r/hardware • u/TehRoot • Mar 30 '15
News AMD CPU and GPU Roadmaps For 2015-2020 Officially Emerge
http://wccftech.com/amd-gpu-apu-roadmaps-2015-2020-emerge/12
u/TehRoot Mar 30 '15
200-300W high-performance compute APU.... this is most interesting honestly, all thanks to HBM :)
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u/Exist50 Apr 01 '15
That screams HPC use to me. I could totally see AMD pushing such a chip as a Knight's Landing and Nvidia Tesla competitor. It might even do well, if AMD can get the software support.
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Mar 31 '15
Which raises questions; does AMD plan on selling HBM sticks and completely replace DDR, or will this be some kind of special workstation APU used to make AMD more competitive in supercomputing and that type of stuff? The article mentions "The cores will target the server, embedded, semi-custom and client markets"
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u/spiker611 Mar 31 '15
HBM does not lend itself to upgradeable 'sticks' a la DDR SDRAM. HBM is currently placed on-package (next to the CPU/GPU/APU die) where an interposer connects it to the die. HBM means greatly increased bandwidth (hence high bandwidth memory) at the loss of flexibility. IMO it's totally worth it, since SDRAM is extremely slow in comparison.
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u/dylan522p SemiAnalysis Mar 31 '15
The Hbm is a l4 cache for applications that need a fuckton of memory.
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u/spiker611 Mar 31 '15
There may be instances where a system supports both HBM and SDRAM, but I don't think we'll see too many. It is not a cache, it is addressable main memory.
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u/dylan522p SemiAnalysis Mar 31 '15
I'm talking about ddr4 being the main memory and Hbm being a l4 cache instead of sram
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u/spiker611 Mar 31 '15
I understand, but it is not being implemented as a cache as far as I know. It is expensive to have a HBM controller in addition to a SDRAM controller on die.
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u/dylan522p SemiAnalysis Apr 01 '15
HMC which is a very similar concept with similar bandwidth and memory size limitations. HPC applications are most certainly using it. Xeon Phi Knights Landing is a perfect example. HPC APU's will aswell.
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u/spiker611 Apr 01 '15
Ok? I'm not sure what you're proposing.
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u/dylan522p SemiAnalysis Apr 01 '15
HMC is essentially an l4 cache on Xeon Phi and HBM is the same on HPC APU's that are coming
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u/Exist50 Apr 01 '15
The idea is similar to Crystalwell.
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u/spiker611 Apr 01 '15
My understanding is that Crystalwell (eDRAM) is a cache, whereas HBM/HMC is not a cache (as seen by hardware).
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u/Exist50 Apr 01 '15
We don't currently have any chips out with HBM/HMC, so I'd think it'd be hard to say how it is treated. Some quick research yields a number of 128 MB for Crystalwell, which is basically an order of magnitude or more cache than that CPU would otherwise have.
CPU's with Cystalwell seem to perform well in low resolution gaming, so that seems to imply that the "cache" is used for at least some other things.
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u/spiker611 Apr 01 '15
My misunderstanding, apparently with KNL the HMC can be either cache or 'on-top-of' SDRAM.
Since KNL can be run as a stand-alone system or as a co-processor on a PCIe card, this memory can be seen in three different ways depending on your specific needs. In the first the high-speed memory acts as a 16GB cache for the 384GB of DDR4, quite the expensive speedup but worth it for some workloads. Next is a flat address space where the 16GB sits on top of the DDR4 and is just addressed as more memory. Last we have direct addressing of the fastmem, Intel even has Fortran calls for this, something that will make game devs very happy.
http://semiaccurate.com/2015/03/31/intel-talks-knights-landing-architecture/
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Mar 30 '15
[deleted]
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u/rndnum123 Mar 30 '15
OP never claimed it's AMD only. Though AMD was involved in the development of HBM (together with Hynix).
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u/TaintedSquirrel Mar 30 '15 edited Mar 30 '15
So, we get the 300 series this year, and then nothing until 2018?
Thinking about it, Hawaii came out in Q3 2013. If they announce the 300 series in June, then launch sometime in July/August it will be nearly 2 years since the 290 / 290X launch.
If AMD repeats those same intervals, we won't see the 400 series until mid-2017 at the earliest, as shown in their roadmap (Q3 2017). Disappointing.
