New AMD Roadmap for 2013 (donanimhaber.com)

[mrmt]

You are a young boy and have not experienced the pre 1995 pricing structure for cpu

Instead of trying to show how good your economic knowledge aged maybe you could point us what were the underlying factors that resulted in the 1995 price structure and if the same factors are present, or could be replicated in the market today.

I can tell that two of the elements aren't. There isn't a boom in the market like the 1990 and there isn't low hanging fruits as before, as the amount of efforts you have to put on fabs, R&D and marketing effort is orders of magnitude bigger than before. They need a lot of money to run all this.

This somehow limits how much Intel can charge for a processor, as they must balance not only their gross margins but also cash flow to fund R&D and CAPEX on their fabs.

That said, I do know that competition is good for the market, but that competition isn't AMD.

AMD had some nice years ten years ago when Intel was totally disoriented. Hyper Transport, the highly efficient Athlon and Athlon 64, the DDR push, all those were good things to consumers, but those were all in the market in 2003.

From there AMD basically spent the next 8 years (!) milking the same architecture and then gave us the 8th wonder of the world, Bulldozer. In the mean time Intel woke up, reclaimed the performance crown in desktops, wiped out AMD in servers and workstations, and has been pushing innovation in the x86 space regardless of AMD. It is AMD copying Intel, as it was before Athlon, not the opposite.

AMD simply isn't relevant in the x86 market for innovation. It does not have the resources to compete, let alone innovate. If AMD goes under tomorrow we probably would see prices stop falling.

 

[boxleitnerb]

But...but...but...according to Rory Read "it's in our DNA to innovate"

SCNR, he said it like 4 times in the webcast last week.

 

[mrmt]

But...but...but...according to Rory Read "it's in our DNA to innovate"

SCNR, he said it like 4 times in the webcast last week.

Should be his new marketing motto. The incompetent used to say "execution" more than 10 times in each of the previous EC.

 

[krumme]

Intel have been competing against washing machines, hookers and drugs since dawn. And so does everybody else. Its nothing new and extrodinary.

If there was a competitor for the 6 core Intel the price would drop. Its not rocket science, it happens each day, and Intel is no magical exception - far from. The x86 cpu is needed all over the b2b market, and there is no alternative within realistic reach because of the enormous TCO involved on the customer side. Period. Get it?

All the celeron, pentium stuff is because of AMD, without AMD there would not have been such thing. And now, if it wasnt for A15 and bobcat on 28nm we wouldnt see Atom on new process nodes in the agressive moves Intel does now. Its a direct consequence of competetion. If there was competition on the top we would easily see 8 cores , there is plenty room. The desktop top end, and the server market, is one major classic text book cash cow, fuelled by no competition.

The dilemma is ofcourse there is a natural tendency towards monopoly in this market for obvious reasons.

And yes i agree its not AMD that is the main competitor for Intel any more, its TSMC and Samsung, but even the slight competition they give from bobcats to the apus, still have a significant impact on the market. Even a small player with low volume can force prices down.

 

[mrmt]

If there was a competitor for the 6 core Intel the price would drop. Its not rocket science, it happens each day, and Intel is no magical exception - far from. The x86 cpu is needed all over the b2b market, and there is no alternative within realistic reach because of the enormous TCO involved on the customer side. Period. Get it?

You are stating the obvious, that a more competitive market would make Intel accept lower ROI/ROE, but that competition isn't AMD. AMD is small enough and too behind the technology curve for that.

All the celeron, pentium stuff is because of AMD, without AMD there would not have been such thing.

Oh, really? So Intel designed specific Pentium and Celeron SKU? Just because of AMD?

Celeron and Pentium are die-savaged i3, they are not a specific SKU. You are assuming that Intel would throw troves of failed i3 in the toiled and go for another run on its fabs instead of selling those failed SKUs for a few bucks, just because of AMD. Given Intel necessity for high volumes, I don't see this as a viable theory.

And now, if it wasnt for A15 and bobcat on 28nm we wouldnt see Atom on new process nodes in the agressive moves Intel does now. Its a direct consequence of competetion.

