Rumor: AMD Southern Islands being produced in Q2 of 2011 or ehhh ... 2012?

happy medium

Lifer
Jun 8, 2003
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Why would they annouce a new chip in the 2nd quarter 2011 when they haven't even released there 6990.?

I would easily assume that the 6990 will be faster then or equal to this Southern Isalnds chip.

Possible reasons.

A. they caught wind of how fast the gtx590 is?
B. they are having trouble with the 6990?
C. mabe its some lower end 28nm chip, just like the 4770?
D. this article is BS?

edit: sounds like C is the winner.

"The first chip in the family is likely to be produced using 28HP or 28HPL process technology and will likely be used as a "pipe cleaner" that will allow AMD to learn maximum about volume manufacturing using the new fabrication process."
 
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tviceman

Diamond Member
Mar 25, 2008
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I thought it was generally accepted that 28nm at TSMC - the fab AMD is still using for all their GPU's - won't be ready for mass production until Q3. So Q2 is quite literally impossible.
 
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dangerman1337

Senior member
Sep 16, 2010
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Why would they annouce a new chip in the 2nd quarter 2011 when they haven't even released there 6990.?

Produced not released/annouced, though I agree that the 6990 Isn't released probably due trying to get good chips for the PCI-E power limit the 6000 always seemed to be a stop gap/filler for Souther Islands.

Though the article is confusing as its either this year's Q2 or next year.
 

AtenRa

Lifer
Feb 2, 2009
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We could see an HD4770 like 28nm graphics card in Q2-Q3 2011 but i dont expect a high-end 28nm graphics cards before Q4 2011.
 

apoppin

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Mar 9, 2000
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Produced not released/annouced, though I agree that the 6990 Isn't released probably due trying to get good chips for the PCI-E power limit the 6000 always seemed to be a stop gap/filler for Souther Islands.

Though the article is confusing as its either this year's Q2 or next year.
Look at the *source*

http://cens.com/cens/html/en/news/news_inner_35399.html

AMD even plans to exclusively contract TSMC to build its 28nm Southern Islands chip in the second quarter of 2012.

TSMC is recognized as the industry`s No.1 supplier of 28nm process foundry with its monthly shipment of 5,000 wafers of 28nm chips in the first quarter of 2011.
Industry executives estimated Apple to join Nvidia, TI and Qualcomm this year in using TSMC`s 28nm foundry service.
i'm glad to help (confuse things)
:sneaky: