AMD Beema/Mullins Launch Thread

[ctsoth]

Now can we please get a two socket motherboard with igpu crossfire support and a modified dual or quad channel memory controller.

 

[Phynaz]

For these? What would be the point? These are low cost chips.

 

[Shivansps]

So, any tablets announced yet?

 

[Haserath]

So, any tablets announced yet?

They don't have any design wins yet...

 

[Idontcare]

They don't have any design wins yet...

They need to stop playing it safe and think more like Apple. Apple didn't wait around for anyone to build them an iPod, an iPad or an iPhone. They dove in and created that capability and marketshare directly.

If no one in the existing OEM space wants to incorporate AMD's chips then AMD needs to either stop designing them and go do something else as a business, or grab this steer by the horns and wrangle it directly themselves by releasing their own consumer grade (not mere reference design) tablet.

 

[Abwx]

The new business model to have design wins promptly is to give each chip for free along with a 100$ banknote.

More seriously, the first products laptop wise are expected for the first days of june, i guess that in the meantime we ll spot some designs as the chip is performing too well to be ignored.

 

[erunion]

They need to stop playing it safe and think more like Apple. Apple didn't wait around for anyone to build them an iPod, an iPad or an iPhone. They dove in and created that capability and marketshare directly.

If no one in the existing OEM space wants to incorporate AMD's chips then AMD needs to either stop designing them and go do something else as a business, or grab this steer by the horns and wrangle it directly themselves by releasing their own consumer grade (not mere reference design) tablet.

NVIDIA found themselves at the same decision point recently and now we have the tegra note.

 

[sontin]

NVIDIA found themselves at the same decision point recently and now we have the tegra note.

They dont sell the Tegra Note.

 

[NTMBK]

They dont sell the Tegra Note.

They sell it, just to their OEMs. Same as reference graphics cards.

 

[sontin]

And? They sell their Tegra chips to OEMs, too...
It's a reference plattform. OEMs can use it or design their own plattform. Fact is nVidia is not selling Tegra Note to end users.

BTW: They did it with Tegra 2 and 3, too. Google used the plattform to make their first Nexus 7.

 

[AtenRa]

Currently I believe they are more interested in lower power entry level Laptops than Tablets.
Also, unlike Intel's BayTrail-T that is a different die design than the rest of the BayTrail SKUs, the AMD Mullins is the exactly same design as Beema. They didnt spend more for it like Intel.

 

[NTMBK]

And? They sell their Tegra chips to OEMs, too...
It's a reference plattform. OEMs can use it or design their own plattform. Fact is nVidia is not selling Tegra Note to end users.

BTW: They did it with Tegra 2 and 3, too. Google used the plattform to make their first Nexus 7.

Yes, but OEMs don't just sell Tegra chips onto their customers with no changes other than sticking a badge on it. The Tegra Note is designed to be a product of high enough quality to sell directly to customers, with no change other than branding. A reference platform is just intended to be a starting point for OEMs, not the end point.

 

[AtenRa]

Im sure OEMs can take the AMD Discovery Platform and use it directly, but as i see it, currently 11.6" Win 8.1 tablet market is very small and OEMs are not that much interested.
It is the reason why i said AMD needs to come to an agreement with MicroSoft about windows price license for those Tablets in order to stimulate interest and raise Windows Tablet Volumes.

 

[seitur]

If amd would release such a chip on a small board for a low price, it could turn into an x86 compatible raspberry pi. This would mean the entire computer interested world would jump on the bandwagon. An addon such a general cheap pic,avr or arm mcu with an usb interface on board as well to use for general purpose input output (GPIO) functions would make it really popular. AMD could do it. I would expect an amd x86soc arduino port to follow soon. It would be really popular and AMD can pull it off at a low price.

Yeah AMD (and Intel) need to start think out of the box.

