AMD cuts ‘Bulldozer’ instructions from ‘Zen’ processors for good reasons

[ahhming]

AMD explicitly revealed in the description of the patch to the GNU Binutils package that “Zen”, its third-generation x86-64 architecture in its first iteration (znver1 – Zen, version 1), will not support TBM, FMA4, XOP and LWP instructions developed specifically for the “Bulldozer” family of micro-architectures.

The company even decided to remove support of the “Bulldozer”-specific instructions to save transistors and die space for something more useful.

 

While FMA4 and XOP could boost performance in gaming, HPC and multimedia applications, a promising thing that will be missed by numerous programmers is LWP, or lightweight profiling.

The lightweight profiling was developed to enable code to make dynamic and real-time decisions about how best to improve the performance of simultaneously running tasks, using techniques such as memory organization and code layout, with very little overhead. The LWP is a set of hardware features in AMD “Bulldozer” processors, which should be considered when designing applications.

 Elimination of such instructions clearly points to the fact that AMD’s new micro-architecture will be complete different from “Bulldozer”

 

Source:

http://www.kitguru.net/components/cpu/anton-shilov/amd-cuts-bulldozer-instructions-from-zen-processors/

[Aniallation]

Of course... if they stuck with Bulldozer, which is an architecture that belongs in a museum, they're going to get screwed over by Intel even more then they already are.

[linuxnutcase]

Amd needs zen to be a win for them to stay on the field

[Suika]

Man, it's going to suck if Zen is actually a let down. 

[MrRavens]

So much stuff coming out of AMD that we want to see, if it keeps them a float or not. Now ya ya, I know they aren't going to die next week. I just want to see great things come out of them. They are the main players that shake Intel and Nvidia. Keep'em awake AMD!  

[cesrai]

Yes AMD please kick Intel in DA thing.

[Ashaira]

Amd needs zen to be a win for them to stay on the field

 

depends on what you mean by win. to me if it's 10% slower than intel uses 50w more but is 2 thirds the price that is a win for me.

[JustCallMeVlad]

Attention amd.... Copy whatever Intel is doing

[Humbug]

depends on what you mean by win. to me if it's 10% slower than intel uses 50w more but is 2 thirds the price that is a win for me.

That would be ok.

It needs to be like the GPU market. AMD is not always faster than Nvidia in terms of flagship parts but they do always have a full range of competitive products all the way from budget to premium enthusiast stuff. And they always seem to deliver improvements every generation. Unfortunately competing with Intel in the CPU market seems to be much more difficult... Intel has become so good that AMD is basically forced to sell their entire range as budget products, and this has been going on for years; which is a disaster for the cashflow.

[Syntaxvgm]

Well of course. If this was bulldozer version 2 we would have all collectively ass-raped AMD with an ice auger. 

Fucking bulldozer tired of it. NOW GO GIVE INTEL BETTER COMPETITION! 

 

 

 

 

Better have SMT as well you assholes. And not be so hot, or have such low IPC. People say that doesn't matter, but do you see AMD gaming laptops? No you don't. 

[Guest Strangerbob]

That would be ok.

It needs to be like the GPU market. AMD is not always faster than Nvidia in terms of flagship parts but they do always have a full range of competitive products all the way from budget to premium enthusiast stuff. And they always seem to deliver improvements every generation. Unfortunately competing with Intel in the CPU market seems to be much more difficult... Intel has become so good that AMD is basically forced to sell their entire range as budget products, and this has been going on for years; which is a disaster for the cashflow.

 

Negative.

 

7970 was faster than 680 once they fixed their drivers, not to mention it was released when nvidia still had the 580, so you can say amd won the flagship that generation too.

But then again the original Titan was out there with the 7970 as the best from AMD for 6 months.

 

290x was EQUIVALENT 100% to 780ti. And it seems the same will be the case with 390x and titanx (except titan x will cost twice).

And in the last dual gpus - the 295x2 was clearly faster and way cooler than the titanZ.

 

Nvidia was clearly the winner of flagship in the days when DirectX 10 first appeared. Since then it was either equal or amd was the winner of the flagship, the blind fanboyism and ignorance of facts in the community is the reason why nvidia dates to charge 30% more either way, for no reason.

[PlayModeOn]

Man, it's going to suck if Zen is actually a let down. 

I wouldn't be surprised if it's like another FX-8xxx release.

[Eroda]

guess we will just have to see, but there shouldnt be any sane consumer who wants AMD to fail. we want AMD to kick Intels ass because that is the only thing that will get intel trying something risky

[EpicAdom]

Yes AMD please kick Intel in DA thing.

Amen to that. We need some competition.

[ForsakenLive]

We all believe in you AMD! Even the hardcore Intel fans need this to happen, so they can get something noticeable better than Sandy...

