AMD's FirePro w9000/w8000 review thread.

[f1sherman]

Holy cow, why do they even bother?

They should have spent the money they spent on developing these cards on sending a nice letter to Nvidia saying "The market is all yours, kthxbye".

Well yeah, it already is,
but taking even a small piece of that market, is better than nothing.

This is not a battle with Intel where they start with a huge handicap in process technology and have to fight uphill all the way through.
AMD is in GPU business, there is no reason not to put up a fight...
other than already having too many areas to cover with limited resources.

Limited resources, which is their main problem since god-knows-when (since ATI acquisition?).
So it's kind of a catch 22. ATI acquisition sucked them dry of cash, but it keeps them alive.

 

[ShintaiDK]

I assume AMD is making money on FirePro cards when production, validation, driver tests, design additions and certifications etc is payed. But saying AMD should be there just for the sake of being there is wrong.

If it makes a loss, you either have to pull the plug or have a plan on how to make profit in the future.

 

[Crap Daddy]

So, these are terrible results. Why?

 

[Genx87]

So, these are terrible results. Why?

I'd venture to guess what AMDs problem has been and previously ATIs. Poor drivers. In the professional market driver support is vital. Why AMD cant figure this out after this many years is beyond me. It is almost like they enjoy watching their potential being pissed away on each new release.

 

[Genx87]

There's a review @ Hot Hardware. I've updated the OP with a link.

Looking at the benches they ran the performance is pretty dismal.

Yup more driver failing at AMD. Nvidia launching a new line of Quadro cards which wont help their situation either.

 

[sontin]

I'd venture to guess what AMDs problem has been and previously ATIs. Poor drivers. In the professional market driver support is vital. Why AMD cant figure this out after this many years is beyond me. It is almost like they enjoy watching their potential being pissed away on each new release.

In the end it's a money question. AMD's graphics business operates around a black 0. There is no money to invest in something which makes no huge revenue for them. nVidia had a little bit less than 90% of the overall professional market.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

AMD Jack of all trades, master of none.

 

[-Slacker-]

AMD Jack of all trades, master of none.

Moar worthless slogans please.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

It's a figure of speech, not a slogan.

"I’m lovin’ it" would be a slogan, McDonald's uses it I'm sure you're familiar with it.

"Stupid is what stupid does" would be a figure of speech, Forest Gump used it with great success.

 

[-Slacker-]

No it isn't.

 

[3DVagabond]

Just a couple of observations on this review.

Why no driver versions listed? Any review always lists driver versions for the cards tested. Looking at Hot Hardware's last Fire pro review on the 7900 they listed them. So, it's not because they don't do it.

A bit of older software used. They explain that it's all they have at their disposal for testing and it might not be fair to AMD.

We have to offer an evaluation of the cards as they exists today with the software and drivers at our disposal.

I'm not blaming Hot Hardware for doing this. I'm just pointing it out because it's easy to miss in the middle of the review.

 

[Homeles]

No it isn't.

Yeah, it is.

 

[Silverforce11]

Guess they have awhile to optimize their drivers til big K shows up.. but this is a piss poor effort, do not launch a product when your drivers aren't ready, its amateurish.

 

[Akantus]

Guess they have awhile to optimize their drivers til big K shows up.. but this is a piss poor effort, do not launch a product when your drivers aren't ready, its amateurish.

I don't want to start flame war or anything, nor am I hating AMD.
I know I'm going to regret this...

I would say launching a product without drivers ready is .... AMDish......YEAAAH

First 7000 series without proper driver for months and now this. This time it's even worse since it's about profesional market, where companies would rather buy slower product with proper support, than having to deal with bad support.
I know drivers not performing doesn't mean bad support, but it isn't good sign either.
Who wants to buy card that will "maybe" some time in the future have good performance?

Unless of course this review doesn't reflect reality by selective benchmarking, but I don't know about that...

 

[Silverforce11]

First 7000 series without proper driver for months and now this.

Whats your definition of proper and you got examples? Because I had the 7850 and it was flawless in every game I played. Now I own a 7950, it's also flawless.

As to the Firepro, its a given if you release top end next gen and its slower than last gen its a dud, and they are being amateurs by releasing it when its not ready. The bad rap will stick long after they fix the drivers.

 

[Akantus]

Whats your definition of proper and you got examples? Because I had the 7850 and it was flawless in every game I played. Now I own a 7950, it's also flawless.

As to the Firepro, its a given if you release top end next gen and its slower than last gen its a dud, and they are being amateurs by releasing it when its not ready. The bad rap will stick long after they fix the drivers.

Can't remeber exactly how long, but there wasn't non-beta driver for 7000 series for quite a long time after release. I'm not saying it isn't ok now.

And you are right about the bad reputation sticking.

 

[lopri]

Professionals that I know of don't read Hot Hardware let alone this forum, thankfully. (And for the record Hot Hardware is.. let's just say I don't go to Hot Hardware, either.) I mean, this forum is a hardware forum, in the end.

Professionals tend to discuss at a different places, where tests are run by the professionals and for the professionals. Not by the investors, employees, or advertisers.

