ATI | KitGuru https://www.kitguru.net KitGuru.net - Tech News | Hardware News | Hardware Reviews | IOS | Mobile | Gaming | Graphics Cards Mon, 27 Aug 2018 12:09:16 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.3 https://www.kitguru.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/cropped-KITGURU-Light-Background-SQUARE2-32x32.png ATI | KitGuru https://www.kitguru.net 32 32 Vizio and Sigma Designs found guilty of infringing on AMD graphics patent https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/matthew-wilson/vizio-and-sigma-designs-found-guilty-of-infringing-on-amd-graphics-patent/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/matthew-wilson/vizio-and-sigma-designs-found-guilty-of-infringing-on-amd-graphics-patent/#respond Mon, 27 Aug 2018 12:09:16 +0000 https://www.kitguru.net/?p=384483 Back in early 2017, we learned that AMD had filed a lawsuit against TV makers, LG and Vizio, in addition to chip suppliers MediaTek and Sigma Designs. In the complaint, AMD said that these companies were infringing on two patents from the ATI days and requested an investigation from the US International Trade Commission (ITC). …

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Back in early 2017, we learned that AMD had filed a lawsuit against TV makers, LG and Vizio, in addition to chip suppliers MediaTek and Sigma Designs. In the complaint, AMD said that these companies were infringing on two patents from the ATI days and requested an investigation from the US International Trade Commission (ITC). Now, the ITC has confirmed that it found Vizio guilty of patent infringement.

Some of Vizio's TVs were utilising chips from Sigma Designs. These chips were found to have been infringing on AMD's patent for a ‘parallel pipeline' graphics system. Sigma Designs has since gone bankrupt, so it is unlikely that any brand new Vizio TVs will be affected. However, the US International Trade Commission has ordered Vizio and Sigma to stop making any products that infringe on AMD's patent and imports of those TVs will now be blocked, meaning they can't be sold in the US.

At this point in time, we don't know exactly which TV models from Vizio will be affected but US customers shouldn't be surprised if a few models suddenly disappear for good.

AMD's graphics patent war has been successful so far. As Engadget points out, AMD managed to secure an out of court settlement with LG following the initial lawsuit filing. Now that Vizio has been found guilty by the ITC, AMD may end up seeing another payout.

KitGuru Says: This case has had a relatively swift resolution, which is a nice change of pace compared to the multi-year patent disputes we usually come across.

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AMD legal complaint calls for ban on products from LG, Vizio and more https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/matthew-wilson/amd-legal-complaint-calls-for-ban-on-products-from-lg-vizio-and-more/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/matthew-wilson/amd-legal-complaint-calls-for-ban-on-products-from-lg-vizio-and-more/#comments Mon, 06 Feb 2017 18:36:22 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=320980 It looks like AMD has a bone to pick with LG, Vizio, MediaTek and Sigma Designs as the chip maker has filed a lawsuit recently, requesting bans on products sold by these companies due to patent infringements. In its legal complaint, AMD has requested that the US International Trade Commission investigates the matter, which involves …

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It looks like AMD has a bone to pick with LG, Vizio, MediaTek and Sigma Designs as the chip maker has filed a lawsuit recently, requesting bans on products sold by these companies due to patent infringements. In its legal complaint, AMD has requested that the US International Trade Commission investigates the matter, which involves infringements on two patents filed by ATI prior to AMD acquiring it, as well as one patent filed by AMD itself.

AMD claims that products manufactured by these companies infringe on technologies relating to unified shaders, GPU architecture and parallel pipeline graphics systems. However, it is worth noting that companies like LG, Vizio and the others mentioned in this complaint all license their GPU technology from third-parties like ARM or Imagination.

Unfortunately, the legal system currently makes it easier to sue over physical products, rather than intellectual property. According to Anandtech, this is why AMD is suing LG, Vizio, MediaTek and Sigma Designs rather than chip licensors like ARM or Imagination themselves.

As part of its complaint, AMD has also pointed out that companies like Samsung and GlobalFoundries have licensed the IPs mentioned earlier for its own products. Speaking of Samsung, this case does draw some comparisons with an Nvidia lawsuit last year, in which Nvidia complained that Samsung and Qualcomm were infringing on some of its own graphics technology patents.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: This lawsuit is in the early stages, so companies like LG haven't had a chance to respond yet. Either way, it could take a while for this case to come to a conclusion, so we will be keeping an eye on it. 

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AMD’s dual-GPU Radeon R9 Fury X2 ‘Gemini’ adapter spotted in India https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amds-dual-gpu-radeon-r9-fury-x2-gemini-graphics-card-spotted-in-india/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amds-dual-gpu-radeon-r9-fury-x2-gemini-graphics-card-spotted-in-india/#comments Tue, 06 Oct 2015 01:33:37 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=270710 Advanced Micro Devices has begun to test its upcoming dual-chip graphics card internally. The company shipped six samples of its dual-GPU Radeon graphics adapters to India, which means that the company is developing drivers for the solution. According to Zauba.com database, which monitors imports and exports to and from India, where high-tech companies employ a …

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Advanced Micro Devices has begun to test its upcoming dual-chip graphics card internally. The company shipped six samples of its dual-GPU Radeon graphics adapters to India, which means that the company is developing drivers for the solution.

According to Zauba.com database, which monitors imports and exports to and from India, where high-tech companies employ a lot of software developers, AMD shipped six “Fiji Gemini” graphics cards from Canada to India. The graphics boards carry two “Fiji” graphics processing units and a cooling system designed by Cooler Master, reports WccfTech.

Typically, AMD begins to send samples of its graphics cards to India months before the announcement. If AMD shipped the very first samples of its dual-GPU Radeon R9 Fury X2 graphics boards to its Indian developers in late September, it may indicate that the product will be formally introduced very late in 2015 or even early in 2016.

amd_radeon_fiji_fury_maxx
Dual-GPU AMD Radeon R9 Fury. Image by Anshel Sag, staff technologist and technical writer at Moor Insights & Strategy.

The upcoming dual-chip AMD Radeon R9 Fury X graphics card – which may be officially called Radeon R9 Fury X2 or Radeon R9 Fury Maxx – features two code-named “Fiji XT” GPUs with 4096 stream processors and 4GB of HBM memory. In total, the graphics solution features 8192 stream processors and 8GB of high-bandwidth memory. The board has two 8-pin PCI Express power connectors, which means that it can consume up to 375W of power.

Manufacturer suggested retail price of AMD’s Radeon Fury X is $649. It is highly likely that the dual-GPU product will cost over $1000.

AMD did not comment on the news-story.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: Looks like AMD Radeon R9 Fury X2 will not be introduced this fall, but will likely hit the market only in winter.

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AMD unveils embedded ‘Tonga XT’ GPU with 2048 stream processors, 256-bit memory bus https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-unveils-embedded-tonga-xt-graphics-chip-with-2048-stream-processors-256-bit-memory-bus/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-unveils-embedded-tonga-xt-graphics-chip-with-2048-stream-processors-256-bit-memory-bus/#comments Tue, 29 Sep 2015 21:10:30 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=269973 Advanced Micro Devices on Tuesday introduced its new lineup of embedded graphics processing units designed for various special-purpose and professional applications. Among the new embedded graphics solutions that AMD introduced, there is AMD Embedded Radeon E8950 MXM module, which is based on the highly-anticipated “Tonga XT” silicon with all stream processors activated. The AMD Embedded …

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Advanced Micro Devices on Tuesday introduced its new lineup of embedded graphics processing units designed for various special-purpose and professional applications. Among the new embedded graphics solutions that AMD introduced, there is AMD Embedded Radeon E8950 MXM module, which is based on the highly-anticipated “Tonga XT” silicon with all stream processors activated.

The AMD Embedded Radeon E8950 MXM module features 2048 stream processors, 128 texture units, 32 raster operations pipelines and 256-bit memory controller. The chip is based on the GCN 1.2 architecture, it fully supports decoding/encoding of ultra-high-definition videos using H.265 and H.264 codecs. The GPU is compatible with DirectX 12, OpenGL 4.5, OpenCL, Mantle and Vulkan application programming interfaces. The small form-factor solution carries 8GB of GDDR5 memory and can drive up to six displays.

amd_embedded_radeon_e8950_1

The AMD Embedded Radeon E8950 is the company’s most powerful and feature-rich embedded graphics solution designed for high-end casino and arcade gaming machines, medical imaging devices and military/aerospace applications. The product has maximum single precision compute performance of around 3TFLOPS.

“The demand for rich, vibrant graphics in embedded systems is greater than ever before, and that demand is growing,” said Scott Aylor, corporate vice president and general manager of AMD Embedded Solutions. “Our latest additions to the embedded product lineup help designers build mesmerizing user experiences with 4K multi-screen installations and 3-D and interactive displays. In addition, the powerful capabilities of our GPUs can address the toughest parallel compute challenges.”

amd_embedded_radeon_e8950

In addition to the high-performance Radeon R8950, AMD also introduced slightly less powerful solutions, including the Radeon R8870MXM and the Radeon E8870PCIe with up to 768 stream processors as well as the Radeon E6465MCM, the E6465MXM and the E6465PCIe with up to 128 stream processors.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: If AMD now offers “Tonga XT” for embedded systems, it is only a matter of time before the company rolls-out its Radeon R9 380X based on the same chip.

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Valve: DirectX 12 does not make a lot of sense, Vulkan does https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/valve-directx-12-does-not-make-a-lot-of-sense-vulkan-does/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/valve-directx-12-does-not-make-a-lot-of-sense-vulkan-does/#comments Thu, 24 Sep 2015 00:02:35 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=269081 Microsoft Corp.’s DirectX 12 application programming interface promises to significantly improve performance of video games in Windows 10 operating system thanks to efficient usage of modern hardware. However, Valve Software believes that it makes no sense to use DX12, but to utilize cross-platform Vulkan API instead. Modern application programming interfaces – namely Apple’s Metal, Khronos Group’s …

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Microsoft Corp.’s DirectX 12 application programming interface promises to significantly improve performance of video games in Windows 10 operating system thanks to efficient usage of modern hardware. However, Valve Software believes that it makes no sense to use DX12, but to utilize cross-platform Vulkan API instead.

Modern application programming interfaces – namely Apple’s Metal, Khronos Group’s Vulkan and Microsoft Corp.’s DirectX 12 – are all considered low-level APIs and have generally similar capabilities. All three APIs have improved ability to use multi-core microprocessors, allow software makers to have close-to-metal access to resources of graphics processing units, they all support GPGPU [general-purpose computing on graphics processing units], reduce driver overhead and so on. The three APIs are compatible with a wide range of hardware.

valve_dx12_vs_vulkan

Apple’s and Microsoft’s APIs are only supported by Apple iOS/OS X platforms as well as Microsoft Windows 10, respectively. By contrast. Vulkan should be compatible with all operating systems from Google (future versions of Android) and Microsoft (Windows 7/8/10) as well as a wide range of hardware, which makes it preferable for game developers who want their titles to run on different types of devices.

