Samsung 14FF so far has only been proven in low-power mobile chips (i.e. A9, SD820, Exynos 7/8). There is no evidence thus far that it can deliver >4GHz, high perf/clock chips in anything close to the kind of power envelope that Intel's can.
Intel's processes are fine tuned for the very limited range of fairly high-performance PC processors that it builds, while Samsung/TSMC are basically gunning for the mobile guys first and foremost.
Intel also builds its own chips & doesn't have to hand over any foundry margin to Samsung/GloFo/TSMC, which certainly helps on the cost structure front.
BTW, don't you think it's just a teensy-weensy bit suspicious that AMD is able to fit 8 whole super duper Zen cores into a 95W power envelope on a process that is probably inferior for high performance CPUs than Intel's 14nm? What do you think those CPU cores are going to come clocked at? 4GHz at Skylake-like IPC? Very doubtful.
Perhaps Zen would have a significant clock-deficit to Intel or maybe they can try to make it as closer as possible but w/ taking a significant beating on power.This is all assuming that Samsung 14nm can't go head-to-head w/ Intel 14nm at higher clock-ranges. Also till now there's no actual tests or benches we have seen.Think,we should wait more.
I am more interested in Zen-based APUs,expecially for notebook market.
It is where AMD could have leveraged its more core advantage if it goes w/ it's traditional 4core options with or without smt enabled.It is where it could have taken well on the dual core i5s which are what most mid-range notebooks are especially in MT(this is assuming Zen is a pretty significant improvement in per core performance and close enough to ~SB or IB ipc).But it seems zen-based APUs would be launched closer to cannonlake on notebooks.Intel might be more equipped with replies by then.
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