Thursday, February 23rd 2017
Of New Horizons and Zen: The Story of the Name "Ryzen" for AMD's New Processors
AMD's Ryzen CPU has been a hot topic as of late, and certainly looks set to shake up the CPU world as we know it; however, it wasn't that long ago that we weren't calling it "Ryzen" at all, but merely referring to it by its codename, "Zen." What happened to that?
The "Zen" name was quite popular, and AMD claims to have made the name choice to emphasize the balance it struck between various design principles. It resonated with many enthusiasts to be sure. It was a far cry more popular than the line of "construction equipment" themed code-names that preceded it (though whether that had to do with actual performance of those products or their naming scheme itself is certainly up for debate).
Regardless, there is no denying the "Zen" name was well entrenched and already had its own level of pride built up around itself, so why dump it?
According to John Taylor, corporate vice president of marketing for AMD, they did so because they had no choice. See, AMD wanted to trademark the "Zen" name like any good company would. However, in one of their largest markets (the United States) trademarking the term "Zen" would be impossible due to the plethora of already Zen-themed products on the market and the requirement that the brand must be "strong and unique." Knowing Zen would never be trademarkable under US-law, AMD turned to its inner space geek and looked to the reports in the news at the time of the "New Horizons" mission to Pluto. They couldn't deny that the "Zen" sound appeared in the word "Horizon," and so the initial name they came up with to replace "Zen" was "Rizen," a mere product of chopping the start off the word "Horizon" and replacing the "o" with an "e" to "Zenify" it. They later would tweak this to its final product of "Ryzen", fearing people would pronounce it "risen" rather than "Ryzen," true to its "New Horizon" origins.
Continuing in that theme, AMD first made this choice apparent at its December 2016 Zen Architecture announcement event, aptly titled "New Horizon," another homage to the little probe that could. In keeping with the Japanese Zen theme, the Zen boxes of today's product announcement are adorned with a Japanese Calligraphy symbol known as an Enso: Essentially a brushed circle. That aspect is a homage to the original name: more than the Ryzen name, which is probably appropriate given the desirability of the original name: However, I can't help but feel it would be equally cool if they decided to pay homage to the origins of the name Ryzen, with a picture of New Horizons or a space probe on the box. That would be pretty darn cool too.
The "Zen" name was quite popular, and AMD claims to have made the name choice to emphasize the balance it struck between various design principles. It resonated with many enthusiasts to be sure. It was a far cry more popular than the line of "construction equipment" themed code-names that preceded it (though whether that had to do with actual performance of those products or their naming scheme itself is certainly up for debate).
Regardless, there is no denying the "Zen" name was well entrenched and already had its own level of pride built up around itself, so why dump it?
According to John Taylor, corporate vice president of marketing for AMD, they did so because they had no choice. See, AMD wanted to trademark the "Zen" name like any good company would. However, in one of their largest markets (the United States) trademarking the term "Zen" would be impossible due to the plethora of already Zen-themed products on the market and the requirement that the brand must be "strong and unique." Knowing Zen would never be trademarkable under US-law, AMD turned to its inner space geek and looked to the reports in the news at the time of the "New Horizons" mission to Pluto. They couldn't deny that the "Zen" sound appeared in the word "Horizon," and so the initial name they came up with to replace "Zen" was "Rizen," a mere product of chopping the start off the word "Horizon" and replacing the "o" with an "e" to "Zenify" it. They later would tweak this to its final product of "Ryzen", fearing people would pronounce it "risen" rather than "Ryzen," true to its "New Horizon" origins.
Continuing in that theme, AMD first made this choice apparent at its December 2016 Zen Architecture announcement event, aptly titled "New Horizon," another homage to the little probe that could. In keeping with the Japanese Zen theme, the Zen boxes of today's product announcement are adorned with a Japanese Calligraphy symbol known as an Enso: Essentially a brushed circle. That aspect is a homage to the original name: more than the Ryzen name, which is probably appropriate given the desirability of the original name: However, I can't help but feel it would be equally cool if they decided to pay homage to the origins of the name Ryzen, with a picture of New Horizons or a space probe on the box. That would be pretty darn cool too.