Graphics market share not looking good for AMD - down to just 18%?

[qubit]

According to the NVIDIA slide below, it's very bad news for AMD.

Right, so the research has been carried out by apparently independent outfit Mercury Research, but take something like this from a competitor with a pinch of salt. Still, there's no doubt that NVIDIA now has a much bigger market share than AMD, whatever the actual numbers are.

Once again, it's bad news for competition and is the reason why we're seeing grossly overpriced top end cards like the Titan X from NVIDIA.

According to Mercury Research’s latest data, NVIDIA has jumped from 77% of the discrete GPU market in Q4 2014 to 82% in Q2 2015. This basically means that AMD has dropped from 23% to 18% (of the discrete GPU market).

www.dsogaming.com/news/amdnvidia-market-share-graph-shows-nvidia-conquering-4-out-of-5-pc-gamers-own-an-nvidia-gpu

 

[m&m's]

AMD frustrates me. Their flagship the Fury X is only available with a damn watercooler and all models from all brands are the same. Lets get stuck with the reference design... JUST WHY? I don't want any damn pump in my computer, is this so hard to assimilate AMD? It's not like this Coolermaster block was really worth it compared to good coolers available from Gigabyte, MSI, Sapphire, Asus and others which can keep the Fury Non-X below 70C. WTF is wrong with AMD, do they want to kill themselves? They claim "Our cards are very good at overclocking" and it turns out that it's false and that it overclocks like shit.

Bad marketing and so so products for years, what do they expect? They're only good at selling real cheap to budget gamers since all the high end is meh compared to NVidia.

I want AMD to survive and come back strong but they have to move their asses.

 

[R-T-B]

I want AMD to survive and come back strong but they have to move their asses.

I think they need your avatar as a motivator.

 

[xvi]

I'm still waiting to see how the Fury Nano pans out.

Also, I don't know how much I trust a slide from nVidia regarding AMD's market share.

 

[qubit]

@m&m's Couldn't agree more.

When they had that latest change of management, it looked like the company would finally be managed properly, but I can see no difference. This company is being driven into the ground by these sorts of obvious stupidities and I'm feeling more and more that they will not survive more than 2-5 years the way that they're going. No wonder that NVIDIA and Intel charge such high prices for products that are only small or smallish improvements over the previous generation.

There's a human cost here too, with all the ordinary people that will lose their jobs due to some overpaid and incompetent executives ruining the company that supports them.

 

[Frick]

It's easy to manage when you're not involved.

 

[newtekie1]

Their products have been very big let downs. That isn't to say they aren't good products, but AMD's PR team has hyped them up so much that when we finally got them, we were all disappointed. That puts a bad taste in people's mouths that is hard to get rid of.

Also, they don't seem to care that they are dying. If they would have marketed the Fury X with true statements instead of lies, and then released it for $50 cheaper, the thing would have been a hit. Very near 980Ti performance for $50 less, people would have loved it.

And yes, forcing all manufacturers to buy the cards from them, pre-built with the cooler, and not allowing them change anything was a major stupid move. Yes, nVidia can get away with it on their $1,000 Titans, but AMD needs to realize their cards aren't in that class.

 

[64K]

@m&m's Couldn't agree more.

When they had that latest change of management, it looked like the company would finally be managed properly, but I can see no difference. This company is being driven into the ground by these sorts of obvious stupidities and I'm feeling more and more that they will not survive more than 2-5 years the way that they're going. No wonder that NVIDIA and Intel charge such high prices for products that are only small or smallish improvements over the previous generation.

There's a human cost here too, with all the ordinary people that will lose their jobs due to some overpaid and incompetent executives ruining the company that supports them.

You have piqued my financial investment curiosity. What about the last management change looked like AMD would be managed properly to you?

 

[NC37]

2 big things AMD bumbled this year (Of course theres more):

-Made customers wait months for rehashed cards
-Announced Fury Nano when announcing the Fury line

The 300 series rollout was a disaster. It left everyone waiting months for a disappointment. Added to the fact that AMD insisted there was value in the old tech and kept prices high while hyping Fury. Granted a 390 will beat a 980 right now, but the stigma of 2013 tech combined with an AMD that was clearly promoting Fury over 300 series, doesn't help.

Nano was also another killer. Wave Fury X in faces all you want AMD, that won't pay the bills. The $300-$400 segment is what makes or breaks you and you can't get people to buy 390s over 970s when they know Nano is coming. On top of that and the rehash stigma. Just a perfect storm for losing share.