“Unless you are aggressive enough to be shipping a DX12 game this year, I would argue that there is really not much reason to ever create a DX12 back end for your game,” said Dan Ginsburg, a software developer from Valve, at Siggraph, reports DSO Gaming. “The reason for that is that Vulkan will cover you on Windows 10 on the same class of hardware and so much more from all these other platforms and IHVs that we have heard from. Metal is single platform, single vendor, and Vulkan… we are gonna have support for not only Windows 10 but Windows 7, Windows 8 and Linux.”

vulcan_2

For Valve, which is developing its own Steam OS to power its living room PCs called Steam Machines, DirectX 12 clearly does not make a lot of sense. By contrast, Vulkan will be supported by Steam OS, which is based on Linux.

While for cross-platform developers it makes a great-sense to use Vulkan, DirectX 12 still has a number of advantages. The Vulkan API is still not finalized, so it cannot really be used for commercial products right now. As a result, those, who plan to release their titles in the next twelve month, should keep using DirectX 12.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: Vulkan is extremely promising API that can have a tremendous impact on the industry. However, since the technology is simply not ready, for many developers DirectX 12 is virtually the only choice.

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XFX is working on liquid-cooled Radeon R9 Fury graphics card https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/xfx-is-working-on-liquid-cooled-radeon-r9-fury-graphics-card/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/xfx-is-working-on-liquid-cooled-radeon-r9-fury-graphics-card/#comments Wed, 23 Sep 2015 22:28:08 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=269015 XFX is gearing up to release a Radeon R9 Fury-based graphics adapter featuring a liquid cooling system. The card will feature overclocking potential on par with AMD’s Radeon R9 Fury X, which will help to at least partially close performance gap between the “Fury” and the “Fury X” products. The XFX Radeon R9 Fury with …

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XFX is gearing up to release a Radeon R9 Fury-based graphics adapter featuring a liquid cooling system. The card will feature overclocking potential on par with AMD’s Radeon R9 Fury X, which will help to at least partially close performance gap between the “Fury” and the “Fury X” products.

The XFX Radeon R9 Fury with liquid cooling will rely on AMD’s reference design for its graphics cards based on the “Fiji” graphics processing units, but will utilize a cooling system similar to that installed on the flagship AMD Radeon R9 Fury X graphics products. In fact, the whole design of the graphics adapter resembles that of AMD’s top-of-the-range offering, according to images published by VideoCardz web-site.

xfx_radeon_r9_fury_liquid_cooling

Typically, AMD Radeon R9 Fury graphics cards powered by cut-down “Fiji Pro” graphics chips with 3584 stream processors, 224 texture units, 64 raster operations pipelines and 4096 high-bandwidth memory bus up to 25 per cent slower than the Radeon R9 Fury X adapters with fully-fledged “Fiji XT” GPUs (4096 SPs, 256 Tus, 64 ROPs, etc.). However, if liquid cooling system helps to significantly overclock the “Fiji Pro” GPU, then performance difference between AMD’s enthusiast-class graphics cards will shrink.

AMD and XFX did not comment on the news-story.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: It looks like AMD is preparing to let all of its partners to sell the Radeon R9 Fury products. At present only Asustek Computer and Sapphire Technology supply graphics cards featuring “Fiji Pro” GPUs, but shortly everything is expected to change.

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AMD engineer: Developers were given the total freedom with ‘Zen’ https://www.kitguru.net/components/cpu/anton-shilov/amd-engineer-developers-were-given-the-total-freedom-with-zen/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/cpu/anton-shilov/amd-engineer-developers-were-given-the-total-freedom-with-zen/#comments Wed, 23 Sep 2015 10:21:26 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=268893 The “Zen” micro-architecture is a tremendously important project for Advanced Micro Devices. If the new technology is successful, AMD will become a viable developer of central processing units again. If not, the company will have troubles with surviving. Fortunately, “Zen” is a completely new micro-architecture that promises to be very competitive. Apparently, the management team …

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The “Zen” micro-architecture is a tremendously important project for Advanced Micro Devices. If the new technology is successful, AMD will become a viable developer of central processing units again. If not, the company will have troubles with surviving. Fortunately, “Zen” is a completely new micro-architecture that promises to be very competitive. Apparently, the management team gave a lot of freedom with the new CPU design.

“It is the first time in a very long time that we engineers have been given the total freedom to build a processor from scratch and do the best we can do,” said Suzanne Plummer, a director of design engineering at AMD and also a veteran Austin chip engineer, who heads development of a “Zen”-based processor, in an interview with MyStatesman.

amd_zen_performance_advantages_fad

Last week AMD announced that Jim Keller, a legendary processor engineer who headed development of “Zen” micro-architecture, had left the company. It is believed that he has completed the work on the first two iterations of the “Zen” technology. He also worked on the “K12” architecture, which is compatible with the ARMv8-A instruction set architecture.

“[Zen] is a multi-year project with a really large team,” said Ms. Plummer. “It’s like a marathon effort with some sprints in the middle. The team is working very hard, but they can see the finish line. I guarantee that it will deliver a huge improvement in performance and (low) power consumption over the previous generation.”

Ms. Plummer has worked at AMD since 2002, when the company took over Alchemy Semiconductor.

amd_zen_performance_advantages_fad_1

The first processor based on “Zen” micro-architecture is code-named “Summit Ridge”. The chip is expected to hit the market in October, 2016, and aim at high-end desktops and servers. The new cores will offer at least 40 per cent performance improvement at the same clock-rate compared to existing cores.

“Everything is riding on ‘Zen’,” said analyst Nathan Brookwood with Insight 64. “They are shooting for performance parity with where (arch-rival) Intel will be. AMD understands that they have to succeed with ‘Zen’. If ‘Zen’ fizzles, they will really have to do a lot of running around.”

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: “Zen” will be AMD’s first major new design since 2011. It has to be successful. If it is not successful, AMD’s share in the market of CPUs will shrink even further.

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Nvidia to fetch second-gen HBM memory from Samsung and SK Hynix – Report https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/nvidia-to-fetch-second-gen-hbm-memory-from-samsung-and-sk-hynix-report/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/nvidia-to-fetch-second-gen-hbm-memory-from-samsung-and-sk-hynix-report/#comments Tue, 22 Sep 2015 07:00:42 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=268605 As developers of graphics processing units start to use high-bandwidth memory (HBM), manufacturers of graphics cards cease their ability to buy memory directly from DRAM makers. A good news is that Nvidia Corp. intends to buy second-gen HBM from two suppliers, which potentially means flexible pricing. Nowadays manufacturers of graphics cards can buy GDDR5 memory …

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As developers of graphics processing units start to use high-bandwidth memory (HBM), manufacturers of graphics cards cease their ability to buy memory directly from DRAM makers. A good news is that Nvidia Corp. intends to buy second-gen HBM from two suppliers, which potentially means flexible pricing.

Nowadays manufacturers of graphics cards can buy GDDR5 memory from different manufacturers. However, when it comes to HBM, memory needs to be placed near the chip on a special silicon interposer, which means that a GPU developer has to buy DRAM chips, install them and test the “GPU package.” Advanced Micro Devices buys HBM memory chips from SK Hynix to place it near its “Fiji” graphics processing unit and then sells the whole “package” to actual suppliers of graphics cards.

nvidia_pascal_module

The first generation of HBM is manufactured only by SK Hynix. However, the second-generation HBM will be available from both Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix. As it appears, Nvidia will buy such memory from both makers for its “Pascal” GPUs, reports Business Korea. AMD is expected to do the same, yet it has not been confirmed.

Availability of HBM from two suppliers means lower prices, which is a good news for makers of graphics cards and the end user.

Nvidia did not comment on the news-story.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: In fact, both Nvidia and AMD (ATI Technologies, to be precise) used to report sales of both GPU and GDDR memory back in the mid-2000s. Actual manufacturers of graphics cards, such as Asustek Computer, Gigabyte Technology and Sapphire Technology, then managed to persuade GPU developers to sell GPUs without memory. Nowadays, apparently, it all comes back.

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PowerColor, XFX prep to start shipments of AMD Radeon R9 Fury graphics cards https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/powercolor-xfx-are-gearing-up-to-start-shipments-of-amd-radeon-r9-fury-graphics-cards/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/powercolor-xfx-are-gearing-up-to-start-shipments-of-amd-radeon-r9-fury-graphics-cards/#comments Sat, 19 Sep 2015 16:20:37 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=268494 PowerColor and XFX are preparing to add another graphics card into their range of adapters based on AMD’s “Fiji” graphics processing unit. In the coming weeks the two companies will start to sell their AMD Radeon R9 Fury graphics cards, thus, expanding availability of AMD’s latest product. Although all partners of Advanced Micro Devices formally …

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PowerColor and XFX are preparing to add another graphics card into their range of adapters based on AMD’s “Fiji” graphics processing unit. In the coming weeks the two companies will start to sell their AMD Radeon R9 Fury graphics cards, thus, expanding availability of AMD’s latest product.

Although all partners of Advanced Micro Devices formally offer AMD Radeon R9 Fury and AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics adapters based on the fully-fledged Fiji GPUs with 4096 stream processors, 256 texture units, 64 raster operations pipelines and 4096-bit memory bus, far not all can supply AMD Radeon R9 Fury graphics cards powered by cut-down “Fiji” chips (3584 SPs, 224 TUs, 64 ROPs). In fact, only Asustek Computer and Sapphire Technology sell AMD Radeon R9 Fury graphics cards today. Fortunately, that is going to change soon.

powercolor_radeon_r9_fury

PowerColor, a Tul Corp.’s brand, recently quietly added description of its Radeon R9 Fury graphics adapter to its web-site. The board is currently not available anywhere, but its addition into the list of products clearly indicates that the company is on-track to start selling it in the coming weeks.

XFX, a Pine Holdings Limited’s brand, is also gearing up to start shipments of its Radeon R9 Fury graphics card. VideoCardz web-site has published press images of XFX’s yet-unannounced R9 Fury, which is an indicator that the product is about to be formally introduced.

xfx_radeon_r9_fury_1

The Radeon R9 Fury graphics cards from PowerColor and XFX rely on AMD’s reference design and come with 4GB of high-bandwidth memory and massive triple-fan/three-slot cooling systems with multiple copper heat-pipes to maximize their overclocking potential. The cards require two auxiliary 8-pin PCI Express power connectors. In fact, both boards will be very similar to Sapphire’s Radeon R9 Fury Tri-X.

xfx_radeon_r9_fury

At present, it is unclear when companies like Gigabyte Technology, MicroStar International and other plan to start offering their versions of the Radeon R9 Fury.

The manufacturer suggested retail price of AMD Radeon R9 Fury graphics cards is $549/£439.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: While it is great to see that availability of AMD’s Radeon R9 Fury is improving, the lack of creative touch on those cards is evident. So far, only Asustek Computer has designed a custom printed-circuit board for its Radeon R9 Fury Strix. All the others continue to use AMD’s reference design, probably because they just buy actual cards from the GPU developer.

