Simmytu

For anyone complaining about AMD being more APU focused, keep in mind Intel chips are essentially APUs with a crappy graphics core that no one will realistically use if they can help it. If AMD can deliver a more powerful CPU core and still have onboard graphics that's actually usable beyond light desktop work, it will be a nice thing. Will probably retire the 2500k in 2016 with something from AMD.

Yes but I just described a scenario where it matters: SLI/XFire, where the communication between slots shoots up tremendously. Also, a 480 is not that good a card to run such a test these days. Try a 980.

I figure this is why they aren't releasing a desktop Carrizo and haven't released any new FX chips based on Bdver3. They are more than likely trying to conserve resources to invest into other IP.
 
I'm not either. AMD has proven time and time again that node isn't everything. Carrizo brings a 30% improvement in performance per watt on the same exact node as Kaveri. These technologies will eventually scale up once they move to FinFET designs.
 
Zen will be based around an entirely new architecture. A new motherboard and socket will most definitely be needed. Keep in mind Zen may be a complete SoC so the need for south bridges is ruled out entirely. The most interesting concept I think AMD may bring to the table as they have with Carrizo is uArch. Allowing you to run either an FX, APU, or even mobile chips in a single socket. In short taking AM1, FM2+, and AM3+ and smashing them all together. Tho that's just something I personally would like to see happen.
 
Wondering the same thing myself.
 
The problem with DirectX 12 is that by the time it becomes widely adopted in the game industry. Zen would of already been launched and replaced Bdver2 in most of our machines. Certainly it will help people who tend to cling to their hardware for a very long time. Tho personally at that point anyone who has to complain about poor performance should reconsider running 5 year old hardware.

Yep. My 7950 was a very strong performer. Ran almost all my games maxed at 1080p.
 
Also, for all you complaining about Hawaii being power-hungry, the 780/780ti only had marginally lower TDP.
 
And for those of you saying "AMD is suffering" or things to that affect; No, they're not. They have found areas of the market where they can be very successful and will continue to do so. They don't need to beat Intel either, they just need to keep them on their toes and fill the portions of the market that are somewhat abandoned by Intel. Intel has recognized the need for stronger iGPUs and the approaching shift (and benefits) with HSA and they have responded with their Iris Pro graphics. Unfortunately for Intel, those iGPUs that can and will compete on the same level as Kaveri and Carrizo, but will still be priced WAY too high for AMD's APU target market and thus, AMD will remain unchallenged in that regard.

For me the big issue is that they send out review samples, sell a few boards and THEN bring out a revision within a few weeks, that is just downright dishonest. We all I would assume, check out reviews of a board before we buy? Those reviews will almost always be on the 1.0 revision and I for one, naively, assumed that revisions are to fix problems, not cut costs. So a 1.1 or v2 board should be BETTER not worse. And putting these changes  down in the small print, things that would significantly impact performance amd would definitely impact any decision I made whilst purchasing is not a good excuse or a particularly honest practice.
 
oh and to all those who say "duh, why are you buying such cheap boards they suck blah blah blah" there are doxens of reasons why you would want to purchase boards at this end. Not every pcuser is a member of the MasterRace and needs or wants a dogs bollocks top end system. Would you seriously match a $100 CPU with a $300 board? really? Ive built plenty of systems for people on very low budgets who just need a machine that can browse the web, skype and email... 

1) The price point should not matter. Changing a product to be worse, yet keep selling the product under the same name and product code is bad.
2) The 4770K was not being "pushed to it's limits". It could not even handle the 4770K on the default settings. Changes are it won't be able to handle the i5-4670 either.
 
 
Again, no overclocking was done in the test. The MSOFETs could not handle the power delivery needed to run the CPU at stock settings.
The test results are not comparable either. Throttling down to 800MHz when encoding a video after 6 minutes when the rev 1 could keep the board at a higher frequency without throttling is not a minor thing.
 
 
What do you even mean? The specifications for the revised board is far lower and has big issues such as uneven load and overheating.
 
 
Ad hominem.
I really expected better from you moose.
 
 
No this is not par for the course and even if it was it still doesn't excuse shitty behavior. Revision products is common. Revision products and lower the specifications to the point where the product becomes unusable even under normal operation, and keeping the same product code is not common.
Even if we go along with your bullshit that this is common practice for motherboard manufacturers, how does that make it okay? Slavery was common practice at one time as well, did that make it totally acceptable? Obviously slavery is far worse but my point is that just because a lot of people are doing the same bad deed doesn't mean it is any less bad to do.
 