Silvermont because of AMD? wow, thanks. And here I thought that Intel was pushing so hard on Atom for it to have an edge over ARM on tablets.

If there was competition on the top we would easily see 8 cores , there is plenty room.

You forgot Westmere-EX, a 10-core CPU.

But I you are wrong here. SNB-EP die size isn't really small by any standards (sure, smaller than AMD big chip, but that's not anything to talk about), and TDP have to be in check. A SNB-EP MCM would have twice the cores but would probably operate at very low frequencies, something that would impair single thread performance.

Single thread performance is very, very important. You can't paralellize everything and once you reach this limit, the speed of your program will be dictated by the sequential part of the code, where IPC is the only measure that matters.

This "Moar Cores!!!" cry is nothing more than AMD marketing at work. Is it always the answer? I think it is not:

http://semiaccurate.com/2012/11/04/amd-launches-16-core-abu-dhabi-opterons/

Worse yet, any potential customer thinking of buying on price will be scared away by one other little problem, power use. The Xeon is a 135W part, the Opteron is 115W, so AMD is better right? Differences in how TDP is calculated between two companies aside, to do the same about of work, AMD needs two 115W CPUs for every Intel 135W CPU, not to mention the overhead of servers, switches, storage, and everything else. Power costs are a significant portion of TCO, and AMD is almost twice the power use of Intel.

Moar cores!!! does not always mean moar Performance, but always means Moar Complexity and Moar Heat.

I do think that it's not entirely lack of competition that prevent better Intel server chips, but stricter validation requirements for the mission critical servers they are trying to dominate and design trade offs such as power consumption and die size area. It is a more balance approach than being Gung-Ho on core count.

And yes i agree its not AMD that is the main competitor for Intel any more, its TSMC and Samsung, but even the slight competition they give from bobcats to the apus, still have a significant impact on the market. Even a small player with low volume can force prices down.

If it is a small player with low volumes they can't force prices down, as it will either lift its price or will run out of units well before having any meaningful impact on prices. That's not really AMD case here.

You seem to think that the low prices are because of AMD presence in the market. It isn't. AMD is losing money right now, which means that if they could sell their chips for more they would. Low prices comes from Intel relentless drive to maximize their own profits with enough cash flows to stay ahead of the rest of the industry. What sometimes happen is that AMD carves a niche and Intel responds in the next generation or two wiping it out of the market. It's been a while since AMD came with a truly innovative or disruptive product.

So in a sense we are all better with AMD around, but not much better. If the company go under there won't be price hikes or total lack of innovation. It's not 2003, Intel can supply the entire x86 market if needed and has ARM to worry about in the future, and Intel has to push itself hard enough to keep the interest on new hardware.

 

[cytg111]

http://www.anandtech.com/show/6290/...well-transactional-synchronization-extensions

- I dont think I really want/need a 6 core+ beast, without the issues in said artice adressed.. Eye to eye, a 4 core system that features TX (according to chart), will perform like a 5 core without. Now next gen is not eye to eye, better IPC and likely higher clocks (how else will they sell em in wallmart), so a 6 core Sandy or even Ivey .. vs haswell? I think they'll perform on par on heavy threaded apps(not counting avx2) and haswell will pull ahead in lightly threaded apps ..
Thats why i dont understand the IVB-E push next year .. makes no sense..

 

[krumme]

You are stating the obvious, that a more competitive market would make Intel accept lower ROI/ROE, but that competition isn't AMD. AMD is small enough and too behind the technology curve for that.



Oh, really? So Intel designed specific Pentium and Celeron SKU? Just because of AMD?

Celeron and Pentium are die-savaged i3, they are not a specific SKU. You are assuming that Intel would throw troves of failed i3 in the toiled and go for another run on its fabs instead of selling those failed SKUs for a few bucks, just because of AMD. Given Intel necessity for high volumes, I don't see this as a viable theory.



Silvermont because of AMD? wow, thanks. And here I thought that Intel was pushing so hard on Atom for it to have an edge over ARM on tablets.



