Comments Locked

49 Comments

Back to Article

  • eva02langley - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    "Dear friends, please don't buy AMD, they don't understand the real wonder of 4 cores like we do. Be sure that we are there to support you in buying the most overpriced CPU that are not justifying the performances in any ways. We would make sure that our army of fanatic trolls do the necessary for preventing the truth from getting out, that we are screwed. Please, support us so we can continu to screw you.

    SIgned, Intel CEO"
  • Bulat Ziganshin - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    yeah, smart customers could buy true 8-cores as long as 2011, thanks to true technology leader
  • Dragonstongue - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    <3 AMD but to say they had the first TRUE 8 core circa 2011 is NOT true, part of the reason they got nailed with lawsuit and chose to pay up vs fighting it (after a bit of time) though they settled prior to actually going to court

    if you reference someone else, please enlighten the rest of us.

    True would mean "similar to everyone else" not that Intel nor others "to my knowledge" went out of their way to call their product other than what it was i.e only having 4 slow cores 2 fast cores and calling a 6 core...not even Intel was "foolish" to be doing this.

    IMO "first 8 core processor" would have been 8 identical CORES even if something like less cache instead of cloning every bit and piece of the design (some things not needed to clone every part for many reasons.

    Anyways....Tech leader, no, wicked designers since the day they opened shop, absolutely (my mom uses my old E8400 EO still running strong to this day) myself, Phenom II 955 (old system) current Ryzen 3600 performance wise it gives me between 3700x and 3800x (in many things, not everything)

    .............

    Good on Intel for saying "something" however, even if was keeping some very key details out such as backdoors which were/are the cause of much of their potential nasty security gaping holes, and the current 10nm is nowhere CLOSE to what original would have been (they had to do something otherwise would have never likely released anytime soon, seeing as they were talking/saying would have been out sometime during 2013-14 time frame.

    ^.^
  • Smartcom5 - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Just so you know, no judge has ruled anything, since they came to an agreement beforehand – and that's precisely what a settlement is for: By come to an agreement for eventually settling the case altogether, without any sentence or court ruling involved being needed in the first place.

    That wasn't done since AMD was 'guilty as charged' like you put it, but since it was a process AMD settled for by agreeing to compensate buyers nonetheless, despite the claim is highly questionable if not outright fraudulent – for if they wouldn't've, the law-suit could easily have lasted half a decade and counting without coming to any greater consensus while even could've needed to have summoned all major CPU-manufactures like IBM, Intel, Motorola (Freescale), ARM and alike to court to testify before the judge on what's a core and what exactly isn't.

    It's a legal loophole some lawyers saw fit to exploit and fill their pockets with by going after AMD.

     › part of the reason they got nailed with lawsuit and chose to pay up vs fighting it (after a bit of time) though they settled prior to actually going to court

    AMD couldn't have been (allegedly) falsely advertised – as no-one has ever defined what exactly a core actually legally would be/is defined by nor what a CPU's function-units has to be consisting/assembled of to legally being classifiable as being a true core.

    You only can agree or disagree over something being some untrue statement upon something what's defined to be. A core isn't yet, so AMD wisely tossed the nonsense before it became rather costy throughout time.
  • WaltC - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Translated: "We had no idea AMD was going to beat us technically again--just jump out there and leapfrog us *again*, you know--I mean what are the odds, right? We were just puttering along, running the industry and raking in the dough, and here comes the upstart *again!* We're so durn tired of competition that some of us think it would be easier to just quit, you know? We didn't think we had a need for new architectures, and you can roll a tank over our 14nm CPUs and not hurt them! What's all the fuss about "security," anyway? We've patched almost all the holes, except the new ones that seem to come out of the woodwork weekly. So WTF? If you can't wait on us to produce more second-rate products, well, go and buy AMD then--yeah, that'll learn ya'!"
  • milkywayer - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    When is Intel apologizing for milking their 4 core CPUs for several years. Selling two core mobile CPUs as i7 and all that BS until AMD came out with ryzen and miraculously Intel then had 6core mainstream cpus ready in a quarter.

