AMD Pits K6-2 350MHz Chip Against Intel Pentium II 09/22/98
Newsbytes, Tuesday, September 22, 1998 at 12:25
MAKATI CITY, PHILIPPINES, 1998 SEP 22 (NB) -- By Joel D Pinaroc,
Metropolitan Computer Times. The ongoing chip war is raised to yet
another level again with the recent announcement by Advanced Micro
Devices [NYSE:AMD] of the availability of its latest microprocessor,
the K6-2 350 megahertz (MHz) chip, positioned to directly compete
with Intel's Pentium II microprocessor product line.
AMD is apparently banking on the new K6-2 350 MHz chip's features, to
overtake Intel's Pentium II, as far as performance is concerned.
Chong Kum Shiong, product marketing manager of AMD, in a press briefing
held recently, stressed that the new AMD chip is "gaining momentum in
the market" due to the strong support being shown by top PC vendors such
as IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Compaq, Fujitsu and Acer, among others.
"OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) and end-users are embracing the
value and leading-edge performance of 3Dnow! Technology with AMD
processor-based systems for home and business applications, providing
users with a rich 3-D (three-dimensional) visual computing experience,"
Chong said. "In addition, the 350 MHz AMD K6-2 provides competitive
performance on mainstream business applications compared to a 350 MHz
Pentium II."
In a presentation, Chong said AMD has already shipped over seven million
AMD-K6 processors. This figure is expected to reach 12 million by the
end of 1998, with the volume shipment of the new K6-2 350 MHz chip.
Sitting on a 100 MHz Bus Frontside L2 and powered by 9.3 million
transistors, Chong said the K6-2 350 MHz will compete head-on with its
Pentium II counterpart for the high-end PC desktop market.
With AMD's 3DNow! technology, Chong said the K6-2 350MHz chip provides
users with "superior visual computing" experience, without compromising
the processor's competitive performance on mainstream business
applications.
According to Chong, leading software applications that are currently
supporting K6-2 and 3Dnow includes, Microsoft's DirectX 6.0, OpenGL,
Glide 2.5 and 3.0 and a slew of interactive 3-D gaming titles.
Chong also added that AMD is bent on further increasing the performance
level of K6-2 processors with upcoming 400 MHz chips in the fourth
quarter and 450 MHz in the first quarter 1999. For instance, K6-2
"Sharptoot," AMD's answer to Intel's "Katmai," said Chong, will be the
"ultimate sixth generation processor to utilize both 100 MHz backside
and 100 MHz Frontside L3. |
