Athlon 64 architect returns to AMD

[NTMBK]

http://www.anandtech.com/show/6129/apple-a4a5-designer-k8-lead-architect-jim-keller-returns-to-amd

Could this be the start of a turnaround for AMD? Lots of leading brains behind the Bulldozer architecture are out, and the man behind the chip that beat Intel is back in charge of chip architecture.

 

[PricklyPete]

that is good to hear...competition is a good thing.

 

[ShadowVVL]

hmmmI dont think it will make a big difference but who know.I hope it does but what can 1 man do to stop the iron fist that is intel?

 

[Arkadrel]

That sounds like good news for once.

Looks like he does good work where ever he goes, and the company he's in gets on track and gets bought up by someone else

"lead architect on AMD's K8 processor (the original Athlon 64)"
"system engineer on K7 (the original Athlon)"
"co-author of the x86-64 spec"

"co-authoring the Hyper Transport"

Notice how Steve Job's main guys where AMD people?
Raja Koduri (former AMD Graphics CTO) and Jim Keller (CPU dude)

Dude was behinde the ipads too..
Sometimes a few great minds can really change a company for the better.
I hope he can help the mess AMD is in.
​

 

[Rifter]

Not going to help, too little too late. AMD just doesnt have the fabs to compete with intel.

 

[Arkadrel]

@Rifter

It cant hurt haveing the guy around
He did good work at apple with the Ipads.
He did good work at AMD, back then AMD was much more competetive with intel than it is today.

 

[sm625]

Hey Jim do you read these forums?

 

[grkM3]

going from memory the athlon was bought from the great minds at DEC from there alpha chip or who ever had it.

 

[Homeles]

Not going to help, too little too late. AMD just doesnt have the fabs to compete with intel.

Apparently you haven't been paying attention at all during the last 6 months. AMD is no longer contractually bound to GloFo. Even then, GloFo's brand new New York fab goes into production this year

 

[pantsaregood]

AMD is a pretty big ship. It isn't going to turn on a dime.

That said, this may turn the Bulldozer architecture into a repeat of NetBurst. Piledriver is as unimpressive as Bulldozer as initially, and I don't see Steamroller or Excavator being great. I don't know how committed AMD is to either of those revisions, so we may see another Tejas/Cedarmill episode.

 

[Edgemeal]

Not going to help, too little too late. AMD just doesnt have the fabs to compete with intel.

Even when AMD owned their own fabs they never had the capacity to really compete with Intel. Look at ARM, they don't have any fabs yet in Q2 alone two billion ARM chips were sold (according to AMRs Q2 report).

AMD needs all the help they can get, hopefully this guy will make a difference.

 

[TakeNoPrisoners]

Most likely nothing will happen and AMD will continue on the path bulldozer made to failure.

 

[Ajay]

going from memory the athlon was bought from the great minds at DEC from there alpha chip or who ever had it.

Keller was from DEC where he worked on the 21164 and 21264. Question is, was he hired for his ARM experience or his track record of working on/contributing to innovative CPU architectures?

 

[Homeles]

Piledriver is as unimpressive as Bulldozer as initially

Wat

So hold on a minute, Piledriver — an upgrade — is now just as bad as something that was either a downgrade or side grade depending on the application? Please tell me you're serious... this is quite hilarious.

 

[SlowSpyder]

Wat

So hold on a minute, Piledriver — an upgrade — is now just as bad as something that was either a downgrade or side grade depending on the application? Please tell me you're serious... this is quite hilarious.

I thought the early Piledriver info looked good. Not an Ivy Bridge killer, but better performance at lower power than Bulldozer. That's heading in the right direction at least.

 

[ThatsABigOne]

Count on it, it is not going to make a difference.

 

[AtenRa]

The Bulldozer architecture will be the main X86 design for AMDs Server, High End desktop PCs and the CPU cores of APUs for the next 3-5 years.

If you expecting a radical change in the next few months better forget it, it takes years to design a new microarchitecture.

 

[Homeles]

Count on it, it is not going to make a difference.

This guy's resume speaks for itself.

 

[BenchPress]

Not going to help, too little too late. AMD just doesnt have the fabs to compete with intel.

Fabs aren't their main issue. First and foremost they need a competitive architecture. And while it's too late for Bulldozer and its direct descendents, AMD is working on longer term architectures already and this is where Jim Keller can help to make a real difference. The Athlon 64 was amazing and if he really had a big hand in that then having him back at AMD is great news.

 

[Rvenger]

Fabs aren't their main issue. First and foremost they need a competitive architecture. And while it's too late for Bulldozer and its direct descendents, AMD is working on longer term architectures already and this is where Jim Keller can help to make a real difference. The Athlon 64 was amazing and if he really had a big hand in that then having him back at AMD is great news.

I agree, this will affect AMD's future and this is a great thing.

 

[jhu]

That sounds like good news for once.

Looks like he does good work where ever he goes, and the company he's in gets on track and gets bought up by someone else

"lead architect on AMD's K8 processor (the original Athlon 64)"
"system engineer on K7 (the original Athlon)"
"co-author of the x86-64 spec"

"co-authoring the Hyper Transport"

Notice how Steve Job's main guys where AMD people?
Raja Koduri (former AMD Graphics CTO) and Jim Keller (CPU dude)

Dude was behinde the ipads too..
Sometimes a few great minds can really change a company for the better.
I hope he can help the mess AMD is in.
​

You forgot this part:

having worked on the Alpha 21164 and 21264

 

[Phynaz]

He was with AMD for a year. He didn't have much of an impact on anything in that short of a time-frame, and he certainly didn't architect a CPU in a year (not that one person could do it anyway).

Basically for a year he managed the CPU team.

 

[AnitaPeterson]

Most likely nothing will happen and AMD will continue on the path bulldozer made to failure.

I, for one, do not relish the prospect of leaving the CPU market almost exclusively to Intel, and the GPU market almost exclusively to nVidia... Why would you?

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Can't hurt, AMD needs something even if it may just be a mind-share move.

Basically for a year he managed the CPU team.

These people are paid a ton of money for a reason, look at Jay Wilson as to how much good/bad can come from a single person even if that person didn't write a single line of code or do any actual work.

The choices they make can have a huge impact both good and/or bad on the end product.

 

[moonbogg]

AMD is mixing it up and changing stuff for sure. I would like to see them somehow come back, but right now its just hard to imagine. Ideally I will be dying to throw my money at them for a sick "AMD FX Revolution" CPU rig (which is what it should be called). BUT I doubt it. For now and likely for the next 10 years, they are still just aMd.