AMD Phenom II TWKR Black Edition spotted

[saaya]

I still hate Phenom for the name.

i worked at amd and heard the name before the launch and told all people at markom that had anything remotely to do with the processor naming thats its terrible and they should NOT use it... same for the logo... a comet? uhm a comet is a falling star, a star, something great and admired falling down, crashing and burning in flames and then exploding... hello? and thats what you markom people consider a good logo for a processor?

in the end it was the perfect logo for K10 cause K10 was amd falling down, crashing and burning and the cpus themselves were scorching hot

everything amd has done markom wise in the past years has been cr4p... phenom, the processor naming mess with numbers and letters, copying intels i7 processor naming, spending millions on advertising of their power efficiency just weeks before intel launched c2d which was way more power efficient, marketing their platforms aka dragon and spider which only got a shrug out of most people, if they even remembered it... fusion this fusion that, but besides some marketing slides and theory talk that was all... avivo this avivo that, but actually its 4 year old tech and it sucks... stream here and there, but whats it actually being used for besides f@h which is several years old too...

well at least they focussed on their hardware and while i dont think they go their cpu stuff done right yet, they certainly got their gpu stuff dont right.

i still dont get why they dont make their cpus wider like intel did with the core duo to core2duo move... it a mystery to me...
what was it, 3 to 4 issue or 4 to 5 issue? anyhow, sure the boost isnt big, but geez, they are up to 25% behind on ipc and intel wont get worse ipc over time, and all they did so far was just add cache and rework the cache and imc system...
adding cache... thats the most unefficient way of boosting performance afaik... amd used to TRASH intel for adding more and more cache and trying to only scale through higher clocks back in the days... and now? intel is all about efficiency, smart cpu managment, high ipc, high perf per watt... and amd is using old cores and just keeps bolting more and more cache to them and trying to clock them higher and higher... its almost like switched worlds...

it was clear that intel would change their design approach, they had to... but instead of staying ahead or going even further amd did the incredible and dropped their superior design approach and target and used that of intel
i really hope in some years when we are all old and grey somebody will write a book about what happened inside of amd when hector ruiz took over... the more i think of it the more it looks like he did the best he could to ruin the company, and even now as we speak hes trying to get amd down by throwing stones in their wheels at the global foundry...

there has been no ipc improvement in their cores (except for the tiny bumps caused by more cache etc) since the original athlon64 from over 5 years ago...

[Shintai]

i worked at amd and heard the name before the launch and told all people at markom that had anything remotely to do with the processor naming thats its terrible and they should NOT use it... same for the logo... a comet? uhm a comet is a falling star, a star, something great and admired falling down, crashing and burning in flames and then exploding... hello? and thats what you markom people consider a good logo for a processor?

in the end it was the perfect logo for K10 cause K10 was amd falling down, crashing and burning and the cpus themselves were scorching hot

everything amd has done markom wise in the past years has been cr4p... phenom, the processor naming mess with numbers and letters, copying intels i7 processor naming, spending millions on advertising of their power efficiency just weeks before intel launched c2d which was way more power efficient, marketing their platforms aka dragon and spider which only got a shrug out of most people, if they even remembered it... fusion this fusion that, but besides some marketing slides and theory talk that was all... avivo this avivo that, but actually its 4 year old tech and it sucks... stream here and there, but whats it actually being used for besides f@h which is several years old too...

well at least they focussed on their hardware and while i dont think they go their cpu stuff done right yet, they certainly got their gpu stuff dont right.

i still dont get why they dont make their cpus wider like intel did with the core duo to core2duo move... it a mystery to me...
what was it, 3 to 4 issue or 4 to 5 issue? anyhow, sure the boost isnt big, but geez, they are up to 25% behind on ipc and intel wont get worse ipc over time, and all they did so far was just add cache and rework the cache and imc system...
adding cache... thats the most unefficient way of boosting performance afaik... amd used to TRASH intel for adding more and more cache and trying to only scale through higher clocks back in the days... and now? intel is all about efficiency, smart cpu managment, high ipc, high perf per watt... and amd is using old cores and just keeps bolting more and more cache to them and trying to clock them higher and higher... its almost like switched worlds...

it was clear that intel would change their design approach, they had to... but instead of staying ahead or going even further amd did the incredible and dropped their superior design approach and target and used that of intel
i really hope in some years when we are all old and grey somebody will write a book about what happened inside of amd when hector ruiz took over... the more i think of it the more it looks like he did the best he could to ruin the company, and even now as we speak hes trying to get amd down by throwing stones in their wheels at the global foundry...

there has been no ipc improvement in their cores (except for the tiny bumps caused by more cache etc) since the original athlon64 from over 5 years ago...