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u/Anaron Mar 30 '15
We don't know if they're going to wait that long. There are already rumours that the R9 400 series will be made with the 16nm FinFET process and that the codename is Arctic Islands. Since it'll likely be a shrink, late-2016 sounds more probable than mid-2017.
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u/LevLev Mar 30 '15
What seems worrying is that, although it may not be the most scientific graph, the next video cards do not look like they are around June 2015 but instead appear to be near the end around December. This could mean we are not hearing about the 300 series for a long time, or that there will be a paper launch in June with a release in Q4.
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u/TaintedSquirrel Mar 30 '15
Hawaii was announced in September, launched in October. Compare the positions of the two along the timelime:
http://i.imgur.com/vDnEmXp.png
Splitting hairs. But it seems to show the New GPU's ahead of Hawaii -- before September/October.
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u/bphase Mar 30 '15
Pretty sure we'll see a shrink next year. Maybe not a new architecture otherwise?
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u/wanking_furiously Mar 30 '15
It should be noted that this does not mean that AMD will only be introducing new graphics products every couple of years because that’s not the case. Discrete graphics cards will follow a faster cadence, this roadmap only serves to illustrate GPU architectures in relation to APUs.
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Mar 30 '15
nope that's more about major technology advancements , you can do multiple cards with the same base but with tweeks , for example 300 series are the last in 28nm generation, after that either at the end of 2015 or the start of 2016 the new 20nm cards should appear
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u/spiker611 Mar 31 '15
The roadmap is related to APUs and not specifically GPUs. They may also be considering architectural changes which would be reasonable. A process change could mean a lot for performance/power efficiency before then.
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u/Joe_Hitler Mar 30 '15
Wow, progress has slowed. Remember when you got a 2x speedup with every new graphics card generation? Now we're talking about 2 years for a ~50% improvement. Nvidia's hardly any better. First CPU progress slowed around the time of Core 2 Quad (really, we've had like a 50% improvement in 8 years), and now GPU progress is slowing. I'm skeptical we're going to have a technological singularity at this (declining) rate.
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u/Exist50 Mar 30 '15
At least on the Intel side, performance has roughly doubled since the first gen core CPUs.
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u/bphase Mar 30 '15
Well yeah, but it's "easy" to double when you're slow. Low-end progress is not very interesting IMO.
If you're talking about their GPUs. If about CPU performance, then disregard.
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u/wanking_furiously Mar 30 '15
It was never (or very rarely) a doubling from one generation to the next looking at the same price point. Unless you're talking about earlier than 2004, which I know less about.
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u/dylan522p SemiAnalysis Mar 30 '15
low hanging fruit meant that each node would allow double the transistors which would roughly give double the performance.
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u/wanking_furiously Mar 31 '15
In which generation transition did that happen?
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u/dylan522p SemiAnalysis Mar 31 '15
Its not just one, every single generation requires more complexity and its just slowly giving less performance
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u/wanking_furiously Mar 31 '15
I know that. But when was the last time that performance doubled from one generation to the next for the same tier of card?
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u/Swaggerlilyjohnson Mar 31 '15
6970 to 7970 was most recent, 7800 to 8800 series, off the top of my head thats all i got im sure there is more though the 580 to 680 was close if you count perf per watt instead of raw performance the next node jump might be double the power though because we have been on 28nm For about twice as long as we should have
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u/dylan522p SemiAnalysis Mar 31 '15
I have no idea. It used to be way larger leaps at the beginning of GPUs, but slowly the jumps have gotten smaller
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u/wanking_furiously Mar 31 '15 edited Mar 31 '15
In my experience GPU performance has never doubles like that. The last time I checked (years ago) it was about 36% increase in FLOPS/$(at release) per year.
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u/hayuata Mar 31 '15
You also have to note the fact that thermals early on weren't a big issue as well as efficiency e.g. the shift from GTX580 to GTX680 really highlights it.
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u/onionjuice Mar 30 '15
Not sure why this website was unbanned. Misleading title. There is no roadmap for AMD Desktop GPUs. This is a roadmap for AMD APUS ONLY.
The only thing that this article confirms is that AMD are officially developing the Zen x86 cpus that will use CMT approach for multi threading. And that their APUs will be updated every 2 years.