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AMD Radeon R9 380X with ‘Tonga XT’ to hit the market in late October https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-radeon-r9-380x-with-tonga-xt-gpu-to-hit-the-market-in-late-october/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-radeon-r9-380x-with-tonga-xt-gpu-to-hit-the-market-in-late-october/#comments Thu, 17 Sep 2015 21:05:07 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=268228 Advanced Micro Devices and its partners are gearing up to release the Radeon R9 380X graphics card featuring the code-named “Tonga XT” graphics processing unit. The product is expected to hit the market next month and will become a good addition to the company’s lineup for the holiday season. Manufacturers of graphics cards already have …

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Advanced Micro Devices and its partners are gearing up to release the Radeon R9 380X graphics card featuring the code-named “Tonga XT” graphics processing unit. The product is expected to hit the market next month and will become a good addition to the company’s lineup for the holiday season.

Manufacturers of graphics cards already have samples of the fully-fledged “Tonga” graphics chip with 2048 stream processors, 128 texture units and 32 raster operations pipelines. AMD is expected to start shipping commercial versions of the “Tonga XT” GPUs shortly and makers of add-in-boards should be able to start selling their Radeon R9 380X products sometimes in late October, reports Fudzilla.

The AMD Radeon R9 380X graphics adapters will carry 4GB of GDDR5 memory, which indicates a 256-bit memory bus, not a 384-bit memory interface, as expected by several unofficial sources. Usage of 256-bit memory interface should simplify printed-circuit boards of the graphics cards and make them cheaper. As a result, makers of add-in-boards will be more flexible in terms of final pricing.

amd_radeon_r9_280

Performance of AMD Radeon R9 380X in actual games should be higher than that of the Radeon R9 280X (aka Radeon HD 7970) despite of wider memory interface supported by the latter thanks to improvements on the micro-architectural level (such as better support for async shaders, improved performance of tessellation/gemetry and so on) and new techniques that improve effective memory bandwidth (e.g., delta colour compression).

AMD did not comment on the news-story.

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KitGuru Says: The Radeon R9 380X looks rather good on paper. However, its success will be determined by pricing. Right now, AMD and its partners sell the Radeon R9 380 for $249, whereas the Radeon R9 390 is priced at $349. Keeping in mind that AMD used to sell its Radeon R9 290-series products for as low as around $250, it is hard to imagine that a product with lower performance for $299 will become a success. If AMD actually wants to fight back market share from Nvidia, it will have to reconsider its prices for the holiday season. As a result, it is logical to expect that the launch of the Radeon R9 380X will be accompanied by changes in AMD’s price-list.

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AMD reportedly begins to fight back market share from Nvidia https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-reportedly-begins-to-fight-back-market-share-from-nvidia/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-reportedly-begins-to-fight-back-market-share-from-nvidia/#comments Thu, 17 Sep 2015 00:59:49 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=268151 Advanced Micro Devices began to fight back its market share from Nvidia Corp. in the third quarter of the year, a financial analyst revealed on Wednesday. While Nvidia still dominates the market, the launch of AMD’s latest graphics cards helped the company to improve its sales a bit. “Graphics processor unit pricing and availability suggest …

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Advanced Micro Devices began to fight back its market share from Nvidia Corp. in the third quarter of the year, a financial analyst revealed on Wednesday. While Nvidia still dominates the market, the launch of AMD’s latest graphics cards helped the company to improve its sales a bit.

“Graphics processor unit pricing and availability suggest that AMD’s recent Radeon R9 300-series refresh has helped regain some lost share at about $400 and about $200 price points, while Nvidia maintains a dominant position in premium high-end GPU cards ($500+),” wrote Ian Ing, an analyst with MKM Partners, in an article at Barron’s.

The analyst notes that due to shortages of AMD Radeon R9 Fury-series graphics cards during the third quarter, AMD could not really gain a lot of share in the segment of expensive graphics adapters used by enthusiasts. At the same time, the analyst indicates, that in many cases such add-in-boards are sold at prices, which exceed those recommended by AMD, which means that the company earns premium by selling the adapters.

amd_radeon_r9_390_official

By contrast, prices of Nvidia’s GeForce GTX Titan X and GeForce GTX 980 Ti decreased by 3 and 2 per cent during the quarter, respectively. Still, thanks to wide availability, Nvidia and its partners can sell a lot of graphics adapters powered by the company’s latest code-named GM200 chip.

Mr. Ing claims that since AMD Radeon R9 300-series graphics cards are readily available, but their prices do not decline, demand for such add-in-boards could be fairly high, which suggests that AMD is gaining share.

In Q2 2015 AMD’s share in the market of discrete graphics processing units for desktops declined to historical minimum of around 18 per cent. By contrast, Nvidia commanded 82 per cent of the market.

AMD is in its quiet period and could not comment on the news-story.

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KitGuru Says: Trying to guess market share by monitoring retailers may not be a good idea. However, at present this is one of a few ways to understand what is happening in the market. While it is a good news that AMD is increasing its presence in the market, it should be noted that given AMD’s current position even if the company gains 5 per cent a quarter Nvidia will still be the dominant player.

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Shortages of AMD Radeon R9 Fury-series graphics cards persist https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-radeon-r9-fury-series-graphics-cards-continue-to-be-in-short-supply-analyst/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-radeon-r9-fury-series-graphics-cards-continue-to-be-in-short-supply-analyst/#comments Wed, 16 Sep 2015 22:08:19 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=268067 About three months since the formal announcement, Advanced Micro Devices’ flagship products based on the code-named “Fiji” graphics processing units are still in extremely short supply, according to a market analyst and various retailers. At present, AMD offers Radeon R9 Fury X and Radeon R9 Nano based on the fully-fledged “Fiji” graphics chip with 4096 …

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About three months since the formal announcement, Advanced Micro Devices’ flagship products based on the code-named “Fiji” graphics processing units are still in extremely short supply, according to a market analyst and various retailers.

At present, AMD offers Radeon R9 Fury X and Radeon R9 Nano based on the fully-fledged “Fiji” graphics chip with 4096 stream processors, 256 texture units, 64 raster operations pipelines and 4096-bit memory bus. Both the “Fury X” and the “Nano” graphics adapters are based on AMD’s design and are made under supervision of the company by a contract manufacturer. Asustek Computer and Sapphire Technology also offer AMD Radeon R9 Fury graphics cards powered by cut-down “Fiji” chips (3584 SPs, 224 TUs, 64 ROPs) and featuring custom design of cooling systems and printed circuit boards.

amd_radeon_r9_fury_card

As it appears, AMD does not sell its cut-down “Fiji” graphics processors to many of its partners and does not allow the latter to customize adapters that feature fully-fledged “Fiji” GPUs. Consequently, for suppliers of graphics cards it makes more sense to sell Nvidia-based solutions right now.

“AMD’s flagship Fury X and Fury continue to have a very limited number of SKUs and are largely out of stock, suggesting that the pace of availability and ecosystem support is discouraging add-in-board (AIB) manufacture,” wrote Ian Ing, an analyst with MKM Partners, in an article at Barron’s.

amd_radeon_r9_fury_x_exploded

Overclockers UK, a major online store in the U.K., offers to pre-order Radeon R9 Fury X, but has Radeon R9 Fury from Asustek Computer and Sapphire Technology in stock. AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics cards are available from multiple suppliers. In fact, OcUK even offers a small discount on the Sapphire Radeon R9 Nano and sells them for £515.

Newegg.com, a major online store in the U.S., at press time only had Radeon R9 Fury X from VisionTek in stock. The store also has Radeon R9 Fury from Asustek Computer and Sapphire Technology available. AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics cards are available from several brands, but all are sold at prices that exceed MSRP [manufacturer suggested retail price].

CaseKing.de, a major German retailer, does not have a single Radeon R9 Fury X in stock, but has multiple Radeon R9 Nano from different suppliers as well as Radeon R9 Fury from Asustek and Sapphire.

amd_radeon_fiji

Insufficient availability of the AMD Radeon R9 Fury-series products have challenged AMD for about a quarter. The reasons for tight supply of the “Fiji” graphics processor are unclear. If AMD ran into yield issues with its largest graphics processor ever, then there would be products based on cut-down versions of “Fiji” available (e.g., Radeon R9 Fury or Radeon R9 Fury LE). However, the R9 Fury sold only by Asus and Sapphire, which means that there are not a lot of such chips available from AMD. The Radeon R9 Nano graphics cards are in stock of retailers, but it is the first week of its availability.

Limited availability of AMD Radeon R9 Fury-series graphics cards keeps prices of such graphics cards high and does not allow AMD to recapture market share it lost to Nvidia Corp. in the recent quarters.

amd_radeon_r9_nano_1

AMD is in its quiet period and could not comment on the news-story.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: It looks like the amount of “Fiji” graphics processors in production is limited. As a result, if you are planning to get a Radeon R9 Fury graphics card, grab one while you can. For example, the Radeon R9 Nano can be acquired in the first week of availability. Perhaps, AMD will solve the issues with availability of its “Fiji” in the coming months, but not in the coming weeks or days.

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AMD preps Radeon R9 380X with fully-fledged “Tonga” GPU https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-preps-radeon-r9-380x-with-fully-fledged-tonga-gpu/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-preps-radeon-r9-380x-with-fully-fledged-tonga-gpu/#comments Mon, 14 Sep 2015 21:25:11 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=267731 Advanced Micro Devices is reportedly working on a new graphics card based on its code-named “Tonga” graphics processing unit. The Radeon R9 380X will be powered by the fully-fledged GPU with all stream processors activated. Performance of the product will be similar to that of the Radeon R9 280X. The AMD Radeon R9 380X will …

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Advanced Micro Devices is reportedly working on a new graphics card based on its code-named “Tonga” graphics processing unit. The Radeon R9 380X will be powered by the fully-fledged GPU with all stream processors activated. Performance of the product will be similar to that of the Radeon R9 280X.

The AMD Radeon R9 380X will feature “Tonga” GPU with 2048 stream processors as well as 384-bit memory bus, reports Expreview. The graphics board will offer considerably higher performance than the Radeon R9 380, but will also consume more power. Thanks to the GCN 1.2 architecture, the new graphics adapter will significantly outperform the Radeon R9 280X, which is based on the outdated “Tahiti” graphics chip.

xfx_radeon_r9_380x

AMD reportedly decided not to offer Radeon R9 285X with unlocked “Tonga” chip last year because it considered its power consumption too high. Right now, the company needs a new product that would feel the gap between the Radeon R9 380 and the Radeon R9 390-series products.

AMD’s partners among graphics card makers have already received the unlocked “Tonga” graphics processor and are reportedly preparing adapters based on their own designs of printed circuit boards. One of such graphics cards developed by XFX has been pictured.

AMD did not comment on the news-story.

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KitGuru Says: While it is great to see AMD working on a new graphics card, it is completely unclear why the company did not introduce a product with “full” “Tonga” graphics processor unit earlier.

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AquaComputer unveils full-cover water-block for Radeon R9 Nano https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/aquacomputer-unveils-full-cover-water-block-for-amd-radeon-r9-nano/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/aquacomputer-unveils-full-cover-water-block-for-amd-radeon-r9-nano/#comments Fri, 11 Sep 2015 22:12:05 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=267398 AquaComputer, a leading maker of components for custom liquid-cooling solutions, on Friday introduced its full-cover water-block for AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics cards, thus making high-performance liquid-cooled gaming PCs in mini-ITX form-factor a reality. The Kryographics R9 Nano single-slot full-cover water-block for AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics boards is made of pure electrolytic copper with …

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AquaComputer, a leading maker of components for custom liquid-cooling solutions, on Friday introduced its full-cover water-block for AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics cards, thus making high-performance liquid-cooled gaming PCs in mini-ITX form-factor a reality.