3 vs 4 issue wide is extremely little difference. And the key problem is x86/x64. Other CPU archs easily scale to 10 issue wide. So for AMD staying at 3 issue wide is not an issue by itself. Specially not without HT. I would say that the 4 issue part in Core 2 is less than 5% used. For i7 with HT on its higher but still...

[saaya]

3 vs 4 issue wide is extremely little difference. And the key problem is x86/x64. Other CPU archs easily scale to 10 issue wide. So for AMD staying at 3 issue wide is not an issue by itself. Specially not without HT. I would say that the 4 issue part in Core 2 is less than 5% used. For i7 with HT on its higher but still...

i dont think its just 5%... they did quite a jump in performance when they widened it up... 5% average performance maybe, but in some cases its 15% at least i think...

and lets even say its only 5%... well how many extra transistors do you need? look at core duo and core 2 duo, the diference is minimal, and you get a 5% boost... for the same boost from cache you have to increase the die size by probably at least 25%... at least... and to get a 5% perf boost by clockpeed you have to increase the clocks from 3ghz to at least 3150mhz... a whopping 150-200mhz extra...

and its not like they have to redesign the entire logic, we are talking about quadcores here, so you rework one core and just copy it 4 times... and its not a complete rework, you just add an execution unit like the ones you already have, and then you just need to tweak the decoder and some other logic a little bit... i mean geez, wth... we are talking about the second largest chip maker here with dozens of chip engineers and all they did for the past years is copy and paste almost exactly the same design and just add some extra logic here and there... how amd could ever come up with a64 from athlonxp with this way of designing their chips is beyond amazing actually... :P

come on amd! get the whip out on your engineers and let them do some actual work and not just maintentance and process node shrinking!

[Shintai]

i dont think its just 5%... they did quite a jump in performance when they widened it up... 5% average performance maybe, but in some cases its 15% at least i think...

and lets even say its only 5%... well how many extra transistors do you need? look at core duo and core 2 duo, the diference is minimal, and you get a 5% boost... for the same boost from cache you have to increase the die size by probably at least 25%... at least... and to get a 5% perf boost by clockpeed you have to increase the clocks from 3ghz to at least 3150mhz... a whopping 150-200mhz extra...

and its not like they have to redesign the entire logic, we are talking about quadcores here, so you rework one core and just copy it 4 times... and its not a complete rework, you just add an execution unit like the ones you already have, and then you just need to tweak the decoder and some other logic a little bit... i mean geez, wth... we are talking about the second largest chip maker here with dozens of chip engineers and all they did for the past years is copy and paste almost exactly the same design and just add some extra logic here and there... how amd could ever come up with a64 from athlonxp with this way of designing their chips is beyond amazing actually... :P

come on amd! get the whip out on your engineers and let them do some actual work and not just maintentance and process node shrinking!

How can you claim the performance is due to being 4 issue wide and not anything else? In the majority of code you barely use 2. Remember all the Hyperthreading block diagrams? Sometimes there is even only 1 (or 0) execution unit in action.



I would say most of core 2s performance over core comes via single cycle SSE and memory disambiguation plus improved prefecthers. And you can see how close Phenom 2 is to Core 2 in 3 vs 4 issue wide. However when AMD one day puts in hyperthreading I am sure they will change to 4 issue wide.

[informal]

i worked at amd and heard the name before the launch and told all people at markom that had anything remotely to do with the processor naming thats its terrible and they should NOT use it... same for the logo... a comet? uhm a comet is a falling star, a star, something great and admired falling down, crashing and burning in flames and then exploding... hello? and thats what you markom people consider a good logo for a processor?

in the end it was the perfect logo for K10 cause K10 was amd falling down, crashing and burning and the cpus themselves were scorching hot

Just FYI ,a comet is not a star and therefore not a falling star .Look it up.You were probably thinking of a meteor(which is also not a star) or commonly known as a shooting star(logo is a comet and not a meteor).

