If AMD waits too long to drop prices, I will go with Intel

[thestain]

Anyone else losing patience with AMD? Edit June 11th.. Anyone understand the broken English regarding the price drop from AMD.. http://www.hkepc.com/bbs/itnews.php?tid=613657

No attempt to match price drops from Intel for a couple months now.. and with Conroe coming out in July or August .. my thought is if AMD drops prices really soon, I will still go with them, but if I have to wait much longer.. I might as well wait for the higher performing, lower cost Conroe, even though I don't like Intel.

AMD's pricing and lack of any real changes to its core.. means.. price drop soon or Intel here I come.

Anyone else ready to bolt from AMD to Intel if AMD does not drop prices soon?

 

[nzimmers]

Same here.....right now Intel has a very strong price/performance position.....I was looking to update from my 2.4ghz northwood (which is a decent chip still) but going amd to see big improvments would cost way to much.....I can get tons of performance for half the price if I chose another Intel platform

 

[Cooler]

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=27&threadid=1866364&enterthread=y

Massive Pice Cuts for intel coming soon!

 

[Xcobra]

well probably see a price drop in two to three months, i mean come on AM2 just came out, you just cant expect price to drop all of a sudden, be patient!

 

[thestain]

AMD should have slashed prices 20-30% accross the board when it launched AM2!!

This would have been the way to go!

With Intel's announced price cuts for July.. and some big ones at that and Conroe with a bang for the buck of 30-50% better than AMD's current line up.. the time for AMD to cut prices is running out! The window of opportunity for AMD to compete is now, not later!

If AMD drops prices significantly soon, before Conroe comes out.. then it makes its products a reasonable alternative at this time, but the time to cut prices is now, not later.. and.. the closer we get to Conroe and its superior performance and bang for the buck, the less likely most of us will want to pay a premium for second place technology.

The longer AMD waits to drop prices, the worse it will be for it!

 

[TuxDave]

I know how you feel. I was looking into upgrading my s939 3200+ into any X2 processor but I changed my mind once I saw that they're still so expensive.

 

[mamisano]

With nothing to challenge AMD's current line of processors why should they drop prices? They are selling everything they can produce right now. Once Core2 hits the streets and beats the AM2 processors, then the prices will HAVE TO come down.

I think it will soon be like when the Athlon XP was nearing end of life, they were much cheaper than the P4 chips because they were inferior for a time. When AMD releases an updated A64 to compete or beat Core2 then they can once again demand a premium.

 

[imported_UncivilizedAMD]

An 805 for 93 bux, that's gonna be ownage in sempron territory right there.

 

[thestain]

Originally posted by: mamisano
With nothing to challenge AMD's current line of processors why should they drop prices? They are selling everything they can produce right now. Once Core2 hits the streets and beats the AM2 processors, then the prices will HAVE TO come down.

1) They are not selling everything they can produce.
2) Their distributors inventory is growing, not declining.

Competition is not always based on presently available alternatives!

Intel is competing with AMD's present product based upon its future product. Don't you think AMD would be wise to compete with this future product? Do you think all the hype from Intel and its marketing are not directed at decision makers making buy now or later decisions?


In this case, with prices always falling a little.. I would go with AMD.. slight premium to buy today if priced at maybe a ten percent premium for performance compared to Conroe.. well worth it.. but.. that is not how AMD is pricing things.. the premium to buy today is more like 40% higher than where prices for similar or better performing Conroes will be in three months.

AMD can compete now with Conroe, with the advantage of having products already out there and they can ask a small premium for performance over the yet to be available Conroe, Core 2 Duo.. or AMD can keep prices SKY high and stick its head in the sand and imagine that it is only competing with existing, released, already on the market and available product lines, which by the way have had their prices dropped a lot more than AMD has recently.

The Stain

 

[Gamer X]

Originally posted by: mamisano
With nothing to challenge AMD's current line of processors why should they drop prices? They are selling everything they can produce right now. Once Core2 hits the streets and beats the AM2 processors, then the prices will HAVE TO come down.

I think it will soon be like when the Athlon XP was nearing end of life, they were much cheaper than the P4 chips because they were inferior for a time. When AMD releases an updated A64 to compete or beat Core2 then they can once again demand a premium.

QFT

 

[v8envy]

You want a superior product, be prepared to pay a premium price. I'm all over a 930 though, just as soon as I find a midrange motherboard likely to support Conroe. The coming Intel price drops look nice, but I'm not going to hang out another 4 weeks to save fifty bucks.