 
Why do you keep saying "push a 4770K to it's limit"? They were running it on stock settings. Can you honestly say that you did read the article before jumping in to blindly defend Gigabyte's bad business practice? I don't think you did. Either you didn't or you're strawmanning.

• They don't know that it is a different one, it has the same EAN/SKU code. Or would you check every part you sell in your shop with thousands and thousand of items?
 
• Why are you defending a shitty move from a company you don't trust? Makes no sense. It would make more sense if you added this thread as another reason why you don't trust them..
 
• It does differ a lot..
 no Dual Bios anymore 4 phase PWM controller is now a 3 phase PWM controller Ampere rating mosfets went from 69A to 52A Mosfets/gate drivers per phase went from 3 per phase to 2 per phase Gate drivers per phase went from max 4 to max 2 Different Turbo-settings -> e.g. an i7 4770K will turbo to 3,9Ghz on all cores in Rev 1.0  and it will turbo to 3,9Ghz on the first core and 3,7Ghz on the other cores in Rev 2.0 also this: "As it turns out, the 4770K CPU on the Rev 2.0 board throttles to 800MHz after about 2.5 minutes of Prime 95. Using an infrared thermometer we measured the mosfet temperatures, which turned out to be 112 ºC. With the board set manually to a more agressive turbo (i.e. the Rev 1.0 default setting) the CPU throttles after merely 15 seconds to 800 MHz.
The Rev 1.0 board using standard settings (so with the agressive turbo) also throttles back, but only after about 3 minutes, i.e. 12 times later than the Rev 2.0. At that time the highest mosfet temperature we measured is about 100 ºC. With the Rev 1.0 set manually to Intel's default Turbo settings (i.e. the Rev 2.0 default) the CPU stays consistently at its maximum speed of 3.7 GHz without any throttling whatsoever, not even after running Prime95 for over an hour. The mosfet temperature in that test didn't go higher than 90 ºC."
 
and this: "The significantly higher temperature of the components in the CPU power supply and the unbalanced load over the mosfets in the Rev 2.0 board make it likely that the new revision won't last as long as the Rev 1.0, even though we cannot prove that using this test. What we can demonstrate beyond any doubt is that the CPU power supply of the Rev 2.0 board is not up to the task, even for normal consumer workloads"
 
 
In other news, one of the guys at hardware.info (dutch) commented that he contacted Asus and MSI and they responded that they do not do this.
They say that if they change something big as changing/removing chips - decreasing the amount of phases - decrease the amount of layers of the motherboard - etc, it'll get a new product code & ean code.
 
Beware though, it may still happen with asus and msi as well. Although the guys that update the price comparison database confirm this.

Wow you guys disappoint me.
This is unacceptable. Since when was it acceptable to release an inferior product under the same name? I am pretty sure people got very upset when Kingston switched the NAND in some SSD to NAND with far worse performance. Why not get upset when Gigabyte removes features like dual BIOS and possible change to a worse power design on their board?
If they want to make major changes to the board then how about calling it something else? Yeah I know, I must be crazy to even come up with the idea of naming different products different things. You don't release a product and market it as having a bunch of things, then silently release a newer version which removes some of those features, which still keeping the same name on the product.
 
Imagine if AMD or Nvidia would do this. Imagine if AMD made a revision to the 290X that made it perform like the 290. Would you people still be saying the same things? "Just return it if you don't like it". "Different does not equate to misrepresented". "It's the distributors fault".
Not sure about you but I would think that was just as unacceptable as Gigabyte doing this.
 
I am getting pretty tired of people defending companies that do things that hurt consumers. Good companies should be honest and value their customers. This is clearly the exact opposite of that. Gigabyte is being dishonest, and they are willing to throw their customers under the bus if it means making a bit more money. Nobody should defend those kinds of actions, ever.
 
Also, I am not sure how many people actually read the article before jumping in to defend Gigabyte, but some of the differences are NOT listed on their website. So when they make downgrade to some boards they sometimes don't actually list all the downgrades on the official site. In those cases, it doesn't even matter if you're very cautious, contacts your retailer and asks which revision of the board you will get and then double check the specifications on Gigabytes own website, you will still end up with the wrong information.

