AMD Counters Nvidia with VR-Ready RX 480

[vibranium]

 

 

AMD fired shots across the bow of Nvidia at its Computex press conference, announcing a brand-new, $200 graphics card that supports VR gaming. When it goes on sale on June 29th, it'll be the cheapest GPU you can buy with these capabilities. ...

 

The new card is the AMD Radeon RX 480, officially priced at $200 (about £165 when you tack on VAT). AMD has made direct comparisons with Nvidia's GeForce GTX 1080 graphics card, not because the RX 480 is more powerful, but instead because two RX 480's working together is faster than a GTX 1080. It might seem like a weird comparison, but when you consider that a pair will cost less than $500, you can see where AMD is coming from. ...

 

In terms of specifications, the RX 480 has 36 compute units and 4GB or 8GB of GDDR5 memory running on a 256-bit bus. Power consumption is 150W. It runs on AMD's much-talked-about Polaris architecture that gamers have been waiting on for a very long time.

 

The DisplayPort 1.3/1.4 and HDMI 2.0b connectors will also be capable of outputting HDR games, when they eventually appear.

AMD has been fairly tight-lipped on performance data so far, with no single-GPU figures revealed. It has, however, revealed performance for two GPUs running in Crossfire on the strategy game Ashes of the Singularity. In that benchmark, the RX 480 scored 62.5fps compared to the Nvidia GeForce GTX 480's 58.7fps.

 

But it's not quite that simple.

 

Ashes of the Singularity is a single game that's well optimised with DirectX 12 and supports asynchronous compute, a technology that allows graphics cards to run computing tasks and graphics tasks at the same time. This is something AMD does very well and Nvidia does less well, so it's no real surprise that the RX 480 comes out on top here.

 

If you're 100% convinced that you'd rather have two RX 480s instead of a single GTX 1080, bear in mind that with power consumption up at 300W with two cards (versus 180W for Nvidia) you'll need a higher capacity power supply and a more expensive motherboard that supports CrossFire. In other words, it's not a zero-sum game.

It's also worth noting that multi-GPU setups don't always add up to great performance, although AMD insists that with DirectX 12 games and those built on Vulkan, multi-GPU solutions are well supported.

 

However, if reports stating that the RX 480 is capable of running games smoothly at 1440p resolution prove accurate, this will definitely attract a lot of interest and could put AMD in a great price/performance sweet spot.

 

Should Nvidia be worried? Only a little. First, it's widely expected (and, frankly, inevitable) that Nvidia will launch a mid-range GeForce GTX 1060 in the next few months that will support VR. However, given the AMD Radeon RX 480 will launch on June 29th, this will give AMD a big head start when it comes to the mid-range part of the market. It could be a very exciting battle.

 

The lack of a high-end Polaris-based card will be a disappointment for some, but the specifications of the RX 480 leave room for some much more capable models.

 

 

ARTICLE SOURCE

 

[Dce3480]

And I Love Her  AMD  FTW

[pc71520]

I  AMD Radeon, too.

[Sylence]

AMD has always been the winner in terms of performance to price ratio, and once again here we see the results. after all it's all about the money, right.

 

AMD haven't even revealed their R9 490, or 490X which will probably come when 1080ti comes out

[DKT27]

Ignoring the whole VR thing and comparison with higher cards. I think this is a great thing AMD has done. They have not only released a mid ranged card that is very much capable to take on other expensive ones, but they have also done a great thing by releasing a card aimed at range which most of the gaming players like to buy - making this card aimed at the majority of the gaming players and such.

[rudrax]

The RX 480 comes with 5 TeraFlops of horse power where the GTX 1080 boasts a staggering 9 TeraFlops. But looking at the price tag difference, the RX 480 is a winner. Now it'll be intetesting to see how AMD's high end release troubles the mighty king Pascal! 

[steven36]

2 hours ago, rudrax said:

The RX 480 comes with 5 TeraFlops of horse power where the GTX 1080 boasts a staggering 9 TeraFlops. But looking at the price tag difference, the RX 480 is a winner. Now it'll be intetesting to see how AMD's high end release troubles the mighty king Pascal! 

