Enter the Dragon: AMD AM3 6-core desktop arriving in 2010

[perkam]

I hope they release it sooner.

An overclocked Phenom II X6 will match overclocked i7s in folding applications at a lower system cost.

Perkam

[Manicdan]

i do think its too soon for more cores, i think 5ghz duel cores will out perform 3ghz quads in 90% of the average users applications. by the time most programs work with quad cores, most people will have quads, and XS users will have 12 cores. (but there will be a few things that were built right and we will love them for it, and its because of those few companies who strive to get the best out of every cpu, that we have a reason to be happy for these awesome new chips)

[Smartidiot89]

I'm curious where do you see usage of more than four cores in your daily usage?

Benchmarks Except for that umh... nowhere at all except folding

[Particle]

More than four cores? It's kind of nice to have an x264 encode going in the background that doesn't impact my performance while I'm playing Supreme Commander. That's about 8 cores maxed.

[saaya]

But Intel and AMD has given up the speed race what else can they do but make the cpu's more efficient and parallel in nature with addition of cores.

if you cant make the cores clock higher then make them do more work per clock... just copy pasting the same core over and over for years and praying that some apps will hopefully make use of it one day is ridiculous...

for servers that strategy actually works well, thats why they continue, both intel and amd... but they must realize that they cant dump all those mega core chips on the desktop, we will have 8core 16 thread and 12 core cpus in the server market soon... it will probably be a decade until this amount of cores makes sense in a desktop system... so whats their strategy? in the server segment they double up cores every now and then, and desktop? 4 cores... 4 cores... 4 cores... 4 cores... all we get is slightly improved ipc, slightly higher clocks, slighty lower tdp and slightly lower prices maybe... if they dont come up with a better strategy the desktop segment will stagnate for quite a while...

[MirageSys]

This reminds me of apples stock and earnings expectations.

AMD is being heavily pessimistic and loose with their expected launch so they can say "Hey look at us, we are beating our deadlines!"

[Tomasis]

I dont mind for 6 cores.. there are a lot of video, 3d guys (of course apps arent optimized but likely will be those ones first of all apps in future)

[Monkeywoman]

AMD Phenom II X6 with six cores and processing threads will have to compete with Intel Gulftown i7 which should have six cores at 12 processing threads...Is AMD going to release their own type of SMT?

[chew*]

Are you trying to rival Shintai for being referenced in people's sigs?

2010 will demonstrate what a rut CPU design is in for desktop users as 6 core CPU's prove to be near useless over their faster running Quad brothers in the same power envelope.

If AMD release a 6 core CPU without a turbo boost function in 2010 against a 6 core Westmere, they are going to lose embarrassingly in benchmarks and workloads.

Chad maybe you are unaware but amd already has a "turbo" feature. Its called fusion. Looks like they are overhauling it to work inside of AOD now a smart choice as who want multiple programs open.

[zalbard]

AMD Phenom II X6 with six cores and processing threads will have to compete with Intel Gulftown i7 which should have six cores at 12 processing threads...Is AMD going to release their own type of SMT?

It will be used in Bulldozer apparently.
And yeah, Gulftown should be out before AMD 6-core chip, so competing will be oh so tough... Hoping for a nice price though!

[Helloworld_98]

AMD Phenom II X6 with six cores and processing threads will have to compete with Intel Gulftown i7 which should have six cores at 12 processing threads...Is AMD going to release their own type of SMT?

Yeah, it's called CMT.

[poke349]

if you cant make the cores clock higher then make them do more work per clock... just copy pasting the same core over and over for years and praying that some apps will hopefully make use of it one day is ridiculous...

There's a limit to that too...
First with SSE, and now AVX. Needless to say, not everything can vectorize.

Same idea at the instruction level. It's kinda hard to make an instruction take less than 1 cycle. Yes you can do multiple instructions at once, but again, that's parallelism and not every application allows for that.

[Hell Hound]

Lost planet uses 7 cores ,and I'm guessing lost planet 2 will use the same.Some games do benefit from more cores.http://www.gamespot.com/features/6185511/index.html

[Hornet331]

Chad maybe you are unaware but amd already has a "turbo" feature. Its called fusion. Looks like they are overhauling it to work inside of AOD now a smart choice as who want multiple programs open.

I thought fusion is a software solution?

Its not really somthing like turbo, where the cpu on its own decides when and how much it "overclocks".
Also fusion is tide to the os, if your on any other os then windows -> no go, intels turbo is os independent.

[informal]

I thought fusion is a software solution?

Its not really somthing like turbo, where the cpu on its own decides when and how much it "overclocks".
Also fusion is tide to the os, if your on any other os then windows -> no go, intels turbo is os independent.

