How bad was AMD Bulldozer and its variants

[Insert_Nickname]

Excacator is in many ways a miracle.
Made by extremely scarce budget.
On a cheap and outdated process node.
On the foundation of the "cpu from hell" aka bd.
Respect from here.
But still 50% higher perf and half the power is like 5 years forward.
I hope my next slim notebook is a RR and not the usual boring 2c stuff from Intel. Man its like i had 10 of those.
(Edit i actually had 8 pcx dual core Intel notebooks and only a single 4c i7 as variation....arggg no more 2c please...)

EX is a miracle, especially the power management, that I agree wholeheartedly. What I can't help speculating is how BD would have fared, had EX been the starting point instead of BD?

I have enormous respect for the engineers who pulled it off, on a shoestring budget no less...

 

[DrMrLordX]

I think the Bulldozer 83xx series excels in those situations.

Honestly, at that point, I would think they'd be better off with an APU. You make some compromises, but the powerhungry nature of any Con-core 4m chip makes them . . . difficult to own unless you're very precise with how you tune their voltage and clockspeed.

Sure a 4m PD chip at around 4 GHz isn't that hard to tame. But 4.5 GHz and higher gets to be a bit much.

If someone is really on a shoestring budget, an old Kaveri or Carrizo/Bristol Ridge chip is actually much cheaper to own overall, in terms of upfront costs and power requirements/cooling. All you have to do is lower expectations a bit more and they'll get you through.