The Kryographics R9 Nano single-slot full-cover water-block for AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics boards is made of pure electrolytic copper with either acrylic or aluminum top cover. Water channels in the block pass over the GPU+HBM package as well as voltage regulator module to cool-down the inductors, which get rather hot with the stock cooling solution. The GPU+HBM package is covered by a micro structure with 0.5mm grid to ensure maximum cooling performance.

aquacomputer_liquid_cooler_water_radeon_r9_nano

According to AquaComputer, the GPU temperature of the Radeon R9 Nano remains at below 35°C in typical conditions (with room/liquid temperature of around 27°C) when its water-block is used, which is massively cooler compared to AMD’s stock cooling system.

The Kryographics R9 Nano water-block is designed for custom-built liquid-cooled solutions and is aimed at experienced enthusiasts who are seeking for either additional performance from AMD’s smallest and most powerful graphics card, or want to make their PCs completely silent. What should be noted is that just a few of mini-ITX PC cases can support custom liquid cooling systems.

Traditionally, water-blocks from AquaComputer are easy to install and are compatible with various tubes and various pumps from the company and its competitors.

aquacomputer_liquid_cooler_water_radeon_r9_nano_1

According to TechPowerUp, different versions of the AquaComputer Kryographics R9 Nano full-cover water-block will be available shortly. Pricing looks as follows:

  • Kryographics R9 Nano – €94.9
  • Kryographics R9 Nano acrylic glass edition – €104.9
  • Kryographics R9 Nano black edition – €104.9
  • Kryographics R9 Nano, nickel plated version – €109.9
  • Kryographics R9 Nano acrylic glass edition, nickel plated version – €119.9
  • Kryographics R9 Nano black edition, nickel plated version – €119.9

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: While the Kryographics R9 Nano single-slot full-cover water-block for AMD Radeon R9 Nano is a unique product, its market prospects are completely unclear. Those, who want to have extreme performance, will naturally buy AMD Radeon R9 Fury X. Meanwhile, small form-factor systems do not use liquid cooling. On the other hand, maybe the Radeon R9 Nano will just redefine SFF PCs as we know them?

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AMD: We are actively promoting HBM and do not collect royalties https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-we-are-actively-promoting-usage-of-hbm-and-do-not-collect-royalties/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-we-are-actively-promoting-usage-of-hbm-and-do-not-collect-royalties/#comments Fri, 04 Sep 2015 12:19:21 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=266267 Advanced Micro Devices is currently the only company to use high-bandwidth memory it co-developed with SK Hynix and other partners. While usage of HBM is clearly a competitive advantage that AMD has over its rivals, the company is encouraging others to use the new memory type and does not intend to collect any royalties for …

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Advanced Micro Devices is currently the only company to use high-bandwidth memory it co-developed with SK Hynix and other partners. While usage of HBM is clearly a competitive advantage that AMD has over its rivals, the company is encouraging others to use the new memory type and does not intend to collect any royalties for HBM.

It has taken AMD over 8.5 years to develop high-bandwidth memory and a set of technologies that enable new DRAM chips as well as their interface with host processors. In a bid to make HBM memory more affordable, more developers of graphics processors and other bandwidth-demanding chips have to use this technology. Once HBM gets less expensive than today, the industry in general will benefit from this.

amd_sk_hynix_hbm_implementation_1

Nvidia Corp. has publicly revealed that its next-generation “Pascal” architecture of graphics processors supports second-generation HBM memory and in 2016 graphics cards with GP100 GPUs and HBM2 DRAM will hit the market. In fact, HBM support is a key feature of Nvidia's “Pascal”, which will help the company to triple the bandwidth available to its next-gen GPUs, thus significantly improving their performance.

nvidia_pascal_3d_memory_roadmap_geforce

Earlier this week a web-site reported that Nvidia will delay adoption of HBM because of royalties demanded by AMD for its HBM-related intellectual property. In particular, it is reported that 2.5D GPU packaging used for the “Fiji” graphics processing unit is covered by AMD’s patents and Nvidia either needs to design its own package or pay licensing fees to its rival. According to AMD, this is not true.

“AMD is not involved in collecting any royalties for HBM,” said Iain Bristow, a spokesman for AMD. “We are actively encouraging widespread adoption of all HBM associated technology on [Radeon R9] Fury products and there is no IP licensing associated.”

Advanced Micro Devices owns a number of patents covering HBM, but as that intellectual property is a part of JEDEC’s JESD235 standard, it has to be licensed to applicants desiring to implement the standard “either without compensation or under reasonable terms and conditions that are free of any unfair discrimination.” Moreover, AMD and Nvidia have a broad cross-licensing agreement, which largely prevents royalty demands.

amd_sk_hynix_hbm_design

Nvidia did not comment on the news-story and called the information “rumours and speculation.”

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: Adoption of HBM memory by Nvidia may be slow-downed not by AMD, but by availability of second-generation HBM. Perhaps, SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics will only release next-gen HBM in the second half of 2016, which means that HBM2 will be available in mass quantities only in 2017.

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AMD will not allow partners to modify specs of Radeon R9 Nano https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-will-not-allow-partners-to-modify-specs-of-radeon-r9-nano/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-will-not-allow-partners-to-modify-specs-of-radeon-r9-nano/#comments Tue, 01 Sep 2015 15:22:04 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=265767 Even though Advanced Micro Devices will allow its partners to build their own versions of AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics cards, it will not let them significantly alter specifications of such graphics adapters. As a result, the difference between the original Radeon R9 Nano and custom versions from AMD’s partners will be minimal. In about …

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Even though Advanced Micro Devices will allow its partners to build their own versions of AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics cards, it will not let them significantly alter specifications of such graphics adapters. As a result, the difference between the original Radeon R9 Nano and custom versions from AMD’s partners will be minimal.

In about three months from now Advanced Micro Devices will allow its partners to build custom versions of Radeon R9 Nano graphics adapters. The only thing that AMD’s partners will be allowed to modify is the cooling system of the product. Producers of graphics adapters will not be able to increase clock-rates of their Radeon R9 Nano or significantly adjust printed-circuit boards, reports Expreview web-site.

amd_radeon_r9_nano_1

Custom versions of AMD Radeon R9 Nano will have to preserve form-factor of the graphics card and should be compliant with mini-ITX standards. Thermal design power of partner’s Radeon R9 Nano graphics cards will have to be the same as TDP of AMD’s version.

AMD Radeon R9 Nano-based graphics boards from AMD’s allies will use fully-fledged “Fiji” graphics processing units with 4096 stream processors, 256 texture mapping units, 64 raster operations pipelines and 4096-bit HBM memory bus.

amd_radeon_r9_nano

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: It looks like custom versions of AMD Radeon R9 Nano will not be significantly different compared to AMD’s own graphics adapter. What we can expect are graphics adapters with hybrid or liquid cooling systems, which will have higher overclocking potential than AMD’s own Radeon R9 Nano. Keeping in mind that “Nano” graphics cards have different voltage regulator module compared to AMD Radeon R9 Fury X, even modified “R9 Nano” graphics adapters with advanced cooling systems will not have overclocking potential on par with the top-of-the-range product.

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AMD started to work on HBM technology nearly a decade ago https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-started-to-work-on-hbm-technology-nearly-a-decade-ago/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-started-to-work-on-hbm-technology-nearly-a-decade-ago/#comments Sat, 29 Aug 2015 12:57:50 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=265468 The high-bandwidth memory (HBM) introduced along with AMD’s code-named “Fiji” graphics processing unit radically changes the way graphics adapters are built and also dramatically improves potential performance of future graphics processing units. But while HBM looks ingeniously simple on paper, it was extremely hard to develop and is not easy to build. In fact, AMD …

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The high-bandwidth memory (HBM) introduced along with AMD’s code-named “Fiji” graphics processing unit radically changes the way graphics adapters are built and also dramatically improves potential performance of future graphics processing units. But while HBM looks ingeniously simple on paper, it was extremely hard to develop and is not easy to build. In fact, AMD started to work on what is now known as HBM as early as in 2006 – 2007.

The need for speed

Memory bandwidth has been a performance-limiting factor for graphics processors since the introduction of the first gaming-grade graphics cards, three-dimensional games and 32-bit colour back in the nineties. In a bid to considerably increase performance of a graphics adapters, IHVs [independent hardware vendors] had to bolster bandwidth of their DRAM [dynamic random access memory], which was not always easy.

ati_radeon_9700_pro
ATI Radeon 9700 Pro: World's first graphics card with 256-bit memory bus. Image by myhard.com.

There are several ways to increase memory bandwidth on a graphics card: to rise memory clock-rate, to widen memory interface, or to use a more efficient memory technology. After increasing frequencies of graphics DRAM to rather high levels in 1997 – 1998, Nvidia Corp. was the first company to start using the double data rate (DDR) memory (which transfers data on both the rising and falling edges of the clock signal, the technology known as double-pumping) on its GeForce 256 DDR graphics cards in 1999 and doubled bandwidth available to the GPU. ATI Technologies introduced the world’s first graphics card with 256-bit memory bus in 2002 and doubled memory bandwidth of graphics processors once again. In 2002 – 2003 new memory technologies – GDDR2 and GDDR3 – designed specifically for GPUs and supporting quad-pumping were introduced and doubled available bandwidth another time.

But memory bandwidth improvements in the early 2000s did not come for free. Increases of clock-rates and data rates amplified power consumption of memory chips. Wider memory interfaces required more memory ICs, which also increased power requirements of add-in-boards.

By 2006 – 2007, when the work on the ATI R600 graphics processor with 512-bit memory bus as well as on the GDDR4 and the GDDR5 memory technologies was essentially completed, it became clear that memory consumed a lot of power already and would consume even more over time. Since ATI and Nvidia planned to use their GPUs for high-performance computing (HPC) applications, which require a lot of local memory, it was obvious that power consumption of GDDR was going to become a problem.

amd_sk_hynix_hbm_history_graph

At the time, new memory tech development team at ATI Technologies led by Joe Macri came up with an idea of brand-new memory technology, which could provide extreme bandwidth while consuming a low amount of energy. The key elements of the new technology were multi-layer memory devices with an ultra-wide interfaces that used silicon interposer to connect to a processing device.

Brief history of HBM

Modern technologies take a long time to develop. For example, the work on DDR4 started back in 2005, a couple of years before DDR3 was commercially launched. Similarly, ATI Technologies (which AMD acquired in 2006) started to think about high-bandwidth memory with low power consumption about a decade ago, before the company helped to commercialize GDDR4 in 2006 and GDDR5 in 2008. The work on what is now known as HBM began sometimes in 2006 – 2007 and in 2013 the technology became an industry standard.

