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AMD Discussion

Stacc said:
Second, the 32 core version of zen will probably not be an APU, and have no GPU on board. If these are mostly destined for servers, there is no need to spend the spend silicon space on a GPU.
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A server APU can be used for GPU computing where you need fast communication. I doubt it will have more than 16 CPU cores, though (which would still be very good).
 
koyoot said:
Yes, there is. http://www.amd.com/en-us/press-releases/Pages/amd-reveals-worlds-2016feb01.aspx
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What does this have to do with Zen or APUs? its just a graphics card designed for use in servers.
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cube said:
A server APU can be used for GPU computing where you need fast communication. I doubt it will have more than 16 CPU cores, though (which would still be very good).
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Bandwidth between the CPU and the GPU is not usually a bottleneck. With zen topping out at 32 cores that is going to be a very big die. I doubt they have any room left to fit any sort of GPU on there, especially one that has even mainstream performance.
 
Stacc said:
Bandwidth between the CPU and the GPU is not usually a bottleneck. With zen topping out at 32 cores that is going to be a very big die. I doubt they have any room left to fit any sort of GPU on there, especially one that has even mainstream performance.
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16 cores of die space for GPU is 4 times that as for desktop APU.

GPU computing on a card is only fit for big chunks of calculation.
 
Stacc said:
What does this have to do with Zen or APUs? its just a graphics card designed for use in servers.
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It has everything. Because it is technology behind that. Architecture will be similar from compute side on Vega/Raven Ridge, Zen APU, as is here. This is exact use case for this technology.
 
Stacc said:
Bandwidth between the CPU and the GPU is not usually a bottleneck. With zen topping out at 32 cores that is going to be a very big die. I doubt they have any room left to fit any sort of GPU on there, especially one that has even mainstream performance.
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Bandwidth is not the problem. Latency is. Integrated GPUs have crazy low latency. When they have direct access to RAM, that latency nears 0 as data does not need to be copied.

If anything, integrated GPUs actually decrease available bandwidth because if they're working directly from RAM, that RAM will be slower than the VRAM you'd typically find on a dedicated card. But for small tasks an integrated card can outbench a dedicated one simply because the latency is lower.

I'm still not convinced Zen is the right architecture for serious work, but for small stuff the performance benefits of an integrated GPU have been proven.
 
goMac said:
Bandwidth is not the problem. Latency is. Integrated GPUs have crazy low latency. When they have direct access to RAM, that latency nears 0 as data does not need to be copied.
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Yes, and that crazy low latency is what HSA is seeking for a dGPU too. That's AMD's "secret" weapon; to take the latency out of all GPUs (and other co-processors) operations. Cannot do that with Intel (except iGPU).

So, the outcome of HSA is less congested PCI-e lanes along with small overhead on CPU.
 
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That Naples is quite a system... sound total overkill for MP. I think current OS X doesn't even support 64 cores/ 128 threads... maybe there are hidden changes under macOS Sierras hood?

Apple need to remake the Grand Central Dispatch in OS X anyway to make HSA happen... if Apple is ever going to adapt it.. Next gen GCD should be able to handle both parallel, serial and mixed computing in unified, coherent memory. Before that we wont see openCL 2.x. That would make macOS very interesting platform for HPC, live video broadcast and VR/AR.
 
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http://www.anandtech.com/show/10578...rs-micro-op-cache-memory-hierarchy-revealed/2

This is best analysis of the Zen CPU. Now it is all down to core clocks on final silicon.
Stacc said:
Another problem with Apple adopting an 8 core Zen CPU in something like the iMac is that it will likely be a step down (possibly a significant step down) in single threaded performance compared to skylake and kaby lake. I think most consumers benefit from fewer faster cores than more slower cores. Given the low core counts of most of the products apple ships (iPhones, iPads, Macs), Apple likely agrees.
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They will have 32 lanes. Zen is modular architecture. It has 2 clusters that are built from 4 cores, and 8 MB of L3 cache.

Both clusters need to have their own separate 16 PCIe lanes, for complete scalability.

4 cores, 8 MB L3 cache, 16 PCIe lanes.
8 cores, 16 MB L3 cache, 32 PCIe lanes.
 
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It seems like it is so but let's wait to be sure.
An 8 core CPU with 32 lanes is great for the desktop.
Naples with 32 cores will go up to 128 lanes? Heard that rumor but seems overkill. Great if it does though.
Also 8 mem channels. Hopefully with ECC support, it would be non-sense otherwise.
However, only roughly a year from now.

It was also rumored to have support for 32 SATA/NVMe drives and a controller with support for 16 10GbE connections. The IO is also flexible.

But with all this integrated stuff, it will be a massive socket for sure.
 
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We go from module to complex. Maybe Bulldozer was not a complete waste of time.

So there probably won't be 6-core CPUs.

Initial Zen availability and the end of THIS year (which does mean you will actually be able to get one).
 
AMD already has nice low end mobile APUs, but is barely given a fair chance at succeeding by PC vendors.
 
Server chips are due for 2017.

You ask why at the end of the year we will see first Zen chips? Because AMD is preparing their own gaming platform, which I already mentioned in another thread - Project Quantum. It will be based on Zen and Vega.
 
Q2'17 to be exact, if all goes well.
Quantum with Zen and Vega would look good. But depends on Vega's availability as well. Will it be October or next year as well?
AMD might be pushing Vega to October on account of this as well, if this is true.
 
I guess I will just upgrade to a modern but not gimmicky case this year. And maybe some simple water cooling.
 
I think it could be a good idea to also sell Wraith separately, if it was at a low price.
 
ManuelGomes said:
Q2'17 to be exact, if all goes well.
Quantum with Zen and Vega would look good. But depends on Vega's availability as well. Will it be October or next year as well?
AMD might be pushing Vega to October on account of this as well, if this is true.
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Vega is the name of architecture, not particular chips. There are 2 GPUs made with this. Everything points to situation where we will see Late Q4 launch - October for smaller Vega GPU, and Early 2017 for bigger Vega GPU.

RX 490 and RX Fury. Both with HBM2.
 
Lower-End Vega architecture presumably you will see only in Raven Ridge APUs.

Vega is high-end desktop architecture.
 
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