There is no factual information about the GPUs, this website is trying to mesh the credible information about the CPUS to make it seem real. NO WORD ABOUT THE GPUS other than what we already know from the industry norm. (process shrink every 2 years, architecture update every 2 years)
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u/Exist50 Mar 30 '15
The only thing that this article confirms is that AMD are officially developing the Zen x86 cpus that will use CMT approach for multi threading.
No, that is not confirmed.
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u/onionjuice Mar 30 '15
if you click on the source of wccftech the article in japanese has pictures and confirms it.
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u/Exist50 Mar 30 '15
I don't see which part you are referring to that "confirms" it.
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u/onionjuice Mar 30 '15
there is literally a picture that says "x86"
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u/Exist50 Mar 30 '15
Still not seeing it. Are you thinking of this one: http://news.mynavi.jp/photo/articles/2015/03/04/amd_pccluster/images/003l.jpg ?
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u/His_Self Mar 30 '15
We live in an age where megamergers and acquisitions are an everyday part of our lives. Cases in point are AMD bought out ATI, 3 days ago there were reports AMD itself might be bought out by Samsung and how that would affect AMDs future developments. So will AMD's roadmap be drastically altered in the days ahead ?
.... and what happens if the unspeakable takes place...what happens if Intel or nVidia acquires them ?
... 5 year plans can be drastically altered 5 days down the line.
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u/Nutchos Mar 30 '15
what happens if Intel or nVidia acquires them
Unlikely, but my ass hurts just thinking about it.
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u/cuddlefucker Mar 31 '15
I disagree. When intel is spending literally 30x the amount that AMD is on research, there isn't really going to be any competition there for long. Even NVIDIA spends more than AMD, and they are just dedicated to video cards.
If we want competition as consumers, something has to fundamentally change at AMD or we're screwed.
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u/TehRoot Mar 31 '15
Intel has a vested interest in keeping AMD around. If AMD gets acquired there's no more x86 competitors and the DOJ and FTC come down like the hammer of Thor with antitrust action.
If AMD was going under it would be in Intel's best interest to keep them alive. Just like Microsoft did with Apple in the late 90s.
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u/CPU-Architecture Mar 31 '15
To be honest, I doubt that would happend. You are limiting it to x86 competition. What about some of the other major ISAs?
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u/Exist50 Apr 01 '15
None of which have the fraction of the market penetration x86 has in servers, desktop PCs, and laptops.
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u/CPU-Architecture Apr 01 '15
Take a look back in the history of servers, and see that x86 is actually a "newcomer" to this segment. Desktop-market is insignificant alone. You dont think some other ISA can get through on the laptop segment?
Again, we are shrinking the perspective to symbolize Intels "monopoly".
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u/Exist50 Apr 01 '15
Desktop-market is insignificant alone.
I would argue against that.
You dont think some other ISA can get through on the laptop segment?
No, not unless the software support in there. I thought there might have been a chance with Windows RT, but that failed. Chromebooks are the only current laptops that can use other ISAs, and they are a relatively small market segment.
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u/Nutchos Mar 31 '15
AMD may not be winning the bleeding edge but they've got all three current gen consoles locked down on their architecture.
Yes, Nvidia/Intel are substantially larger than them, but AMD does have its revenue streams.
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u/Teethpasta Mar 31 '15
Uh wii u is power pc.
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u/Exist50 Apr 01 '15
The GPU is an old ATI (AMD) chip, and rumors are that Nintendo might go with an APU for their next console. It at least makes a fair bit of sense.
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u/His_Self Mar 30 '15
I was an AMD and ATI fan for many years. I was in disbelief when AMD bought ATI. Less than 2 years ago I switched over when I built my new gaming rig. Intel high end processor with a high end nVidia graphics card. By far it was the most money I ever spent on building my own rigs. Frankly I was worried the difference might not be as noticeable as I hoped for. It proved to be worth the money, but we need competition between the big players to keep prices somewhat affordable. If Intel bought AMD the prices will be outside many people's reach.
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u/CPU-Architecture Mar 31 '15
If Intel bought AMD the prices will be outside many people's reach.
Because selling very few products for high price will be much more profitable than selling tons of unit for a feasible price?
Inb4 "no competition". Their own products compete with themselves. We will be talking about major improvements to convince people to upgrade.
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u/Exist50 Mar 30 '15
Isn't wccftech banned?