I'm stated that I was afraid that despite being a crappy chip, the P4 would run away on MHz alone...and AMD is helping them right along with delays on the Palomino and Hammer.
Give a little credit where it's due. In terms of performance per die size, yeah, the P4 leaves a lot to be desired. At low frequencies it's overall performance also leaves a lot to be desired... As frequency has ramped, however, the P4 has looked better and better because it's performance is SCALING better than the K7. If you look at the percent increase in benchmark performance divided by the percent increase in CPU frequency, the P4 always beats out the K7... frequently by 2X or more. This has allowed a CPU which a 1.3GHz was a massive under-performer to take the overall performance crown at 1.8GHz. The gap will widen at 2.0GHz, and with the release of Northwood (with more cache) at 2.0 and 2.2GHz for starters, AMD's going to find themselves in a world of hurt. In the final analysis, the P4 isn't a "crappy chip." It was a new chip with some initial growing pains and a lot of potential. It's now starting to show that potential.
If it was a case of a simple frequency ramp, AMD could go to a performance rating. It isn't, though. Intel's basically hit AMD with the double whammy. Their chip scales better with clock than the competition, and has a lot more clock headroom than the competition. Sure, Intel's paying a hefty penalty in die size, but Intel's manufacturing expertise is second to none in the industry... and it appears they've put it to good use in accelerating the P4 ramp.
AMD's only hope to get back into the top end at this point is the Hammer series... an by going to x86-64, I honestly think they've shot themselves in the foot. Itanium momentum is already growing, and McKinley is due to pilot release next quarter.
I honestly think Jerry Sanders' ego got ahead of him on this one. AMD doesn't have the expertise to go into servers at this point. AMD certainly doesn't have the background for real 64-bit capability at this point either. Their mobile solutions are also questionable in terms of power consumption, packaging, and thermals. AMD is trying to do too much too soon, and it's going to boomerang on them. |