You forgot Westmere-EX, a 10-core CPU.

But I you are wrong here. SNB-EP die size isn't really small by any standards (sure, smaller than AMD big chip, but that's not anything to talk about), and TDP have to be in check. A SNB-EP MCM would have twice the cores but would probably operate at very low frequencies, something that would impair single thread performance.

Single thread performance is very, very important. You can't paralellize everything and once you reach this limit, the speed of your program will be dictated by the sequential part of the code, where IPC is the only measure that matters.

This "Moar Cores!!!" cry is nothing more than AMD marketing at work. Is it always the answer? I think it is not:

Moar cores!!! does not always mean moar Performance, but always means Moar Complexity and Moar Heat.

I do think that it's not entirely lack of competition that prevent better Intel server chips, but stricter validation requirements for the mission critical servers they are trying to dominate and design trade offs such as power consumption and die size area. It is a more balance approach than being Gung-Ho on core count.



If it is a small player with low volumes they can't force prices down, as it will either lift its price or will run out of units well before having any meaningful impact on prices. That's not really AMD case here.

You seem to think that the low prices are because of AMD presence in the market. It isn't. AMD is losing money right now, which means that if they could sell their chips for more they would. Low prices comes from Intel relentless drive to maximize their own profits with enough cash flows to stay ahead of the rest of the industry. What sometimes happen is that AMD carves a niche and Intel responds in the next generation or two wiping it out of the market. It's been a while since AMD came with a truly innovative or disruptive product.

So in a sense we are all better with AMD around, but not much better. If the company go under there won't be price hikes or total lack of innovation. It's not 2003, Intel can supply the entire x86 market if needed and has ARM to worry about in the future, and Intel has to push itself hard enough to keep the interest on new hardware.

LOL. All this bs about single threaded performance and "cry about moar cores".

Am I then supposed to talk about bobcat single threading performance bashing atom, and Intel graphics that sucks, and Michael from Dell caling Otellini for more money - again?

And then you can respond. Will you then fell better?

Sorry to disapoint you. But i am not payed to be your psychologist.

Feel free to beliewe prices is not affected from mid - down by AMD. I have no further arguments.

You win !!!!

 

[Ferzerp]

No one is saying they aren't affected at all. Everyone is saying that they aren't affected nearly as much as you're thinking.

 

[mrmt]

Feel free to beliewe prices is not affected from mid - down by AMD. I have no further arguments.

Of course you haven't, as there is no way to explain how a company losing money can drive market prices down.

 

[pelov]

No one is saying they aren't affected at all. Everyone is saying that they aren't affected nearly as much as you're thinking.

Feature wise they certainly are. You've got to fork over >$200 to buy something that can be overclocked. Then there's also virtualization features as well as the useless HD4000 on enthusiast-class unlocked chips as well.

Intel is having a rough time selling chips and it's only going to get more difficult, whether AMD is alive and kicking or not really isn't going to cause much of an impact for most consumers. The prices are likely to stagnate and the improvements aren't going to be as great as they once were. If you're looking for Intel's best you'd likely have to see how Atom is faring.

 

[pablo87]

Registered just to support Krumme's argument.

Intel's modus operandi ad vitam eternam has been to protect their amazing profits and high ASP's while causing pain for AMD in the value segment.

When AMD destroyed 286 margins, Intel introduced the 386sx.

When AMD managed to develop a 386sx and 386dx, and out MHz'd Intel, Intel meet comped (still remember pricing going from $190 to $90 overnight on 386DX-25 because of AMD's 386 launch) while heavily promoting 486DX2-66 at the bargain price of .....$425.

When AMD caught up, Intel launched the Celeron brand (remember the 300 w/o cache? You probably don't as it stunk and was quickly replaced with the Celeron 300A 128k cache).

After 486, Intel made sure its socket was incompatible with AMD's, so AMD had to bear the higher cost of having its own chipset/motherboard infrastructure.

When Core was introduced, Pentium was created as the value brand. A little less performance, much, much lower pricing ($50 vs $180).

Throughout, Intel liberally used a technique called "meet comp" to match or beat AMD's pricing; often this involved bundles with chipsets.