[Humbug]

Negative.

Read my post again. I don't know who you are arguing with. What I said in my post is that AMD is not always faster than NVIDIA in terms of flagships. I.e. Sometimes they are faster and sometimes NVIDIA is a bit faster. But it's always competitive...

I am a happy user of an R9 290, best GPU experience I have ever had in terms of performance, features, drivers, everything... So no I am not an NVIDIA fan boy although they are good too (was using NVIDIA up until 2014).

[Misanthrope]

Attention amd.... Copy whatever Intel is doing

Yeah, let's copy 14nm manufacturing process. Oh wait, we can't intel is literally the only company in the world that's able to do that.

[Doobeedoo]

So how will they compensate to those removed instructions that could boost performance in various tasks like gaming and applications. There better be a significantly better replacement for them.

[Misanthrope]

So how will they compensate to those removed instructions that could boost performance in various tasks like gaming and applications. There better be a significantly better replacement for them.

 

Knowing AMD: More cores!

 

In all seriousness though: It makes sense that they remove unpopular instructions if they can use the die space to boost performance. 

[Opcode]

So how will they compensate to those removed instructions that could boost performance in various tasks like gaming and applications. There better be a significantly better replacement for them.

Zen still has FMA4 the source is wrong.

 

+ { "CPU_ZNVER1_FLAGS",

+ "Cpu186|Cpu286|Cpu386|Cpu486|Cpu586|Cpu686|CpuSYSCALL|CpuRdtscp|Cpu387|Cpu687|CpuFISTTP|CpuNop|CpuMMX|CpuSSE|CpuSSE2|CpuSSE3|CpuSSE4a|CpuABM|CpuLM|CpuFMA|CpuFMA4|CpuBMI|CpuF16C|CpuCX16|CpuClflush|CpuSSSE3|CpuSVME|CpuSSE4_1|CpuSSE4_2|CpuAES|CpuAVX|CpuPCLMUL|CpuLZCNT|CpuPRFCHW|CpuXsave|CpuXsaveopt|CpuFSGSBase|CpuAVX2|CpuMovbe|CpuBMI2|CpuRdRnd|CpuADX|CpuRdSeed|CpuSMAP|CpuSHA|CpuXSAVEC|CpuXSAVES|CpuClflushOpt|CpuCLZERO" },

 

XOP was cut in favor of AVX instructions.

[creativename]

Yeah, let's copy 14nm manufacturing process. Oh wait, we can't intel is literally the only company in the world that's able to do that.

Pretty sure samsung has 14nm process to.

[azurezeed]

we all pray for Zen

[GloriousPain]

Yeah, let's copy 14nm manufacturing process. Oh wait, we can't intel is literally the only company in the world that's able to do that.

Honestly if they just copy Ivy Bridge, and just sell it for cheaper than Intel's Haswell  they'd in all honesty win as realworld performance differences between Sandy Ivy Haswell and Broadwell  is next to nothing 

[patrickjp93]

I feel so sorry for AMD... As they're coming out with Zen in another year, DX12 is going to be making games run more in parallel on the CPU, and FX8/9 will suddenly gain some fresh life for those on I3s and the like. When people buy into the 8-core platform, any and all bottlenecks should be erased, leaving Zen unappealing to those who bought Skylake and those with AMD hardware and no problems...

[patrickjp93]

Honestly if they just copy Ivy Bridge, and just sell it for cheaper than Intel's Haswell they'd in all honesty win as realworld performance differences between Sandy Ivy Haswell and Broadwell is next to nothing

SB to Hasaell is a 65% jump with properly tuned software. You'd be shocked to find the problem is software devs stuck in SISD mode and focusing on legacy support at the expense of all else.

Pretty sure samsung has 14nm process to.

More like 20nm with FF and a dash of marketing.

https://www.semiwiki.com/forum/content/3884-who-will-lead-10nm.html

Actual figures of the industry on densities and transistor sizes. Samsung is nowhere close to matching Intel's 14nm and in fact it's less dense than their 20nm planar.

Well of course. If this was bulldozer version 2 we would have all collectively ass-raped AMD with an ice auger.

Fucking bulldozer tired of it. NOW GO GIVE INTEL BETTER COMPETITION!

Better have SMT as well you assholes. And not be so hot, or have such low IPC. People say that doesn't matter, but do you see AMD gaming laptops? No you don't.

To be fair the lack of AMD gaming laptops is far more a marketing and contracts problem. AMD certainly has the hardware for it.

Also. Intel doesn't need better competition. IBM's stiff enough as it is. The problem right now is all in the software side, not the CPU side. SB->HW is a 65% difference for properly tuned software that makes use of the best instructions available.