Cheap SOC chip for PC-in-board Raspberry like construction could be a huge success if priced right (obviously it would be more expensive than R-Pi, but if it would not be too expensive and if AMD or Intel could accept low margins on that kind of board then it could be win)

 

[blackened23]

Im sure OEMs can take the AMD Discovery Platform and use it directly, but as i see it, currently 11.6" Win 8.1 tablet market is very small and OEMs are not that much interested.
It is the reason why i said AMD needs to come to an agreement with MicroSoft about windows price license for those Tablets in order to stimulate interest and raise Windows Tablet Volumes.

Windows 8.1 licensing for 7 inch and less form factors is free. Or will be in a couple of weeks, MS has already announced this. For bigger form factors it's substantially cheaper than it was in prior years. The days of full 99$ OS licensing for all OEMs are done, MS realized this a long time ago; MS cannot compete with google on the mobile front with that type of pricing. And MS has adjusted accordingly, they're not stupid about this.

Is that truly the real problem though? Pricing? Nope. Windows 8.1 on tablets is just not good - pricing is just one aspect with Windows for mobile. It's just not a great OS for mobile tablet form factors, period.

It's just more important that AMD get full android compatibility. Like it or not, for 7 inch tablets Android is just the bigger and (IMO) better market. Windows 8.1 also is also rather terrible as a *mobile* operating system; after having used the ipad for some time I came to the realization of how bad win 8.1 is in this respect. It's great on an ultrabook or desktop with a keyboard or trackpad. For mobile touch optimized apps? It's not good. Compatibility is great for a jack of all trades but it isn't a master of mobile. For touch optimized applications, iOS and android are FAR better. And then there's the fact that DPI scaling for high resolution displays is all jacked up in Windows 8.1, and then we're back to applications for 8.1 not being designed specifically for mobile. That compounds the windows 8.1 DPI problem. With android and iOS, applications are designed with the form factor in mind (ie tablets). So this means mobile touch optimized apps are just superior on android. Whereas Win 8.1 is better for a desktop or an ultrabook with a trackpad/mouse. So AMD should be focused on android compatibility rather than Windows - if AMD wanted to make a smart business move, that would be it. Of course their record of business moves in the past 7-8 years, questionable at best. We'll see. Of course it seems like Beema and Mullins will be used not for tablets but rather for sub notebooks just like Temash was.

 

[ctsoth]

For these? What would be the point? These are low cost chips.

Assuming gaming companies transition to well threaded code to work with the playstation and xbox, 8 low powered cores coupled with crossfire igpus and decent memory should be capable of running the next generation of games, at least those designed for xbox and playstation and ported to PC. It would be great for a home server/storage HTPC solution. Look at the 8core atom motherboard on anandtechs frontpage.

IDC has a great point that applies to more than just tablets. AMD needs to do more than make products than hope they do well, they have to be aggressive, leverage their strengths, and create products that are interesting and functional, and bring them to market themselves if need be. I'm sure it wouldn't be any extra R&D work for AMD to directly supply the motherboard I am dreaming of. They have already poured plenty of R&D into creating the xbox and ps4 systems. I think they already have the technology and the research done, they just didn't think of building it.

 

[tential]

They need to stop playing it safe and think more like Apple. Apple didn't wait around for anyone to build them an iPod, an iPad or an iPhone. They dove in and created that capability and marketshare directly.

If no one in the existing OEM space wants to incorporate AMD's chips then AMD needs to either stop designing them and go do something else as a business, or grab this steer by the horns and wrangle it directly themselves by releasing their own consumer grade (not mere reference design) tablet.

Nvidia did similar with the Shield design and the Tegra Note.

It's funny to see everyone say this is a win for AMD though. Why not wait for the full details/actual products first? Especially after all the other times we've seen things from AMD and were disappointed with the final product, I'll wait before I call it a success or failure.

I was happy with Kabini, but some of the best uses for it still have lackluster support. Particularly HD audio passthrough in Linux (DTS HD audio) isn't there support wise. Would love to use Kabini as a set top box for something like XBMC but no HD Audio passthrough is a downer. AMD just needs some minor polishing on these latest round of products and it'd be perfect. I can't wait though, I really would like to see competition in these low price/low margin segments.

