Industry Update - Q2-2005: Chipset wars, AMD's growing market share and more...
by Anand Lal Shimpi on June 13, 2005 4:34 AM EST- Posted in
- Trade Shows
Rumor: AMD's Low Cost K8 with Integrated Graphics in 2008?
Apparently, AMD has been talking about doing a very integrated, very low cost K8 derivative for 2008. The CPU would feature an on-die memory controller like the current Athlon 64. However, it would also feature an on-die graphics core and I/O controller - effectively, removing the need for any chipset on the motherboard.If you'll remember a few years back, Intel had a similar chip planned, code-named Timna. Timna was supposed to integrate a graphics core and memory controller onto a single chip to drive total system costs down considerably, but Intel pulled the plug on the project at the last minute and shifted resources to what eventually became Centrino.
AMD is definitely in a good position to piece together such a highly integrated CPU, given that they have already integrated the memory controller on-die with much success. We do wonder where the graphics core would come from, as AMD would either have to design one from scratch or license the technology from another company. Given that this type of a CPU would be targeted at very low cost markets, it would almost have to be an in-house job. Granted, this is a very early rumor that may not pan out at all, so take all of this with a grain of salt.
In the more near-term future, AMD will be transitioning to an on-die DDR2 memory controller by the middle of next year with their new M2 Socket and Socket-F (for desktops and servers respectively). The initial design guides for boards based on these new sockets have been given to motherboard manufacturers, but the first samples won't be ready until the end of this year.
Finally, the last piece about AMD here involves Turion. Either AMD isn't very serious about Turion right now, or manufacturers aren't too impressed with it because we hardly heard any mention of the new mobile CPU at Computex from any of the notebook vendors. Many product roadmaps going through to the end of this year were completely devoid of any mention of a Turion based notebook.
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snedzad - Monday, June 13, 2005 - link
No, it won't. KT880 chipset is for K7 (socket A) processors. You probably thought about K8T800 chipset, that doesn't support 939 socket. Only K8T800Pro and K8T890 are supporting 939 and none of them dual core. Even a bios update won't help. Via works on revision of the chipset that should allow dual core CPUs.xsilver - Monday, June 13, 2005 - link
Will the kt880 chipset support dual core? (asus a8v, abit av8 etc...)many of us owners would like to know :)
Viditor - Monday, June 13, 2005 - link
Nehemoth - I'm pretty sure that's not an official roadmap. It looks like an educated guess on VR Zone's part as to what's happening based on the analyst meeting from Friday.One thing they missed was the mobile sector. At the meeting, AMD said they were coming out with dual core Turions next year as well...
One other thing I think they might have wrong is the 65nm parts not coming out till 2007, though they didn't list anything for H2 06...
Viditor - Monday, June 13, 2005 - link
"You can go to HP or Compaq and order a Turion laptop right now. So they are out there, just not pushed real hard right now"That's true, but notice that they only have one Turion designed notebook...
This was a very late arrival and it's not very well integrated. You can say there aren't many models because it's not being pushed, or go the other way and say it's not being pushed because there aren't many models...
It is a fact that unless a design is locked in by January, you will have very few models available for that year...
Marlin1975 - Monday, June 13, 2005 - link
You can go to HP or Compaq and order a Turion laptop right now. So they are out there, just not pushed real hard right now.knitecrow - Monday, June 13, 2005 - link
I love these industry update articlesNehemoth - Monday, June 13, 2005 - link
If you go herehttp://www.vr-zone.com/?i=2328&s=1
Are The Manila And Windsor Cores
and see the new AMD roadmap, you can see the new core with integrated graphic..
Viditor - Monday, June 13, 2005 - link
ElMoIsEviL - "marketshare figures taken from Mercury show results that differ greatly from these"Marketshare numbers from Mercury show the previous quarter...
Beenthere - Monday, June 13, 2005 - link
Industry figures can be twisted to say whatever you want them to say and they are typically 3-6 months behind current sales. With AMD selling more desktop CPUs than Intel over the past several quarters and Mobo production being ahead of sales, you can be pretty certain AMD's sales and market share gains are very real. Even Intel's 10Q's show major drops in CPU sales and Intel is actually BUYING all the sales they are getting. If the shift is from 80/20 to 60/40 or 50/50 it's still a Helleva coup for AMD and the hand writing is on the wall for Intel, who's arrogance got the better of them.As for SLI - it's a technology few need and only enthusiasts will pay thru the nose for. Even if SLI Mobos get down to $100 which they will, you still need two over-priced graphics cards to use SLI. Even power PC users don't need SLI and few consumers will throw good money away like gamers do.
yacoub - Monday, June 13, 2005 - link
So is that actually a saying in Taiwan or just creative journalistic license? ;)