    Ah the fruits of competition.

    Eat Dirt, Shittel.
  • imaheadcase - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    milkywayer sure has lots of hate for something he doesn't understand about.
  • milkywayer - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Enlighten us, 'imaheadcase'.
  • Qasar - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    milkywayer, i wish he would too....
  • Smell This - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link


    Not a big surprise, but another talking-point Fail has bit the dust.

    An over-clocked AMD FX-83xx 'Vishera 8-core' is 7- to 10% +/- faster in multi-threaded benchmarks than the stock AMD (Zen) Ryzen 5 1400 4C/8T processor. Even with an OC, the Zen can't quite reach the FX ...

    Yeah ... the FX pushes 2x+ the watts and runs DDR3, but as far as I am concerned, AMD fans can take the pre-paid lawsuit card, attach it to a brick, and mail it back to:

    AMD CPU Settlement
    1650 Arch Street, Suite 2210
    Philadelphia, PA 19103-9996

    Thank you, Dr Su, for putting-up with this lawsuit nuisance. If you want to put me under NDA, I'd be more than happy to test-drive Big Navi for you. HA!

    ;-)
  • smilingcrow - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    That's what can happen when the competition falls asleep for a decade, you get lazy.
    Intel thought AMD were like a drunk spouting gibberish and didn't take them seriously as they had been drunk for a decade, almost living on the street.
    Now that AMD have sobered up and got serious Intel have to get serious again.
    Although a lot of their woes are down to their 10nm debacle.
  • escksu - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    No, it has nothing to do with competition from AMD. As you have said, its pretty much due to their 10nm issues. Then their 14nm couldn't keep up with demand.

    Demand outpace their production capacity. So, business is too good for Intel actually.....
  • Smartcom5 - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    If so, then why they ramping up 14nm production-volume by about 25%?

    Remember, their shortages are existing for a reason …
    It's no coincidence that the shortages Intel is facing on 14nm coincided with the release of any higher core-count mainstream CPUs like the 8700K. Yet it's not only the increased core-count on their desktop-products which suddenly eats up die-size. The ongoing increased demand within the HPC- and Server-space hits them too as well (XCC server-chips are huge, 698mm²).

    It's obvious that they just can't satisfy demand due to yield or rather yield-throughput.
    → 𝐼𝑛𝑐𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑒𝑑 𝑐𝑜𝑟𝑒-𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑡 𝑒𝑎𝑡𝑠 𝑑𝑖𝑒-𝑠𝑖𝑧𝑒 𝑒𝑎𝑡𝑠 𝑤𝑎𝑓𝑒𝑟-𝑠𝑖𝑧𝑒 𝑒𝑎𝑡𝑠 𝑞𝑢𝑎𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑡𝑦.
    So increased core-count directly eats up quantity-numbers → Lower number of final chips.
    It's simple as that.

    You only can process a given (rather small) number of wafers each month, and Intel just horribly miscalculated the demand of actual chips (and AMD with the War on Cores™ helped them with that greatly) which would have to be fabbed (as any greater part should've already being fabbed on 10nm), hence the shortage on their 14nm nodes everywhere.

    That being said, given how Intel is forced to play along in the AMD-dominated race for higher core-counts, and how they're forced to compete and helplessly run short on wafer-throughput by doing so – we shouldn't await it to lessen anytime soon, as the core-count won't stop by for Intel's 10-Core parts or higher 56-Core Xeon-parts …

    𝒕𝒍;𝒅𝒓: Increased core-count eats die-size eats wafer-size eats quantity. → Lower number of final chips.
  • imaheadcase - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Um they don't just tear out 14nm production equipment and put in 10nm. lol
  • milkywayer - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    10nm will be ready when it'll be ready. But his point is valid. AMD caught Intel by surprised and forced Intel to cut down number of cpus per wafer by making 6 core the new mainstream. Intel had calculated milking the market with dual core i7 mobile parts e.g. For several years were it not for AMD to disrupt the market with higher core ryzen parts.
  • imaheadcase - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    You can't say "a point is valid" when someone just showed it wasn't. Thats not how that works at all. lol

    You keep using the term "milking the market", they make a product that sells well, and people buy it, so they keep making it. People buy what works for them. AMD has awesome product going on right now, intel was not caught off guard, intel simply tried to do what AMD did but a different way of going about it fab wise. It didn't go like they planned so revamping it.