Architecturally, the first-generation high-bandwidth memory (JESD235) uses a protocol similar to that of the original DDR, which development kicked off in 1996 and was concluded in mid-2000. But a in a bid to finish the new standard, AMD, SK Hynix and other developers had to create a massive amount of additional technologies that ultimately facilitated creation of graphics processors like AMD’s “Fiji”.

amd_sk_hynix_hbm_implementation_1

There are several key technologies that empower HBM:

  • Memory chips with multiple vertically stacked memory devices interconnected using through-silicon-vias (TSVs) and microbumps and then placed on a base logic die.
  • Silicon interposer that connects memory ICs to host processor using an ultra-wide interface. Silicon interposer is made using a photolithography technology in a semiconductor fabrication plant.
  • Host processor with ultra-wide memory interface.

amd_sk_hynix_hbm_design

Development of new technologies requires a lot of prototyping activities in general. Before AMD and SK Hynix proceeded to standardize their HBM memory with JEDEC in 2010, the companies had to design multiple implementations of their new technologies and learn how they operated in real-life.

amd_sk_hynix_hbm_history_graph_proto

AMD started to experiment with interposers and processors back in 2007. The first GPU to connect to memory using an interposer was the RV635, which powered ATI Radeon HD 3650/3670 graphics adapters. Eventually, AMD experimented with interposers and the “Cypress”, which was the world’s first DirectX 11-supporting graphics processor. Both the RV635 and the “Cypress” were based on the TeraScale architecture (gen 1 and gen 2), which was succeeded by the GCN [graphics core next] architecture in 2012.

amd_sk_hynix_hbm_history_graph_proto_1

The JESD235 standard was published in October, 2013, when the work on AMD’s “Fiji” was well underway and the graphics processing unit was months away from tape-out.

The HBM saga continues

The first-generation HBM (HBM1) stacks four DRAM dies with two independent 128-bit channels per die on a base logic die, creating a memory device with a 1024-bit interface. Each channel supports 1Gb capacities (2Gb per die), features 8 banks and can operate at 1Gb/s data-rate (1GHz effective DDR clock-rate). As a result, each HBM 4Hi stack (4 high stack) package can provide 1GB capacity and 128GB/s memory bandwidth. AMD’s Radeon R9 Fury X flagship graphics adapter features 4GB of HBM memory with unprecedented bandwidth of 512GB/s. While the first-gen HBM has limitations when it comes to capacity, it allows to create very small and very high performance graphics solutions thanks to the fact that HBM chips are smaller than GDDR5 ICs.

amd_sk_hynix_hbm_implementation

The second-generation HBM (HBM2) utilizes 8Gb dies with two 128-bit channels featuring 16 banks and sporting up to 2Gb/s data-rates (2GHz effective DDR frequency). The architecture of the HBM2 will let manufacturers built not only 4Hi stack (4 high stack) packages, but also 2Hi stack and 8Hi stack devices. As a result, memory producers will be able to assemble HBM2 memory chips with up to 8GB capacity (8Hi stack) and up to 256GB/s bandwidth (2Gb/s data rate, 1024-bit bus).
sk_hynix_tsv_roadmap_hbm

Architectural advantages of HBM2 will allow GPU developers to use it not only for ultra-high-end applications with 4096-bit memory bus, but also for adapters that do not require extreme performance. Next-generation enthusiast-class graphics cards based on AMD’s “Greenland” graphics processors as well as Nvidia’s GP100 (“Pascal”) GPUs will feature 8GB – 16GB of HBM memory with up to 1TB/s bandwidth. Samsung Electronics forecasts that over time HBM will enable add-in-boards with up to 48GB of memory.

amd_sk_hynix_hbm_pcb

The third-generation HBM is in development and engineers currently do not share any information about it. It is logical to expect further increases of capacities as well as performance. While we have no idea how additional capacities and performance will be achieved, we are pretty sure that engineers at companies like AMD are already playing not only with prototypes of future implementations of HBM, but also with something that will succeed them a long time down the road.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: The evolution of GDDR memory slowed down in 2007 (partly because Joe Macri and the team went on to develop HBM) and HBM promises to bring back rapid increase of memory bandwidth in the coming years. How far will HBM go? Will we see graphics cards with 2TB/s or 4TB/s memory sub-systems in the next five to seven years? We do not know for sure, but it looks like exciting times are coming back!

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AMD Radeon R9 Nano: Extreme performance in mini-ITX form-factor https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-unveils-radeon-r9-nano-leading-edge-performance-in-mini-itx-form-factor/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-unveils-radeon-r9-nano-leading-edge-performance-in-mini-itx-form-factor/#comments Thu, 27 Aug 2015 14:58:11 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=265121 Advanced Micro Devices on Thursday introduced its highly-anticipated AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics card, which combines massive performance with relatively low power consumption and ultra-small form-factor. The new graphics card uses fully-fledged “Fiji” graphics processor and its peak compute performance even exceeds that of Nvidia Corp.’s GeForce GTX Titan X. Small form-factor, unbeatable performance The …

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Advanced Micro Devices on Thursday introduced its highly-anticipated AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics card, which combines massive performance with relatively low power consumption and ultra-small form-factor. The new graphics card uses fully-fledged “Fiji” graphics processor and its peak compute performance even exceeds that of Nvidia Corp.’s GeForce GTX Titan X.

Small form-factor, unbeatable performance

The AMD Radeon R9 Nano is not a small brother to the flagship Radeon R9 Fury X, but a graphics card that offers nearly similar performance, which means that it is essentially a competitor. The miniature graphics adapter sports “Fiji” graphics processing unit with 4096 stream processors, 256 texture mapping units, 64 raster operations pipelines and 4096-bit interface for high-bandwidth memory operating at 1GHz. The board carries 4GB of HBM memory with 512GB/s bandwidth.

amd_radeon_r9_nano

Compute performance of the AMD Radeon R9 Nano is 8.2TFLOPS, which just 5 per cent below that of the top-of-the-line Radeon R9 Fury X and which is considerably higher than compute performance of Nvidia’s flagship offering, the GeForce GTX Titan X (6.2TFLOPS).

According to AMD, the Radeon R9 Nano is at least 30 per cent faster than any mini-ITX graphics card available today (i.e., Nvidia GeForce GTX 970) in various games in ultra-high-definition 4K (3840*2160) resolution. Thanks to ultimate compute performance of the novelty, that difference will only increase over time as games take advantage of compute capabilities of GPUs.

amd_radeon_r9_nano_perf

AMD’s “Fiji” graphics processing unit based on the GCN 1.2 architecture fully supports all modern technologies and application programming interfaces, including DirectX 12, OpenGL 4.5, OpenCL 2.1, Vulkan, Mantle, FreeSync and other.

“With the Radeon R9 Nano graphics card, AMD is enabling 4K class gaming in your living room in an exceptionally quiet, ultra-small design built to excel in today's games and on the latest APIs like DirectX 12 and Vulkan,” said Matt Skynner, corporate vice president and general manager of product, computing and graphics business unit at AMD. “There simply is nothing else like it.”

State-of-the-art design

The miniature AMD Radeon R9 Nano uses 6” printed circuit board specially developed for high-end graphics cards. The card will fit into any mini-ITX system that is compatible with dual-slot graphics adapters.

amd_radeon_r9_nano_2   amd_radeon_r9_nano_3

The board features 4+1-phase voltage regulator module based on high-end solid-state chokes as well as International Rectifier’s IR3564B dual-output digital multi-phase controller used on advanced mainboards. The VRM is extremely sophisticated and features additional chokes to stabilize and clean power in a bid to ensure stable operation in rather extreme conditions. The card has one 8-pin auxiliary PCI Express power connector.

amd_radeon_r9_nano_6

Too cool-down the card, which can dissipate up to 175W of power, AMD developed a special cooling system featuring one vapour chamber, numerous heat-pipe, an aluminum radiator and a 90mm fan that can exhaust heat in multiple directions. The cooler looks similarly to the one used on the Radeon R9 Fury X and features brushed aluminium finishes and multiple metal parts in order to ensure minimal vibration. The fan reportedly produces 42dBa of noise.

The graphics adapter features three DisplayPort 1.2a outputs as well as one HDMI 1.4 connector.

Price and availability

AMD’s partners will begin to sell the Radeon R9 Nano graphics boards under their own brands starting from the 10th of September. The manufacturer suggested retail price of the Radeon R9 Nano will be similar to that of the Radeon R9 Fury X: $649 in the U.S., £509 in the U.K. and €629 in Eurozone.

amd_radeon_r9_nano_1

In the first three months of availability, all AMD Radeon R9 Nano will be manufactured by a contract maker under supervision of Advanced Micro Devices and then sold to partners. Three months from now select AIB suppliers may release their own mini-ITX graphics cards based on the “Fiji” graphics processing units similar to AMD’s Radeon R9 Nano.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: Small form-factor, limited power consumption, extreme compute performance and great performance in games make AMD’s Radeon R9 Nano a very attractive product. Its MSRP is rather high, but its competitors – AMD Radeon R9 Fury X and Nvidia GeForce GTX 980 Ti – consume more power and are larger. Therefore, if you are building a mini-ITX PC to play video games in 4K UHD resolution, you really don’t have a lot of choice here.

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Pricing and launch date of AMD Radeon R9 Nano leaked https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/pricing-and-launch-date-of-amd-radeon-r9-nano-leaked/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/pricing-and-launch-date-of-amd-radeon-r9-nano-leaked/#comments Thu, 27 Aug 2015 06:50:54 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=265048 Specifications and capabilities of AMD’s upcoming Radeon R9 Nano graphics card have been largely known for quite some time now. The new graphics adapter will be the highest-performing mini-ITX add-in board ever built and will be among the fastest graphics cards available today. According to a new leak, the product will not be too expensive. AMD’s partners …

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Specifications and capabilities of AMD’s upcoming Radeon R9 Nano graphics card have been largely known for quite some time now. The new graphics adapter will be the highest-performing mini-ITX add-in board ever built and will be among the fastest graphics cards available today. According to a new leak, the product will not be too expensive.

AMD’s partners will start to sell the Radeon R9 Nano graphics card on the 10th of September, 2015. The manufacturer suggested retail price of the Radeon R9 Nano will be similar to that of the Radeon R9 Fury X: $649 in the U.S., £509 in the U.K. and €629 in Eurozone, according to WccfTech, which cites AMD’s documents and sources close to the company.

amd_radeon_fury_nano

The AMD Radeon R9 Nano will be built by a contract manufacturer under supervision of Advanced Micro Devices and sold to partners as card, not as a graphics processing unit. Only three months later some manufacturers of graphics boards may be granted rights to build their own Radeon R9 Nano graphics adapters.

The AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics card for mini-ITX personal computers is powered by AMD’s “Fiji” graphics processing unit with 4096 stream processors, 256 texture mapping units, 64 raster operations pipelines and 4096-bit memory interface. The Radeon R9 Nano will have compute performance of around 8.2TFLOPS, which is only 5 per cent below that of the Radeon R9 Fury X. Just like the flagship graphics solution from AMD, the miniature graphics adapter carries 4GB of HBM [high-bandwidth memory] operating at 1000MHz.

amd_radeon_fury_nano_1

The AMD Radeon R9 Nano will be the fastest graphics adapter for small form-factor systems ever designed. Its performance will be comparable to that of AMD’s Radeon R9 Fury X and Nvidia’s GeForce GTX 980 Ti. It is unlikely that the Radeon R9 Nano will get a strong rival in its category any time soon.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: Keeping in mind that the AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics card is unique, its $649/£509 price tag does not seem to be excessive. What remains to be seen is whether AMD will be able to satisfy demand for the miniature graphics adapter. In fact, it is easier to build the flagship AMD Radeon R9 Fury X than the Radeon R9 Nano. For the for former, AMD needs to get one “Fiji” chip with 4096 stream processors, but for the latter the company needs a GPU with 4096 SPs, low power consumption and low heat dissipation, a combination that may be hard to find.

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AMD readies faster A8 and A10 accelerated processing units https://www.kitguru.net/components/cpu/anton-shilov/amd-readies-faster-a8-and-a10-accelerated-processing-units/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/cpu/anton-shilov/amd-readies-faster-a8-and-a10-accelerated-processing-units/#comments Wed, 26 Aug 2015 09:36:19 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=264911 Advanced Micro Devices is working on two new A8 and A10 accelerated processing units for desktop systems. The new chips will be based on the code-named “Kaveri” design and will not bring tangible performance improvements compared to existing APUs. Nonetheless, the new processors will help AMD to maintain average selling prices of its highly-integrated offerings …

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Advanced Micro Devices is working on two new A8 and A10 accelerated processing units for desktop systems. The new chips will be based on the code-named “Kaveri” design and will not bring tangible performance improvements compared to existing APUs. Nonetheless, the new processors will help AMD to maintain average selling prices of its highly-integrated offerings for desktops.

The new quad-core AMD A8-7690K and AMD A10-7890K will feature slightly higher clock-rates than existing A8 and A10 accelerated processing units. For example, the A10-7890K accelerated processing unit will have default frequency of 4.10GHz, which is 200MHz higher compared to existing flagship APU. The A8-7690K will be around 100MHz faster than its predecessor, reports CPU-World. Unfortunately, it is unknown whether the new chips will also sport higher GPU frequency.

amd_fusion_carrizo_bristol_ridge

From micro-architecture point of view, the new APUs from AMD are similar to their predecessors: they feature four “Steamroller” cores, DirectX 12-class integrated graphics processor featuring GCN 1.1 architecture, second-generation video coding engine (VCE) and fourth-generation unified video decoder (VCE) units that ensure high quality video playback and support all modern encoding formats (MPEG 2, MPEG 4, H.264, VC-1, etc.) except H.265/HEVC, VC-9 and some other.

amd_apu_kaveri_specs

AMD’s latest accelerated processing units that belong to the “Kaveri Refresh” family feature a reworked power supply circuitry, which gives cleaner and higher volume power delivery to the die. This lets AMD to increase “official” frequencies of its highly-integrated desktop chips and which also provides overclockers a significantly better headroom for further tweaking. In addition, AMD is able to bolster clock-rates of its chips thanks to the fact that GlobalFoundries’ 28nm super high performance (SHP) process technology has got significantly better than it was early in its lifecycle.

In addition to high-performance AMD A8-7690K and AMD A10-7890K, Advanced Micro Devices is also working on AMD A6-7470K as well as Athlon X4 850 and Athlon X4 870K.

The new microprocessors are expected to hit the market in the coming weeks and months.

AMD did not comment on the news-story.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: While it is nice to see that AMD is gradually increasing performance of its APUs, the chips are still behind their competitors from Intel Corp. when it comes to general-purpose computing performance. Moreover, relatively high thermal design power of 95W does not allow to build ultra-small systems based on the new AMD A8 and A10 “Kaveri” accelerated processing units.

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Specs of AMD Radeon R9 Nano confirmed: 4096 SPs, 8.19TFLOPS https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/specs-of-amd-radeon-r9-nano-confirmed-4096-sps-8-19tflops/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/specs-of-amd-radeon-r9-nano-confirmed-4096-sps-8-19tflops/#comments Wed, 26 Aug 2015 01:03:58 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=264891 It is not a secret that AMD’s upcoming Radeon R9 Nano graphics card will be the most powerful adapter for mini-ITX personal computers ever produced and will have no rivals for quite some time. As it appears, the Radeon R9 Nano will not only offer high performance, but it will actually offer compute performance that will …

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It is not a secret that AMD’s upcoming Radeon R9 Nano graphics card will be the most powerful adapter for mini-ITX personal computers ever produced and will have no rivals for quite some time. As it appears, the Radeon R9 Nano will not only offer high performance, but it will actually offer compute performance that will be comparable to that of AMD’s flagship Radeon R9 Fury X.

The AMD Radeon R9 Nano graphics card – which sales are expected to begin in the coming weeks – is based on the fully fledged code-named “Fiji” graphics processing unit with 4096 stream processors, 256 texture mapping units, 64 raster operations pipelines and 4096-bit memory interface, according to slide from AMD’s presentation published by VideoCardz web-site. The graphics board will continue to carry 4GB of HBM [high-bandwidth memory] operating at 1000MHz.

amd_radeon_fury_nano_graphics_card

The miniature graphics card from AMD and its partners will have clock-rates comparable to those of the flagship Radeon R9 Fury X. The Radeon R9 Nano will have compute performance of around 8.2TFLOPS, which is only 5 per cent below that of the Radeon R9 Fury X. Actual performance of the Radeon R9 Nano will be considerably higher than that of the Radeon R9 Fury, which uses a cut-down version of “Fiji” with 3584 stream processors, and will be very close to that of the top-of-the-range product.

AMD-Radeon-R9-Nano-Final-Specifications-900x507

Thermal design power of the AMD Radeon R9 Nano will be 175W. Many small form-factor personal computers these days can cool-down such graphics cards. Makers of high-performance systems will likely release SFF PCs featuring the Radeon R9 Nano with extreme performance in games in the coming months. Moreover, thanks to the fact that the “Fiji” graphics processor supports hardware-accelerated decoding and encoding of H.265 (HEVC) video, the Radeon R9 Nano can even be used to playback of ultra-high-definition video. Unfortunately, since “Fiji” does not support HDMI 2.0 output, it may not be the best card to build home-theater personal computers for Ultra HD Blu-ray playback.

Pricing of AMD’s Radeon R9 Nano is unknown. Its performance is clearly higher than that of the AMD Radeon R9 Fury, which costs $549, but the product is not as fast as the Radeon R9 Fury X, which retails for $649.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: Keeping in mind that far not all people, even among enthusiasts, like liquid-cooling systems, the Radeon R9 Nano may actually become more popular than the Radeon R9 Fury X. The Radeon 9 Nano will be truly unique and it has all chances to become a best-seller.

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Sales of desktop graphics cards hit 10-year low in Q2 2015 https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/sales-of-desktop-graphics-cards-hit-10-year-low-in-q2-2015/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/sales-of-desktop-graphics-cards-hit-10-year-low-in-q2-2015/#comments Mon, 24 Aug 2015 21:20:49 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=264714 Sales of graphics cards for desktop PCs decreased once again in the second quarter of 2015, according to data from Jon Peddie Research. Market share of Advanced Micro Devices also hit a new low during the quarter. Shipments of discrete graphics adapters for desktops dropped to 9.4 million units in Q2 2015, which is minimum …

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Sales of graphics cards for desktop PCs decreased once again in the second quarter of 2015, according to data from Jon Peddie Research. Market share of Advanced Micro Devices also hit a new low during the quarter.

Shipments of discrete graphics adapters for desktops dropped to 9.4 million units in Q2 2015, which is minimum amount in more than ten years. According to JPR, sales of graphics cards dropped 16.81 per cent compared to the previous quarter, whereas sales of desktop PCs decreased 14.77 per cent. The attach rate of add-in graphics boards (AIBs) to desktop PCs has declined from a high of 63 per cent in Q1 2008 to 37 per cent this quarter. Average sales of graphics cards have been around 15 million units per quarter in the recent years, but declined sharply in 2014.

nvidia_geforce_gtx_980_1

Nvidia continued its dominance in the market of desktop discrete graphics cards. Market share of the company increased to 81.9 per cent, an all-time high. By contrast, sales of AMD Radeon graphics adapters decreased to a minimum in more than 10 years. The share of AMD dropped to 18 per cent in Q2 2015, which is the lowest share that AMD had in history. The highest share of desktop discrete market that AMD ever had was 55.5 per cent back in Q3 2004, according to Jon Peddie Research. AMD shipped around 35 per cent or desktop discrete graphics processing units in the last four years. AMD’s share began to contract sharply after Nvidia introduced its GeForce GTX 970 and 980 graphics cards in Q3 2014. In about a year AMD lost 20 per cent of market share it controls.

jpr_aib_q2_2015

 

Note: Some numbers are estimates.

JPR claims that while the market of desktop AIBs is shrinking, sales of expensive graphics cards used by gamers are increasing.

“However, in spite of the overall decline, somewhat due to tablets and embedded graphics, the PC gaming momentum continues to build and is the bright spot in the AIB market,” said Jon Peddie, the head of JPR.

jpr_aib_q2_2015_shares

AMD’s quarter-to-quarter total desktop graphics cards unit shipments decreased 33.3 per cent. Nvidia’s quarter-to-quarter unit shipments decreased 12 per cent.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: It is noteworthy that AMD is losing market share despite the fact that it has rather competitive graphics processing units. Further improvements of integrated graphics processors will decrease sales of add-in graphics boards.

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Samsung expects graphics cards with 6144-bit bus, 48GB of HBM memory onboard https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/samsung-expects-graphics-cards-with-6144-bit-bus-48gb-of-hbm-memory-onboard/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/samsung-expects-graphics-cards-with-6144-bit-bus-48gb-of-hbm-memory-onboard/#comments Fri, 21 Aug 2015 15:56:38 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=264471 Samsung Electronics indicated that it plans to start volume production of high-bandwidth memory (HBM) next year at the Intel Developer Forum this week. At the trade-show, the company revealed its current vision and expectations concerning HBM. Samsung foresees that eventually high-performance applications (such as GPUs) could feature up to six HBM devices to enable unprecedented …

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Samsung Electronics indicated that it plans to start volume production of high-bandwidth memory (HBM) next year at the Intel Developer Forum this week. At the trade-show, the company revealed its current vision and expectations concerning HBM. Samsung foresees that eventually high-performance applications (such as GPUs) could feature up to six HBM devices to enable unprecedented capacities and bandwidth.

As it appears, Samsung plans to skip the first-generation HBM memory and will only manufacture products compliant with the second-generation HBM specification, which offers higher densities and clock-rates. Such approach will let Samsung to address broader market segments with its HBM offerings. Right now HBM can only be used on consumer graphics cards and certain highly-custom products, but HBM2 will enable professional and high-performance computing GPU-based solutions, which require a lot of memory onboard.