 Here's what wall street  thought about it AMD's  announcement.

Quote

 

Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) Stock Tumbles After Pricing Graphics Chips

Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) shares are down after pricing its graphics chips to power virtual reality software at $199, below comparable products that cost about $399.

 

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Advanced Micro Devices (AMD)  shares are down 3.35% to $4.42 on Wednesday after pricing its graphics chips to power virtual reality (VR) software at $199, much lower than comparable products that go for around $399, the Wall Street Journal reports.

 

The company's reason to do so is to make virtual reality technology more affordable to consumers, as a recent survey conducted by the Advanced Imaging Society showed that 68% of respondents believe VR equipment is way too costly.

 

For instance, other technologies like VR headsets, including Oculus Rift, made by Facebook's (FB) Oculus VR Unit and HTC's Vive, currently cost $599 and $799, respectively. 

 

The chips based on its new Polaris design are estimated to arrive in graphic cards for personal computers at the end of June, the Journal noted.

 

Despite Advanced Micro Devices' efforts to make the starting cost of PCs more suitable, graphics chips are only one component among other technologies needed to run current VR gear, Fortune noted.

 

Separately, the chipmaker projects to return to operating profit in the second half of this year, CEO Lisa Su said today, speaking on the sidelines of the Computex technology trade show in Taipei, Reuters reports. 

 

TheStreet Ratings currently has a "Sell" rating on the stock with a letter grade of D.

 

This is driven by some concerns, which we believe should have a greater impact than any strengths, and could make it more difficult for investors to achieve positive results compared to most of the stocks we cover. The area that we feel has been the company's primary weakness has been its declining revenues.

 

Recently, TheStreet Ratings objectively rated this stock according to its "risk-adjusted" total return prospect over a 12-month investment horizon. Not based on the news in any given day, the rating may differ from Jim Cramer's view or that of this articles's author. TheStreet Ratings has this to say about the recommendation:

 

We rate ADVANCED MICRO DEVICES as a Sell with a ratings score of D. This is driven by some concerns, which we believe should have a greater impact than any strengths, and could make it more difficult for investors to achieve positive results compared to most of the stocks we cover.

 

You can view the full analysis from the report here: AMD

 

https://www.thestreet.com/story/13592466/1/advanced-micro-devices-amd-stock-tumbles-after-pricing-graphics-chips.html

 

 

 

 

[macnavarra]

These reminds me of the old Ati glory days with these http://www.cnet.com/products/ati-radeon-9800-pro-128mb-agp/specs/ Card.

[steven36]

You be better off spending a few extra dollars and buy something with support  than buying something with poor support 3 years from now you will regret it ,

 

AMD  didn't  even think DX12 was even going to exist back in 2013 they were not even prepared

http://www.i-programmer.info/news/144-graphics-and-games/5744-amd-no-directx-12.html

 

When Windows 10 came out many of us had a hard time Finding drivers that would work with DX 11 on Windows 10 and if you look at steam most AMD processes are still on DX11 they don't support there products very long .

 

Also AMD poor support not only has hindered Windows users it also hindered Linux users as well  . I had been using Ubuntu based distros since last summer and because of there driver  team suck on no matter what O/S you use I had to switch  to a Distro based on Arch  to even get my hardware to work with newer Linux  Kernels  and have full driver support .  No way Id invest in  AMD hardware ever again  or buy something with  it  in it .

[Sylence]

lol a few extra dollars on Nvidia means 200$ to 300$ more for the same and even less performance.

 

AMD Radeon cards that feature DirectX 12 have no issues with it, specially on Windows 10 and 8.1 and 7. driver support is even better, no crap ware like Nvidia. 

[steven36]

 

Quote

 

AMD Exposes More Weakness At E3

 

Summary

At E3, AMD showed more cheap Polaris-based GPUs, but nothing for notebooks.

The low performance and price of AMD's Polaris chips indicate continuing process problems at Global Foundries.