Intel launches Ultrabook and to make sure AMD can't compete, trademarks the name.

No AMD will mean permanently higher ASPs in desktop and notebooks, you can forget about x86 CPUs under $100, while Intel bombs the price on Atom to conquer the tablet/smartphone market. Its going to be a redux of what happened for the past 25 years in x86, just search AMD and replace with ARM.

By the way, its called cross-subsidization and is commonly used by businesses that have monopolies in one business to take over another market. Because the threat from ARM is real, Intel is going to campaign hard to convince everyone that ARM is the real competition and not AMD so nobody cares when AMD goes away. Once Intel gets the PR green light, they will crush AMD mercilessly as they do not want to battle on 2 fronts. Perhaps it will be done at the height of the PC crisis (which naturally will get helped along to be the worst) with perhaps even a quarterly loss from Intel. Nobody will argue then that there is a crisis and that Bear Stearns (oops, I meant AMD) has to go away in order for Bank of America (oops, I meant Intel) to survive.

Conspiracy? Perhaps. All I can say is, only the paranoid survive.

edit: that doesn't absolve AMD from total incompetence.

 

[frozentundra123456]

Registered just to support Krumme's argument.

Intel's modus operandi ad vitam eternam has been to protect their amazing profits and high ASP's while causing pain for AMD in the value segment.

When AMD destroyed 286 margins, Intel introduced the 386sx.

When AMD managed to develop a 386sx and 386dx, and out MHz'd Intel, Intel meet comped (still remember pricing going from $190 to $90 overnight on 386DX-25 because of AMD's 386 launch) while heavily promoting 486DX2-66 at the bargain price of .....$425.

When AMD caught up, Intel launched the Celeron brand (remember the 300 w/o cache? You probably don't as it stunk and was quickly replaced with the Celeron 300A 128k cache).

After 486, Intel made sure its socket was incompatible with AMD's, so AMD had to bear the higher cost of having its own chipset/motherboard infrastructure.

When Core was introduced, Pentium was created as the value brand. A little less performance, much, much lower pricing ($50 vs $180).

Throughout, Intel liberally used a technique called "meet comp" to match or beat AMD's pricing; often this involved bundles with chipsets.

Intel launches Ultrabook and to make sure AMD can't compete, trademarks the name.

No AMD will mean permanently higher ASPs in desktop and notebooks, you can forget about x86 CPUs under $100, while Intel bombs the price on Atom to conquer the tablet/smartphone market. Its going to be a redux of what happened for the past 25 years in x86, just search AMD and replace with ARM.

By the way, its called cross-subsidization and is commonly used by businesses that have monopolies in one business to take over another market. Because the threat from ARM is real, Intel is going to campaign hard to convince everyone that ARM is the real competition and not AMD so nobody cares when AMD goes away. Once Intel gets the PR green light, they will crush AMD mercilessly as they do not want to battle on 2 fronts. Perhaps it will be done at the height of the PC crisis (which naturally will get helped along to be the worst) with perhaps even a quarterly loss from Intel. Nobody will argue then that there is a crisis and that Bear Stearns (oops, I meant AMD) has to go away in order for Bank of America (oops, I meant Intel) to survive.

Conspiracy? Perhaps. All I can say is, only the paranoid survive.

edit: that doesn't absolve AMD from total incompetence.

You registered just to post this rambling conspiracy theory???

 

[frozentundra123456]

Intel have been competing against washing machines, hookers and drugs since dawn. And so does everybody else. Its nothing new and extrodinary.

If there was a competitor for the 6 core Intel the price would drop. Its not rocket science, it happens each day, and Intel is no magical exception - far from. The x86 cpu is needed all over the b2b market, and there is no alternative within realistic reach because of the enormous TCO involved on the customer side. Period. Get it?

All the celeron, pentium stuff is because of AMD, without AMD there would not have been such thing. And now, if it wasnt for A15 and bobcat on 28nm we wouldnt see Atom on new process nodes in the agressive moves Intel does now. Its a direct consequence of competetion. If there was competition on the top we would easily see 8 cores , there is plenty room. The desktop top end, and the server market, is one major classic text book cash cow, fuelled by no competition.

