AMD: Next CPU architecture will be completely different

Status
Not open for further replies.

Wildside

Hellfire!
Messages
3,038
Location
Riverside, CA
Source

AMD has squeezed an awful lot out of its AMD64 architecture since it first materialised in 2003, and even the latest K10 core used in the Phenom chips uses basically the same architecture with a different cache system. However, the company says that it's now looking at a whole new architecture for the next generation of CPUs.

AMD's technical director of sales and marketing for EMEA, Giuseppe Amato, told Custom PC that ‘if I look at the next generation architecture of our CPU, then it will definitely not be, how can I say, comparable with the Phenom. It will look completely different.' Amato was unable to give us any specific details of the new architecture, but did add that it would ‘solve problems that today we think can never be addressed by hardware.'

The AMD64 architecture introduced us to new features such as 64-bit desktop computing, as well as the integrated memory controller. It gave Intel's NetBurst architecture a good for its money too, consistently out-performing Pentium 4 chips in our benchmarks. However, the new AMD64-based Phenom chips are unable to compete with Intel's new Core 2 Quad chips at the top end of the market, with AMD positioning even the top-end Phenom chips at a similar price to Intel's Core 2 Quad Q6600.

Intel also decided to go back to the drawing board in terms of its CPU architecture when it went from NetBurst to Core, which was interestingly more like Intel's ancient P6 Pentium Pro core than a Pentium 4 chip. What would you like to see in a new CPU architecture from AMD? And what sort of problems could be solved by the architecture that ‘we think can never be addressed by hardware?' Let us know your thoughts.
 
I wonder what they are talking about "that we think can never be addressed by hardware"... possibly a tie-in of all hardware, redistributing the performance stack, and thusly offloading it's resources and making the system even more powerful, kinda like network farming. at any rate, definitely interested to see what it brings!!
 
This is what a lot of people forget...the core chips are using a whole new architecture, while the X2's are still just Athlon 64's slapped together to make a dual core....phenoms being X2's slapped together as well. the chips have held up reasonably well i think.
 
ricanflow said:
the chips have held up reasonably well i think.

Definitely. Can you imagine four P4's running as a quad? It would make Chernobyl look like a backyard BBQ...

:D
 
Hopefully this will be able to surpass or at least rival Nehalem's performance. With the Phenom's being such a disappointment AMD really needs to pull this one off.
 
LMFAO @ Trotters post, honestly, they had better use a totaly new socket design and stick with just the latest tech if they go to a new architecture, that and dump the whole AM2(+) shiz. DDR3 ram only, totaly new socket design, better mounting method for the heatsink, new naming scheme, that way we can easily tell what chips are comparable with intels, just like when they started the whole 2000+ and such...
 
Ahh... there we go :D

I hope AMD gets this one right, they should do a lot of research like what Intel did with their Core 2 Architecture
 
Im pretty sure amd has been doing this...why do you think theyve been laying low?

Intel did this back in the netburst days. They saw what amd64 was capable of, so they threw out the idea of higher clock speed = better and went with a redesign of the pIII/pentium m architecture.

The way i see it, pentium m's are basically 32bit core solo chips, not exactly but very similar (1.4ghz pentium m beats 2.8ghz p4) as in they perform very well even at lower clock speeds compared to netburst chips.
 
I'm really curious about that statement: "solve problems that today we think can never be addressed by hardware." What does that mean?
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top Bottom