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Server IGPs typically have their own dedicated framebuffer though, to avoid stealing RAM bandwidth from the CPU.

just brew it! wrote:

Server IGPs typically have their own dedicated framebuffer though, to avoid stealing RAM bandwidth from the CPU.

And they're generally a decade out of date, but supported by damn near everything you'd imagine booting in the past two decades.

Waco wrote:

just brew it! wrote:

Server IGPs typically have their own dedicated framebuffer though, to avoid stealing RAM bandwidth from the CPU.

And they're generally a decade out of date, but supported by damn near everything you'd imagine booting in the past two decades.

Yup, I've encountered Matrox and ATI Rage based IGPs on server boards as recently as a few years ago.

I keep reading that the Zen 8 core CPU is going to be priced from $300 to $500. I guess we will know more next week. At $300 I'll consider building a system using the 8 core chip, but not at $500. Although at $500 some people will look at it as a  real bargain in comparison to what Intel's 8 core Broadwell-E CPU cost.

I would not pay $300 (let alone $500) today for a CPU for a personal system. If I was building a system using someone else's money, then sure...

I think the most I've paid for a CPU since the late 1990s was around $200 (or just a bit over $300 if you count a pair of Athlon MP chips for a dual-CPU system as a single CPU purchase). Going back further, I believe there was a 486 DX4 that I paid more for, but that was a very long time ago!

whm1974 wrote:

I keep reading that the Zen 8 core CPU is going to be priced from $300 to $500. I guess we will know more next week. At $300 I'll consider building a system using the 8 core chip, but not at $500. Although at $500 some people will look at it as a  real bargain in comparison to what Intel's 8 core Broadwell-E CPU cost.

Um, unlikely.

$417 gets the 85 W E5-2620 v4 Broadwell-EP, $581 gets you the 45 W D-1541 Broadwell-DE, both 8C. How much of a bargain can a ~$500 8C Zen be? Depends on clocks ofc, and we can work it out:

The Piledriver-based FX-9590 is compared to the Skylake i7-6700K here, and is about 58% of the Intel chip in 1T workloads despite a 19% higher clock.

This means Piledriver has ~49% of the IPC of Skylake.

If ( AMD's claim of a 40% IPC improvement for Zen over Excavator is true) and (we know Steamroller has about a 5% IPC improvement over Piledriver and Excavator about the same over Steamroller)
then
Zen's IPC is 76% of Skylake. (0.49*1.05*1.05*1.4 = 0.76)
fi

Now, those Intel chips I listed are Broadwell, so we can lose 5% IPC there, say, and put Zen at 80%.

This means, to be 1T competitive with those Xeons at ~$500, an 8C Zen design needs to be base clocked at 2.66 GHz and turbo up to 3.4 or 3.8 GHz, depending on whether it's competing against the 45 W or 85 W Broadwell. If it's actually 95 W, it's no bargain versus Broadwell unless it turbos up to 4 GHz and is under $400.

If it can't get that fast in reasonable TDP, it won't be anything like $500.

just brew it! wrote:

I would not pay $300 (let alone $500) today for a CPU for a personal system. If I was building a system using someone else's money, then sure...

I think the most I've paid for a CPU since the late 1990s was around $200 (or just a bit over $300 if you count a pair of Athlon MP chips for a dual-CPU system as a single CPU purchase). Going back further, I believe there was a 486 DX4 that I paid more for, but that was a very long time ago!

Well since CPUs do last longer then they used to, I'm more open about getting a higher end processor now than I was in the past.

whm1974 wrote:

Well since CPUs do last longer then they used to, I'm more open about getting a higher end processor now than I was in the past.

But the reason CPUs last longer is because meaningful improvements have been so slow. That also diminishes the benefit of buying a new high-end one!

TBH even my 4 year old FX-8350 is still overkill for what I use my PC for. The only way I could even come close to rationally justifying a new CPU (any new CPU, let alone a $300+ one) at this point would be potential future electricity savings; and once you factor in the cost of a new motherboard and DDR4 RAM even that's going to be a losing proposition.

just brew it! wrote:

whm1974 wrote:

Well since CPUs do last longer then they used to, I'm more open about getting a higher end processor now than I was in the past.

But the reason CPUs last longer is because meaningful improvements have been so slow. That also diminishes the benefit of buying a new high-end one!

TBH even my 4 year old FX-8350 is still overkill for what I use my PC for. The only way I could even come close to rationally justifying a new CPU (any new CPU, let alone a $300+ one) at this point would be potential future electricity savings; and once you factor in the cost of a new motherboard and DDR4 RAM even that's going to be a losing proposition.

Ah reality sure does bites really hard... In any case I can't justify building another system at this time for the same reason you can't.