 

[AtenRa]

Windows 8.1 licensing for 7 inch and less form factors is free. Or will be in a couple of weeks, MS has already announced this. For bigger form factors it's substantially cheaper than it was in prior years. The days of full 99$ OS licensing for all OEMs are done, MS realized this a long time ago; MS cannot compete with google on the mobile front with that type of pricing. And MS has adjusted accordingly, they're not stupid about this.

Is that truly the real problem though? Pricing? Nope. Windows 8.1 on tablets is just not good - pricing is just one aspect with Windows for mobile. It's just not a great OS for mobile tablet form factors, period.

It's just more important that AMD get full android compatibility. Like it or not, for 7 inch tablets Android is just the bigger and (IMO) better market. Windows 8.1 also is also rather terrible as a *mobile* operating system; after having used the ipad for some time I came to the realization of how bad win 8.1 is in this respect. It's great on an ultrabook or desktop with a keyboard or trackpad. For mobile touch optimized apps? It's not good. Compatibility is great for a jack of all trades but it isn't a master of mobile. For touch optimized applications, iOS and android are FAR better. And then there's the fact that DPI scaling for high resolution displays is all jacked up in Windows 8.1, and then we're back to applications for 8.1 not being designed specifically for mobile. That compounds the windows 8.1 DPI problem. With android and iOS, applications are designed with the form factor in mind (ie tablets). So this means mobile touch optimized apps are just superior on android. Whereas Win 8.1 is better for a desktop or an ultrabook with a trackpad/mouse. So AMD should be focused on android compatibility rather than Windows - if AMD wanted to make a smart business move, that would be it. Of course their record of business moves in the past 7-8 years, questionable at best. We'll see. Of course it seems like Beema and Mullins will be used not for tablets but rather for sub notebooks just like Temash was.

Just to remind you and the rest of the forum, unlike Intel, AMD has an ARM license. They dont need to spend billions to force x86 in to the 7-8" Tablets and 4-5" Smart Phones. They can create a very competitive low power low BoM, Mobile ARM + GCN HSA APU SoC for that segment. They can use their x86 designs for 10-11.6" and higher Windows Tablets as well entry level and/or low power Notebooks.

 

[NTMBK]

Just to remind you and the rest of the forum, unlike Intel, AMD has an ARM license. They dont need to spend billions to force x86 in to the 7-8" Tablets and 4-5" Smart Phones. They can create a very competitive low power low BoM, Mobile ARM + GCN HSA APU SoC for that segment. They can use their x86 designs for 10-11.6" and higher Windows Tablets as well entry level and/or low power Notebooks.

The consumer tablet SoC market is a bloody, shark-infested pool. Any new entrants would need to compete with the likes of Apple, Qualcomm, Samsung, and an Intel who is happy to pour billions of contra-revenue dollars into mobile in order to buy themselves a slice of the market. AMD would be eaten alive. NVidia already tried the same strategy (vanilla ARM cores, differentiate with the GPU) and this market chewed them up and spat them out. Given AMD's very limited resources, they should spend them elsewhere.

 

[AtenRa]

The consumer tablet SoC market is a bloody, shark-infested pool. Any new entrants would need to compete with the likes of Apple, Qualcomm, Samsung, and an Intel who is happy to pour billions of contra-revenue dollars into mobile in order to buy themselves a slice of the market. AMD would be eaten alive. NVidia already tried the same strategy (vanilla ARM cores, differentiate with the GPU) and this market chewed them up and spat them out. Given AMD's very limited resources, they should spend them elsewhere.

I didnt say they will do it, i just said they have the license and the IP to make a low power cheap ARM HSA SoC. Also many of the reasons why AMD is targeting the 11.6" and above Windows Tablets with its x86 designs are the ones you just mentioned.
They hardly have any competition in that segment

 

[blackened23]

What the heck are you talking about ARM licensing for. Pay attention. I AM TALKING ABOUT THE OPERATING SYSTEM. Windows 8.1 versus android/iOS. ARM licensing has absolutely z-e-r-o things to do with operating systems. Android and chrome OS work fine on intel chips despite them not being ARM SOCs. Intel worked with google to ensure complete compatibility, and they have the first android x64 SOC right now. Now i'm sure you're eager to talk the BT down, but the Bay Trail right now is either the fastest or second fastest CPU for android available. The qualcomm 801 may be faster, but I haven't seen a full array of benchmarks yet. Anyway, back to operating systems.