Microsoft's Xbox One announcement also indicates that chips combining Zen and Polaris won't be available until late 2017.

Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ:AMD) CEO Lisa Su took the stage at E3 to highlight more graphics cards based on its new Polaris architecture. These cards, the RX 470 and RX 460, feature quaintly anachronistic single slot form factors, and their main selling feature is their higher performance per watt. In the name of "democratizing" PC gaming and VR, AMD is offering consumers a backward step in performance for a very low price. Meanwhile, the graphics chips that AMD keeps promising, low power notebook Polaris GPUs for which there is probably a reasonable market, were nowhere to be seen.

 

Source: PCGamer

True Vaporware

The hallmark of AMD's marketing strategy since the beginning of the year has been to highlight products that can't be bought by consumers. AMD has been very careful not to over-promise. It usually doesn't say when the products will actually be available, or what their performance will actually be. But it makes a lot of glowing generalizations that leaves fans and investors assuming that its products will outperform the competition.

For all the marketing hype, AMD has only made two very specific claims about its Zen CPUs and Polaris GPUs. AMD has said that Zen will feature 40% more instructions per clock cycle, due to implementing hyperthreading in the CPU cores. For Polaris, the claim has been higher performance per watt, in the range of 2-2.8X depending on the product.

 

And that's about it. When you sift through all the marketing hype, those are the main claims that withstand scrutiny. The only other specific performance information we have is the CrossFire performance that Koduri showed at Computex for a pair of RX 480 cards.

That limited information does not support the hypothesis that AMD's offerings will outperform its rivals' CPUs or GPUs, which is why we now are hearing the spin about "democratization". AMD knows it doesn't have the premium end in GPUs, so it is embarked in a race to the bottom to sell its products based on low price.

The new RX 470 and RX 460 are cases in point. It's clear that these cards will offer sub-par performance for even the previous generation of graphics cards. The only real improvement they offer is that they'll consume less electricity. Gamers looking to play games in 4K or VR will not be able to use these cards.

The important market for Polaris has seemed to be for sometime in notebook GPUs, where the power efficiency could be used to best advantage. AMD's press release that accompanied the E3 presentation contains a lengthy reference to the value of Polaris in notebooks:

Console-class GPU performance for thin and light notebooks - Gaming notebooks have traditionally been large and cumbersome or under-powered for today's gaming needs. The Radeon™ RX Series addresses this with flagship technology that effectively gives mobile users GPU performance that rivals that of consoles with exceptionally low power and low-z height to drive thin, light and high-performance gaming notebooks, and 1080p 60Hz gaming experiences for both eSports and AAA titles.

This is classic AMD marketing. It extols the virtues of Polaris in notebooks. AMD makes it seem as if the product is right around the corner. But there are no specifics. There's no model number. There's no launch date. There's not even a rough time frame for availability. This is true vaporware.

Bottom Feeding

Neither of the cards that Lisa Su held up at E3 would be suitable for use in a modern thin and light notebook or 2-in-1. The RX 460 will have a starting price of about $100 and performance of the R7 360, according to expectations of AnandTech. But even the 460 will not have a low enough power consumption (expected to be about 75 W) to go into a notebook.

 

It's important for investors to understand the technical reasons why AMD has been forced into bottom feeding with what should have been its premium GPUs. This is really driven by yield and maturity issues in Global Foundries' 14 nm FinFET process that AMD is using for Polaris, and expected to use for Zen as well.

When a foundry first starts a new process node, yields, in terms of percentage of chips on a wafer that are usable, are not very good. As the foundry gets more experienced with the new process, it figures out what it's doing wrong and yields improve.

One way to get around the yield problem in the near term is to make sure that the individual chips are small. AMD has had to keep Polaris small in order to help GloFo get decent yields. So the RX 480 actually has fewer stream processors (the basic unit of GPU processing for AMD) than the previous generation R9 390 (2304 vs. 2560 according to AnandTech). Other performance specs are expected to be in line with the R9 390.

The chip inside the low-end RX 460 is Polaris 11, and is assumed to be even smaller than Polaris 10 inside the RX 480. Smaller means better yield and more chips per wafer, so cheaper, but also lower performing.

