Platform Trends: AMD Ends the Year With Highs and Lows

2006 has been a wild year for both AMD and Intel. The dueling chipmakers provided headline-grabbing news, from Intel's dazzling Core 2 Duo release to AMD's surprising purchase of graphics giant ATI.

CPU release schedules also changed drastically. Instead of simply ramping up dual-core clock speeds, Intel launched the first quad-core PC processor. AMD responded with its double-dual-core Quad FX platform, giving consumers plenty of choices among multiprocessing desktops.

It's certainly been a year of change, including the fact that Intel has seized the performance lead at all levels. For its part, AMD is working hard to keep some promises, introduce a few new processors, and get primed for a better 2007.

No More 90-Nanometer

AMD recently introduced its long-awaited "Brisbane" core, built with 65-nanometer-process engineering and due to replace the current 90-nanometer "Windsor core" in 2007. Introducing 65nm parts before the end of 2006 was an AMD promise, and though cutting it a bit close, the company did deliver, dropping thermal design power (TDP) from 89 to only 65 watts while decreasing minimum core voltages from 1.3 to 1.25 volts.

The 65nm process will soon be finding its way into the meat and potatoes of AMD's lineup, where the die shrink and reduced power requirements will have the biggest impact. After all, the mainstream market represents the majority of AMD sales, so greater efficiencies will boost the company's bottom line more with a midrange Athlon 64 X2 4600+ than with a hardcore-gamer Athlon 64 FX-62.

One interesting facet of the new 65-nanometer CPUs is that they totally change the AMD model number system and hierarchy. Historically, AMD has differentiated its processors by both clock speed and core architecture, as with the Athlon 64 X2 4600+ and 4800+, which both run at 2.4GHz but have different designs with 2x512K versus 2x1MB of Level 2 cache. There have been breaks in the schedule in which the Athlon 64 FX preempted the latest core, but these have quickly ended, with AMD sometimes retroactively (as with the Athlon 64 X2 5200+) introducing new mainstream models to fill the gap.

The Brisbane core changes all that, and gets AMD back to a standardized 2x512K dual-core architecture. This is logical given the inherent lower cost and power usage and the higher chip yield of a 2x512K compared to 2x1MB release, especially as core speed has been a more consistent indicator of overall performance than varying L2 cache.

What's changed, however, is the clock multiplier, which utilizes the CPU bus to provide a given clock speed. For the first time these will encompass half-step ratios such as 11.5x and 12.5x, allowing AMD to achieve in-between clock speeds such as 2.3GHz and 2.5GHz as well as its former stepping from 2.2GHz to 2.4GHz to 2.6GHz and so on.

To be sure, not everything is wine and roses with the new 65nm Athlon 64 X2s. Many performance benchmarks have shown notable discrepancies between the 65- and 90-nanometer parts, with the older cores outpacing the newer cores. Many reasons for this have been discussed, with a slower Level 2 cache on the smaller die perhaps the most logical culprit. Overclocking ability, always a prime consideration with any die shrink, is not getting rave reviews, but that is common with the first units out of a factory.

Speeding the Release Schedule

Although the 65-nanometer migration brings power consumption down to competitive levels, AMD still finds itself behind the Core 2 Duo/Extreme 8-ball in terms of overall performance, as well as trumped by Intel's introduction of a quad-core processor -- although AMD insists its K8L "native" quad-core design will top Intel's placement of two dual-core dies on a single chip.

The best-known answer to such a shortcoming is to ramp up clock speeds and try to overpower the competition -- ironically, the exact strategy Intel employed against AMD not long ago. And this is exactly what AMD has done, quietly releasing new 2.8GHz Athlon 64 X2 5400+ and 5600+ processors and ramping up for 3.0GHz in 2007.

These 90-nanometer processors also put a formal end to the Athlon 64 FX brand as far as dual-core systems are concerned, as the Athlon 64 X2 5600+ has the same specifications as an Athlon 64 FX-62. The new CPUs used in the Quad FX platform are sold in pairs and designated the Athlon 64 FX 70-series.

This stealth release makes sense in some ways, but is confusing in others. We've already seen a 2.8GHz AMD chip in the form of the Athlon 64 FX-62, so it's not as if the company has reached a new performance high. But by the same token, anything that closes the gap with the desktop Core 2 Duos should be actively promoted.

One potential angle might be that AMD can already sell all the CPUs it can make, especially since Dell became a customer. Another might be that AMD is close to shipping 65-nanometer, 3.0GHz Athlon 64 X2 5800+ and 6000+ chips that would really challenge Intel. The odd left-foot, right-foot march of alternating 2x512K and 2x1MB cores is also confusing; we might see a 65-nanometer cache standardization similar to that recently made to the Athlon 64 X2 4000+ through 5000+ products.

All told, AMD may be limping a bit as it enters the new year, but its November/December flurry certainly gives its fans hope. The consensus is that AMD needs to maintain the status quo until its native quad-core processors arrive in mid-2007, and so far, that seems to be taking place. The ramping up of the release schedule will put at least some pressure on Intel, while the transition to 65-nanometer engineering will ensure that AMD engineers will work out the kinks before K8L hits the streets. At this point, there's only one thing AMD really needs to worry about -- a mainstream rather than high-end Intel quad-core, such as the Core 2 Quad that rumor has Intel slotting below the Core 2 Extreme in early 2007.