Upon further contemplation, I think it'd make sense for AMD to * raise * socket 939 prices. Just like AGP vs PCIe -- many people are stuck with perfectly functional DDR ram and premium motherboard, and thusly it's more economical for them to pay extra for a CPU which fits into their current plantform than replace the whole platform. $300 for a 3800x2 is much cheaper than $600 for a new motherboard/ram/CPU upgrade to a X4000 or equivalent and DDR2. That would still hold at $400 for a 3800x2, so hiking prices even fifty bucks across the board won't be out of line. They wouldn't get many new sales, but they'd definitely wring every last dollar out of the upgraders.

 

[Henny]

It would be tough for AMD to drop prices now since they're still at 90nm The cost benefits from 65nm don't hit until very late this year at the very earliest.

AMD doesn't care about us. Their focus is the high end server business.

 

[mamisano]

Dont forget, the number of people who purchase their 805 with the plan of overclocking is a drop in the buck compared to overall sales. Sure some Intel's offerings make sense to enthusiasts but not to a majority of people who keep their systems stock.

 

[v8envy]

And those people don't *NEED* the performance of an overclocked or high end CPU. They're perfectly fine with a single core 2.6 ghz netburst chip or 1.8 ghz sempron. More than fine. Over the top fine.

Very good point re: 90nm production costs. Only supports my viewpoint. Make fewer of the 90mm chips, price them way higher. That's the way you get the most return in a shrinking market.

You'll see AM2 chips selling for less than socket939 ones sooner rather than later. Just watch.

And while AMD may not care about the relatively small (but still huge $-wise) desktop market, Intel is looking to be looking at grabbing the whole thing. Very hard. Remember the spillover effect -- the geeks talking up the CPUs for server farms are probably enthusiasts in their time off. Gartner group recommendations and performance/watt reviews are one thing, your sysadmins going 'yes, but that's BS in our case because...' is quite another.

 

[secretanchitman]

Originally posted by: nzimmers
Same here.....right now Intel has a very strong price/performance position.....I was looking to update from my 2.4ghz northwood (which is a decent chip still) but going amd to see big improvments would cost way to much.....I can get tons of performance for half the price if I chose another Intel platform

exactly same here, down to my own 2.4C northwood...

 

[imported_UncivilizedAMD]

Even to the majority of people who keep their system stock, these new prices make sense to everybody. At the low end theres the 805 @ 93 bux with superior performance @ stock over all semprons within that price range. Midrange you have the 945 @ 163 which will go head to head with an AMD 3200+ @ 140 or even a 3500+ @ 195. Stock 3.4 dual core vs stock single core 2.0 and 2.2 is a nobrainer imo. Conroe E6300 is also expected at 183 also which is a way better choice than a 3500+ @195. Go higher and you have more Conroe vs am2 dual core and thats a nobrainer as well, superior performance at every price bracket matchup.

 

[thestain]

And while AMD may not care about the relatively small (but still huge $-wise) desktop market, Intel is looking to be looking at grabbing the whole thing. Very hard. Remember the spillover effect -- the geeks talking up the CPUs for server farms are probably enthusiasts in their time off. Gartner group recommendations and performance/watt reviews are one thing, your sysadmins going 'yes, but that's BS in our case because...' is quite another.

[/quote]

Great point. and with Conroe hitting retailers by the middle of July, this is why it really won't cost AMD that much to lower prices to the enthusiast market place and compete with Intel in this area. Word of mouth from the enthusiast goes a long way!

Those that say AMD should keep prices up.. are kind of missing the point.. I am a consumer and I have a choice to make.. buy now or wait and buy later.. with the HUGE price and performance edge currently touted by Intel for shortly after the 4th of July, what reason is AMD giving me to buy their soon to be over priced and under performing product? Conroe Conroe Conroe.. that is all everybody will be hearing after the 4th of July weekend.. so AMD needs to drop prices by the middle of June imo.

AMD needs to offer something.. maybe we will find out more on June 1st when AMD tells us more.. but.. right now, I need a reason to buy now from AMD, rather than wait for a E6700 that I could overclock to 3.2 GHZ on air, that cost about $530 and which will outperform not only anything AMD has now, but should outperform anything AMD has until next year at the earliest. Top of the Line AMD CPU's should be priced much, much lower considering they will get spanked so bad in two months time. AMD is going to have some real problems in six-eight weeks, if they don't do something today.

A lot of people are in "wait" mode.. and AMD could capitalize on a lot of pent up demand by unlocking its cpus and dropping prices NOW!

AMD.. lower prices and sell product now for a lot more even with reduced prices that you can in two months or don't lower prices now, have your customers buy from Intel and go out of business... AMD what you going to do?