 

[Blue-Knight]

Graphics market share not looking good for AMD - down to just 18%?

Linux support had an impact. Definitely.

Spoiler: Do not read if you are easily offended

I'm sorry about AMD, but my next GPU will be from NVIDIA. Unless they come with something SPECTACULAR.

 

[R-T-B]

Linux support had an impact. Definitely.

Not sure what Linux has to do with anything here? They've supported linux for years and it's largely irrelevant to the topic at hand. If anything, their support has been poor but improving, and that is all that's really economically sensible given the market segment of linux users is incredibly small.

 

[red_stapler]

What's actually new from AMD aside from the Fury cards? Everything else is a rebrand. Not much incentive to upgrade from my 7950 at this point.

 

[qubit]

You have piqued my financial investment curiosity. What about the last management change looked like AMD would be managed properly to you?

I just remember that they had a change at the top and that the new person was touted as having the sort of vision and ability one would need to turn around a failing company like this. In particular some of the news sites were cautiously optimistic about it. Personally, I remember feeling very cynical with a ray of hope, but now that's been dashed.

The overhyping, overpricing and limiting of their Fury products (especially insisting on that one reference design for the Fury X with the watercooler) were dumb moves that are helping a reasonable product to fail and one with promising new technology in it, too. This is so obvious to see by everyone, yet the few people who should realize this (the decision makers) somehow don't. It beggars belief.

 

[Frick]

The overhyping, overpricing and limiting of their Fury products (especially insisting on that one reference design for the Fury X with the watercooler) were dumb moves that are helping a reasonable product to fail and one with promising new technology in it, too. This is so obvious to see by everyone, yet the few people who should realize this (the decision makers) somehow don't. It beggars belief.

I think AMD has deep cultural issues, and they probably has issues and pressures not visible to the outside. Everone's been moaning about their management for ages, and it keeps repeating. Those people are probably not fools, at least not everyone. Why do they keep making mistakes?

 

[Blue-Knight]

Why do they keep making mistakes?

Because they are humans!?

 

[R-T-B]

Because they are humans!?

But some humans are better at doing it than others, apparently. AMD are expert mistake humans.

 

[Bansaku]

I would like to know how Mercury came up with those numbers. I would expect, judging from what I see out in the wild with my own eyes mixed with local computer store's inventory levels/movement, that the split would be 60/40 in favour of nVidia. There is no way in hell they hold 82% of the market, and I don't buy it for a second.

 

[R-T-B]

I would like to know how Mercury came up with those numbers. I would expect, judging from what I see out in the wild with my own eyes mixed with local computer store's inventory levels/movement, that the split would be 60/40 in favour of nVidia. There is no way in hell they hold 82% of the market, and I don't buy it for a second.

In discrete GPUs I do... that's what this is claiming.

 

[OneMoar]

 

[qubit]

I think AMD has deep cultural issues, and they probably has issues and pressures not visible to the outside. Everone's been moaning about their management for ages, and it keeps repeating. Those people are probably not fools, at least not everyone. Why do they keep making mistakes?

I agree about those cultural issues. Why the hell this company keeps making such obvious fuckups when their products could sell given the right marketing and pricing I don't know. We'd have to be privvy to the internal politics of the company to figure that one out.

Now, this is pure speculation, but it wouldn't surprise me if there's good old fashioned corruption at the bottom of this with some people in high places trying to make a fast buck before the ship goes down. Perhaps I'm completely wrong, but when I see obvious screwups that a child could see, which are repeated over and over, I begin to suspect foul play.

 

[v12dock]

"I want AMD to survive I love competition blah blah blah, but unless AMD releases something 'competitive' I will only buy Nvidia"
Either bite the bullet and buy a less "competitive"inferior product or continue to slowly kill them.

 

[Frick]

"I want AMD to survive I love competition blah blah blah, but unless AMD releases something 'competitive' I will only buy Nvidia"
Either bite the bullet and buy a less "competitive"inferior product or continue to slowly kill them.

Thing is they're not really inferior. Some are, but most of them aren't. As newtekie said, they're just not the gods among mortals the PR teams promises.

 

[Vayra86]

"I want AMD to survive I love competition blah blah blah, but unless AMD releases something 'competitive' I will only buy Nvidia"
Either bite the bullet and buy a less "competitive"inferior product or continue to slowly kill them.

Capitalism works this way: you release stuff customers want, or you can kiss your company goodbye.

AMD tried it this way: saying they release stuff customers want, while actually re-releasing old junk that wasn't competitive in the first place. The triple rebrand, followed by the complete letdown that they dubbed Fury, I am surprised they're still standing.

