Intel and AMDs Furture

[Skanky Sylveon]

1 hour ago, AncientNerd said:

Maybe but it seems to be what I am seeing in a fair number of people I interact with in the "real world". From my kids friends (mid-20 something professionals), people I know from work and family friends. It may just be that I interact with a tech savvy/rich bunch but the price of laptops/desktops are down from what just a desktop was a few years ago (well...twenty, I guess my definition of a few may be skewed). Where you could expect to spend $3K on a basic desktop, now you could expect to get, laptop, desktop, phone and tablet for ~$3K if you don't go crazy with any single element of the whole set. Say $1K laptop, $800 desktop (or equivalent home PC of some sort) , $800 phone, $400 tablet and you are about what the equivalent desktop would have run you in the mid to late 1990's when the explosion of desktops happened.

 

So maybe it is cost prohibitive, or maybe it just needs the right set of applications to make it viable.   

When it comes to tech savvy people, I do see a trend towards that particular setup as well.  However, for the average consumer, it would be too high a price to justify.  That is, until they go to their tech savvy friend's house...  

 

12 hours ago, AncientNerd said:

This may be true this time however I lived through the switch from µm to sub µm transistor sizes in the late 1980s and early 1990s and we had exactly the same kind of articles, about similar types of "new materials" that would be needed to push down into the nm scale.

Really?  I find that very interesting.  I would love to know more.

[AncientNerd]

On 10/20/2017 at 8:32 PM, Cinnabar Sonar said:

Really?  I find that very interesting.  I would love to know more.

There were multiple studies into Gallium-Arsinide  (spelling?) and Germanium as a base substrate rather than Silicon during the late '70s and early '80s to overcome the "limitations" of Silicon. With enough papers published that they were showing up in High-school and Baccalaureate level electronics and computer classes as reference points as to the limitations of Moore's Law and why computer processing power was leveling off. I had several very good teachers/professors who were sure that they only way the power of computers was going to advance was via networks of small/weak computers. Which in a way is true - just the "small weak" level is multiple orders of magnitude higher than what they thought. Since the power level that we were playing with was 8086 through 80386 level machines in 16-64 machine arrays (just a note the 80386 was late 1980's obviously but compute power wise the % difference between the two is minuscule comparing either to any processor made in the last 5 years). 

[Skanky Sylveon]

13 hours ago, AncientNerd said:

There were multiple studies into Gallium-Arsinide  (spelling?) and Germanium as a base substrate rather than Silicon during the late '70s and early '80s to overcome the "limitations" of Silicon. With enough papers published that they were showing up in High-school and Baccalaureate level electronics and computer classes as reference points as to the limitations of Moore's Law and why computer processing power was leveling off. I had several very good teachers/professors who were sure that they only way the power of computers was going to advance was via networks of small/weak computers. Which in a way is true - just the "small weak" level is multiple orders of magnitude higher than what they thought. Since the power level that we were playing with was 8086 through 80386 level machines in 16-64 machine arrays (just a note the 80386 was late 1980's obviously but compute power wise the % difference between the two is minuscule comparing either to any processor made in the last 5 years). 

Thanks for the info.  I wonder if this time there really is a problem?

[mr moose]

Intel have been pretty good at moving with or just before the general trend, even if they don't go to market with said technology. Between 2013 and 2015 they bought up a lot of wearable and gesture based technology IP.   From 2015 they started buying machine learning IP, autonomous vehicle IP and companies working on that stuff.  Whatever the next big thing is you can bet your arse Intel will be in  on the ground floor if not the second.

 

AMD on the other hand bought Nitero (mostly 60Ghz wireless VR headsets) and software start up HiAlgo.  Who also concentrate on games.  Not sure where they intend on going with given the arse end fell out of he VR bubble not long ago.   Prior to that AMD's last acquisition (that I can find) was sea micro. 

 

Part of me wants a bigger fish to buy AMD,  Apple or Samsung sound like good options on the surface.  At least then they would have some money behind them.

 

 

[Pixel5]

On 19.10.2017 at 4:52 PM, Sniperfox47 said:

I really hope that in 10 years AMD will be gone. Not that I have anything against AMD, it's just that the x86 market could desperately use a new player with more capital behind them than AMD, maybe a buyout?

that is the worst idea ever, yes the market could need another player but not by gutting AMD and selling it to a new owner, that will just make intel stronger.

 

what we really need and already needed a decade ago was much more severe penalties and compensation payments from intel for their wrong doings against AMD.

This is ultimately what put AMD into the position they are today and the fact that Intel came out with very minor fees to pay compared to what they gained will ensure that they will continue to work in the background to hold AMD or anyone else that comes into the market small enough so they never become a real competitor.