AMD Zen will get 8 channel DDR4 support and SMT says CERN employee

#5231186

Neo Cyrus

2016-02-12 13:07

8 channel? Jeez, that better be a solid memory controller.

#5231187

BLEH!

2016-02-12 13:11

I'm guessing AM4 will be dual channel or at most quad.

#5231191

Denial

2016-02-12 13:32

I hope Zen is good. I want an AMD processor, I miss the Athlon 64 stickers I used to have all over my case when I was a young nerd.

#5231196

Neo Cyrus

2016-02-12 13:38

I hope Zen is good. I want an AMD processor, I miss the Athlon 64 stickers I used to have all over my case when I was a young nerd.

Even if they deliver what they promise, a 40%+ increase in IPC, it's still not going to catch up to Intel as far as per core performance goes. Bulldozer at 4GHz Vs Sky Lake at 4GHz - http://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/697?vs=1543 Just about everything still seems to be single or dual threaded. Single core performance matters too much and AMD still seem to be playing the moar coars game.

#5231200

Ryu5uzaku

2016-02-12 13:51

Even if they deliver what they promise, a 40%+ increase in IPC, it's still not going to catch up to Intel as far as per core performance goes. Bulldozer at 4GHz Vs Sky Lake at 4GHz - http://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/697?vs=1543 Just about everything still seems to be single or dual threaded. Single core performance matters too much and AMD still seem to be playing the moar coars game.

But then again bulldozer should be somewhat slower then that excavator we just don't have anything to compare from excavator. Bulldozer seems to lose some 40-50% vs skylake in everything.

#5231204

Anarion

2016-02-12 13:55

Even if they deliver what they promise, a 40%+ increase in IPC, it's still not going to catch up to Intel as far as per core performance goes. Bulldozer at 4GHz Vs Sky Lake at 4GHz - http://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/697?vs=1543 Just about everything still seems to be single or dual threaded. Single core performance matters too much and AMD still seem to be playing the moar coars game.

Sky Lake turbo goes higher (4,2 GHz) than 4 GHz so not quite clock to clock comparison. Also Bulldozer is weaker than Excavator. Personally I think that Zen is really interesting BUT my 3770K @ 4,4 GHz still goes strong. I would love to have more cores and mobo that has better features but I think that I'll wait for Zen+. AM4 should be mature platform then.

#5231208

vbetts

Moderator

2016-02-12 14:03

I only care about the APU's, an APU with ddr4 support would be amazing!!!

#5231213

LimitbreakOr

2016-02-12 14:17

We really need an excavator ipc benchmark somewhere on the net, hasn't amd already released an athlon with 2 excavator modules on the fm2? A piledriver vs excavator vs Haswell vs skylake ipc benchmark. Why hasnt anyone done this?it would be a really sweet read!

#5231223

vbetts

Moderator

2016-02-12 14:41

We really need an excavator ipc benchmark somewhere on the net, hasn't amd already released an athlon with 2 excavator modules on the fm2? A piledriver vs excavator vs Haswell vs skylake ipc benchmark. Why hasnt anyone done this?it would be a really sweet read!

I believe it is not released yet, only has been announced.

#5231228

icedman

2016-02-12 14:51

I only care about the APU's, an APU with ddr4 support would be amazing!!!

Should be pretty awesome if it gets quad channel ddr4 I'm very much looking forward to playing with one of these apu's, my 5800k was the funest cpu I've ever played with.

#5231241

schmidtbag

2016-02-12 15:08

Seeing as AMD's IGPs have always been crippled by memory, I think the extra channels will make a pretty big difference (though, 8 might be overkill...). Without the IGP, 8 channels just sounds stupid, even for 32 cores. For the average CPU task, you can hardly ever notice a performance difference between 1 and 2 channels. I'm not talking about synthetic benchmarks here, I'm talking about real-world performance.

#5231242

Undercova

2016-02-12 15:11

Would be great to see some super-duper APU's, especially if they use those for the next gen of consoles. Even if you don't play on consoles, better performance on that side should translate to better PC ports. Like The Division dev said they didn't want to create too big difference between platforms, ect. Maybe.

#5231246

Anarion

2016-02-12 15:23

Seeing as AMD's IGPs have always been crippled by memory, I think the extra channels will make a pretty big difference (though, 8 might be overkill...). Without the IGP, 8 channels just sounds stupid, even for 32 cores. For the average CPU task, you can hardly ever notice a performance difference between 1 and 2 channels. I'm not talking about synthetic benchmarks here, I'm talking about real-world performance.

AM4 platform will almost certainly be dual channel DDR4 only. Server platform is another story.