[saaya]

Just FYI ,a comet is not a star and therefore not a falling star .Look it up.You were probably thinking of a meteor(which is also not a star) or commonly known as a shooting star(logo is a comet and not a meteor).

i know, but thats just arguing over small details...
lava is called magma before it comes to the surface, then its called lava...
meteorites or are called comets or asteroids before they enter the atmosphere...

the thing is, most people call it falling star, and thats a beautiful image, but NOT what you want people to relate to your product... a rock burning and crashing down in the sky :P

Shoot me a message if I can apply for an entry level marketing job at AMD cause I've been bashing my head with their naming scheme since the XP lineup. XP came out so snag that, then it seemed like Gillete was going hardcore marketing with Phenoms so AMD went with that. It's driving me nuts, but I agree I can't wait to hop back to AMD finally getting it together again. I'm GLAD the last CEO got the boot. All my hardware is AMD/ATI except this one rig and it's felt really weird having it and I am not even going to upgrade it I'm just going to hop back to AMD. But the name putting a "phenom" in my rig urghhhh curdling name..

no idea... amd is using interns to do cheap and basic work, like most big companies these days, you might get a position that way, though i doubt it... amd tend to do marketing externally afaik... smart thing really, cause in my experience markom people are the most likely employees to spend 90% of their day on facebook myspace and msn, if you pay them on a per project basis though, they NEED to keep moving

sure, there are exceptions to this... but ive seen this happen quite often...

shintai, well i dont know that much about cpu architecture at all... but what i do know is that amd barely improved their cores ipc, if at all, over several years, which is just not acceptable... yes they are "fast enough" for almost everything in daily computing, but the market obviously doesnt think the processors are fast enough, otherwise they would have a bigger share than 20% and you can find almost 0 highend pc with an amd cpu inside.

and its contradicting with their other strategies... if they really want to build a fast enough processor and dont even try to get their ipc up, why do they focus on quadcore cpus then? native quadcores even? cause even as of today most cpus sold are dualcores, and those really are FAST ENOUGH for most faily computing tasks...

and they obviously spent some time on deneb to tweak the inter core performance of their quadcores, which is nice, but i cant help but wonder, why you would spend such an effort on getting several underperforming parts to work well together instead of going for a fast redesigned part and just bolt several of those together without much hassle. which is btw what intel has been doing for quite a while, and quite succesfully i might add...

it still strikes me as ironic that intel came up with 2 cores glued together and not amd... cause its an ingenious economic solution in the original amd style... you can create 2 products ranges with one chip, and cover two segments with one original product... and if amd would have been smart they could have had quadcores (2 dualcore dies) at almost the same time they launched their dualcore athlonx2 in 2005, over 1 year before intel launched the core2 quad... sigh...

[Chad Boga]

the thing is, most people call it falling star, and thats a beautiful image, but NOT what you want people to relate to your product... a rock burning and crashing down in the sky :P

I don't see why you should rip AMD marketing for a rare moment of honesty.

[Glow9]

i worked at amd and heard the name before the launch and told all people at markom

Shoot me a message if I can apply for an entry level marketing job at AMD cause I've been bashing my head with their naming scheme since the XP lineup. XP came out so snag that, then it seemed like Gillete was going hardcore marketing with Phenoms so AMD went with that. It's driving me nuts, but I agree I can't wait to hop back to AMD finally getting it together again. I'm GLAD the last CEO got the boot. All my hardware is AMD/ATI except this one rig and it's felt really weird having it and I am not even going to upgrade it I'm just going to hop back to AMD. But the name putting a "phenom" in my rig urghhhh curdling name..

[eRazorzEDGE]

same for the logo... a comet? uhm a comet is a falling star, a star, something great and admired falling down, crashing and burning in flames and then exploding

just pointing out that a comet is a large body of ice and (possibly) rock that orbits a star once every so many years. take Halley's comet for example, comes around once every 75-76 years.

i believe you're thinking of meteor's, as in meteor showers. chunks of space debris that fall to earth and burn up in the sky.

*edit* lol, informal beat me to it while i was out looking at my broken into car... god damned theives

[informal]

just pointing out that a comet is a large body of ice and (possibly) rock that orbits a star once every so many years. take Halley's comet for example, comes around once every 75-76 years.

i believe you're thinking of meteor's, as in meteor showers. chunks of space debris that fall to earth and burn up in the sky.

*edit* lol, informal beat me to it while i was out looking at my broken into car... god damned theives

Haha sorry man,I was lucky you were busy