Such as this -> http://www.cgchannel.com/2011/10/review-professional-gpus-nvidia-vs-amd-2011/

Though my guess is that given a year or two those places will also be infested by employees, investors, and fanboys.

 

[3DVagabond]

I'm not going to go searching through reviews to show that Southern Islands has had good driver support. The last time I did that the person making the claims came back with different conditions for the claim.

Overall, driver support for the 7000 cards has been very good. There was a while after release some reviewers and consumers were using Cat 11.12 WHQL drivers on them because they were released after the cards. They should have been using 11.12 RC11 though.

 

[Akantus]

Overall, driver support for the 7000 cards has been very good. There was a while after release some reviewers and consumers were using Cat 11.12 WHQL drivers on them because they were released after the cards. They should have been using 11.12 RC11 though.

That's what I'm talking about. There were newer WHQL drivers, which brought few improvements in games, but those were unusable on 7000's. Those improvements came later in unified driver if I remember correctly.

I didn't mean it like there were unusable, but not everything was optimal.
I would much rather have it, that cards were released with launch drivers and within, let's say 2 weeks, release proper WHQL drivers and iterate upon that. It's not like they didn't have the cards for quite some time before release.

 

[3DVagabond]

That's what I'm talking about. There were newer WHQL drivers, which brought few improvements in games, but those were unusable on 7000's. Those improvements came later in unified driver if I remember correctly.

I didn't mean it like there were unusable, but not everything was optimal.
I would much rather have it, that cards were released with launch drivers and within, let's say 2 weeks, release proper WHQL drivers and iterate upon that. It's not like they didn't have the cards for quite some time before release.

What difference does it make if their "proper WHQL" drivers, as long as they work? Sending drivers to M$ is just a formality. Cat 12.1 was released ~2wks after the 7970 hit the shelves. It seems like AMD had a separate driver for GCN from the prior arch's, which is understandable since it was a totally new design.

Why don't we see people complaining because when Kepler was first released it only ran at PCIE 2.0 and they didn't release a patch to enable PCIE 3.0 on it until late June? I know the answer, "PCIE 3.0 doesn't matter." If it was AMD though it would be because they have crappy drivers.

 

[Akantus]

What difference does it make if their "proper WHQL" drivers, as long as they work? Sending drivers to M$ is just a formality. Cat 12.1 was released ~2wks after the 7970 hit the shelves. It seems like AMD had a separate driver for GCN from the prior arch's, which is understandable since it was a totally new design.

Why don't we see people complaining because when Kepler was first released it only ran at PCIE 2.0 and they didn't release a patch to enable PCIE 3.0 on it until late June? I know the answer, "PCIE 3.0 doesn't matter." If it was AMD though it would be because they have crappy drivers.

I'm not comparing AMD/Nvidia... I just remember all those threads "still no WHQL driver for GCN" for some it doesn't matter if it's WHQL or not, for some it does.

But enough beating dead horse, you see it just as another nvidia fanboys "teh AMD makez crappy driverz", I was just talking real issues that happened, in relation to AMD launching professional product where drivers and proper support mean even more, and the only review we have at hand doesn't bring much hope of changes.

 

[ShintaiDK]

What difference does it make if their "proper WHQL" drivers, as long as they work? Sending drivers to M$ is just a formality. Cat 12.1 was released ~2wks after the 7970 hit the shelves. It seems like AMD had a separate driver for GCN from the prior arch's, which is understandable since it was a totally new design.

Why don't we see people complaining because when Kepler was first released it only ran at PCIE 2.0 and they didn't release a patch to enable PCIE 3.0 on it until late June? I know the answer, "PCIE 3.0 doesn't matter." If it was AMD though it would be because they have crappy drivers.

It means everything when the software supplying company rejects your support requests due to no WHQL drivers.

 

[3DVagabond]

I'm not comparing AMD/Nvidia... I just remember all those threads "still no WHQL driver for GCN" for some it doesn't matter if it's WHQL or not, for some it does.

But enough beating dead horse, you see it just as another nvidia fanboys "teh AMD makez crappy driverz", I was just talking real issues that happened, in relation to AMD launching professional product where drivers and proper support mean even more, and the only review we have at hand doesn't bring much hope of changes.

I'm definitely not trying to defend the Firepro performance. Arch wise, they should be burying the nVidia cards, and they clearly aren't. Drivers (at least with the apps used w/Catia) are the obvious culprit. Considering the price they are trying to charge for the W9000, they had better fix it fast.

 

[Jaydip]

3d add this link as well
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/firepro-w8000-w9000-benchmark,3265.html

 

[Akantus]

3d add this link as well
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/firepro-w8000-w9000-benchmark,3265.html

And again, the performance is all over the place. Either it wins (sometimes by a lot) or it loses badly. We all know the potential is there, but the results sometimes are, and sometimes aren't.

From the article:

"Then again, we don’t necessarily think that AMD's supporting software is as well-tuned as it could be in a number of different scenarios we tested. So, we recommend that you do some research into what you'll be doing with these cards before buying one of them."