Intel Developer Forum Conference - Spring 2001: Part 1

ServerWorks on AMD

The obvious question for us to ask ServerWorks was what they thought of AMD entering the server market and if they would ever work with them.  Their response was actually pretty interesting, and can basically be summed up in a few key points:

1) AMD needs a higher bandwidth FSB: Even with its 266MHz FSB, the Athlon's EV6 bus alone doesn't offer as much bandwidth as the P4/Xeon's FSB.  However a counterpoint to be made here is that the EV6 is a point-to-point protocol, meaning that each CPU gets a dedicated path to the Northbridge, which could result in higher overall bandwidth utilization with more than one processor. 

2) PCI-X where are you? As we mentioned in our most recent server upgrade article, there is a clear need for higher bandwidth PCI and even 64-bit PCI won't cut it once you add in things like Gigabit Ethernet and high end RAID arrays. 

3) AMD needs to invest in the technology: We got the hint from ServerWorks that they didn't see AMD as a heavy investor in the type of technology that these guys are building.  The higher margins are in server products, but AMD has to start somewhere so the AMD 760MP may just be the first step into a much larger world. 

We showed you earlier a breakdown of the "Intel-inside" systems in the server market, and in there we mentioned that the highest profit margins reside in the hard hitting SMP systems with more than 4 or 8 processors.  This is the market that AMD must eventually set their sights on as well.  AMD is in a strong situation since their flash memory division has been rather successful, however AMD today is where Intel was at the release of the Pentium II.  They have the ability to take their current product line, which is outperforming much of the competition, and segment it even more to tend to the needs of the higher end server and workstation markets.  This is what they are trying to do with the release of the 760MP but we won't see the true potential of AMD's branch into this market until the introduction of their Hammer line of processors.

ServerWorks isn't going to burn any bridges with Intel just so they can make a dual processor chipset for AMD.  If AMD were to provide a 4 or 8 way ClawHammer/SledgeHammer design that can outperform the Intel Xeon/Itanium then it might just be enough to pique the interests of the folks at ServerWorks.  Until that day, the Intel Xeon will be the only CPU enjoying a 6.4GB/s memory bus.