64s were killing P4s.

yekko 13y ago

Mismanagement

puivert 13y ago

> This is pretty important for AMD because they've been having a terrible time matching Intel at per cycle efficiency. Bulldozer was always supposed to be a high clock long pipe machine, sacrificing some IPC. See eg http://www.anandtech.com/show/5057/the-bulldozer-aftermath-delving-even-deeper/2 http://www.anandtech.com/show/5057/the-bulldozer-aftermath-d... "Per-clock efficiency" is generally not goal in itself in CPU design, absolute performance and efficiency are. Where AMD has stumbled is getting the clock up, probably partly related to their unfortunate fab situation The speed-demon strategy has seen successes historically, Pentium 4's fate notwithstanding. See eg the DEC 21164 and the IBM z196.

beedogs 13y ago
There was a lot more wrong with the P4 (not the least of which was the absolutely abysmal chipset Intel married it to) that rendered it such a disaster.