    Every single one of these people shitting on Intel right now would be doing the exact same to AMD if it was other way around. Intel didn't fail with any product, they just failed at making new ones as fast. AMD can have the life snatched right back out of them in a year and no one would care.
  • milkywayer - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    You're confused about what people are saying. These are corporations who are out there to make money. Everyone gets that. Some are just happy to see Intel in panic mode Caz it got lazy due to no competition and kept selling the same 4 core cpus for 5+ years. Had they innovated and brought in 6 and 8 core mainstream cpus in time, they'd have enough capacity even on 14nm. Of course now they run around and burn more of the wafers on 6 core which they thought would be used for 4 core cpus until 2025. Hah
  • Qasar - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    imaheadcase, the SAME thing can be said about amd's power usage before Zen, and now. they shit on amd for that, but now that intel uses more power, its ok...
  • tamalero - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Pretty sure it has to do with competition. intel needed 10nm to compete with TSCM and Samsung's 7NM.
    Yet it was a cluster f** for years for intel.
    And since they tried to retool a lot of fabs into 10nm. This lead to 14nm constraints.

    They literally shot their own foot while expecting too much and doing badly in the switch to 10nm.
  • Targon - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    You may not have done much thinking on the issue, because the situation is entirely due to how things played out between AMD and Intel. I'll try to keep this short:
    When AMD wasn't terribly competitive, Intel became very complacent. 2 and 4 core chips were all Intel put out there, and there was no actual design improvements since Skylake, so IPC improvements stopped, with only tiny clock speed improvements over the years.

    Now, when all you had was 2 and 4 core chips, and designs also did not improve, that made it so there was virtually zero reason to upgrade a computer. Think about it, unless your old computer died, why buy a new one if it won't be faster? Years went on, and the entire industry felt like it was stagnant.

    And then, Ryzen 7 launched in March of 2017, competitive performance, but 8 cores/16 threads compared to the 4 core/8 thread from Intel. Even with a BIG clock speed advantage, the majority of people out there suddenly saw that AMD had a GOOD product that was better in many ways compared to what Intel had in the consumer space. Threadripper came out later and raised the bar as well. It took a bit, but Intel did respond, 6 core/12 thread, and then 8 core/16 thread.

    Now, think about that, what had been a situation of, "no reason to upgrade your computer" turned into a, "I want a new computer!". Sales improved between 2017 and 2019, and Intel wasn't ready for what would happen if they actually made new products that were better than what they sold the year before! So, Intel had a production problem, because it was used to relatively low demand!

    The fact that Intel also tied their core design with a lack of improvements to the fab process has also really caused problems at Intel. There really isn't a good reason why an improved CPU core design couldn't be made on 14nm with an improved IPC. Seriously, that is NOT how it should work! 10nm chips can't hit anywhere near the clock speeds that the very mature 14nm process can hit at this point, so Intel can't put a new core design on 14nm, can do a new core design on 10nm but losing 25% clock speed, or come up with excuses for why everything is messed up at Intel.

    Their solution was to blow smoke up the asses of the analysts and hope the SEC doesn't come down on the company for continual lies about 10nm fabs told at quarterly results(Q4 2015 was when Intel claimed that 10nm was on track, and it's been one lie after another since then). So, 10nm laptop chips are shipping with a 18% IPC boost that no one can test, but with horribly low clock speeds and the TDP ratings, which are all about heat released at BASE speed...well, if you have the same TDP for 10nm as you have for 14nm, but clock speeds are lower, how is that an improvement?

