Idea - "Ryzen VGA card".

[VirtualLarry]

It has come up again and again, that AMD is not competitive at the low end or in business machines, with Ryzen, because no iGPU.

I know that Ryzen Mobile is coming out, and there have been waffelings about possibly not being released for Desktop?

Either way, a great way to move Ryzen CPUs, including the Ryzen 2000-series CPUs (Zen+), without an iGPU, would be to release a really cut-down RX 550 card, call it the RX 540 or 530, with half-again as many shaders (one fourth of the total shaders of the chip in RX 560), and possibly even GDDR3 or DDR3, if the GPU even has memory bus connections for older DRAM standards, but including support for 4K UHD video desktop output, and video-decoding support. Basically, a 4K-capable HTPC-style card. Make it passive, like the NV GT1030 card. Release it cheap, and make it a bundle, or offer a combo rebate, if you buy a Ryzen CPU with it.

That would go a long way towards ameliorating the difference in price and functionality, between Ryzen and Coffee Lake, for entry-level and business-class builds.

 

[jpiniero]

They do... the 520 and 530 is Oland though. Which is 5 years old. Although I think there's a second version of the 530 which may be a bit more recent gen but for sure is 28 nm. I don't think AMD wants to spend the money to do another mask for something that small.

 

[VirtualLarry]

They do... the 520 and 530 is Oland though. Which is 5 years old. Although I think there's a second version of the 530 which may be a bit more recent gen but for sure is 28 nm. I don't think AMD wants to spend the money to do another mask for something that small.

"Oland"? You mean the GPU in the R5 230 and 6450? That's not even GCN, is it?

I wasn't talking about needing another die spin, just a means for them to dispose of heavily-damaged RX 460/560 dies.

 

[jpiniero]

Oland is first gen GCN. It was rebranded into 240 and 250.

 

[cbn]

a really cut-down RX 550 card, call it the RX 540 or 530, with half-again as many shaders (one fourth of the total shaders of the chip in RX 560), and possibly even GDDR3 or DDR3, if the GPU even has memory bus connections for older DRAM standards, but including support for 4K UHD video desktop output, and video-decoding support. Basically, a 4K-capable HTPC-style card. Make it passive, like the NV GT1030 card. Release it cheap, and make it a bundle, or offer a combo rebate, if you buy a Ryzen CPU with it.

I'm thinking Polaris 12 (512sp) probably does have a DDR4 memory controller on it. It is the only reason I can think of why it has 128 bit bus like the 1024sp Polaris 11 used in the RX560.

P.S. From an older post I did calculate a cutdown Polaris 12 with DDR4 2400 would have a similar core to memory bandwidth ratio as RX 560:

It could even be DDR4 and a cut down version of Polaris 12. (re: 384sp @ DDR4 2400 actually has a similar core to memory bandwidth ratio as RX 560).

 

[VirtualLarry]

Is there even a Polaris 12 chip? I thought that RX 550 (512 SP) was just a binned / disabled RX 560 GPU chip (Polaris 11?)

 

[cbn]

Is there even a Polaris 12 chip? I thought that RX 550 (512 SP) was just a binned / disabled RX 560 GPU chip (Polaris 11?)

https://www.anandtech.com/show/11280/amd-announces-the-radeon-rx-500-series-polaris/2

At the heart of the RX 550 is AMD’s new Polaris 12 GPU. This is an even smaller, lower performance, and lower power GPU than Polaris 11. It features just 8 CUs – half as many as Polaris 11 – but a full 128-bit memory bus.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Thanks, cbn, I didn't realize that the RX 550 had it's own Polaris 12 die for 8 CUs. So if it does, and AMD doesn't sell anything with less CUs, then maybe they should... introduce an RX 540, with 256 shaders, and maybe 64-bit GDDR5, and especially, WITH the updated video-decode support, make it passively-cooled, and sell it for $50. Would make a nice Ryzen CPU compliment, for those rigs that need video-output and HDMI2.0 and video-decode support for 4K VP9 for YouTube.

 

[mikeymikec]

Is there a good explanation somewhere of what GCN does (at a "this is how it helps end users" level)? Wikipedia isn't much help.

 

[cbn]

64-bit GDDR5

I wonder if 4K Youtube could be played with 1GB VRAM?

(1GB GDDR5 should work for 64 bit since I see 128 bit with 2GB GDDR5)

 

[VirtualLarry]

Is there a good explanation somewhere of what GCN does (at a "this is how it helps end users" level)? Wikipedia isn't much help.

It's not directly so much of "how it helps end-users", so much as it is, GCN and derivatives are the only currently driver-supported architectures by AMD. If you buy a VLIW4/5 GPU ("Terascale"), then there are no new drivers for those cards. So it's really GCN or bust, if you want to be supported. Well, that and Vega, but Vega's not fully-supported (yet) either.

 

[VirtualLarry]

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/lenovo...1tb-hard-drive-silver/5887606.p?skuId=5887606

Seems to come with an OEM GDDR5 1GB video card? Could AMD already have implemented my idea, for the bigger OEMs wanting video-out for their Ryzen PCs?

AMD Radeon R5 340 graphics
Driven by 1GB GDDR5 dedicated video memory to quickly render high-quality images for videos and games.

https://www.techpowerup.com/gpudb/2683/radeon-r5-340-oem

It's Oland.

 

[mikeymikec]

It's not directly so much of "how it helps end-users", so much as it is, GCN and derivatives are the only currently driver-supported architectures by AMD. If you buy a VLIW4/5 GPU ("Terascale"), then there are no new drivers for those cards. So it's really GCN or bust, if you want to be supported. Well, that and Vega, but Vega's not fully-supported (yet) either.

Ah, I see. Thanks.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Someone posted in Hot Deals about the flood of Zotac GT 730 1GB GDDR5 PCI-E x16 video cards, for roughly $40 ea. HDMI/DVI/VGA. ITX-style, but with fan, not passive.

Seems ok to me, I bought some for my Ryzen builds

 

[IntelUser2000]

I wasn't talking about needing another die spin, just a means for them to dispose of heavily-damaged RX 460/560 dies.

The low end, especially if they want to fulfill what you are suggesting, is quite high volume, so not only they'd have to re-salvage such throwaway dies but may have to purposely cripple good ones as well.

Also the fixed function and media units don't change in size, so as the chip size becomes smaller, the more sacrifice they have to make to reduce the size. Nothing beats integration for low cost machines.