Pravin,
Elctronic News take on how the CPU competition is going to shape up in Y2K. Nice article with a couple of bar charts showing Market Segments and PC revenues for the next three years. Some of the facts are not up to date but overall it's a nice read -
electronicnews.com ______________
Here is the main section pertained to AMD:
Meanwhile, AMD seems to have found new legs. Once described with adjectives like "beleaguered", the company is suddenly on the move, adding manufacturing capacity, and improving its products in a last-ditch attempt to shake the perception that it is anything but a dependable supplier.
After initially ceding control of the low-end PC processor business to AMD, Intel in 1999 came roaring back with price cuts and new products that put its Celeron processor back on top in that segment.
But now the battle has widened. AMD has launched its assault on Intel's Pentium III product line with the Athlon microprocessor while maintaining pressure on Intel in lower end spaces with its various flavors of K6.
AMD's most important goal, most analysts said, will be making the transition from being an alternative platform for consumer PCs to becoming a viable and reliable source for corporate desktop PC microprocessors.
"AMD is in really good shape in terms of product design. Its conversion to 0.18-micron technology is going well by all accounts," Brookwood said. "It certainly has the ability to compete with Intel at the middle and high levels of the market but they really need to establish a beachhead with enterprise andbusiness-type systems. It needs to overcome the perception that it is just a consumer brand."
McCarron predicted that AMD will win at least a few designs for corporate systems.
"We've talked with some tier-one OEMs, and they are giving AMD some serious consideration," he said. "There hasn't been a period within the last five years when the OEMs have been so willing to get Intel upset at them. And from the OEM's perspective, it's really convenient to have AMD around to get better pricing from Intel. But without significant sales and design wins, AMD is not a threat to Intel."
In 2000, every Athlon shipped will be fabbed on 0.18-micron processes. Those Athlon microprocessors produced at Fab 25 in Austin will have aluminum interconnects and those from Fab 30 in Dresden, Germany, will have copper interconnects. Clock speeds are expected to hit 800MHz during the first quarter.
Around midyear, two new parts, codenamed Thunderbird and Spitfire, will hit the market with initial clock speeds of 900MHz. Both equipped with an on-chip level-two cache, Thunderbird will be aimed high, while Spitfire low.
Later in the year, AMD will bring out Mustang, a part it has said little about. Optimized for the copper process in Dresden, the chip may possibly be the first AMD offering to debut at a clock speed of 1GHz. AMD will offer Mustang-based parts for a wide range of applications, ranging from the consumer PC all the way up to servers.
_____________________________________________________________________
There are other interesting sections in this article - "The Race to 1GHz", "VIA", etc.
Goutama |
