Question Zen 6 Speculation Thread

[511]

And Meteor Lake (and Meteor Lake-U, presumably). And Lakefield. There seems to be a recurring problem here . . .

I think with lake filed they were fine with it but when they tried to scale it up with MTL they realized the folly and they realized it too late.
Not every problem can be solved by firing

 

[DrMrLordX]

Fire the interconnect team!

Knowing LBT, they probably already have.

I think with lake filed they were fine with it but when they tried to scale it up with MTL they realized the folly and they realized it too late.

That may be true, but that wouldn't explain Arrow Lake, especially after Lunar Lake was so . . . not bad.

Um anyway, so, Zen6? Zen6. Won't have interconnect problems, or at least not ones any worse than what AM5 owners already expect from their platform.

 

[MS_AT]

Also, no Strix Halo with quad channel DDR5-8000 for desktop.

Do I understand it right, that you see a market for a new socket just for Strix Halo, to be able use it with socketed DDR5? You do understand that would make the boards more expensive than AM5 is, and your dGPU options would be limited do to Halo's lack of PCIe lanes. At the same time, integrated gpu would not be able to hold it's own against dGPU rivals.

Would you buy it yourself?

 

[igor_kavinski]

You do understand that would make the boards more expensive than AM5 is

No, I don't understand how that would make it more expensive because: https://www.newegg.com/asrock-b650m-hdv-m-2-micro-atx-motherboard-amd-b650-am5/p/N82E16813162114

https://www.asrock.com/mb/AMD/B650M-HDVM.2/#MemoryGNR

$115 mobo has support up to DDR5-7200. DDR5-8000 shouldn't be a big deal. Adding two extra channels would make this at most a $400 mobo. What we would get is stable OOB DDR5-8000 operation with lower memory latency and extra bandwidth. I would definitely pay $1200 for this CPU+mobo combo. Considering that Corsair is selling Strix Halo with 64GB RAM for $1600, selling just the CPU and mobo for $1200 seems like an excellent deal with the added bonus of upgradability up to 256GB RAM.

 

[511]

That may be true, but that wouldn't explain Arrow Lake, especially after Lunar Lake was so . . . not bad

Lunar Lake was slightly later definition than ARL also it's monolithic

 

[Joe NYC]

They are going for profit over market penetration.

AMD is trying to increase mobile market share but is failing.

It's like they don't think they can continue to make great products so may as well make as much money as possible. Prime example is not changing the IOD for Zen 5 for DDR5-8000 1:1 RAM speeds.

On desktop, AMD has deux ex machina (V-Cache) which overwhelms the other imperfections (while Intel is also asleep).

Also, no Strix Halo with quad channel DDR5-8000 for desktop.

$600+ motherboards for this would be a non-starter

They can certainly do a lot better but they are more occupied with making money and playing it safe rather than making a serious effort to drive Intel out of the market with products that Intel has no hope of beating.

I don't think that's a fair assessment. Intel is making a lot more money on mobile, both margin and total. AMD is working hard, not holding back, but it is just missing the mark with all the mobile designs.

Maybe things will change, with Jack Huynh in charge of client. He seems to have a more killer instinct than his predecessor who seems to have just faded into retirement.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Maybe things will change, with Jack Huynh in charge of client. He seems to have a more killer instinct than his predecessor who seems to have just faded into retirement.

Yeah. RDNA4 is good. If he can do the same for mobile CPU, that will be great.

 

[Joe NYC]

what's the thread title.... that's right.... zen 6

Hopefully, things improve for AMD with Zen 6 in mobile.

At least, AMD will not be at a node disadvantage, since the mobile parts will be combination of N3P and N2P, while Intel will only be on par with N3P.

One would think that AMD would outcompete at least Meteor Lake and Raptor Lake (with Strix Point and Kraken, where AMD was at decent node vs. Intel), but so far, it has not happened.

 

[yottabit]

They are going for profit over market penetration.

They’re rapidly gaining marketshare in datacenter. It’s every business person’s dream to be able to rapidly gain marketshare in the highest profit venue. They’d have to be insane to devote too many resources to client when there is still ground left in datacenter.

They’re doing quite well with their current strategy of client getting hand-me-down server stuff. It’s wild that it’s worked so well.

Strix Point and Strix Halo are examples of AMD trying “more” for client and were both kind of a “meh” market reception.

If they achieve 80%+ marketshare in datacenter, then I think you’ll see an AMD that’s focused on more areas. But if the AI boom proves to still be a around, I think it might be a bigger push GPU and GPU software before client CPU. Maybe both.

 

[adroc_thurston]

Intel is making a lot more money on mobile, both margin and total.

They're literally maintaining their share by shedding operating margin.
Why are you like that.

 

[MS_AT]

No, I don't understand how that would make it more expensive because

Economy of scale. You would have limited run of premium boards to fit premium APU that has uncertain market positioning, what would drive the cost further up. Remember it would fit only HALO, the boards would be useful only for HALO.

What we would get is stable OOB DDR5-8000 operation with lower memory latency and extra bandwidth.