MOSFET wrote:

That Sugo SG10 has fairly decent looks for what appears to be a pretty tiny mATX cubish case.  I bet a 95W CPU would throttle under a maxxcool torture test, though  :D

You'd lose that bet.

The SG10 has 2x 120MM intakes right on top of the graphics card, and a huge front intake. There are rear and top exhausts right near the CPU. It has very clean airflow, and it cools better than your typical full-sized case.

I have an overclocked 4670 that used to be paired with a Radeon 6970 (200-250W card). The CPU fan hardly ever spun up with a Hyper 212---and there are better coolers.

The old video card was as quiet as it could be---i.e., 6970s are never silent but it was equal to the old ATX case. I have a GTX 1070 in there now, and it is not audible during 1440p gaming sessions.

The SG10 has some tradeoffs, but cooling is not one of them.

just brew it! wrote:

But the reason CPUs last longer is because meaningful improvements have been so slow. That also diminishes the benefit of buying a new high-end one!

TBH even my 4 year old FX-8350 is still overkill for what I use my PC for. The only way I could even come close to rationally justifying a new CPU (any new CPU, let alone a $300+ one) at this point would be potential future electricity savings; and once you factor in the cost of a new motherboard and DDR4 RAM even that's going to be a losing proposition.

I hear you; the only reason I have a Skylake is that my Bloomfield i7-960 stopped working.

I might've been able to justify Summit Ridge or Kaby Lake, had the Bloomfield not gone to Silicon Heaven -- but maybe not, certainly even Skylake wasn't enough better to get me to spend while the old machine still ran.

If the FX-8350 system stopped working, I still have a secondary (FX-8320) system; so even system death would not give me a compelling reason. But who am I kidding -- if Zen comes anywhere near living up to the hype, I'll probably build a system once an 8c part is available for below $200.

I think I need to stop watching computer building videos on Youtube. I getting a very strong urge to build them.

Redocbew wrote:

Isn't the possibility of a small form factor Zen system decided by the motherboard vendors, and not by AMD?  Having 8+ cores in a mini-ITX form factor isn't anything new, so it's not like Zen would be breaking new ground here.  I would agree having a small but obnoxiously loud PC is kind of missing the point, but that's not really up to AMD to decide if it makes sense to do that.

Thoroughly agreed.  Also it's TOTALLY possible to make SFF machines quiet, even powerful ones.  You lose 10 or 15% overclocking headroom from the SUPER extreme guys but you can overclock without much issues if you choose the right components and extra fans (quiet, ideally)
I have tentative interest in Zen but I wouldn't even consider 4/8  - I want 6/12 or 8/16, period.  Cause there's no chance they'll compete vs an i7 7700k, they just won't.    
I believe the B350 chipset is the ideal one for a tricked out ITX build - the extra X370 features seem pointless if you don't have an extra GPU.

whm1974 wrote:

just brew it! wrote:

Not sure why that would even be considered a "cheat". TBH I never expected the 8c/16t version to have an IGP; I figured it would be analogous to the APU/FX thing today -- lower core count devices with an IGP for budget-sensitive applications, and higher core count without IGP for performance desktops and workstations. The only difference this time around is that they both use the same socket.

Why would anyone even put an iGPU on a high performance CPU anyway?

I have absoloutely no interest in PC gaming anymore and I'm disapointed that Zen doesn't have a GPU.    I don't want to buy one and it costs a fair bit to get a mildly reasonable one which will output to my 2xDP 30" and 1xDVI/HDMI/VGA 24" ....
My Intel 4690k (?) or whatever I have, 4590? something, works totally fine for what I need, it's just too slow a CPU, NOT too slow a GPU. 

AbRASiON wrote:

whm1974 wrote:

just brew it! wrote:

Not sure why that would even be considered a "cheat". TBH I never expected the 8c/16t version to have an IGP; I figured it would be analogous to the APU/FX thing today -- lower core count devices with an IGP for budget-sensitive applications, and higher core count without IGP for performance desktops and workstations. The only difference this time around is that they both use the same socket.

Why would anyone even put an iGPU on a high performance CPU anyway?

I have absoloutely no interest in PC gaming anymore and I'm disapointed that Zen doesn't have a GPU.    I don't want to buy one and it costs a fair bit to get a mildly reasonable one which will output to my 2xDP 30" and 1xDVI/HDMI/VGA 24" ....
My Intel 4690k (?) or whatever I have, 4590? something, works totally fine for what I need, it's just too slow a CPU, NOT too slow a GPU. 

Well later next year AMD is planning on release a Zen based APU.

How's that intended to perform though? Will it still be 8c/16t? or at least 6/12? Because I can get 4/8 with Intel right now.

I'd be willing to bet it will be 4c/8t. Gotta remove some cores to make room for the GPU while keeping the die size down, otherwise manufacturing costs will make it uneconomical.