The more I think about it, those guys at AMD see this coming like a freight train and are just waiting to get all the AM2 product in retailers hands by the middle to end of June and then they must know they are going to have to provide some serious incentives to consumers to buy their product and about all they have to offer is present availability and price, because Conroe has the better performance.

The Stain

 

[R3MF]

a 3.2Ghz 940 dual-core costs £165 versus £190 for a 2GHz 3800+ x2.

if you don't mind the extra heat/power requirement then even the old fashioned Pentium D is a better price/performance option!

AMD's pricing is very questionable at the moment.

 

[jwalker46]

If you look at the announced prices for Conroe, and the percentage performance gain, AMD would have to cut prices by 30-50% to be competitive (i.e. to offer the same performance per dollar).

Perhaps AMD simply and literally cannot afford such a large percent drop in revenue. My guess is, AMD's sales will collapse, but somewhere en route to bankruptcy it will be bought out by a Chinese company just for its distribution channel.

 

[lifeblood]

Conroe is how many months away and people are already talking of the demise of AMD? I have a hard time believing AMD is in such a precarious position.

A small price cut by AMD now would be nice. A major price cut when Conroe comes out is more likely. If you look at history companies usually don?t cut their prices until their competitor actually starts selling its competing product.

I?m hoping for a deep price cut on AMD?s X2 processors. Considering my investment in my current system, it makes more sense for me to upgrade to an X2 than throw out my RAM, motherboard, etc and go with Conroe.

 

[Dribble]

Prices are dictated by supply as well as demand. I suspect AMD don't have that many AM2 cpu's too sell. If they lower prices then they won't have the cpu's to keep up with demand. The price is probably balanced so they sell the stock they have for the highest price they can get away with.

 

[Viditor]

Originally posted by: UncivilizedAMD
Even to the majority of people who keep their system stock, these new prices make sense to everybody. At the low end theres the 805 @ 93 bux with superior performance @ stock over all semprons within that price range. Midrange you have the 945 @ 163 which will go head to head with an AMD 3200+ @ 140 or even a 3500+ @ 195. Stock 3.4 dual core vs stock single core 2.0 and 2.2 is a nobrainer imo. Conroe E6300 is also expected at 183 also which is a way better choice than a 3500+ @195. Go higher and you have more Conroe vs am2 dual core and thats a nobrainer as well, superior performance at every price bracket matchup.

1. The 805 is ONLY better in multitasking apps...in single threaded it's worse than the Sempron. It certainly is a better choice for overclockers, but a worse choice for gamers (unless you only like to play SMP optimised games).
2. I've never heard of of the Intel 945...what is it?
3. We don't know how well the Conroes with the smaller cache will perform yet...

 

[Viditor]

Originally posted by: thestain
Anyone else losing patience with AMD?

No attempt to match price drops from Intel for a couple months now.. and with Conroe coming out in July or August .. my thought is if AMD drops prices really soon, I will still go with them, but if I have to wait much longer.. I might as well wait for the higher performing, lower cost Conroe, even though I don't like Intel.

AMD's pricing and lack of any real changes to its core.. means.. price drop soon or Intel here I come.

Anyone else ready to bolt from AMD to Intel if AMD does not drop prices soon?

To each their own...I'm very happy with my X2 ATM. If I needed a system today, I'd still probably go AM2 and upgrade to K8L early next year.
There's always something better down the road, so I guess it depends on when you need a computer.

 

[lifeblood]

Will K8L be socket AM2? Will an AM2 motherboard bought today with with K8L? If that's so it provides a good reason to by an AMD AM2 based system today.

 

[thestain]

Well..

1) I sure hope we see AMD come out with K8L earlier, rather than later..

2) It will probably have too many pins to fit on the AM2 platform, but if anyone can pull it off, AMD can.

3) Good point on lower cache Conroes.. no benchies out for the smaller cache models.

4) how much wood would a would chucker chuck if a would chucker could chuck would?

5) It looks like Conroe by Middle of July

6) AMD might be cutting back on production of the old stuff already.. word out of East Germany is FAB 30 is getting removed from production for a complete over-haul and change in wafers they use from 200 MM to 450 MM..

7) I sure hope AMD comes out with Greyhound ASAP.

and.. one nice thing i have heard is that with tweaks to DDR2/DDR3 memory controller on the new AM2 cpus.. DDR3 will be very well managed by the time K8L comes out.

but, back to the point.. anyone else waiting for a price drop from AMD or for the new Conroe?

The sooner AMD drops prices, the sooner a lot of people who don't want to wait, even the few weeks until Conroe comes out, will buy AMD instead.