Intel delays 14 nm KabyLake to 2016H2/2017Q1, 10 nm Cannonlake to 2017H2/2018Q1

[Fjodor2001]

You misunderstand. Those of us in the "Intel fan-club," as it were, are saying that AMD is irrelevant right now so that if they disappeared off the planet now it would make no difference.

If AMD were to come in with competitive products, then Intel would of course have to react. However, the "AMD fan-club" seems to think that AMD launching competitive products here is a given.

I agree with you on this. But not all on the forum do. That's my point.

Some even believe that a monopoly would result in better performing and lower priced Intel CPUs.

Yes, that's what would happen if AMD were to become more competitive.

Good that we agree on that too.

Strange though that so many seem to wish for AMD to go bankrupt as soon as possible and that Zen will be unsuccessful. Those having such wishes are in my opinion severely biased, and not primarily interested in what benefits the consumers, but rather what benefits a specific company.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Meaning what?

Will competition lead to lower Intel CPU prices and better performing products at the same price point, or not?

You're avoiding that question...

Yes, duh, competition leads to better value to the consumer. Nobody with even a cursory knowledge of freshman economics will dispute this.

What everyone is saying is that AMD's product offerings are so feeble today that the demise of AMD at this point would not have a material impact on Intel's pricing/delivered performance to customers.

Again, you seem to think it's a foregone conclusion that AMD will be competitive and will absolutely force Intel's pricing down. We have to wait and see whether Zen is any good or just another PowerPoint Tiger.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Strange though that so many seem to wish for AMD to go bankrupt as soon as possible and that Zen will be unsuccessful. Those having such wishes are in my opinion severely biased, and not primarily interested in what benefits the consumers, but rather what benefits a specific company.

I don't think people are necessarily "wishing" for it; I think they are merely "predicting" it. Also don't confuse healthy skepticism of a company that, frankly, is very poorly run and underfunded with a desire to see it fail.

 

[Sweepr]

Meaning what?

Will competition lead to lower Intel CPU prices and better performing products at the same price point, or not?

You're avoiding that question...

I must have missed that question, probably because you didn't ask.
Sure, assuming AMD puts out an interesting product (both performance and price) then I see Intel lowering prices or offering something better for the same price.

Too bad this doesn't fit your alternate reality were AMD sells cheaper and faster 8C/16T chips with Haswell IPC for less than Intel quad-cores (meaning no Intel response).

You're just bitter because in 2016 you'll be sitting on an expensive and slow 4 core Intel CPU, while others will be using a cheaper and faster 8 core AMD CPU.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Some even believe that a monopoly would result in better performing and lower priced Intel CPUs.

Nah, it wouldn't.

 

[Fjodor2001]

Yes, duh, competition leads to better value to the consumer. Nobody with even a cursory knowledge of freshman economics will dispute this.

Some do:

But how would a monopoly on CPUs lower the price for the consumer?

I said prices would be the same or lower.

And that's what I'm objecting to.

Again, you seem to think it's a foregone conclusion that AMD will be competitive and will absolutely force Intel's pricing down. We have to wait and see whether Zen is any good or just another PowerPoint Tiger.

Absolutely not. You're misinterpreting me. I'm saying that if AMD Zen is competitive, it will lower prices and/or force Intel to provide better performing products at the same price point.

So at least it has the potential to drive prices down and improve performance/price. If it'll actually perform well enough to do that, we'll just have to wait and see.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Absolutely not. You're misinterpreting me. I'm saying that if AMD Zen is competitive, it will lower prices and/or force Intel to provide better performing products at the same price point.

So at least it has the potential to drive prices down and improve performance/price. If it'll actually perform well enough to do that, we'll just have to wait and see.

Then I apologize. We appear to be in agreement, then!

 

[ShintaiDK]

So what are you saying - if Intel is faced with competition, they may have to lower prices or provide better performing products for the same price after all?

In that case you're changing your opinion now. Monopoly does not mean lower Intel CPU prices after all?

If Zen is this god chip you dream of. Then Zen will be 1059$ or higher due to limited supply.

When AMD was in the lead with K8. They took all the money they could get and then some. And one thing is certain, you, as the consumer dont get anything from it price wise. You pay the same (or more) for the performance point as always. The performance point may change, but the price wont. (It may go up due to supply.)

The only question is who will take what price. But you are not going to get your dream chip for cheap.

Remember, we never had cheaper CPUs since AMD became irrelevant. How do you explain that?

 

[krumme]

The economics most do not grasp here is that even if amd is a miniscule unimportant player in regards to marketshare it still have a profound inpact on pricing and portfolio from Intel. Its the same to all markets if its apples or cpu.

An example is Intels response to the new a57 server cpu from amd. An example shintai screamed out in the forum.

At the same time - 2 post away - we hear this nonsense story from him about lower prices if there is no competition.

But his viewpoint is reflected by others. Whatever suit an agenda. I am a little with Fjodor by saying more consistence is preferred and perhaps a more nuanced decription is in order

 

[krumme]

Regarding the rumours about delay. Its normally automaticly viewed as bad. But what bad is there about it if its needed for profit? More time is usually an excellent way to less cost.
There is no point in bleeding edge nodes if the benefit is not there. Then its better to use the investments elsewhere be it new arch new software whatever.

 

[frozentundra123456]

Well if there is anything Fjodor is, it is consistent!!

 

[ShintaiDK]

The economics most do not grasp here is that even if amd is a miniscule unimportant player in regards to marketshare it still have a profound inpact on pricing and portfolio from Intel. Its the same to all markets if its apples or cpu.

However its important to remember its a dynamic demand with an industry that depends on huge cash flows. High prices=Bankrupt company.

 

[Phynaz]

I'm saying that if AMD Zen is competitive, it will lower prices and/or force Intel to provide better performing products at the same price point.

AMD having a competitive product isn't enough. Intel will only move if they lose significant market share.

Considering AMD's execution problems for the last decade, they could have a very competitive product, but still not be competitive in the market.

Build it and they will come works in movies, not in the real world. For example, look at Apple. Nobody has been able to move the needle in the smartphone market regardless of how competitive the devices may be. It's still Apple, and everyone else.

 

[Arachnotronic]

AMD having a competitive product isn't enough. Intel will only move if they lose significant market share.

Considering AMD's execution problems for the last decade, they could have a very competitive product, but still not be competitive in the market.

Build it and they will come works in movies, not in the real world. For example, look at Apple. Nobody has been able to move the needle in the smartphone market regardless of how competitive the devices may be. It's still Apple, and everyone else.

I think people, especially on technical forums, hugely underestimate the value of a good sales/marketing team.

 

[Fjodor2001]

AMD having a competitive product isn't enough. Intel will only move if they lose significant market share.

There seems to be different opinions on that among users on the forum. Some believe that Intel would rather lower CPU price than lose market share. Other's like you believe that they'd rather give up market share than lower price (i.e. as they did before when AMD was competitive in the server CPU market segment).

Considering AMD's execution problems for the last decade, they could have a very competitive product, but still not be competitive in the market.

Build it and they will come works in movies, not in the real world. For example, look at Apple. Nobody has been able to move the needle in the smartphone market regardless of how competitive the devices may be. It's still Apple, and everyone else.

Some comments:

* Android has a larger share of the smartphone market than iOS/Apple.
* There are Andoid phones at the same high price point as iPhone that are selling well (e.g. Samsung S6).
* The comparison between iPhone vs x86 CPUs is not completely fair anyway. Because x86 SW can be run on both AMD and Intel CPUs (and other potential x86 CPUs supporting the same ISA). So there is no ecosystem tied to it like there is on iPhone/iOS, where you can only run iOS SW on iPhone, and only access the Apple ecosystem from it.

I.e. it is quite easy to shift between an Intel x86 CPU and an AMD x86 CPU, and vice versa. They are more like commodities.

 

[Arachnotronic]

There seems to be different opinions on that among users on the forum. Some believe that Intel would rather lower CPU price than lose market share. Other's like you believe that they'd rather give up market share than lower price (i.e. as they did before when AMD was competitive in the server CPU market segment).

The reason Intel lost share in the server space during AMD's "reign" wasn't for stubbornness on pricing.

In the data center the only equation that matters is total cost of ownership, or TCO. This includes but is certainly not limited to upfront acquisition costs; in fact a significantly more power efficient solution, when deployed at scale, will be far cheaper for the data center operators to own.

Intel lost share because its products were watt-sucking under-performers that were too expensive to own over the long-term compared to the best Opteron solutions at the time. Intel could have brought chip prices to zero and that wouldn't have stopped AMD's incursion at the time.

 

[Fjodor2001]

The reason Intel lost share in the server space during AMD's "reign" wasn't for stubbornness on pricing.

In the data center the only equation that matters is total cost of ownership, or TCO. This includes but is certainly not limited to upfront acquisition costs; in fact a significantly more power efficient solution, when deployed at scale, will be far cheaper for the data center operators to own.

Intel lost share because its products were watt-sucking under-performers that were too expensive to own over the long-term compared to the best Opteron solutions at the time. Intel could have brought chip prices to zero and that wouldn't have stopped AMD's incursion at the time.

I think what should be considered is the total cost of ownership (TCO). That will include the price of the CPU, energy costs, etc. Depending the average CPU load, energy costs in a country, expected lifetime, etc the TCO and thus buying decision may differ between companies buying servers.

But anyway, the issue is the same. Assuming Intel's competition can provide lower TCO, will they rather give up market share, or lower the price of the CPUs to retain market share?

Also, remember that it's not just server CPUs we're talking about if it's Zen being discussed, but also high end desktop CPUs and APUs.

 

[Arachnotronic]

But anyway, the issue is the same. Assuming Intel's competition can provide lower TCO, will they rather give up market share, or lower the price of the CPUs to retain market share?

Lower the price of CPUs. It's better to get some revenue at lower margin in this case than completely lose the sale.

People think that Intel "loves its high margins" because it has this dumb fixation on maintaining a certain level of margin. Not the case. Gross profit margin is honestly the best indicator of how competitive a particular company's product portfolio is. The more competitive your products are relative to competition, the greater your margins are.

So, no, Intel isn't going to keep its prices the same and just let sales walk away if its competition can provide a better TCO (although how would they do this?); they will respond in a manner that maximizes profit for itself and its shareholders.

 

[dark zero]

However its important to remember its a dynamic demand with an industry that depends on huge cash flows. High prices=Bankrupt company.

Luxury companies and Apple says Hello.

Also Intel is going to that path... Now the Atom x5 is on $20, a little more than the BT Atom

 

[Phynaz]

I think people, especially on technical forums, hugely underestimate the value of a good sales/marketing team.

AMD certainly has :biggrin:

 

[Phynaz]

There seems to be different opinions on that among users on the forum. Some believe that Intel would rather lower CPU price than lose market share. Other's like you believe that they'd rather give up market share than lower price (i.e. as they did before when AMD was competitive in the server CPU market segment).

When did say that? Please take the time to comprehend my posts. I said Intel will only take action if they lose market share.

Do you really think if AMD comes out with a product that is competitive in performance Intel is going to take some kind of action in a panic before it's even determined if the AMD product sells?

You have to be grossly ignorant about business to believe price is the only lever Intel has. We all see how being the low cost provider has made AMD irrelevant, and brought them to the brink bankruptcy. Unless AMD's business strategy is to keep selling off parts of itself until there's nothing left.

* Android has a larger share of the smartphone market than iOS/Apple.
* There are Andoid phones at the same high price point as iPhone that are selling well (e.g. Samsung S6).

Thanks for proving my point.

All the above and Apple has never used price as a sales tool. You know why? Because he who lives by price dies by price. Otherwise known as "watch your margins". I think I advised you in the past to take a business 101 class at your local community college so you can obtain a grasp on these principals.

* The comparison between iPhone vs x86 CPUs is not completely fair anyway.

It's an analogy, not a comparison.

 

[Arachnotronic]

All the above and Apple has never used price as a sales tool. You know why? Because he who lives by price dies by price. Otherwise knows as "watch your margins". I think I advised you in the past to take a business 101 class at your local community college so you can obtain a grasp on these principals.

I think another way to put what you're saying is that good companies find ways to deliver more value (through added R&D investments, marketing, etc.) rather than simply slashing price.

Think NVIDIA with things like GameWorks, GeForce Experience, etc.

 

[Phynaz]

I think another way to put what you're saying is that good companies find ways to deliver more value (through added R&D investments, marketing, etc.) rather than simply slashing price.

Think NVIDIA with things like GameWorks, GeForce Experience, etc.

Exactly. You get it.

 

[Nothingness]

I think another way to put what you're saying is that good companies find ways to deliver more value (through added R&D investments, marketing, etc.) rather than simply slashing price.

Think NVIDIA with things like GameWorks, GeForce Experience, etc.

How does Intel contra revenue fit here? :biggrin:

 

[tenks]

Woa what happened to my thread? looks like the title got edited by someone else? weird.


I originally posted that everything was delayed, but then I realized Wcctech could be interpreting the announcement wrong and went back to the original Intel news about Kaby/cannonlake delay. And I saw it was in line with what was said already...Couldn't figure out how to delete the thread, but it looks like my initial thoughts about the delay were right...Weird and confused!