I have seen more complaints about DDR5-8000 on ArrowLake than Zen5 to be fair. About the BW, do your math to see the caveats to extra bandwidth.

 

[igor_kavinski]

About the BW, do your math to see the caveats to extra bandwidth.

I mentioned quad channel DDR5-8000 for Strix Halo desktop. So same bandwidth as the current Strix Halo but much lower latency and higher RAM capacity. People would buy it like crazy as a "cheap" workstation. Should get very popular with academics, scientists, engineers and students of these fields as well as anyone who loves crunching lots of data.

Current Strix Halo is selling fine by the looks of it. Why would Corsair offer it if there was no money to be made?

 

[Joe NYC]

Yeah. RDNA4 is good. If he can do the same for mobile CPU, that will be great.

I am optimistic. I think I was one of the few people who liked him at CES.

He has been long enough on the job (since April 2024) to have a solid mark on Zen 6 client. And at least from the desktop side, where the leaks are more solid, Zen 6 client looks fantastic.

We will see what emerges from Zen 6 mobile. It does not look as clean win as desktop...

 

[Joe NYC]

They’re rapidly gaining marketshare in datacenter. It’s every business person’s dream to be able to rapidly gain marketshare in the highest profit venue. They’d have to be insane to devote too many resources to client when there is still ground left in datacenter.

Except, client (for CPU) is twice the size of datacenter.

AMD is on a really good path in server. Excellent adoption of the latest generation Turin, while Intel is seriously struggling with adoption of the latest gen Granite Rapids and Sierra Forest. Intel selling mostly Sapphire Rapids and Emerald Rapids.

Really catastrophic situation for Intel in the datacenter.

If they achieve 80%+ marketshare in datacenter, then I think you’ll see an AMD that’s focused on more areas. But if the AI boom proves to still be a around, I think it might be a bigger push GPU and GPU software before client CPU. Maybe both.

50% has to come first, ant that's a psychological hurdle. But it looks to me that AMD is on solid path to achieve it. Probably within a year.

 

[511]

AMD is on a really good path in server. Excellent adoption of the latest generation Turin, while Intel is seriously struggling with adoption of the latest gen Granite Rapids and Sierra Forest. Intel selling mostly Sapphire Rapids and Emerald Rapids.

Really catastrophic situation for Intel in the datacenter.

It will them long to ramp GNR and they are selling EMR/SPR so cheap but they are maintaining share with price cuts

 

[Joe NYC]

They're literally maintaining their share by shedding operating margin.
Why are you like that.

It's true that Intel margin is going down and AMD margin is going up. But as of last quarter:
Intel client operating margin: 26%
AMD client operating margin: 21%

 

[Joe NYC]

It will them long to ramp GNR and they are selling EMR/SPR so cheap but they are maintaining share with price cuts

Yup, and they are not ramping it in a vacuum. They are ramping it against Turin.

 

[adroc_thurston]

It's true that Intel margin is going down and AMD margin is going up. But as of last quarter:
Intel client operating margin: 26%
AMD client operating margin: 21%

Tons of old stuff.
New Intel stuff is very margin dilutive, especially LNL.

 

[igor_kavinski]

New Intel stuff is very margin dilutive, especially LNL.

Really??? LNL being given away??? Where do I sign up???

 

[MS_AT]

I mentioned quad channel DDR5-8000 for Strix Halo desktop. So same bandwidth as the current Strix Halo but much lower latency and higher RAM capacity.

I asked you to do the math. You did not The thing is, the Strix Halo CPU part can only use full Strix Halo SoC BW when doing simultaneous R/W operations from both CCDs. When it comes to read BW, Zen5 desktop with dual channel DDR5-8000 and Strix Halo as is, will give you the same scores if you use 2 CCD SKUs. Of course on average reads are more common than writes. So the Halo CPU advantage vs desktop is limited to specific cases when talking about memory subsystem BW.

 

[adroc_thurston]

LNL being given away??? Where do I sign up???

Yeah almost lol.
I think you'll find LNL laptops at like $600 soon nuff.

 

[igor_kavinski]

When it comes to read BW, Zen5 desktop with dual channel DDR5-8000 and Strix Halo as is, will give you the same scores if you use 2 CCD SKUs.

Umm....NO.




20 GB/s difference in read speeds. Imagine latency being close to 70 ns with quad channel desktop Stix Halo instead of the current atrocious 139 ns.

Mucho gains to be had, my friend.

 

[igor_kavinski]

I think you'll find LNL laptops at like $600 soon nuff.

Cheaper actually but it's only the 226V SKU.

Now if it's the 288V SKU, I will have a really hard time trying not to click BUY.

 

[511]

Yeah almost lol.
I think you'll find LNL laptops at like $600 soon nuff.

There are already 16GB U5 LNL laptop at 600-700

 

[adroc_thurston]

Now if it's the 288V SKU, I will have a really hard time trying not to click BUY.

Who tf cares, you're not buying LNL for perf.

There are already 16GB U5 LNL laptop at 600-700

Yea.