The dilemma is ofcourse there is a natural tendency towards monopoly in this market for obvious reasons.

And yes i agree its not AMD that is the main competitor for Intel any more, its TSMC and Samsung, but even the slight competition they give from bobcats to the apus, still have a significant impact on the market. Even a small player with low volume can force prices down.

I would agree that if there was a competitor for hex core Intel the price would drop. But you are also tacitly admitting that there is no competitor now, and the 39XX, what ever model number that is around 500 to six hundred dollars has not risen to the price of the extreme edition, so there is a limit whether or not there is competition. And the limit would be more apparent in the lower priced chips because they need to sell volume there. With the volume met by low and midrange chips they can charge a premium for the small segment of the market that can use a six core chip.

I am still trying to figure out how a computer competes with a hooker. Maybe downloading porn???

 

[pelov]

I am still trying to figure out how a computer competes with a hooker. Maybe downloading porn???

Uploading porn, maybe

I would agree that if there was a competitor for hex core Intel the price would drop. But you are also tacitly admitting that there is no competitor now, and the 39XX, what ever model number that is around 500 to six hundred dollars has not risen to the price of the extreme edition, so there is a limit whether or not there is competition. And the limit would be more apparent in the lower priced chips because they need to sell volume there. With the volume met by low and midrange chips they can charge a premium for the small segment of the market that can use a six core chip.

That competition isn't going to happen, though. AMD has pulled out of that race. Even if they were still in it, they're next node is 28nm for the foreseeable future while Intel would be using a 14nm Broadwell. If AMD were as stupid as some of you think they are, they'd actually keep releasing desktop and server CPUs. The fact that they pulled Steamroller from their roadmap means they haven't lost all touch with reality.

 

[cytg111]

You registered just to post this rambling conspiracy theory???

you quoted all that just to post a one-liner?

What I personally fail to understand is how standard business practice becomes "rambling conspiracy theory???" (including the ?'s for good measure).
Unless you're a creationist or simply dont get competition, supply and demand, i fail to deduce that to ->"conspiracy" .. no logic there, sorry.

 

[pablo87]

You registered just to post this rambling conspiracy theory???

Yes, much appreciated.

Now that I'm registered, I'll have to more to say on these subjects...

 

[mrmt]

Intel's modus operandi ad vitam eternam has been to protect their amazing profits and high ASP's while causing pain for AMD in the value segment.

When AMD destroyed 286 margins, (...)

I think you should review your timeline here. The events you mentioned are a little out of place and out of context, like mentioning that AMD didn`t develop a 286, but received for free the microcode to become a second source, or that AMD introduced a reverse-engineered version of the 386 AFTER Intel launch the 486.

No AMD will mean permanently higher ASPs in desktop and notebooks, you can forget about x86 CPUs under $100, while Intel bombs the price on Atom to conquer the tablet/smartphone market. Its going to be a redux of what happened for the past 25 years in x86, just search AMD and replace with ARM.

Did you model that, or is it your "gut feeling"? Because Intel does not develop SKUs specifically for the bottom market, they are all die-savaged. So no CPU under 100USD means either low volume, as the CPU demand isn't inelastic at all, or that Intel is throwing all defective candidates out of the window and running another wafer batch to get better dies.

I really want to know about this assumption of higher average sales prices. As of now it is AMD that needs higher prices. What should Intel do? Lift its prices to help AMD? Stop selling at the bottom market to let AMD live? Why would Intel lift the prices if they also need volumes?

By the way, its called cross-subsidization and is commonly used by businesses that have monopolies in one business to take over another market.

They can do that now. They have both margins and cash to do that. AMD failing would give Intel a bigger stick, but nothing different from what they already have.

edit: that doesn't absolve AMD from total incompetence.