Anyone defending GigaByte on this is just a fanboy, plain and simple...
This is misleading, they should've just sold it with a different EAN code. If you buy this from the store, you have no idea if you're buying rev1.0 or rev1.1 or ... (unless the shop tells you the rev version)
 
What I'd like to know is: are other motherboard manufacturers doing the same? Selling a worse product as the same product (same EAN) with a different revision number? (making a better one, is good of course but still fishy if it's the same ean code..)
 
There are a lot of changes on the GA-BM85-HD3 board..

PS: I have 2 Gigabyte motherboards myself (checked them and they are both rev 1.0) and happy with them. But I'm probably going to buy another brand when I need one in the future.. one does not mislead a customer.

Because usually a revision means an upgrade, an unadvertised downgrade doesn't sound very costumer friendly, especially if there is no way to know in advance which version you'll receive.
As I said above, imagine buying a cheapo motherboard, because the official page tells you it has dual BIOS, and the board that you receive doesn't have that second BIOS chip. Is that alright to you?

Yes, very true, but doesn't this pose a problem when the webshop and the cosumer is unable to know which rev they are receiving? This particular user bought the board especially for the dual BIOS, then it turns out the second BIOS chip was removed, while it was still on the official specification list.

Maybe that's just what they want you to think? 
 
CNN deserves it though; their coverage of everything has been horrible. Don Lemon received one of the 'worst journalist' 'awards' from the Columbia Journalism Review.
 
 
http://www.cjr.org/darts_and_laurels/the_worst_journalism_of_2014.php?page=all
 
Then there was this ridiculousness for the November elections...
 


 


 
Let 'em burn. All of the major news networks deserve to be rekt.

Please be good riddance:http://rt.com/usa/207963-cnn-blunders-map-mosque/

I see nothing wrong with this. It's CNN, after all.

The sad truth is that this will affect the people and not the state leaders. 

Interesting article, but I have to ask, was that photo of the office taken during an average work day or was it taken during crunch time when the deadline is looming and everyone is trying to finish up their work?

Is he saying all these things because they're true, or is he a bitter ex-employee who's simply trying to ruin valves reputation?

I've worked in terrible conditions as a fabricator welder, so I can totally sympathise if those things are true, and if they are true then Valve should be totally ashamed of themselves, and those of you who're blindly defending Valve, you're idiots imo, no workplace is perfect, no matter what a company tells us to the contrary, and I wouldn't be surprised if those things are true at least some of the time when the pressure to get work out on time is piling on.

I seriously doubt though that Valve's offices are like that 100% of the time, but if those things are true, he should have taken his findings to whatever authorities deal with this kind of stuff in the US instead of just shit-posting on the internet. For example, if there's even a hint of a fire-hazard in Valves HQ due to cramped conditions, then HSE or it's US equivalent should have been notified immediately.

And that's why I'm dubious of his claims, because instead of going to the local authorities, he posted his "findings" on a blog post, and that to me stinks of someone who is nothing more than a bitter ex-employee with an axe to grind.

But if his findings are true, then Valve absolutely should be held accountable for it, and while I can't simply walk away from my steam account due simply to the sheer amount of money I've spent there, I'll start buying my games elsewhere if those things are true, as difficult as that would be.

Oh what a god damn surprise the LTT sheep are here to defend valve no matter what! lmao oh this is just pathetic! 
 
This guy has every right to complain look at some of the other major game publishers offices they are nothing like this.

Dota 2 doesn't exist, then?
 
I'm a Valve fan, I'll admit it, but I don't believe they should be immune to criticism. No company should be. Their customer support is terrible and needs a massive overhaul, as an example. If what this guy is saying is true, too, their workspaces need an overhaul too.

Great argument!

Exactly. I hate Steam, it never works, and now its just a front for unfinished terrible games (Project Nimbus is cool though).people are all "hurdur so many broken games, Valve will never do" Last time Valve released was 4 years ago, which was CS:GO that (apparently) should have been a update.
People have always judged EA and others for micro transactions, Valve being the worst offender by far imo.

This. Even DARE criticise Valve or Gabe Newell, and all the PCMR plebs will jump on you.
 
I find it pretty disgusting how people praise and worship a business man as much as people do.

What an awful mentality.

This comment tells more about you than him.

Most offices are built in cubicles. Cubicles are superior to totally open chaos like this.