AMD to Sample Bulldozer Architecture in 2010, Sets Product Priorities

[btarunr]

As part of its Financial Analyst Day for 2009, AMD listed out its priorities for the year ahead, looking into 2010. While the company has lived up to its development targets for this year by releasing a full-fledged lineup of PC and server processors built on the 45 nm process, increasing its market share with graphics products, and releasing the first DirectX 11 compliant (back then referred to as 'next generation') GPU, the year ahead looks equally ambitious for AMD.

AMD set the following product priorities for 2010: to deliver four new winning PC platforms in the first half of 2010, improve battery life of its notebook platform, expand homegrown DirectCompute 11 and OpenCL developer tools, propagate DirectX 11 graphics to notebooks, launch the company's first 12-core Opteron processor, and more interestingly, sample the company's next-generation "Bulldozer" architecture to industry customers, along with sampling the company's first Fusion-design "Bobcat" processor, which integrates the CPU with GPU, along with sampling some of the company's first processors built on the 32 nm manufacturing process.

The four PC platforms AMD is referring to, are "Leo" and "Dorado", which succeed the current "Dragon" and "Pisces/Kodiak" as the new enthusiast and mainstream platforms, respectively. Leo brings with it the "Thuban" 6-core desktop processor, the company's 8-series platform core-logic, and DirectX 11 compliant discrete graphics, while "Dorado" continues to use Athlon II series processors with up to 4 cores, albeit on AMD's value 8-series core-logic (which continues to integrate DirectX 10.1 compliant IGP). It is in 2011, that processors up to 8 cores, based on the Bulldozer architecture, start to appear. AMD went as far as to disclose that the enthusiast-grade processor carrying the codename "Zambezi" will continue to come in the AM3 package, so now it is clear that the socket has a long road ahead. "Danube" and "Nile" are the other two platforms that AMD will introduce in H1, both are notebook platforms, which bring to the table support for up to 4 cores, DDR3 memory, and DirectX 10.1 compliant integrated, or DirectX 11 compliant discrete graphics, to the table.

Battery life is one of the biggest selling points of a notebook platform. It does not pay to have a powerful processor that is also power-hungry. AMD intends to bring the power footprint of its notebook platforms down by at least 25 percent. Backed with WHQL signed GPGPU drivers, AMD has already shown keen interest in GPGPU standards, particularly open standards such as Microsoft DirectCompute and OpenCL. It will keep this interest alive by continuing to make more developer tools and hardware optimizations in this area.

Propagating DirectX 11 graphics to notebooks is another priority, though it is not likely to come in the form of integrated graphics, going by the roadmap slides. With energy-effecient GPUs already developed across top market segments, it will only be a matter of designing mobile graphics boards. For the enterprise market, AMD will introduce its first 12-core processors codenamed "Magny Cours", and 6000/4000 series platforms. This is when AMD's own server core-logic re-enters the server market under a completely new design team. The core-logic will compete with offerings from NVIDIA and Broadcom.

Finally the one point that caught our interest is the one that AMD highlighted in its slide. AMD's next-generation processor architecture codenamed "Bulldozer", will start sampling in 2010. It should tell us that development of the architecture may have already commenced. Bulldozer is an architecture designed from ground up, and ideally, it does not inherit the design from its eight-year old K8 turned K10(.5) architecture. The other big development is that of the processor codenamed "Bobcat" that integrates graphics processing onto the processor package. It is unlikely to be the first of its kind, as rival Intel has already sampled such processors. It is in this year that AMD will also sample its first 32 nm processors, although no market availability of such processors is indicated.

[Mussels]

Ony four AMD models are known...

... and they have a plan.



anyone else read this thing as a cylon plot?

[MrMilli]

Originally Posted by btarunr

... Finally the one point that caught our interest is the one that AMD highlighted in its slide. AMD's next-generation processor architecture codenamed "Bulldozer", will start sampling in 2010. It should tell us that development of the architecture may have already commenced. Bulldozer is an architecture designed from ground up, and ideally, it does not inherit the design from its eight-year old K8 turned K10(.5) architecture. ...

Bulldozer has been in development from before 2007 (my guess is even before 2006)!
While i don't know the exact date that AMD commenced work on Bulldozer, designing a CPU architecture from the ground up generally takes 5 to 6 years (add a year sampling to that).
It has been confirmed already that Bulldozer is a completely new design developed from the ground up.

[Imsochobo]

Phenom is basicly:
Improved HT
Improved Memory controller(added one aswell ) its dual 64 bit. not a single 128 bit if i got that right, something strange nonetheless.
Native Quadcore.
Improved IPC.
Support for Level 3 cache.
Over a A64 arch.

Maybe we'll see a New AMD juggernaut cpu from AMD, just like K7 K8 was

[Zubasa]

Originally Posted by Imsochobo

Phenom is basicly:
Improved HT
Improved Memory controller(added one aswell ) its dual 64 bit. not a single 128 bit if i got that right, something strange nonetheless.
Native Quadcore.
Improved IPC.
Support for Level 3 cache.
Over a A64 arch.

Maybe we'll see a New AMD juggernaut cpu from AMD, just like K7 K8 was

The K10 is a little bit more than that, and it certainly rapes the K8 in basically every single way clock for clock. Not to mention that they got rid of the cool bug.

Will this new "ground up" processor be able to compete with more than just the low end Intel? Will AMD make it even half way up the ladder.

I am not asking this to try and start anything, I would just like to know where this chip is going to be in the food chain.

[inferKNOX]

Originally Posted by LaidLawJones

Will this new "ground up" processor be able to compete with more than just the low end Intel? Will AMD make it even half way up the ladder.