Here we agree

 

[frozentundra123456]

Uploading porn, maybe



That competition isn't going to happen, though. AMD has pulled out of that race. Even if they were still in it, they're next node is 28nm for the foreseeable future while Intel would be using a 14nm Broadwell. If AMD were as stupid as some of you think they are, they'd actually keep releasing desktop and server CPUs. The fact that they pulled Steamroller from their roadmap means they haven't lost all touch with reality.

Well, if you mean de-emphasizing "performance" CPUs in favor of APUs, that may be a good strategy. If you mean their switch to try to compete with ARM, I am not sure they can compete with ARM any better or even as well as they can compete with Intel. Intel is also trying to get into that market so they may come head to head vs Intel anyway. I guess it makes sense to abandon a segment where you are not competitive. The problem is what are they going to be competitive in if they are not competitive in what has been their area of expertise for many years.

 

[VirtualLarry]

they are all die-savaged.

Is your 'l' key broken? Salvaged.

 

[pelov]

I guess it makes sense to abandon a segment where you are not competitive. The problem is what are they going to be competitive in if they are not competitive in what has been their area of expertise for many years.

They don't really have much of a choice here. 2 full nodes behind and 40% IPC is not something that you can recover from in a stagnant (or even decreasing) market.

 

[veri745]

Oh, really? So Intel designed specific Pentium and Celeron SKU? Just because of AMD?

Celeron and Pentium are die-savaged i3, they are not a specific SKU. You are assuming that Intel would throw troves of failed i3 in the toiled and go for another run on its fabs instead of selling those failed SKUs for a few bucks, just because of AMD.

I can guarantee you that Intel doesn't produce enough defective i3 die to meet the demand they have in the Celeron and Pentium space.

If there was no demand at the low end (due to the options provided by AMD) then probably 99% of all the die could be sold as i3 instead.

Chipmakers like Intel sell cut-down versions of their products mostly to meet demand, not to sell non-functional products. Of course there is the advantage that they can sell their defective parts, but look at AMD and the success rate people have of unlocking cores on PHII x2 and x3 chips. Of course every once in a while you find a defective one, but most of them work fine.

 

[blckgrffn]

Feature wise they certainly are. You've got to fork over >$200 to buy something that can be overclocked. Then there's also virtualization features as well as the useless HD4000 on enthusiast-class unlocked chips as well.

Intel is having a rough time selling chips and it's only going to get more difficult, whether AMD is alive and kicking or not really isn't going to cause much of an impact for most consumers. The prices are likely to stagnate and the improvements aren't going to be as great as they once were. If you're looking for Intel's best you'd likely have to see how Atom is faring.

This. And :thumbsdown: for it. It's going to get even more boring around here.

Atom vs ARM vs some AMD for good measure. Yawn.

Intel is going to aim at phones and tablets. It's where the boom is. Now that it is *actually* happening, versus just picking up steam, chipzilla is going to show up and lower the 1 to 2 nodes & huge R&D budget boom on anyone who gets in their way.

AMD sticking around and making us all some good APUs and mobile chips is still a positive for the marketplace, as it will give us choice on the x86 side for some time to come. Hopefully, enough to keep Intel investing some on the desktop side.

Hell, even I am tired of Ferzerp pointing it out, but ARM may well be DOA when it comes to 64-bit parts. If Intel executes Atom they way they are uniquely positioned to - well, it won't be pretty. They are sitting on what, 50% of their fab capacity right now? Just need some big orders folks, get your 22nm/14nm parts right here!

I can guarantee you that Intel doesn't produce enough defective i3 die to meet the demand they have in the Celeron and Pentium space.

If there was no demand at the low end (due to the options provided by AMD) then probably 99% of all the die could be sold as i3 instead.

Chipmakers like Intel sell cut-down versions of their products mostly to meet demand, not to sell non-functional products. Of course there is the advantage that they can sell their defective parts, but look at AMD and the success rate people have of unlocking cores on PHII x2 and x3 chips. Of course every once in a while you find a defective one, but most of them work fine.

Pretty sure this is true. I thought this once, but when you look at it Intel moves the volume to actually create these chips. I can't remember what tipped the scales for me now (sorry...) but it seemed to have something to do with the iGPU and die sizes...

