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Opinion: AMD puts Intel in the crosshairs with fast-and-cheap Threadripper chip
marketwatch.com ^ | July 20, 2017 12:36 p.m. ET | Ryan Shrout

Posted on 07/20/2017 11:52:07 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach

Advanced Micro Devices, in releasing the Zen architecture and the Ryzen product family for consumer PCs, started down a path of growth in the processor market that it had been absent from for a decade.

AMD’s

AMD, +1.65%

Ryzen 7 processor family directly targets Intel’s

INTC, +0.46%

 Core i7 line of processors (CPUs) that have been dominant and turns the market on its side by doubling core and thread counts at similar price points. The platform surrounding the CPU was modernized, leaving very little on the feature list that AMD couldn’t match to Intel’s own.

Followed by the Ryzen 5 launch a few weeks later, AMD continued the trend by releasing processors with higher core and thread counts at every price bracket. (Multiple cores enable a CPU to process multiple things at the same time, dividing up the work. Thread count is the number of individual application threads that can be executed simultaneously on the CPU.)

More recently, the EPYC server and data-center processor marked AMD’s first entry for the enterprise markets since Opteron, a move that threatens at least some portion of the 99.5% market share that Intel currently holds. By, again, combining higher core counts with aggressive pricing, EPYC will be a strong force in the single- and dual-socket markets immediately, leaving the door open for further integration with large data-center customers who see first-hand the value AMD can offer compared to the somewhat stagnant Xeon product family.

AMD shows its cards

(Excerpt) Read more at marketwatch.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Computers/Internet
KEYWORDS: datacenter; hitech; opteron; servercpu

1 posted on 07/20/2017 11:52:07 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach

AMD has always been trying to catch Intel

We’ll see how it goes


2 posted on 07/20/2017 12:35:46 PM PDT by Nifster (I see puppy dogs in the clouds)
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach

Competition is great for the consumer. It’s about time AMD got back into this battle.


3 posted on 07/20/2017 12:37:58 PM PDT by Pox (Good Night. I expect more respect tomorrow.)
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach

AMD reveals their earnings next Tuesday.
Inexpensive stock. Has not done much the past 7 months.
In 2016 it went from about $2 to $15 in 1 year.


4 posted on 07/20/2017 1:10:21 PM PDT by minnesota_bound
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach

I use AMDs exclusively in desktops. Never had any performance issues.


5 posted on 07/20/2017 1:19:02 PM PDT by Seruzawa (FABOL)
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach

I need to build an engineering workstation / compute server ASAP, hence the recently renewed battle between AMD and Intel interests me greatly. In particular, I’m looking at the Intel i9x-7900 vs. the (soon to release) AMD Ryzen Threadripper (12 core or 16 core), or in a less-likely case, the latest Intel Xeon vs. AMD Epyc.

The Intel i9X has better instructions-per-cycle (IPC) - and the fact that it is available NOW - going for it. However, it has no support for ECC RAM, and it is made with a cheaper, less reliable heat extraction system (Thermal paste vs. soldering). It is more expensive, too, but within a few hundred dollars, I’m willing to overlook that.

Threadripper has ECC support and will use soldering, making for better heat extraction from the device when under full load. However, has lower IPC than the i9X, and it isn’t available NOW.

I’m going to be driving this server HARD when I need to, and since the results will be going into chip designs, the results had better NOT BE CORRUPTED. That’s why I’m going to try to wait a few months for the Threadripper systems to become available.

Competition is a great thing!


6 posted on 07/20/2017 1:36:05 PM PDT by Yossarian
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To: Yossarian
I thought the EPRC was available now.

Way more cores if the software will take advantage.

Interesting.

I just want to do heavy browsing and run multiple virtual machines.

Been playing around with Qubes...

7 posted on 07/20/2017 6:26:27 PM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
Sometime around 2010, my company bought a number of HP Proliant servers with Opterons, and when we tried running Windows SQL server on them, we had nothing but problems. We wound up using those servers for Linux and ESXi hosts, and they were just fine. We never did figure out what the problem was, but those were the last AMD processor servers we ever bought.

Mark

8 posted on 07/20/2017 7:45:10 PM PDT by MarkL (Do I really look like a guy with a plan?)
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
I thought the EPRC was available now. Way more cores if the software will take advantage.

Indeed EPYC is available, and has been reviewed. The thing I don't like about it (on my first take) is that single-core performance really gets trounced by the latest Xeon, and another generation of Xeon is about to get launched.

My needs for this workstation are to run some design software that can sometimes be sped up by multi-core, but for other segments is bottlenecked by single-core performance.

Also, my budget is not really ready for either Xeon or EPYC prices! At most, that upcoming iMac Pro, starting at $5000 for a Xeon-based all-in-one, might be justifiable. Then again, that won't be available until December, which means in reality, February....

This makes me think Threadripper may be the "sweet spot" - provided I can drive a system based on it hard (i.e. thermal reliability) and the system has ECC RAM (so my designs don't have deadly flaws sneak in due to data corruption).

9 posted on 07/20/2017 7:47:05 PM PDT by Yossarian
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To: Yossarian
Dell has the exclusive from AMD till 2018 to offer a complete threadripper with Alienware line,...no idea how pricey they will be,...July 25 win info on various stuff will be made by AMD...

And from GURU3D :

ASUS, Gigabyte, MSI and ASRock to Reveal X399 motherboards July 25th

The ASUS Flagship is rumored to go for $349 .

That from the wccftech website.

10 posted on 07/21/2017 10:29:14 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
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To: Yossarian
Dell has the exclusive from AMD till 2018 to offer a complete threadripper with Alienware line,...no idea how pricey they will be,...July 25 win info on various stuff will be made by AMD...

And from GURU3D :

ASUS, Gigabyte, MSI and ASRock to Reveal X399 motherboards July 25th

The ASUS Flagship is rumored to go for $349 .

That from the wccftech website.

11 posted on 07/21/2017 10:29:40 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
That is the ASUS Flagship Motherboard.

Link to Wccftech:

ASUS’s ROG Zenith Extreme Flagship X399 Motherboard For AMD Ryzen Threadripper Processors Unboxed – More X399 Details At AMD’s Meet The Experts Webinar on 25th July

12 posted on 07/21/2017 11:31:03 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
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