Samsung is currently working on multiple HBM packages featuring two (2Hi stack), four (4Hi) and eight (8Hi) 8Gb memory devices on a base logic die with 1024-bit interface, according to a slide that the company demonstrated at the IDF (which was published by ComputerBase.de). Maximum data-rates of Samsung’s HBM products will be 2Gb/s, which will support up to 256GB/s of bandwidth per chip.

samsung_hbm_plans

Samsung believes that HBM memory will enable it to create a variety of chip offerings targeting different market segments. Designers of logic chips (GPUs, APUs, network processors, etc.) will be able to integrate the right amount of HBM controllers into their chips in order to target different applications. At present AMD’s “Fiji” graphics processing unit supports up to four HBM stacks over its 4096-bit interface. Eventually, logic chips could accommodate more HBM controllers and expand interface width to unprecedented 6144-bit, according to Samsung Electronics.

For example, a mainstream graphics card could use just one 2Hi HBM chip to accommodate a 2GB frame-buffer with 256GB/s bandwidth. More advanced graphics adapters for consumers and creative professionals could feature four 2Hi or four 4Hi HBM stacks that provide up to 1TB/s of bandwidth as well as 8GB, 16GB or 32GB of memory. Accelerators for high-performance computing as well as ultra-high-end GPU offerings will support six HBM stacks, thus enabling cards with 12GB, 24GB or 48GB of onboard memory with 1.5TB/s bandwidth.

amd_radeon_fiji_gpu

So far, neither AMD nor Nvidia have demonstrated even hypothetical product implementations (which are used to showcase potential future uses of technologies) of GPU-based solutions featuring six HBM memory chips. Intel Corp.’s Xeon Phi co-processors use HMC [hybrid memory cube] DRAMs as “near memory” and are not expected to support HBM any time soon.

nvidia_pascal_module

Samsung expects HBM memory to be used for consumer graphics cards and high-performance computing accelerators based on AMD “Arctic Islands” and Nvidia “Pascal” graphics processors next year. Sometimes in 2017, network products will also take advantage of the new memory type. Three years from now other applications could employ HBM, according to Samsung.

The world’s largest maker of dynamic random access memory (DRAM) did not unveil any details about its actual HBM chips (capacities, clock-rates, etc.), but expect a family of products with different densities and frequencies.

Samsung did not disclose which process technology it will use to manufacture HBM.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: Samsung is definitely not the first to offer HBM, but it is pretty clear that the company takes the new type of memory very seriously. What is interesting is that the company decided not to give a glimpse into the future of HBM, which indicates that the third-generation HBM is still a work in progress.

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AMD’s project Quantum may never make it to the market https://www.kitguru.net/desktop-pc/anton-shilov/amds-project-quantum-may-never-make-it-to-the-market/ https://www.kitguru.net/desktop-pc/anton-shilov/amds-project-quantum-may-never-make-it-to-the-market/#comments Wed, 05 Aug 2015 00:38:26 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=262199 Small form-factor multi-GPU project Quantum concept personal computer that Advanced Micro Devices demonstrated earlier this year was an impressive piece of hardware. Unfortunately, it may never really hit the market, despite of early claims by the company. Richard Huddy, chief scientist of AMD, claims that even if project Quantum will be made commercially, it will …

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Small form-factor multi-GPU project Quantum concept personal computer that Advanced Micro Devices demonstrated earlier this year was an impressive piece of hardware. Unfortunately, it may never really hit the market, despite of early claims by the company. Richard Huddy, chief scientist of AMD, claims that even if project Quantum will be made commercially, it will be a very rare product.

“I don’t know whether we have an OEM who is committed to building something like it,” said Richard Huddy in an interview with PCR. “We built it as a concept PC, so like concept cars it’s not usually practical to take it straight to market, that wouldn’t make a great deal of sense. But it’s not far from that.”

amd_quantum_pc_2

AMD’s project Quantum concept is powered by a customized version of Asrock’s Z97E-ITX/ac mainboard, Intel Corp.’s Core i7-4790K “Devil’s Canyon” processor as well as dual-chip AMD’s Radeon R9 Fury X2. The system sports innovative liquid cooling system as well as a dual-chamber design. The PC was specifically built to demonstrate ultimate performance in 4K ultra HD (3840*2160) resolution.

The project Quantum was designed by AMD Innovation Lab to demonstrate what can be done, which is exactly what the system did. It attracted attention to itself as well as to AMD’s forthcoming flagship Radeon R9 Fury X2 graphics card operating in CrossFireX mode with 8GB of HBM memory in total.

Unfortunately, since project Quantum uses a lot of custom components, it is unlikely that it will be made commercially since making custom components in low volume is economically inefficient, whereas making them in high volume may not make sense since demand for such systems would likely be limited.

“I would think that if we have the right kind of conversations with some of these OEMs, then we might well turn it into a real product,” said Mr. Huddy. “In that case, it will probably be a very small number. Maybe only one or at most a handful of PC manufacturers who would bring that to market, potentially. It’s a custom piece, not a high volume piece, but it is a thing of beauty.”

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: There are a lot of advanced mini-ITX and micro-ATX PC chassis available today that allow to build high-performance PCs. Obviously, AMD's project Quantum looks remarkable, but would you pay extra money for such design? 

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AMD is researching multi-core ‘exascale heterogeneous processor’ https://www.kitguru.net/components/cpu/anton-shilov/amd-is-researching-exascale-heterogeneous-processor-with-16-zen-cores-gpu-and-hbm/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/cpu/anton-shilov/amd-is-researching-exascale-heterogeneous-processor-with-16-zen-cores-gpu-and-hbm/#respond Mon, 03 Aug 2015 21:53:39 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=261901 Advanced Micro Devices has confirmed that it is researching a multi-core accelerated processing unit based on “Zen” micro-architecture, which will eventually power supercomputers with extreme performance. At present the company is only considering a concept design and it is unclear when AMD decides to actually develop such processor. AMD, just like many other leading designers …

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Advanced Micro Devices has confirmed that it is researching a multi-core accelerated processing unit based on “Zen” micro-architecture, which will eventually power supercomputers with extreme performance. At present the company is only considering a concept design and it is unclear when AMD decides to actually develop such processor.

AMD, just like many other leading designers of chips, believes that supercomputers with exascale-class performance will have to use hybrid processor that feature both general-purpose cores as well as multiple stream processors found in graphics processing units. AMD has been promoting the idea of hybrid accelerated processing units since 2006, hence, its vision regarding “exascale heterogeneous processor”, which it outlined in a paper published by IEEE, is not surprising.

“To make fully realize the capabilities of the GPU, we envision exascale compute nodes comprised of integrated CPUs and GPUs (i.e., accelerated processing units or APUs) along with the hardware and software support to enable scientists to effectively run their scientific experiments on an exascale system,” the paper reads. “We discuss the hardware and software challenges in building a heterogeneous exascale system, and we describe on-going research efforts at AMD to realize our exascale vision.”

AMD-exascale

BitsAndChips web-site reports that the concept of EHP [exascale heterogeneous processor] features 16 or even 32 general-purpose cores based on “Zen” architecture, stream processors based on the next iteration of GCN [graphics core next] architecture as well as HBM [high bandwidth memory].

Earlier this year first details about 16-core APU leaked. AMD’s EHP for supercomputers is expected to feature 16 x86 “Zen” cores with two-way simultaneous multi-threading technology and 512KB L2 cache per core, 32MB L3 cache as well as a new-generation “Greenland” graphics engine with ½ double precision compute rate. The exascale heterogenerous processor is also projected to feature a quad-channel DDR4 memory controller with enhanced ECC capabilities that supports up to 256GB of memory per channel, 64 lanes of PCI Express 3.0 that can be used for SATA Express, integrated SATA, 1GbE, USB as well as various legacy interfaces. The APU is also expected to feature on-package 16GB of HBM2 memory with 512GB/s or higher bandwidth. It is assumed that the chip will hit the market in 2017, but AMD has never confirmed this.

AMD confirmed development of a datacenter APU earlier this year, but has never revealed its specifications. Keeping in mind that initial processors based on “Zen” micro-architecture will be made using 14nm FinFET process technology and will not feature more than eight cores, chips with 16 or 32 cores will likely be manufactured using 10nm FinFET fabrication process sometimes in 2018, at the earliest.

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KitGuru Says: The new paper released by AMD formally confirms what the company has been talking about for years. It does not mean that the company is actually developing an APU with 32 x86 cores and a GPU engine. However it does confirm the company’s vision regarding the future of server chips.

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AMD begins to ship Radeon R9 Nano to partners, images hit the web https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-begins-shipments-of-radeon-r9-nano-to-partners-images-hit-the-web/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-begins-shipments-of-radeon-r9-nano-to-partners-images-hit-the-web/#comments Wed, 22 Jul 2015 23:56:40 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=260312 A web-site has published the first images of AMD’s third graphics card based on the code-named “Fiji” graphics processing unit – the AMD Radeon R9 Nano. The publication of the picture indicates that AMD had already finalized specifications of the product and recently started to ship it to select partners. Iyd.Kr web-site this week published …

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A web-site has published the first images of AMD’s third graphics card based on the code-named “Fiji” graphics processing unit – the AMD Radeon R9 Nano. The publication of the picture indicates that AMD had already finalized specifications of the product and recently started to ship it to select partners.

Iyd.Kr web-site this week published two images of AMD Radeon R9 Nano, the highest-performing small form-factor graphics card for mini-ITX systems. The graphics board looks exactly like on renders by Advanced Micro Devices: it seems to have a very solid design and its cooling system looks very compact.

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The Radeon R9 Nano is reportedly based on the fully-fledged “Fiji” graphics processing unit with 4096 stream processors, 256 texture units, 64 raster operations pipelines and 4096-bit memory interface. The card is equipped with 4GB of high-bandwidth memory operating at 1GHz, which provides 512GB/s of bandwidth.

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Peak thermal design power of the graphics adapter is 175W, but its final GPU clock-rate is unknown. Unofficial estimates point to 830MHz – 900MHz frequency, but AMD keeps the final specifications under wraps.

Pricing of AMD Radeon R9 Nano is yet to be discovered. AMD plans to officially unveil the product in August.

AMD did not comment on the news-story.

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KitGuru Says: Keeping in mind that AMD has started to ship samples of the product to its partners, it is now a matter of time before the final specs and performance numbers of the AMD Radeon R9 Nano leak.

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AMD unveils A8-7670K accelerated processing unit https://www.kitguru.net/components/apu-components/anton-shilov/amd-unveils-a8-7670k-accelerated-processing-unit/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/apu-components/anton-shilov/amd-unveils-a8-7670k-accelerated-processing-unit/#comments Tue, 21 Jul 2015 01:50:22 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=259862 Advanced Micro Devices on Monday introduced its new A8-7670K accelerated processing unit designed for low-cost personal computers. The new APU is based on “Kaveri” design and features slightly lower performance than the flagship A10-7870K. The AMD A8-7670K features four “Steamroller” cores (two dual-core modules) with 3.60GHz/3.90GHz clock-rate, integrated AMD Radeon R7 graphics engine with 384 …

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Advanced Micro Devices on Monday introduced its new A8-7670K accelerated processing unit designed for low-cost personal computers. The new APU is based on “Kaveri” design and features slightly lower performance than the flagship A10-7870K.