So it's in reality the true competitor to the i7 7700k then? :/ 

AbRASiON wrote:

So it's in reality the true competitor to the i7 7700k then? :/ 

That's probably not an unreasonable assumption.

just brew it! wrote:

AbRASiON wrote:

So it's in reality the true competitor to the i7 7700k then? :/ 

That's probably not an unreasonable assumption.

Might be an unrealistic hope, though, as AFAICT to do that Zen would need a 95% increase in IPC over Excavator, or higher clocks than the i7-7700K.

Topinio wrote:

just brew it! wrote:

AbRASiON wrote:

So it's in reality the true competitor to the i7 7700k then? :/ 

That's probably not an unreasonable assumption.

Might be an unrealistic hope, though, as AFAICT to do that Zen would need a 95% increase in IPC over Excavator, or higher clocks than the i7-7700K.

Yeah, perhaps a more likely scenario would be "purported competitor, which will end up being heavily discounted when the performance deficit becomes apparent". Which could still end up being a win for consumers over the long run, if AMD can make a profit on them even at the discounted price and stay in the CPU business. Nothing wrong with affordable 4c/8t with decent integrated graphics... competition is good.

I will be glad to see AMD closing the performance gap with Intel.  Even if they only compete in the mid-range, it will be good for AMD and good for consumers.  For my personal systems, the question is where will Zen slot into my existing CPU ranking?  If the top model of Zen doesn't match the gaming performance of my old Sandy Bridge i7-2600K and Ivy Bridge i5-3570K CPUs, I probably won't be buying.

just brew it! wrote:

Which could still end up being a win for consumers over the long run, if AMD can make a profit on them even at the discounted price and stay in the CPU business. Nothing wrong with affordable 4c/8t with decent integrated graphics... competition is good.

Gotta agree with this. There's still merit in laptops with A10 and A12 APUs. The CPU perormance is pretty bad, but it's *enough* for most people and the IGP is enough to embarass Intel's IGPs at equivalent price points. If AMD can get 8 CUs (512 SPs) or even 12 CUs (768 SPs) onto a 4C8T Zen die, it almost doesn't matter how much faster the Intel CPU is. We've proved for half a decade that Even a Sandy i3 is still up to snuff for today's software, so as long as it can beat that and produce 1080p30 or 720p60 it's going to be a choice between an AMD laptop/PC that *can* game, or an Intel laptop/PC that can't.

just brew it! wrote:

Topinio wrote:

Might be an unrealistic hope, though, as AFAICT to do that Zen would need a 95% increase in IPC over Excavator, or higher clocks than the i7-7700K.

Yeah, perhaps a more likely scenario would be "purported competitor, which will end up being heavily discounted when the performance deficit becomes apparent". Which could still end up being a win for consumers over the long run, if AMD can make a profit on them even at the discounted price and stay in the CPU business. Nothing wrong with affordable 4c/8t with decent integrated graphics... competition is good.

Yep, almost essential really. My best realistic hope for Raven Ridge is Sandy Bridge IPC, decent clocks, and a better iGPU than the Radeon R7 350.

That with DDR4 would line it up to replace my HTPC if that dies, and be thoroughly recommendable for a standard desktop build, platform allowing ofc.

My concern with the Zen based APUs is how well the iGPU is going to be supported in Linux.I know that AMD has been making great progress with Linux graphics drivers and if the FOSS drivers become good enough, I will consider switching  over from Nvidia to AMD for GPUs.

whm1974 wrote:

My concern with the Zen based APUs is how well the iGPU is going to be supported in Linux.I know that AMD has been making great progress with Linux graphics drivers and if the FOSS drivers become good enough, I will consider switching  over from Nvidia to AMD for GPUs.

Yeah, that's definitely a concern. I'm back in the NVIDIA camp for my current rig, because I got fed up with AMD's Linux drivers on my previous one.

whm1974 wrote:

My concern with the Zen based APUs is how well the iGPU is going to be supported in Linux.I know that AMD has been making great progress with Linux graphics drivers and if the FOSS drivers become good enough, I will consider switching  over from Nvidia to AMD for GPUs.

Given how resource-constrained AMD is, I would hope that they pass on Linux gaming support (given the .001% marketshare).

Kretschmer wrote:

whm1974 wrote:

My concern with the Zen based APUs is how well the iGPU is going to be supported in Linux.I know that AMD has been making great progress with Linux graphics drivers and if the FOSS drivers become good enough, I will consider switching  over from Nvidia to AMD for GPUs.

Given how resource-constrained AMD is, I would hope that they pass on Linux gaming support (given the .001% marketshare).

Well I of course will very strongly disagree.

I'm sure all of us Linux gamers wish they'd get that particular act together, but Kretschmer has a point. From a business perspective, they have better things to be spending their time and money on.