AMD's next-generation Vega GPU architecture is expected to be more comparable with Nvidia's (NASDAQ:NVDA) Pascal in performance, but this is off in the future, probably some time in 2017. Once again, the fact that Vega has been put off to 2017 is indicative of process limitations. Vega, which will need to be much larger than Polaris, can't be made profitably until Global Foundries improves its process.

Process maturity also impacts the performance of parts that are considered acceptable. Polaris 11 was expected to go into notebooks, but the high power consumption probably indicates that it isn't performing as efficiently as expected. This is why we aren't seeing any notebook parts, nor are we being given a time frame for availability. Probably neither AMD nor Global Foundries have any idea when they'll be able to produce notebook parts.

 

Project Scorpio

E3 offered more evidence of production limitations for Global Foundries and AMD in the form of Microsoft's (NASDAQ:MSFT) announcement of Xbox One S and Project Scorpio. Microsoft announced the One S update, which features a 40% reduction in volume compared to the Xbox One. It also has a 4K Blu-ray disk player and the ability to play 4K video, but not 4K games. Technical details on the S remain sketchy, but its processor inside is likely to be a minor update of the current semi-custom processor from AMD. This means it's still a 28 nm part using previous gen CPU and GPU technology. No Zen or Polaris.

Part of the reason for inferring this is that Microsoft also previewed a dramatically improved "Project Scorpio" version of Xbox One. This will feature a 6 teraflop GPU and be capable of true 4K gaming, according to Microsoft.

Scorpio is exactly what one would expect from an upgraded Zen+Polaris (ZP) semi-custom chip. But it won't arrive until "Holiday 2017". This is a pretty good indicator of when AMD can be expected to have Zen and Polaris combined in a system on chip (SOC) or what AMD calls an Accelerated Processing Unit (APU).

This also points to the current state of the GloFo process that nothing like a ZP chip is possible in the near term. Once again, the main limitation is the physical size of the chip.

ZP APUs, when and if they arrive, can be expected to offer much better performance than the current generation of APUs that actually are shipping, Bristol Ridge. But Bristol Ridge (another 28 nm part) is basically dead on arrival, shipping in only one product, an undistinguished HP (NYSE:HPQ) Notebook. Bristol Ridge isn't at all competitive in performance with Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) Skylake or Kaby Lake. Once again, AMD is just bottom feeding.

While ZP APUs will offer improvements over Bristol Ridge, it's not obvious at all that they'll be better than Intel's parts that come out in the same time frame. By late next year, Intel will have moved on to its 10 nm process and Cannonlake.

 

Project Scorpio indicates that AMD's ZP APUs can be expected to help sustain console sales. They'll offer a significant performance boost compared to the 2013 era parts they will replace. In the area of PCs, the impact will be much less. I expect AMD to be forced into bottom feeding mode against Intel Cannonlake.

Investor Takeaway

I often receive comments and even direct messages asking why I'm so negative about AMD. It's nothing personal, and it's not based on emotion.

AMD just has so many problems. It's losing buckets of money, and its revenue is shrinking. Despite claims of "market share gains", these are just indicative of AMD's bottom-feeding status. AMD is fighting a two-front war against much stronger and profitable competitors in Intel and Nvidia.

But the big millstone around AMD's neck is Global Foundries. Because of Global Foundries, AMD is delivering products that are about a year (or more in the case of Bristol Ridge) behind its competitors, and there doesn't seem to be any hope of closing that gap.

The June quarter will be another terrible quarter with y/y declines in revenue and no hope for profitability in sight. Will this deter AMD investors? Probably not. AMD may even be able to claim once again growth in GPU market share, which appears to be all that's needed to sustain the hopes of its investors. I continue to rate AMD a short opportunity based on the unrealistic hope of AMD's investors.

Disclosure: I am/we are long NVDA.

I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.

http://seekingalpha.com/article/3982213-amd-exposes-weakness-e3

 

 

[Sylence]

better create another topic lol