#5231263

waltc3

2016-02-12 15:57

Even if they deliver what they promise, a 40%+ increase in IPC, it's still not going to catch up to Intel as far as per core performance goes. Bulldozer at 4GHz Vs Sky Lake at 4GHz - http://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/697?vs=1543 Just about everything still seems to be single or dual threaded. Single core performance matters too much and AMD still seem to be playing the moar coars game.

Remember that the 40% is simply from the architectural changes...has nothing to do with clocks. And the 40% comes from the implementation of SMT--this is something AMD has stated clearly several times in 2015. I don't think there's a question that at the very least it will bring AMD to performance parity with Intel. So just think of that while AMD undercuts Intel pricing by 10%-20%...;) Many games are already using 4 threads, btw. But I agree that anything over that is a bit of a waste (unless you're multitasking.) How they perform, of course, and how they are priced will make all the difference--most likely instituting a bit of a pricing war with Intel--which is great for consumers! Big deal will the be the AM4 chipset, too, and how that performs. Also, remember that in UHD gaming and up, the cpu makes little to any difference at all as those resolutions are GPU-limited. No question but that the higher the resolution the less the cpu matters to the performance equation. Also, benchmarks tend not to concentrate on the software most people who buy cpus actually use and so can be highly misleading for many reasons. Advising today I'd tell people who want to game at high resolutions to go cheap on the cpu and spend the big money on the GPU...;)

#5231267

Kaarme

2016-02-12 16:09

Even if they deliver what they promise, a 40%+ increase in IPC, it's still not going to catch up to Intel as far as per core performance goes. Just about everything still seems to be single or dual threaded. Single core performance matters too much and AMD still seem to be playing the moar coars game.

Even if it's still slightly slower per core, I'd still take an AMD since I could buy a genuine 8-core for the same price that Intel is asking for a 4-core with the placebo hyperthreading function. The single core difference won't be that huge anymore, unlike right now when nobody serious gets an AMD CPU, diehard AMD fans aside. These days more than 4 cores might start to help even in the newest games, in non-game software they have been put to use for years already, despite Intel's best efforts to tell people nobody needs more than four cores.

#5231275

Neo Cyrus

2016-02-12 16:40

But then again bulldozer should be somewhat slower then that excavator we just don't have anything to compare from excavator. Bulldozer seems to lose some 40-50% vs skylake in everything.

Sky Lake turbo goes higher (4,2 GHz) than 4 GHz so not quite clock to clock comparison. Also Bulldozer is weaker than Excavator.

I completely forgot Excavator and Turbo are things. :wanker: Now I'm a little more optimistic.

Remember that the 40% is simply from the architectural changes...has nothing to do with clocks.

Yes but it seems unrealistic for AMD to achieve high enough clocks to compete with Intel while shoving in 8+ cores if they want to maintain a reasonable TDP. Don't expect some amazing clocks.

Even if it's still slightly slower per core, I'd still take an AMD since I could buy a genuine 8-core for the same price that Intel is asking for a 4-core with the placebo hyperthreading function.

That's just an assumption man, there's zero information on how AMD will price anything.

#5231277

__hollywood|meo

2016-02-12 16:51

pretty interesting info this morning. the smt implementation is very, VERY welcome news! also glad theyre unifying the socket, & moving to ddr4 will be great for the apu chips. they scale practically linearly with bandwidth increases at the moment

#5231285

PrMinisterGR

2016-02-12 17:09

If it integrates some HBM (even a miniscule amount, like 256MB) as an L4, it has 40% faster IPC per clock than Carrizo (which is the latest implementation of the old architecture), and it's clocked at around 4GHz, it will be faster than Skylake.

#5231288

schmidtbag

2016-02-12 17:14

If it integrates some HBM (even a miniscule amount, like 256MB) as an L4, it has 40% faster IPC per clock than Carrizo (which is the latest implementation of the old architecture), and it's clocked at around 4GHz, it will be faster than Skylake.

I'm not sure if that would be cost effective, let alone physically possible (remember, HBM is stacked. there isn't much vertical space in a CPU die). IMO, it would make more sense for them to just alter the memory controller to support HBM DIMMs. For CPU performance, this wouldn't accomplish much but it would make the IGP run so much better that getting something like an A10 crossfired with a discrete GPU could probably qualify as an upper-mid range gaming system. Now that I think of it.... why aren't they making HBM DIMMs?

#5231298

Hootmon

2016-02-12 17:41

Now that I think of it.... why aren't they making HBM DIMMs?

One of the main advantages of HBM is its tight integration with the Core. Sticking it out on a bus kind of defeats the purpose.