Wednesday, May 8th 2013
AMD's Answer to GeForce GTX 700 Series: Volcanic Islands
GPU buyers can breathe a huge sigh of relief that AMD isn't fixated with next-generation game consoles, and that its late-2013 launch of its next GPU generation is with good reason. The company is building a new GPU micro-architecture from the ground up. Codenamed "Volcanic Islands," with members codenamed after famous islands along the Pacific Ring of Fire, the new GPU family sees AMD rearranging component-hierarchy within the GPU, in a big way.
Over the past three GPU generations that used VLIW5, VLIW4, and Graphics CoreNext SIMD architectures, the component hierarchy was essentially untouched. According to an early block-diagram of one of the GPUs in the series, codenamed "Hawaii," AMD will designate parallel and serial computing units. Serial cores based on either of the two architectures AMD is licensed to use (x86 and ARM), could handle part of the graphics processing load. The stream processors of today make up the GPU's parallel processing machinery.
We can't make out text in the rather blurry block-diagram, but are rather convinced that if it's authentic, then AMD is making some big changes. Another reason for AMD's delay could be silicon fab process. "Tahiti" as implemented on Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition, already poses high thermal envelope. AMD doesn't want the 28 nm process to restrict its next-generation architecture development, and is holding out till the 20 nm process is in place at TSMC. The fab set Q4 as its tentative bulk manufacturing date for the process.
The source that leaked the block-diagram also posted specifications of the chip that's codenamed "Hawaii," which appears to be the flagship part.
Source:
ChipHell
Over the past three GPU generations that used VLIW5, VLIW4, and Graphics CoreNext SIMD architectures, the component hierarchy was essentially untouched. According to an early block-diagram of one of the GPUs in the series, codenamed "Hawaii," AMD will designate parallel and serial computing units. Serial cores based on either of the two architectures AMD is licensed to use (x86 and ARM), could handle part of the graphics processing load. The stream processors of today make up the GPU's parallel processing machinery.
We can't make out text in the rather blurry block-diagram, but are rather convinced that if it's authentic, then AMD is making some big changes. Another reason for AMD's delay could be silicon fab process. "Tahiti" as implemented on Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition, already poses high thermal envelope. AMD doesn't want the 28 nm process to restrict its next-generation architecture development, and is holding out till the 20 nm process is in place at TSMC. The fab set Q4 as its tentative bulk manufacturing date for the process.
The source that leaked the block-diagram also posted specifications of the chip that's codenamed "Hawaii," which appears to be the flagship part.
- 20 nm silicon fab process
- 4096 stream processors
- 16 serial processor cores
- 4 geometry engines
- 256 TMUs
- 64 ROPs
- 512-bit GDDR5 memory interface
145 Comments on AMD's Answer to GeForce GTX 700 Series: Volcanic Islands
"TSMC would then be able to begin volume production at the end of the second quarter and ramp 20-nm production in the second half of 2013 a Focus Taiwan report said referencing unnamed sources."
www.eetimes.com/design/programmable-logic/4411189/TSMC-expected-to-begin-20-nm-line-early
www.xbitlabs.com/news/other/display/20130404143508_TSMC_Is_Ahead_of_Its_Own_20nm_Roadmap_Report.html
Also I counted 1024 shader units int array though it could obv break down further , my mind may explode 16 serial processors wtf.
The tinfoil is for a hat...not an entire bodysuit. :laugh:
AMD thinks Southern Islands are still very competitive considering current games and they may be right, nonetheless, enthusiasts and geeks always expect the next big weapon in AMD vs nvidia endless war.
xbox soc maybe? 1024gcn cores and 8 jaguar cores with 512bit width to maximize bandwidth on the slow ddr3 memory? seems like thats the most likely case since its clearly an soc distinguishing between the parallel and serial compute units
or who knows if its not kaveri with amd maybe upping the performance level on APU's with making much larger chips with more goodies(reason i think this is because since its showing each 2 cpus as one module makes me think its based on steamroller since jaguar each 4 cores has paired l2cache not each 2)
8core apu and maybe 10-12core fx on steamroller? sure bring it on why not
Sam
I can't imagine a 20nm monster launched this year. And that slide has nothing to do with Volcanic GPU.
www.hardocp.com/article/2012/03/22/nvidia_kepler_gpu_geforce_gtx_680_video_card_review/13
www.hardocp.com/article/2012/10/30/xfx_double_d_hd_7970_ghz_edition_video_card_review/10
and then the 780 comming out with 2 units disabled lol
nvidia is just horrible with new process nodes, they never seem to get the hang of that, they are the ones always complaining about yield and what not simply because their engineers fail to work according to tsmc's fabs which nvidia has been using for over 10 years
amd on that front is miles ahead, always bringing excellent chips right when the fab spins, gotta appreciate amd from amd, and if this volcanic islands thing is coming out this years then it only further proves my point(though i still believe that image has nothing to do with volcanic island or the rumor itself)
Here, have a cookie.