    A lack of parts...it's all because AMD woke the entire industry from the nap that Intel put it into, and Intel just wasn't ready for it. It's all the fault of AMD for increased demand for Intel chips.
  • Beaver M. - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Well the demand is up because of the security issues that go back many generations of CPUs. So of course people and especially corporations want to replace them.
    The real joke is that Intels next generation STILL hasnt fixed all issues on a hardware basis. Couple that with 14 nm, which seems ancient nowadays, when even GPU manufacturers are manufacturing in 7 nm (2 gens ahead of 14 nm!!!!!!), then you know how bad they fucked up.
  • Dragonstongue - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    not taking into account the sheer amount of BS and CRUD AMD had to "unbury themselves from" i.e Intel playing the outright nasty crap they pulled (still do in regards to x86 which is Intel license) nor counting the amazing amount of outright CRAP NVDA pulled (still very much does)

    Sure was AMD sleeping drunk behind the wheel, but competition was playing everygame by the book nothing they did impacted AMD near buried them till AMD sold off Fab business as well as gutted a massive chunk of their holdings to "stay alive"

    Yes all AMD fault, no outside influence....smuck

    -----------

    the 2nd part, completely agree, it does show that AMD has wicked talent(s) in the high tech industry, or they likely would have folded shop many many years ago

    Thankfully they did not, keeps others "on their toes" much much more fair pricing for everyone as well does not hurt (discounting NV and Intel still playing the "we are premium everything, so you should pay, even when things go terribly wrong"

    LOLz >:(
  • brantron - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    Intel's 32 bit x86 CPUs are over 30 years old, and the patents are long since gone. AMD has the x86-64 license. Regardless, they obviously have had cross-licensing deals.

    If "nasty crap" refers to Intel's rebate deals with certain OEMs, what often goes unmentioned is that AMD could not supply enough Athlon 64s. The prices were high.

    In before Ryzen 3950x delayed and expensive because Intel paid off TSMC...
  • Qasar - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    brantron, Dragonstongue was referring to the rumors and rumbles during the athlon K7/athlon 64 days about how intel would bribe and threaten OEMs NOT to use amd products. but if you consider bribes to be rebate deals, then * shurug * in the end, intel was found guilty and ended up having to pay AMD 1.5 billion i think it was to settle it..
  • brantron - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    "Found guilty" really isn't the sort of thing one should casually throw around.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Micro_Devic...
  • Qasar - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    brantron what would you call it then ? ad mission of guilt, but not technically guilty ??
  • Irata - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Dear customers, those of you who have chosen to not offer decent AMD based systems or not market them have not noticed our supply issues as much as the others who foolishly chose to diversify. We thought the chipset shortage back when the original Athlon was released taught you a thing or two.

    But fear not, if you repent there's hope for you and things may look up. There may even be a little something in the mail for you if you help in our quest to eliminate choice and competition.
  • eva02langley - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    "n response to continued strong demand, we have invested record levels of Capex increasing our 14nm wafer capacity this year "

    (Happy Gilmore Clown face laugh)
    https://youtu.be/7BwxSHs9elk?t=142

    I hope AMD disrupt the laptop market with their navi and Zen 2 offering next year. The OEMs needs to wake up.
  • willis936 - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    What, no apology for dragging their feet on security patches? Would timely solutions cut into their strategic profits too much?
  • Dragonstongue - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    cheers to that..Investors and the WORLD needs to know, so they can protect themselves instead of potentially finding out the hard way..we ALL should have enough dealing with crap like that, full stop.
  • Qasar - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    willis936 you also for got the apology for sticking main stream at quad core, and overcharging for semi minor performance increases each year :-)
  • milkywayer - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Amen
  • nandnandnand - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    "Intel Publishers Letter to Customers Apologizing for CPU Shipment Delays"

    Typo in the headline, but we should keep it.
  • Ryan Smith - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    D'oh!
  • Techie2 - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    How many years can Intel screw with a defective 10 Nm design that can't be fixed? It's all good for educated consumers as we can buy better, faster, cheaper CPUs from AMD without be exploited. I believe there is a special place reserved in Hell for Intel execs.
  • prime2515103 - Wednesday, November 20, 2019 - link

    "The added capacity allowed us to increase our second-half PC CPU supply by double digits compared with the first half of this year."

