Why Ivy Bridge Is Still Quad-Core?

[ncalipari]

Why are you so fixated on the number of cores, while disregarding everything else such as IPC, feature improvements, and process technology that goes into these CPUs?

I think these are very important, absolutely. But these advancements are not in contrast with a more core policy. We could also say that these advancements are an help for the more core policy.

If you want more cores, get a Bulldozer, or get a dual socket board.

I can get also a quad socket board, but 24 cores are still better than 16.

 

[Puppies04]

and how would you call a quad core ivy bridge?

Jesus, why are you so fixated on more than 4 cores, even if intel release one I won't buy one because there is nothing I do that would use it. Give me a higher clocked quad any day of the week. Now in 2 years time when there are mainstream programs and games that actually suffer on a quad compared to a hex we can have this conversation again and my viewpoint will have changed but until then you are just going to sound like a broken record.

 

[ilkhan]

This argument seems pretty silly.

If you want cores, buy a bulldozer.
If you want speed, buy Sandy.
If you want both, buy Sandy-E.

Those are the options, stop bitching about wanting both for the price of one.

Of course Intel is milking their current options. I expect we'll continue seeing quads as the default option for years to come. The hard part for Intel is convincing people to upgrade at all. Their current (old) computers work fine most users, replacements with quads are fine. The ones who constantly need more performance are able to pay for it (hence SNB-E).

 

[Puppies04]

AMD have the ability to produce a 20 core chip if they wanted to. By some peoples logic in this thread that means they are stifling CPU advancement and milking us all and once they did produce a 20 core chip you could just turn around and say why haven't you made a 30 core chip.

At what point will you actually realise that because most of their customers barely need a dual core let alone a quad or quad with HT that is what they produce.

 

[nyker96]

well answer = there is not enough competition to force a 6 or 8 core product out of intel. If BD's 8 core is so kickass, Intel would have no choice but to intro a 6 core or 8 core version to compete. But as things go, looks like we will continue to see only quads for even future generations of Intel chips.

 

[Idontcare]

Maybe there is a misunderstanding in the term "milking".

In a competitive market the other players would drive the profit margin down with either technological or price pressure.

Since no one can compete with intel in the x86 market, intel can decide alone how much is their profit margin.

I just hope x86 will be ditched as soon as possible.

Well, AMD is making profits. That means they are choosing to not price their products lower in a bid to compete with Intel and drive their (Intel's) profits down as well.

If Intel is milking the market, its happening with AMD's endorsement.

Otherwise AMD would do something about it. Charging their customers more money than they need to, so much that they are making profits at it, is what is enabling Intel to charge their customers more as well.

 

[soccerballtux]

Well we kinda need them to charge an arm and a leg if we want AMD to survive. The cost of an Intel CPU needs to be high enough that people will give AMD a serious consideration.

 

[Arachnotronic]

If you want more cores, get a Bulldozer, or get a dual socket board.

Or an i7 970/980/980x/990x/3930K/3960X.

 

[cytg111]

It has not been proven that...But in all this you people refuse to except ...facts you people ignor and its a PROVEN fact.....supply and it won't show any real profits in the 4th qt ..... And is infact AMDs old fabs.

And maybe just stating the fact is not a fanboism!
If I was selling hotdogs and I was the only game in town? You better believe those dogs' gonna cost you. It is not about good bad right wrong up or down.. it is what it is, BD is a fail, and cause of that we will see a slight deviation on the good ol' moore-graph for a while, thats all. And its all good, cause Intel is not the only game in town, others will catch up, in a few years, give or take.

But looking into the crystal ball for a release date for haswell and the picture is blury.

 

[ncalipari]

Well, AMD is making profits.

500 Million of Income over a revenue of 7.000 Billions.

If you consider inflations and missed revalutations of investments, AMD is loosing money. That's why AMD stocks have a negative outlook.

 

[ncalipari]

AMD have the ability to produce a 20 core chip if they wanted to.

sources?

At what point will you actually realise that because most of their customers barely need a dual core let alone a quad or quad with HT that is what they produce.

We only need 640 kb of ram.

 

[LokutusofBorg]

well answer = there is not enough competition to force a 6 or 8 core product out of intel. If BD's 8 core is so kickass, Intel would have no choice but to intro a 6 core or 8 core version to compete. But as things go, looks like we will continue to see only quads for even future generations of Intel chips.

This is a bunch of crap, and you other guys throwing around econ 101 insults at people to back up your point-of-view that more cores is the only valid path of innovation are just showing that you don't have a 101 understanding of it yourselves.

The truth is you (people wanting more cores, MOAR!) are not the market demographic driving innovation. You are not the market demographic driving sales. Therefore you are not the market demographic Intel cares about. You are a minor concern and they already have a product (multiple, actually) that serves your demographic.

