Low-down on these AMD "Zen" processors?

[SaltyNuts]

I know there is a huge thread talking about them and debating them, I was just wondering if someone could give the low-down on them. When are they (realistically) expected to be released, and how competitive will they be with Intel performance wise? I miss the days when AMD was more or less competitive with Intel (1st to hit 1 gigahertz baby!!!).

Thanks!






We have two other current zen threads.
Please use those.


http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2453341&page=24&highlight=zen

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2455082&highlight=zen


esquared
Anandtech Forum Director

 

[Arachnotronic]

Late 2016 is when you should see the first Zen CPUs aimed at desktop users. AMD says the CPU will provide a 40% boost in perf/clock over Excavator, which should mean that clock-for-clock it should be in Haswell territory. The big unknown at this point is what the CPUs will actually clock at and what AMD will price them at.

Everything beyond this is speculation.

 

[raghu78]

With AMD its better not to speculate as their claims in the past have often proven plain wrong. We have seen them talk too much and fail to walk the talk in the past few years. As an underdog supporter and a firm believer that competition is good for the consumer I am hoping they can surprise us. But given their track record I am not counting on it to happen.

 

[nismotigerwvu]

We're not going to know much performance wise until late next summer at the soonest. Anything you read now is conjecture. AMD has stated a 40% increase in IPC, but without clocks that's fairly meaningless. It could clock at 2.0ghz while barely moving the needle or it could come in at 4.0 ghz and really shake things up. Here's to hoping that we get a little competition again.

 

[Yuriman]

The expectation is that we'll get large core count chips, somewhere around Ivy Bridge to Haswell per-clock per-core performance, but it's mostly hearsay. AMD is hurting for cash in a bad way, so there's no reason to believe that if AMD builds a chip that out-performs Intel's current 4-core offerings that it will be priced anywhere near Intel's current 4-core offerings.

 

[mysticjbyrd]

Late 2016 is when you should see the first Zen CPUs aimed at desktop users. AMD says the CPU will provide a 40% boost in perf/clock over Excavator, which should mean that clock-for-clock it should be in Haswell territory. The big unknown at this point is what the CPUs will actually clock at and what AMD will price them at.

Everything beyond this is speculation.

I thought it was at least 40%? Did they confirm only 40% in another statement?

The expectation is that we'll get large core count chips, somewhere around Ivy Bridge to Haswell per-clock per-core performance, but it's mostly hearsay. AMD is hurting for cash in a bad way, so there's no reason to believe that if AMD builds a chip that out-performs Intel's current 4-core offerings that it will be priced anywhere near Intel's current 4-core offerings.

I read an article on Forbes that said they would become solvent within 2 years. Of course this was likely just some prediction.

I don't think AMD's hurting as bad as lot of people like to think. How many decades have people been predicting the demise of AMD?

I am not sure I follow your logic either. Price gauging would like hurt sells, not help. I seriously doubt Zen will be able to compete with Kabylake, thus they will have to compete by undercutting them, and aim for the price/performance market.