It makes sense for them to remove as much as the GPU as possible in order to have a very compact die. Intel isn't about wasting $$$. I don't know what they do with defective parts, but with their tiny dies and ability to control the manufacturing process, its going to be ridiculously lower in terms of % than what we are used to seeing on the GPU side from nvidia and AMD. AMD has to sell BD/PD with turned off portions because they don't have the volume to create targeted parts.

 

[krumme]

You registered just to post this rambling conspiracy theory???

I am pretty sure i know who Pablo is looking from the argumentation, and i can say, this man have been in charge of a company selling a minor mountain of computer gear

I think he knows what normal business practice is, - what you call conspiracy - and know this particular business very well.

There seems to be a lot of emotions into this. I set strategy for a small company, at not until this discussion have it occurred to me, that some people find it suspect, to sell the same product with 50% discount when competition enters. I have no problem selling at a loss, to keep compettion at bay.

Is there something wrong with that?

How do you think it is to manage a business? Its often a brutal fight, that turns worse the bigger the business is. Go read fx. the transcript and mails between Otellini and Michael (Dell). This is how its done behind the rosy curtains.

 

[Dribble]

Intel is going to aim at phones and tablets. It's where the boom is. Now that it is *actually* happening, versus just picking up steam, chipzilla is going to show up and lower the 1 to 2 nodes & huge R&D budget boom on anyone who gets in their way.

Not this time - they will come up with some pre packaged products at highish prices which is all they know how to do and all they can do if they want to make the profit margins the share holders require. All the phone/tablet companies will take a look and say "I'll keep my custom arm soc that might not be quite as good in some areas but does exactly what I want it too, gives me complete control over design and costs peanuts".

The profit margin on the arm soc can be near 0 - ARM will make $1 license which is all they need, and the companies using the chips will make it on the end product not the cpu. Intel simply can't compete with that. They can't work on that low a profit margin and they can only provide a few pre-packaged x86 chips, not license the design to allow other companies to develop the exact custom chip they want.

 

[mrmt]

How do you think it is to manage a business? Its often a brutal fight, that turns worse the bigger the business is. Go read fx. the transcript and mails between Otellini and Michael (Dell). This is how its done behind the rosy curtains.

Let put Pablo conspiracy theory in perspective:

If you were Otelini, would you go after a 3.5 billion gain in annual revenues from a company that is more likely to bankrupt itself out of sheer incompetence or try to break in a 50 billion market that is booming? No matter how good it would be to crush AMD, it isn't there that Intel efforts should be. The most lucrative parts are already with them.

But let's say that Intel is determined to crush AMD, is really necessary any additional efforts from Intel? Not really. Intel is committed to bring Haswell and future iterations of the Core architecture to tablets and convertibles, and more important, it wants every ultrabook to be a convertible. They have to have extreme focus on die size, power efficiency and performance, which in turn means lower ASP that will have to be compensated by smaller and more efficient dies in order to reduce COGS, exactly what Intel has been doing since Conroe but an order of magnitude bigger. So that theory that we are going to see increases of 100USD in notebooks prices is simply against their business strategy, as Intel must have a competitive package for tablets and convertibles, in other words, Intel is moving to a business model of smaller ASP, not higher. This is not a strategy to tackle AMD, this is an strategy to tackle ARM. The AMD issue solved itself in the day they launched Bulldozer.

With bulldozer they shifted to a higher ASP strategy. Intel is pretty much happy with prices where they are now, they are still getting 60%+ gross margins each quarter, while AMD went down to 38% (discounting the inventory impairment). Who needs better ASP here? The fact that they are still seen as the one that keeps Intel prices in check is more due to their inability to sell their products at the prices they want than anything else.

So when Pablo comes here stating things like "Intel's modus operandi ad vitam eternam has been to protect their amazing profits and high ASP's while causing pain for AMD in the value segment." it fails to capture, among other things, that Intel is transitioning to smaller ASP products and that AMD tried and failed to transition to high ASP products. All that is left is that Intel wants to destroy poor AMD, as if AMD wouldn't do the same if it could.