I've said it before and I'll keep saying it: AMD could release a top notch product today and still screw it up. If it doesn't go wrong with the product engineering itself, it WILL go wrong with their timing and marketing. Look at how they jumped on the HBM bandwagon: it is the good old AMD approach of 'moar cores' but is now called 'moar bandwidth'. Does it help the Fury at all? NO. Does it destroy their margins, yes, because GDDR5 is cheaper. About margins, they also considered a watercooled solution to be a great idea, and I'm sure it's a whole lot less costly than a tried and tested air cooler right? NOT. They use more metal for similar performance as the direct competitor, they use more expensive memory that doesn't extract more performance, and they still haven't considered moving to a new arch while the direct competitor is revising constantly.

Completely ridiculous.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

"I want AMD to survive I love competition blah blah blah, but unless AMD releases something 'competitive' I will only buy Nvidia"
Either bite the bullet and buy a less "competitive"inferior product or continue to slowly kill them.

This is why I wait for AMD even if it is inferior to NVIDIA. I won't consider AMD processors because they're so far behind Intel so AMD gets the consolation prize in GPU sales from me. Truth be told, only reason why I buy AMD GPUs is because I despise NVIDIA. Some examples:
-AMD releases Mantle, NVIDIA refuses to implement it, AMD gives the code to Khronos and Microsoft, NVIDIA implements it because it is part of a non-AMD standard.
-AMD releases TressFX based on DirectCompute, NVIDIA much later releases Hair Works based on proprietary CUDA code that won't get accelerated on AMD GPUs.
-NVIDIA creates proprietary G-Sync instead of, like AMD, implementing VESA's Adaptive Sync/embedded DisplayPort standard which is an open standard.

These things are not mutually exclusive with market share either. By buying an NVIDIA card, just like buying an Apple device, you're locked into their proprietary ecosystem. This translates to larger market share but these are ill-gotten gains. NVIDIA is not acting in the best interest of gaming where AMD at least tries.

I really wish ATI acquired Ageia PhysX instead of NVIDIA. That's the one area AMD hasn't come up with a good alternative. With Intel having bought out Havok, the prospects for an open physics library look bleak.


So yeah, I buy AMD because...

...and I'm damn proud of it. I called NVIDIA's bullshit almost a decade ago now; it has only gotten worse since.

 

[Vayra86]

This is why I wait for AMD even if it is inferior to NVIDIA. I won't consider AMD processors because they're so far behind Intel so AMD gets the consolation prize in GPU sales from me. Truth be told, only reason why I buy AMD GPUs is because I despise NVIDIA. Some examples:
-AMD releases Mantle, NVIDIA refuses to implement it, AMD gives the code to Khronos and Microsoft, NVIDIA implements it because it is part of a non-AMD standard.
-AMD releases TressFX based on DirectCompute, NVIDIA much later releases Hair Works based on proprietary CUDA code that won't get accelerated on AMD GPUs.
-NVIDIA creates proprietary G-Sync instead of, like AMD, implementing VESA's Adaptive Sync/embedded DisplayPort standard which is an open standard.

These things are not mutually exclusive with market share either. By buying an NVIDIA card, just like buying an Apple device, you're locked into their proprietary ecosystem. This translates to larger market share but these are ill-gotten gains. NVIDIA is not acting in the best interest of gaming where AMD at least tries.

I really wish ATI acquired Ageia PhysX instead of NVIDIA. That's the one area AMD hasn't come up with a good alternative. With Intel having bought out Havok, the prospects for an open physics library look bleak.


So yeah, I buy AMD because...

...and I'm damn proud of it. I called NVIDIA's bullshit almost a decade ago now; it has only gotten worse since.

You know these are very valid points in a utopian world where all companies play nice with each other. But the world doesn't work that way. For all the 'underhand' actions of Nvidia, this company is also the company that makes the largest investment in terms of cooperation with developers. Nvidia KNOWS that to extract maximum performance from their product line up, they need to do this cooperative action, and they have the results to show for it. It all depends on your personal approach to the way these companies work. But for what its worth: Nvidia has furthered the gaming experience in a much broader way than AMD has ever done. And this is not because AMD isn't trying, but because AMD fails to put a solid business case on their attempts where Nvidia does. Nvidia presents a profit margin through their cooperation with developers, and AMD presents a technology as is without translating that to sales. In the end, sales count, because success gets copied and only technology that gets widely used will survive.