Since windows is a dominant OS today on DT I see no problem with fusion and support for it.Those who want linux can always OC through bios and use CnQ2 with the OCing.

[Chad Boga]

Chad maybe you are unaware but amd already has a "turbo" feature. Its called fusion. Looks like they are overhauling it to work inside of AOD now a smart choice as who want multiple programs open.

Which won't help AMD in respect of the 90% + of computer users who don't overclock and won't be a factor in reviews done by the most popular sites.

[chew*]

The way fusoin works is when enabled it kills useless services and bumps cpu clocks depending on what setting you choose.

I see no reason why OEM purchasers can't use it. I see no reason why reviewers don't use it. If they use intels turbo function for reviews then they should use amd's variant as well.

It intention is to give a perormance boost for even the most inexperienced users. Thus its reason for not boosting clocks when in advanced mode.

There implementation may not be the greatest however......it is a viable option with everything set to auto as an average joe would be and C and Q engaged I don't see how turbo is much diff from somone using fusion........cpu downclocks core/volts at idle, pulled out of idle state cpu runs at XXXX speed higher than stock.

[Chad Boga]

The way fusoin works is when enabled it kills useless services and bumps cpu clocks depending on what setting you choose.

I see no reason why OEM purchasers can't use it. I see no reason why reviewers don't use it. If they use intels turbo function for reviews then they should use amd's variant as well.

If OEM's and reviewers aren't using fusion now, what makes you think they will for Hex-core?

You are grasping at straws.

[Olivon]

I thought Fusion was Bulldozer + GPU on the same silicon ...
I missed something

[JumpingJack]

The way fusoin works is when enabled it kills useless services and bumps cpu clocks depending on what setting you choose.

I see no reason why OEM purchasers can't use it. I see no reason why reviewers don't use it. If they use intels turbo function for reviews then they should use amd's variant as well.

There is a huge difference in implementations.

The SW Fusion, fixes itself to a profile, it does not detect load or capability (thermally), and cannot adjust to the conditions. Furthermore, it is not implemented in hardware, and it pushes the CPU outside of specs, hence, voids warranty. This is precisely why OEM's will not use it, and I would challenge you to install it on a OEM system that would need warranty work related to the CPU and see how fast the RMA is rejected. OEMs, not AMD, are liable for warranty work and charges, whether AMD will honor a warranty via an OEM for a processor run out of specifications is a big question mark (I suspect they would, simply to ensure good working relations), nonetheless, the OEM still incurs a cost associated with the repair regardless.

Intel's turbo implementation allows clocking within the thermal specifications, does not void warranty, is an architectural feature of the CPU, and is transparent to the OS, i.e. it does not require profiling or user intervention.

If you think reviewers should be allowed to install special software to inflate performance of the CPU in review that it otherwise is not designed to handle, then a similar software should be used on the other CPU -- i.e. EVGA's Eleet utility (very nice little ap actually).

[chew*]

If OEM's and reviewers aren't using fusion now, what makes you think they will for Hex-core?

You are grasping at straws.

I don't grasp at straws just putting it out there that its a simple application.

Combined with C and Q I don't see how it doesn't detect load or capability....Perschoot is amd's thermal throttling......

You guys should really read the white papers and learn something rather than pretending to know something.

I would be curious to see how many OEM's are actually utilyzing intels turbo feature

[thebluemeanie1]

I've seen Dells that came with Hyper Threading disabled on their Pentium 4s, I wouldn't be surprised in the least if they disable turbo.

[Chad Boga]

I've seen Dells that came with Hyper Threading disabled on their Pentium 4s, I wouldn't be surprised in the least if they disable turbo.

Are Dell disabling turbo on the i7's they sell today?

Let that be your guide.

[Shadov]

I guess we are missing one important thing here!

While AMD is offering users a nice upgrade path: Athlon II X2 -> Phenom II X2 -> X3 -> X4 -> now X6 within the same socket, Intel is milking customers with overblown prices and 3 sockets?

I just hope that some reviewers will see the light and stop recommending overpriced solutions to "normal" users.

[kl0012]

I guess we are missing one important thing here!

While AMD is offering users a nice upgrade path: Athlon II X2 -> Phenom II X2 -> X3 -> X4 -> now X6 within the same socket, Intel is milking customers with overblown prices and 3 sockets?

I just hope that some reviewers will see the light and stop recommending overpriced solutions to "normal" users.

Since it is not clear yet if this thing supports DDR2 memory I don't understand what you are speaking about. What about AM2/AM2+ and DDR2 owners? Probably only owners of new AM3 boards will benefit from this cpu. It's like to say that 775 supports nice upgrade path - Celeron => Pentium => Core 2 Duo => Core 2 Quad.