Windows 8.1 is a very poor touch driven mobile operating system. Period. Android apps are designed for tablet form factors while Windows 8.1 apps have horrible DPI scaling and are designed for everything. Being designed for everything is great for compatibility but GARBAGE for touch driven mobile specific apps. Using the ipad for a long period of time drove this home for me - using Win 8.1 on a tablet in a touch driven fashion is downright PAINFUL compared to using android or iOS. Heck using the gmail, netflix, tapatalk or youtube apps on the iPad are great to use. But using that crap in a browser window on an 8 inch windows tablet with no mouse/kb is just LOL compared to the ipad. Not to mention, the DPI scaling is all jacked up in Windows 8.1 with literally 90%+ of applications not working properly with it. And when the app doesn't work properly with DPI scaling, the OEM has a choice. Lower the display resolution or ditch Windows. This is why you're not seeing tons of Windows tablets with 2560x1600 or higher resolutions, while it can be found on high end android tablets. Win 8.1 is a poor mobile touch driven OS compared to android or iOS. Win 8.1, great for desktop. Terrible as a touch driven mobile OS, mainly because Win 8.1 apps aren't mobile specific.

Now Windows 8.1 is great for an ultrabook with a touchpad or a desktop with a keyboard mouse. When you're actually, you know, MOBILE, the touch driven aspect of windows 8.1 is garbage. So that is why I said AMD needs android compatibility, they do not have it. ARM licensing has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO with being android compatible. Android is free. Android costs nothing. AMD has to implement it to get into that market. And they don't need ARM SOCs to do so.

 

[tential]

So, does it run Crysis?

 

[TrulyUncouth]

And? They sell their Tegra chips to OEMs, too...
It's a reference plattform. OEMs can use it or design their own plattform. Fact is nVidia is not selling Tegra Note to end users.

BTW: They did it with Tegra 2 and 3, too. Google used the plattform to make their first Nexus 7.

I remember all the reports being that Nvidia was building the entire thing then partners just badge and sell... That is massively different than selling them a single component that is a small fraction of a final products total cost(Tegra). This is also clearly different than their reference platforms for T2/T3 since those were never marketed to consumers.

Erunion had a good point. If AMD did as IDC suggested then they would be in a very similar spot to Nvidia with Tegra.

 

[TrulyUncouth]

It's just more important that AMD get full android compatibility. Like it or not, for 7 inch tablets Android is just the bigger and (IMO) better market. Windows 8.1 also is also rather terrible as a *mobile* operating system ... So this means mobile touch optimized apps are just superior on android. ... So AMD should be focused on android compatibility rather than Windows - if AMD wanted to make a smart business move, that would be it. ...Of course it seems like Beema and Mullins will be used not for tablets but rather for sub notebooks just like Temash was.

What the heck are you talking about ARM licensing for. Pay attention. I AM TALKING ABOUT THE OPERATING SYSTEM.

He is making a very valid point in response to your post. You say that Mullins/Beema is not for tablets and that AMD needs to get into ~7" tablet form factors... He made the very logical point that they can simply use ARM to get into that form factor if x86 can't get them there. Perhaps before yelling at others for not listening you should listen to yourself

I personally agree with the sentiment that unless GCN 2.0 is a huge gain in efficiency and designed for mobile first like Maxwell then it probably won't be worth shoe-horning into an ARM SOC and trying to get it into products. I think AMD should just try to keep the Cat cores moving in the right direction as they are already close to ARM power levels and give us Windows compatibility.

 

[blackened23]

It is "supposedly" a 4.5W TDP chip. Well one of them are. So why can't it be used in a 7 inch tablet unless the power consumption is too high?