The AMD A8-7670K features four “Steamroller” cores (two dual-core modules) with 3.60GHz/3.90GHz clock-rate, integrated AMD Radeon R7 graphics engine with 384 stream processors (six GCN compute units) operating at 757MHz, 4MB level two cache, a dual-channel DDR3 memory controller with hUMA [heterogeneous unified memory architecture] technology, up to 95W thermal design power and so on. Thanks to advanced multimedia capabilities of the APU, it can be used for home-theater personal computers. Unfortunately, the new hybrid microprocessor does not support hardware decoding of H.265 streams and also does not support HDMI 2.0 output, which means that the A8-7670K is not a good solution to build HTPCs featuring Ultra HD Blu-ray.

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The new chip is compatible with all existing FM2+ mainboards based on AMD’s A88X, A78, 68H and A58 chipsets and featuring the latest BIOS versions.

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“AMD takes great strides to deliver innovative technology that provides the performance and convenience customers need today and tomorrow,” said Kevin Lensing, senior director of client business unit at AMD. “The AMD A8-7670K APU is no exception. Our newest APU provides a smooth user experience and is engineered for Windows 10 and eSports online gaming.”

The new processor features reworked power supply circuitry, which gives cleaner and higher volume power delivery to the die. The new circuitry enables better overclockability.

The suggested price (SEP) of the AMD A8-7670K is $117.99.

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KitGuru Says: The new processor may be a rather good solution for mainstream PCs not used for demanding applications. AMD itself positions its A8-7670K for home office PCs, hence, do not expect any performance breakthroughs from them.

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AMD begins development of its third major semi-custom design https://www.kitguru.net/components/anton-shilov/amd-begins-development-of-its-third-major-semi-custom-design/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/anton-shilov/amd-begins-development-of-its-third-major-semi-custom-design/#comments Sat, 18 Jul 2015 12:01:35 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=259656 Advanced Micro Devices recently started to design its third semi-custom accelerated processing unit for an undisclosed customer. Some believe that this third semi-custom system-on-chip will eventually power Nintendo’s next-generation game console code-named “NX”. However, AMD claims that the new SoC “expands the base” of its semi-custom business beyond gaming, which means that the APU is …

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Advanced Micro Devices recently started to design its third semi-custom accelerated processing unit for an undisclosed customer. Some believe that this third semi-custom system-on-chip will eventually power Nintendo’s next-generation game console code-named “NX”. However, AMD claims that the new SoC “expands the base” of its semi-custom business beyond gaming, which means that the APU is not developed with a game console in mind.

“We have started a new design this quarter that we believe expands our base for the semi-custom business and we are very pleased with that,” said Lisa Su, chief executive officer of Advanced Micro Devices, during the company’s earnings conference call with investors and financial analysts. “The base semi-custom business is around the game consoles.”

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AMD announced two new semi-custom SoC design wins back in October, 2014. Both chips will integrate AMD Radeon graphics, one will be based on ARM architecture, another one will feature x86 general-purpose cores. One of the APUs is projected to power a “beyond gaming device”. Details about another have never been disclosed, but it is possible that it is a SoC for a gaming device. The two semi-custom system-on-chips are projected to bring the company combined total lifetime revenue of approximately $1 billion over approximately three years starting 2016.

Considering relatively short amount of time between the start of development and actual revenue shipments of AMD's third semi-custom design, it looks like the system-on-chip will not be something very complex. According to comments made by AMD around two years ago, it took it less than 24 months to design, build and tune system-on-chip for Sony PlayStation 4. However, it took years to determine requirements for the SoC as well as its architecture.

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The third semi-custom design is expected to bring the first revenue to AMD in the second half of 2016. AMD expects that the addition of this APU will help the company to further grow its semi-custom business.

“I think we will still see 2016 to be a fairly solid year for the traditional, let's call it game console business, overall,” said Ms. Su. “Then as we layer on top of it some of the new wins, I think that does give us potential to grow in the second half of the year. Obviously, there is a lot to happen between now and then, but I do see semi-custom as a growth driver for us going forward.”

amd_fusion_semi_custon_chip

So far, AMD has received around $3 billion in revenue for its semi-custom SoCs that power Microsoft Xbox One and Sony PlayStation 4. The two consoles have been in production for about two years now.

While semi-custom chip business is stable and predictable, something that is important for AMD, which has not been very successful on its traditional PC and server markets in the recent years, it is not very profitable. AMD admitted last year that its console SoCs are sold with 15 – 20 per cent margin, which is considerably below typical margins for fabless semiconductor companies in general and AMD in particular.

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KitGuru Says: In fact, even combined total lifetime revenue of approximately $1 billion over approximately three years for two chips indicate that both products are rather basic and inexpensive. It is unlikely that they will power devices that are sold in very high volumes (i.e., tens of millions of units).

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AMD vows to keep R&D investments at appropriate levels https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-vows-to-keep-rd-investments-at-appropriate-levels/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-vows-to-keep-rd-investments-at-appropriate-levels/#comments Fri, 17 Jul 2015 22:39:24 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=259626 Despite of tough times, Advanced Micro Devices plans to sustain its research and development investments on certain levels in a bid to ensure that its products are competitive in the future. Research and development are two corner stones of high-tech companies. Without fundamental research of things that may not seem important today and development of actual products, …

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Despite of tough times, Advanced Micro Devices plans to sustain its research and development investments on certain levels in a bid to ensure that its products are competitive in the future.

Research and development are two corner stones of high-tech companies. Without fundamental research of things that may not seem important today and development of actual products, companies will be unable to release anything at all. Just like other things, R&D costs money and companies have to assign a portion of their revenue on such operations in order to maintain financial discipline. Typically, high-tech companies spend between 20 and 25 per cent of their revenue on R&D.

Revenues of Advanced Micro Devices have been declining for many quarters now, as a result, the company has to lower its spending on research and development as well as on multitude of other things. In the last five years AMD’s R&D spending dropped by almost 50 per cent: from $432 million in Q4 2009 to $225 million in Q2 2015 as a result of revenue drops as well as AMD’s attempts to demonstrate profitability.

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Throughout its history, AMD has always tried to maintain its R&D expenses at certain levels in a bid to support its product roadmap and ensure that it will have competitive products years down the road. Unfortunately, due to declines of earnings and decision to demonstrate positive results, AMD’s R&D expenses dropped below $300 million per quarter in Q3 2013 and have been declining since then. In fact, $225 million is the lowest amount of money that AMD spent on research and development per quarter in more than a decade, which essentially means that now it spends less on R&D than back in the days when it developed only microprocessors.

During its earnings conference call with investors and financial analysts this week, AMD said that it would do everything to roll-out new products that are in development right now and prioritize R&D expenses over everything else going forward.

“We have specific products that are coming out over the next, call it, 18-month timeframe, and we are going to do everything possible to protect that roadmap,” said Devinder Kumar, chief financial officer of AMD. “R&D is obviously going to be the higher priority from that standpoint.”

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In a bid to support its ongoing R&D operations, AMD already increased research and development spending as a percentage of revenue to 23.8 per cent in Q2 compared to 22.5 per cent in Q1. Since the company expects its sales to increase in the third quarter, it will naturally be able to either further increase its R&D expenses, or at least maintain them at the current levels.

CFO of AMD understands perfectly that in addition to mid-term products, the company has to invest in the long-term future. Hopefully, it means that AMD will not let R&D spending fall below certain level.

“Even as we talk and contemplate about the actions we are going to take, we are going to do everything to protect that roadmap for the longer term, a strategic roadmap as well as the financial model,” said Mr. Kumar.

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KitGuru Says: While it is nice to see that AMD cares about its mid-term and long-term future, it is clear that in order to be truly competitive with its rivals, the company will have to invest more in R&D, not only in terms of absolute dollars, but also as a percentage of revenue. For example, Nvidia spends around 30 per cent of its revenue on R&D, which is why its research and development budget has surpassed that of AMD despite of similar quarterly revenues. Moreover, as AMD transits its products to FinFET manufacturing technologies, its expenses on chip design will triple. Therefore, either AMD increases its sales and boosts its R&D budget, or it will have to increase its R&D spending as a percentage of revenue…

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AMD: We have taped out our first FinFET products https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-we-have-taped-out-our-first-finfet-products/ https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-we-have-taped-out-our-first-finfet-products/#comments Fri, 17 Jul 2015 02:48:59 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=259448 Advanced Micro Devices said on Thursday that it had taped out its first products, which will be made using a FinFET process technology. While AMD does not reveal which products it had taped out, it is highly-likely that one of them is a highly-anticipated microprocessor based on “Zen” micro-architecture. “We have actually just taped-out our …

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Advanced Micro Devices said on Thursday that it had taped out its first products, which will be made using a FinFET process technology. While AMD does not reveal which products it had taped out, it is highly-likely that one of them is a highly-anticipated microprocessor based on “Zen” micro-architecture.

“We have actually just taped-out our first couple of FinFET designs,” said Lisa Su, chief executive officer of Advanced Micro Devices, during the company’s earnings conference call with investors and financial analysts.

Ms. Su did not elaborate which of the future designs the company had taped out and when exactly this happened. Nonetheless, two tape-outs mean that the company has managed to successfully design its first products with FinFET transistors. Design of an advanced microprocessor that will be made using a FinFET process technology costs north from $150 million without the cost of photomasks needed for production. Therefore, the tape-out means that the vast majority of investments in these two chips have been made.

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Tape-out is the final stage of the design cycle of an integrated circuit, the point at which the artwork of the IC is sent to a maker of photomasks. Once the set of photolithographic masks is ready and verified, it is sent to a contract manufacturer of the chip, which produces the first working samples of the chip. It may take up to several weeks to prepare a mask-set. Production cycle of a complex FinFET processor is around 90 days from wafer start to chip delivery. As a result, if AMD taped out its first FinFET chips in June, then the company will get the first samples of its products in September.

Mass production of chips nowadays starts between nine and twelve months after the initial tape-out. Therefore, if AMD managed to tape-out its chips last month, then it is on-track to start their high-volume production next June or a bit earlier and release its first products made using a FinFET process technology in late Q3 or early Q4 2016.

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AMD does not disclose which of its FinFET chips it has taped-out. Based on official and unofficial information, it is highly likely that the first AMD products to be made using a FinFET fabrication process will be the code-named “Summit Ridge” central processing unit with up to eight “Zen” cores as well as the code-named “Greenland” graphics processing unit based on the next iteration of the GCN [graphics core next] architecture. Over time all AMD products will be made using FinFET process technologies. The “Summit Ridge” will be used for next-generation AMD Opteron processors for servers as well as for AMD FX processors for desktops.

“We will be bringing different parts of the product line into FinFET at different points in time,” said Ms. Su. “I think what we have said is graphics [processors] will certainly utilize FinFETs as well as our new Zen processors and so they will roll out over the quarters in 2016.”

It is noteworthy that AMD still does not want to disclose its manufacturing partner for FinFET process technologies in 2016.

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KitGuru Says: It is a long time before we will see the first FinFET products from AMD on the market. However, it is great to see that the company has finished its first two FinFET designs. The biggest part of the work is over for the two FinFET-based products, now AMD needs to execute and release them in time.

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