Laptop sales have surpassed desktop sales. Battery life, graphics performance, and manufacturing efficiency are driving innovation. All software that was easy to thread has already been threaded. Almost all software that is medium or hard to thread has already been threaded. Not all software can be threaded ad infinitum. *Most* software cannot go beyond a few threads. *Most* software runs fine on a quad core; moving to hex or HT-quad sees diminishing returns. For the minority of users that need non-mainstream equipment, they have products available, and (Econ 101 here, pay attention) if they were able to increase sales and make more money doing it, they would lower prices on those parts. As it is, they have figured out what the market can bear, and they are charging appropriately.

To finish up, you are making a couple very foolish assumptions...

• If there was a market to make money on mainstream many-core chips, you can be sure that Intel would be playing in that market with all they've got
• Intel's engineers are certainly not slowing down or slacking or refusing to push the boundaries of their technology and manufacturing process

 

[denev2004]

sources?

I think he means small cores, for instance, 20 Bobcat cores.
Intel can do 50 LRB cores, which is based on P54C, on 22nm.

 

[ncalipari]

(people wanting more cores, MOAR!) .

Another 640 kb is enough

Laptop sales have surpassed desktop sales.

still intel make most of their profits from HPC CPUs

 

[LokutusofBorg]

Another 640 kb is enough

This is such a head-in-the-sand argument. Intel has not stopped moving their technology forward, as you are so obtusely suggesting.

 

[cytg111]

and how would you call a quad core ivy bridge?

- Tock ?

 

[cbn]

this mentality slow down progress. Someone said that 640 kb of ram was enough for everybody.

At least with extra ram, a person could make a "ram disk".

Doesn't anything past four cpu cores for encoding look to obsoleted by GPGPU or Intel's own Quick Sync.

Therefore: Faster, more powerful cores are needed (this is the progress we are looking for!)......not more cores

 

[ncalipari]

At least with extra ram, a person could make a "ram disk".

I'm using 3 gb of ram at the moment, and I can't see any ramdisk. But maybe yes, 640kb are enough.

Doesn't anything past four cpu cores for encoding look to obsoleted by GPGPU or Intel's own Quick Sync.

My german friends would say that you have a engstirnigen weltanschauung

 

[Avalon]

I think these are very important, absolutely. But these advancements are not in contrast with a more core policy. We could also say that these advancements are an help for the more core policy.



I can get also a quad socket board, but 24 cores are still better than 16.

I can agree with you on the first part, but you do seem to be overlooking the part where Ivy Bridge is just a die shrink of Sandy Bridge, which is a native quad core part. If Haswell comes out with just a quad core, then I can maybe see where you're coming from, but that's still over a year away.

As for your second part, more cores are not always better. If you can't load more than X amount of threads in the majority of your software, the X extra cores are a waste of space, heat, and electricity.

On top of that, I'd expect a theoretical 24 core of some cpu to be clocked lower than a 16 core counterpart, so again if you can't run more than 16 threads in the majority of your work, you're actually slowing yourself down.

 

[MrX8503]

Just as we ran into the ghz barrier, the same will happen with cores. There will be a point where adding more cores is not going to boost performance like it used to and we'll have to turn to other methods.

There's a reason why we run into such barriers and we'll reach the same with cores.

 

[Magic Carpet]

Intel didn't make IB Hexacore becuase there is no competitive pressure, while there is always a demand for more core. AMD missed the shot, and this put INTEL in position to milk this market with an older and more expensive architecture (SBE).

The problem lies with general software, it hasn't caught up yet, why bother? ;-p

It makes more sense to increase IPC instead. Intel doing it right. And the niche uses are being served by 1366/2011.

 

[denev2004]

The problem lies with general software, it hasn't caught up yet, why bother? ;-p

It makes more sense to increase IPC instead. Intel doing it right. The niche uses gets served by 1366/2011.

IVY will not increase IPC.

Even some people in forum.Beyond3D are arguing that Haswell do not need to put much attention in increasing IPC too. They said, cos of the idea of reducing powerconsumption, there should be only one AVX2 FP unit in Haswell.

 

[Magic Carpet]

IVY will not increase IPC.

Even some people in forum.Beyond3D are arguing that Haswell do not need to put much attention in increasing IPC too. They said, cos of the idea of reducing powerconsumption, there should be only one AVX2 FP unit in Haswell.

Interesting, I have formed up a different view. Is it just all cache? ;-p

 

[exar333]

IVY will not increase IPC.

Even some people in forum.Beyond3D are arguing that Haswell do not need to put much attention in increasing IPC too. They said, cos of the idea of reducing powerconsumption, there should be only one AVX2 FP unit in Haswell.

Intel just released information that IVY will increase IPC. Certainly not 10% or anything, but there are internal enhancements in IB that will yield some minor enhancements.

 

[Magic Carpet]

Haswell is going to be socket 1150, last I heard.

-=skipping this=-