Industry Update - Q4-2004: AMD adds SSE3 Support, Intel's 925/915 not selling and more
by Anand Lal Shimpi on November 3, 2004 1:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
AMD vs. Intel
The heated AMD vs. Intel debates of the web weren't present in Taiwan. Most motherboard manufacturers were actually surprised to hear that more users appear to be buying AMD today, simply because their shipments are still predominantly Intel based. As far as percentages go, the motherboard manufacturers unanimously agree that the number of AMD motherboard shipments today are higher than the overall 80/20 market split between AMD and Intel.
The advantage is still in Intel's corner, with the highest percentage we were quoted being that only 30% of all motherboard shipments were for AMD platforms. More than anything this is a testament to Intel's strength. While AMD has been performing very well and chipping away at Intel since the release of the first Athlon, it's going to take a lot more than AMD doing well to dethrone Intel.
The server end of things is also looking very strong for AMD, arguably even stronger than on the desktop side. This month will see the first public demonstrations of 8-way Opteron servers, which will be a first for AMD. The Opteron has not only given AMD the ability to compete in the 4P (soon to be 4 Socket) space, but now stepping into the 8P realm, Opteron is the biggest threat to Intel it has ever been. With the Opteron available in 8P configurations, AMD will have brought 8P processing power down to the affordability of a 4P system. Looking at CPU costs alone, a single Opteron 850 currently sells for around $1500, a single 3GHz Xeon MP (4MB L3) sells for $4000 on average. Multiply that by 8 and you've got a $20K difference in CPU costs alone. We've compared the performance of 4-way versions of the Opteron 8xx vs. the 3GHz Xeon MP and already seen that the Opteron is the better performer of the two thanks to the better scalability of its architecture. While we're still waiting for a review sample of an 8-way server, we'd venture to guess that the superior scalability of the Opteron architecture will only be amplified in an 8-way scenario.
It takes time to develop CPUs and platforms, especially for the enterprise market, so Intel can't respond with product to AMD's threat - at least not today. Instead, Intel is offering motherboard makers much more support to develop some of the next-generation Intel server platforms. From what we heard in Taiwan, Intel is being much more cooperative with the manufacturers in making sure that their next-generation (2005 and 2006) server and workstation platforms come along quite well. Intel has also expressed a great deal of concern about Opteron to the motherboard manufacturers we talked to, although you'd never get them to publicly admit that.
AMD has also put dual core Opterons in the hands of the motherboard vendors. While we couldn't get a confirmation of clock speeds, the motherboard manufacturers we talked to could not say the same for Intel. It seems that AMD is truly ahead of Intel when it comes to dual core.
On the notebook side of things, as we've reported in a recent Insider Story Intel wants to kill the "Transportable" (aka "Desktop Replacement") market segment. The goal being a Pentium-M and Celeron-M dominated notebook world, and also conveniently forcing AMD into a tight spot. The motherboard manufacturers we talked to who also happen to do OEM notebooks asked us more than once whether we thought the DTR segment was truly dead. Maybe Yonah in 2006 will change things, but today the DTR market is definitely alive and well. In fact, many of the Taiwanese manufacturers were confused as to why DTRs sold so well in the U.S., with ultra portable designs selling much better in Japan; after all, who wants to lug around a 10+ lbs laptop? Many of the DTRs today are so heavy that they are more like PC-iMacs instead of notebooks. Needless to say, Intel pulling out of the Transportable/DTR market opens that avenue up to AMD, which is what most of the manufacturers we talked to seem to think as well.
There is also a lot of talk about dual core among the motherboard makers; most of them are wondering whether dual core will be interesting enough to force an upgrade cycle on users. For years, Taiwan has depended on higher clocked CPUs and new cores to sell the latest motherboards, but for the first time in recent history, they aren't being given a higher clocked CPU to count on. The fear is that there won't be any tangible performance increase from dual core CPUs to desktop users and thus the next generation of Glenwood/Lakeport based motherboards (the first boards with dual core support) will see dismal sales much like today's 915. Given Intel's recent track record to these folks, with promises of a quick transition to PCI Express platforms, the caution and concern in the eyes of the motherboard manufacturers is easily understandable.
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Degrador - Wednesday, November 3, 2004 - link
More of these articles would be great. Any chance you'd have a more specific idea of when SSE3 A64s would be available? I was thinking of upgrading in Jan, but might wait a bit longer for those, but I'd prefer not to have to wait too long (might get a 3000+ and wait for next upgrade for SSE3).Btw, #3, the forum attendees make up a rather small section of computer buyers. Most people purchase from OEMs, and are more familiar with the Intel label. Hence Intel can be as demanding of mobo makers as they like. 915 and 925X give them more advertising power (all advertisers seem to love techno babble and product code names), so Intel want to make it available as much as possible. Even recently I had a friend - who I thought was pretty cluey as far as computers were concerned - buy an Intel 3.0 instead of A64 simply because he's always had Intel machines (didn't believe or trust me in A64 suggestion).
KHysiek - Wednesday, November 3, 2004 - link
I don't get why all mobo makers are so quick to use nforce4 for all segments and exclusively for high-end market (includint enthusiast). Chipset is still buggy (HT 800 only), and after few years on the market they drivers lack a lot of maturity. It will also probably be the most pricey of all.Except SATA2 there is nothing really interesting and standing out in this chipset (SLI is very minor thing, wanted by >0.001 percent of potential customers).
drifter106 - Wednesday, November 3, 2004 - link
I must say this was a well written and informative article. Your style of writing is very much appreciated!! I strongly urge you to continue providing readers and members of this community with technological information. Its icing on the cake!!Decalores!!!
Jeff7181 - Wednesday, November 3, 2004 - link
Anand, what are you doing next week? Up for another trip to Taiwan? (that means I want more articles like this... but don't forget about reviews... Far Cry 1.3 has been out for a while now and a certain other website has a very extensive review of it)IceWindius - Wednesday, November 3, 2004 - link
Its quit obvious that Intel has overestimated themselves, the market and the simple fact that you can only shove so much stuff down peoples throats before they become annoyed.In this case, they tried to hard and to fast to push and shove new technology that showed little to no increase to not only their previous chipset and CPU generation, but showed worse performance in comparions to AMD's offerings, which are much cheaper in every shape and form.
Just goes to show that no corporation is perfect and the fact that Intel, the mother of all that is CPU related is getting its ass reamed in desktop, server and chipset area's show that over confidence and cheast heaving in the end will leave both you and the customer bitterly dissapointed.
Go AMD go!!!
phaxmohdem - Wednesday, November 3, 2004 - link
AMD rules, Intel sucks big donkey dong.....ermmmm. That said I am extremely interested in the release of "desktop" Pentium M Mobo's. I'd love to see desktop comparisons putting this chip up against intels and AMDs finest desktop procs and chipsets. I'm thinking compact, kick ass cluster? Too bad the chips are so frigging pricey. however the energy savings may pan out to help justify the cost a little. Did I mention intel sucks big donkey dong for pricing so damn high? (Whistles and pretends Athlon FX chips don't exist)
Spacecomber - Wednesday, November 3, 2004 - link
I appreciate this "straight from the horse's mouth" reporting. It takes things a step beyond the usual efforts to "read between the lines" to try and figure out what is going on behind the scenes.Keep up the good work.
jimmy43 - Wednesday, November 3, 2004 - link
Intel thinks they are the microsoft of the chipset market...Beenthere - Wednesday, November 3, 2004 - link
It's amazing that Intel has NOT learned from past mistakes... They still falsely believe they can strong-arm the Asian Mobo makers and get away with it forcing them to buy 915 chipsets to get 865's. Intel is their own worst enemy and their poor sales show that reality has caught up to the huge egos and their arrogance has cost them dearly.I suspect the Mobo makers will warm up to ATI's PCIe RS480 Mobo chipset REAL fast when they see that no one is interested in Intel products and everyone is demanding AMD Mobos with Via890/nF4/ATI RS480 and PCIE. All you need to do is look at the forum activity for proof.
I'm sure with ATI selling their own Mobo as they do graphics cards, some Mobo companies will try to use the nF4 as leverage, but that could be a huge mistake. There is plenty of room for VIA/Nvidia/ATI Mobos for AMD's S754/939/940. Since ATI claims they will ship PCIe Mobos first and that these Mobos will be AMD CPUs with Intel RS480 Mobos coming some time next year, it looks like the Asian Mobo companies are gonna have a lot of 915 chipset Mobos they can't sell while ATI cleans up with AMD PCIe Mobos.
The Times, they are a changin for the better. With AMD owning the desktop market and now making serious inroads in the server segment, and Intel without a clue or a canoe for two more years, consumers are the real winners. Any Mobo company that wants to still be in business in 6 months better be offering the latest and greatest AMD processor Mobos or they'll be suffering the same financial woes as Intel is finally admitting.
Kaji - Wednesday, November 3, 2004 - link
Nice one! Would definately be cool to get more of these... it gives a great insight into the current "state of industry"Maybe you could videoconference instead of flying to taiwan everytime :)