With both AMD and Intel opening new Fabrication facilities in the developed world and the hype on Conroe, a.k.a Core 2 Duo exceeding anything that I can remember in the past 5-6 years, along with the typical exaggeration that ensues, through blogs, tech. sites etc., it’s perhaps time to look at the greater picture of CPU manufacturing in the near future.
Kritstopher Kubicki, has an interesting article, titled ‘Intel Life after “Conroe”‘ that I found interesting. Specifically, the decoupling of lithographic process & processor core generation is of interest, as it is something that AMD, perhaps in lieu of its reduced manufacturing capacity, has been doing for years. Another interesting aspect of the post-Conroe intel strategy, which is also uncommon for this company, is the unification and focus on a single core for all markets (server, desktop and mobile), which in effect imposes a largest common denominator in terms of features, viz. low wattage, multi core/scalability. Kubicki’s article presents a rudimentary roadmap that stretches for 6 years, starting with ‘Yonah’, the last of the ‘old’ lot released in Q1, 2006 and ending with ‘Gesher’, six years later at 32nm. Intel seems to have an array of interesting technologies for the next few years — let’s not forget it is the dominant player and has loads of money and resources to spare for R&D.
Now where does all this leave AMD? Well, AMD has done little to convince the world about its up and coming products, until recently. Two major points of interest are the Reverse HT (Reverse Hyper Threading), a technology that — seemingly — combines ‘cores’ selectively on applications that are single-threaded, thus significantly increasing performance on those applications and the new architecture due in 2008. The Inquirer has an article where, in its own unique way, it claims that existing AM2 Athlon64s include ReverseHT and “It seems that in certain cases, even an old AMD Athlon 64 3800+ can wipe the floor with Core 2 Duo E6300 CPU”. Interesting, although I wouldn’t bet on its accuracy or validity on the whole. According to the article, a new processor driver from Microsoft is required on Windows to control the feature, e.g. let the CPU know when to use it and when not.
At the beginning of June, AMD announced their short-term intention to focus on quad-core and higher manufacturing capacities, both of which seem wise on their part considering their position. And just a few days ago, at an interview with BusinessWeek, Hector Ruiz, AMD’s CEO made mention of their plan to release a ‘brand-new’ architecture by 2008. In the (non-technical) interview, it was more or less made clear that AMD is also going for a unified architecture — although it has been doing so for years, ever since the solemn, yet very well received, release of K8 back in 2003.
From where I stand, irrespectively on the ‘inquirer-grade’ rumours, the future of CPU design in what may prove to be the twilight of this now 30 year old paradigm seems good: new technology, increased competition, and hopefully faster availability and lower prices.