I am not asking this to try and start anything, I would just like to know where this chip is going to be in the food chain.

Now that is the question. Although I would beg to differ on it just competing on "low end"
AMD's CPUs touch the i7 920 performance in quite a few ways.
This should do something though.
And this is the beginning of the Fusion chips... w/ built in GPU core right? Exciting!

[pr0n Inspector]

Can someone please provide us some solid info? This wall of PR bullshit is hurting my head.

[AlCabone]

i have nothing else to add but: Hell, It's about time!

[Zubasa]

Originally Posted by pr0n Inspector

Can someone please provide us some solid info? This wall of PR bullshit is hurting my head.

PR BS is what keeps a company running, don't you know?

[Jizzler]

Hope there's more info on the new chipsets... not going to get excited until I see them put out a solid foundation for these chips.

[btarunr]

Originally Posted by pr0n Inspector

Can someone please provide us some solid info? This wall of PR bullshit is hurting my head.

That's not PR, and has solid info. Back to school if you can't read.

[wolf]

Originally Posted by Mussels

Ony four AMD models are known...

... and they have a plan.



anyone else read this thing as a cylon plot?

Man that main theme piano song is going through my head already

But seriously, I think they're coming in a bit late, 32nm Bulldozer in 2011 just seems like getting to a party at 4:30 am when everyone's passed out and someones already been taped to the ceiling.

[scope54]

all your going to get is PR BS atm until probably late 2010.

[Fx]

wow, so much awesome news for AMD today!! it looks like they have a solid game plan and now they have that infusion of cash to push a lot of their R&D

[WarEagleAU]

Looks like a competent and complete roadmap with a few surprises. They are sampling the 32nm process faster than I Thought. Earlier timelines had it out in 2011, maybe they will pull a fast one and flip 32nm toward middle to end of next year. Also, AMD has the coolest names for their stuff.

Like the notebook battery power thing. They do alright but really as I have said before, Intel does good with its notebook batteries.

[marsey99]

Originally Posted by MrMilli

Bulldozer has been in development from before 2007 (my guess is even before 2006)!
While i don't know the exact date that AMD commenced work on Bulldozer, designing a CPU architecture from the ground up generally takes 5 to 6 years (add a year sampling to that).
It has been confirmed already that Bulldozer is a completely new design developed from the ground up.

it does seem like forever since they first spoke about this one dont it. this is the one i have been waiting on, this is the project that all the intel guys from isreal that amd poached have been working on.

[trickson]

Originally Posted by Fx

wow, so much awesome news for AMD today!! it looks like they have a solid game plan and now they have that infusion of cash to push a lot of their R&D

Yeah lets hope this one this time is going to be the one that puts AMD on top now .
With 1.25 Billion dollars one would think they could reach new heights ! But time will tell .

[crazy pyro]

Originally Posted by wolf

Man that main theme piano song is going through my head already

But seriously, I think they're coming in a bit late, 32nm Bulldozer in 2011 just seems like getting to a party at 4:30 am when everyone's passed out and someones already been taped to the ceiling.

What the HELL type of parties do you go to Wolf?
Interesting news on the Bulldozer front though.

[Zubasa]

Originally Posted by trickson

Yeah lets hope this one this time is going to be the one that puts AMD on top now .
With 1.25 Billion dollars one would think they could reach new heights ! But time will tell .

1.25 Billion dollars is more than most of us will ever earn.
On the other hand, micro-processors are indeed "state of the art technology" here, its basically rockey science.
In this kind of stuff it is possible to blow a million dollars in a matter of minutes.

[eidairaman1]

This is Very Good news, I just wonder if this will be a Socket change or if it will be AM3, otherwise I will hold off the system build. My Ideal setup would of been the Gigabyte 790FXT-UDP5 or MSI 790FX-GD70 with Phenom II 965 BE 125 or the Athlon II X4 BE with 4MB L2 (1 MB per Core). 3rd Party Designed 5870, HT Omega Claro Halo XT, Enermax 1050 PSU, 8 Gigs 1600MHz DDR3 Low Latency, Samsung Optical Drives, Hitachi/Seagate HDs.

[inferKNOX]

Originally Posted by eidairaman1

This is Very Good news, I just wonder if this will be a Socket change or if it will be AM3, otherwise I will hold off the system build. My Ideal setup would of been the Gigabyte 790FXT-UDP5 or MSI 790FX-GD70 with Phenom II 965 BE 125 or the Athlon II X4 BE with 4MB L2 (1 MB per Core). 3rd Party Designed 5870, HT Omega Claro Halo XT, Enermax 1050 PSU, 8 Gigs 1600MHz DDR3 Low Latency, Samsung Optical Drives, Hitachi/Seagate HDs.

Nah, I'm sure it's on another socket, because it won't have a DDR2 IMC, will have a built in GPU core(s) i think, no doubt a different HTT version, among other things. Also, by the time this is out, you definitely won't want those mobos, you gonna want a mobo w/ the new RAM type (maybe DDR4?), USB 3.0, SATA 6Gb/s, PCIe 3.0, +++!
EDIT: Lol, finally read more than the article's title, it's Bobcat with the intergrated GPU core...

[TheLaughingMan]

Originally Posted by Mussels

Ony four AMD models are known...

... and they have a plan.



anyone else read this thing as a cylon plot?

Not me because I don't know what a cylon is.

[TheMailMan78]

Originally Posted by Zubasa

PR BS is what keeps a company running, don't you know?

Yeah because my 955 is so damn slow

[Para_Franck]

I have found more detailed informations on bulldozer and bobcat here:
http://anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3674