    Double digits? So they were able to supply somewhere between 10 and 99 more CPU's than they did in the first half? Things are worse than I thought...

    And where's the apology letter for the lopped off chunk of performance I paid for?
  • quadibloc - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    When Intel eventually gets its supply problems sorted out, its 10nm chips with AVX-512 will be ahead of AMD's current chips with only half the vector floating-point muscle. Of course, it is taking so long, AMD might have a new generation of chips available by the time that happens. None the less, Intel obviously has the resources to return to technology leadership and a dominant position, and I think we can count on it taking AMD seriously as a competitive threat in future.
    So AMD will have to keep up the good work, and not rest on its laurels. Of course, it will do that, but it could be that even the best it can do will not quite be enough.
  • supdawgwtfd - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Intel isn't looking at having 10nm available on the desktop until around 2021...

    At which point AMD should have their 5000 series Ryzen out with DDR5 and new socket.

    Intel had better have some really good stuff ready for that.
  • Targon - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    If one of the rumors going around is correct, Zen3 may result in another 13-15% IPC boost compared to Zen2. At that point, a 5-8% for Zen4 in 2021 would make it difficult for Intel to beat. AVX-512 isn't used by very many programs, so honestly, "Intel is behind by 25% except in three programs where it is ahead by 1%" wouldn't do much to save Intel from being seen as second rate.
  • jrbales@outlook.com - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    AMD management was probably popping the champagne corks after Intel posted this letter.
  • nevcairiel - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Intel has more orders then they can fullfill and record revenue, thats really not the worst problem Intel could be having.
  • nevcairiel - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    For AMD, being happy that some people might buy you because they can't get what they really wanted is not a good place to be in. They need to convince OEMs and Hyperscalers to use their CPUs on their own merit, not just because Intel is backlogged.
  • Targon - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Many people are doing that, but Intel has a proven track record of bribing OEMs and retailers into only selling Intel chips. The demand for AMD products is increasing significantly.
  • Targon - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Intel was stagnant for years, so when they finally did something(responding to AMD Ryzen), people actually had a reason to want to upgrade their computers. Sure it results in more money, but the shortage was caused by Intel being stagnant for 4-5 years. In another year, AMD will have boosted performance again, while Intel 14nm chips will still be using the old Skylake design with no significant improvements.

    The shift in the balance will continue to go towards AMD through at least 2021, and probably to 2022 or 2023. AMD isn't sitting still.
  • Kishoreshack - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Thanks for the apology
    still buying AMD
    can't buy overpriced products any more
  • Rudde - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    Has Intel server sales gone through the roof, or is the crisis about the smaller chips (up to 8 cores)?
    The former would be almost solely attributed to the security flaws. Another factor is the rebates Intel has been giving lately.
    The increase in smaller chip sales would be attributed to more competive chips packing as much as double the amount of cores compared to earlier chips. They are also more expensive to manufacture, while providing security patches and competitive pricing.

    Is security flaws really that great of a demand source? Intel should patch a huge flaw each generation and they would have insane demand. In the short run at least.
  • Targon - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    What security patches? BIOS and OS mitigations for Skylake are still mitigations, and Zombieload 2 applies to Coffee Lake, so the fundamental problem isn't fixed.
  • boozed - Thursday, November 21, 2019 - link

    If on there were some superior alternative...

    *rubs chin*
  • omsaanmhpiim - Monday, August 24, 2020 - link

    http://bitly.com/zoom-viber-skype-psy

Log in

Don't have an account? Sign up now