The Intel Atom Thread

[VengenceIsMine]

I did find this video of a Windows 1080p Tablet swiping back and forth:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=h8d6J-Mg9zI#t=53

Although I'd hardly call the swiping in the video a complete demonstartion, it did look pretty good to me.



Here is a video of Bay Trail Z3740 playing a 1080p you tube video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=p-7IAArxKHU#t=57

So for a low cost non gaming chip aimed at 1080p level performance it doesn't seem a lot of EUs is needed.....and that is for the low TDP Tablet chip. A low cost Laptop or Desktop chip would have even higher GPU clocks with the same 4 EUs...and better performance.




That is true, but it doesn't mean Intel needs to follow this trend in all segments. In fact, I have to wonder if making the 14nm chip even cheaper to buy (with less than 16 EUs and maybe even dual core) would be a better choice in the long run. This provided the SATA/PCI-E remained for budget laptop and desktops.



Another thing to consider is that screen resolutions are rising, but how soon can we expect to see 4K (or even 1440p) for the average budget user atom is aimed at? I'm thinking 1080p will be around for quite a while for frugal users (especially on desktop and probably low cost laptop too)

The margin in this market is to be competing with Qualcomm at the high end not scrapping with MediaTek or Allwinner for under $150 tablet wins with razor thin margins. The higher end products in the tablet market are in a massive pixel/GPU race right now and if Intel wants design wins there, the GPU needs to be competitive, right now Bay Trail has an excellent CPU vis a vis the competition but GPU lags badly vs Snapdragon & Imagination Tech. Hence the large jump up on the GPU side for Cherry.

 

[Arachnotronic]

The margin in this market is to be competing with Qualcomm at the high end not scrapping with MediaTek or Allwinner for under $150 tablet wins with razor thin margins. The higher end products in the tablet market are in a massive pixel/GPU race right now and if Intel wants design wins there, the GPU needs to be competitive, right now Bay Trail has an excellent CPU vis a vis the competition but GPU lags badly vs Snapdragon & Imagination Tech. Hence the large jump up on the GPU side for Cherry.

The CHT coming in Q4 is known as Cherry Trail VMS = Cherry Trail Value & Mainstream, per a roadmap leaked by VR-Zone. I have heard that this version is 8EU Gen8 LP GPU while the full version is coming in Q1 2015 with 16EUs.

 

[bullzz]

@Intel17 - really? doesnt it make more sense to launch the higher end first since they already have bay trail for value
any idea how many EUs braswell will have?

 

[Arachnotronic]

@Intel17 - really? doesnt it make more sense to launch the higher end first since they already have bay trail for value
any idea how many EUs braswell will have?

No idea on Braswell, and frankly, from what I've heard the Nov. 14/Q1'15 dates represent product qualification for sale. It will be a while longer before these products are in the hands of consumers, IMO.

 

[cbn]

GIGABYTE GA-J1900N-D3V (Celeron J1900 quad core) available at Newegg:

(This is the third Bay Trail Mini-ITX that I know of to make it to retail)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128698

$91.99 with $6.98 shipping.

 

[cbn]

The margin in this market is to be competing with Qualcomm at the high end not scrapping with MediaTek or Allwinner for under $150 tablet wins with razor thin margins.

The lowest end is still important for the long tern viability of x86 though.

Since smaller dies yield better (and sooner) than larger dies on advanced nodes Intel should able to make a dual core/low EU chip economically (Also, for the record, I am referring to SATA/PCI-E based 14nm atom chips....not tablet chips) . The volume should be good too since most people really don't need anything beyond a fast enough dual core and a modest amount of EUs for everyday computing at 1080p resolution.

 

[mikk]

Braswell is scheduled for Q1 2015 in the Roadmap which shouldn't surprise.

 

[erunion]

@Intel17 - really? doesnt it make more sense to launch the higher end first since they already have bay trail for value
any idea how many EUs braswell will have?

Contrarevenue suggests that Intel needs improvement in the value category. Ashraf just did a good piece on BoM on seeking alpha.

Edit: I can't find the link, maybe it was somewhere other than SA.

 

[blackened23]

GIGABYTE GA-J1900N-D3V (Celeron J1900 quad core) available at Newegg:

(This is the third Bay Trail Mini-ITX that I know of to make it to retail)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128698

$91.99 with $6.98 shipping.

Not so sure on this pricing. I can grab a G3220 Haswell Pentium and an H81 motherboard for around 110 bucks. SATA6G, USB3, realtek audio, gigabit LAN, whole 9, with an asus H81 mobo. Or I could lowball the mobo and get an ECS or something (not my preference, but i'm just saying) and get both at the 95-100$ mark. The G3220 is a surprisingly awesome processor for the price. Very snappy and performs great in daily tasks. IMO way better than the AMD low end stuff in that price range because frankly, Llano is a freakin dog in terms of CPU grunt. Anyway, for the price the G3220 + H81 platform certainly sounds more compelling than............this. Is this pricing just inflated or what? Because it's new? Seems like 70$ should be the go to mark for this platform, for both a mobo + CPU. Unless i'm REALLY missing something.

But as far as mobile products, Bay Trail hit the mark. I've been pretty impressed by the various 3770 BT tablets floating around. These mITX boards. I feel the price could be a tad lower for what they offer. Not because BT is bad, but because the Haswell Pentiums are really great performing for dual cores and are cheap as a whole motherboard + CPU platform.

In fact, I just built a G3220 Haswell HTPC system and was completely shocked at how snappy it was. Completely surprised and impressed. I'd consider that the competition for these BT desktop boards if anything, since they're squarely aimed at the HTPC niche. On the AMD you have Llano in that price range, or very low end richlands. Llano is a dog. Richland? Eh. Kaveri is on another planet as the 7850k costs near 200$ and the motherboards for it cost about 100$. If you want an overclocking mobo anyway. So i'll just say that the G3220 + H81 is the price performance leader in the 100$ area. And with that being the case...the above board + CPU should really be closer to 70$ or something.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Contrarevenue suggests that Intel needs improvement in the value category. Ashraf just did a good piece on BoM on seeking alpha.

Edit: I can't find the link, maybe it was somewhere other than SA.

http://www.fool.com/investing/gener...-android-mystery.aspx?source=iaasitlnk0000003

 

[CHADBOGA]

Not so sure on this pricing. I can grab a G3220 Haswell Pentium and an H81 motherboard for around 110 bucks. SATA6G, USB3, realtek audio, gigabit LAN, whole 9, with an asus H81 mobo. Or I could lowball the mobo and get an ECS or something (not my preference, but i'm just saying) and get both at the 95-100$ mark. The G3220 is a surprisingly awesome processor for the price. Very snappy and performs great in daily tasks. IMO way better than the AMD low end stuff in that price range because frankly, Llano is a freakin dog in terms of CPU grunt. Anyway, for the price the G3220 + H81 platform certainly sounds more compelling than............this. Is this pricing just inflated or what? Because it's new? Seems like 70$ should be the go to mark for this platform, for both a mobo + CPU. Unless i'm REALLY missing something.

But as far as mobile products, Bay Trail hit the mark. I've been pretty impressed by the various 3770 BT tablets floating around. These mITX boards. I feel the price could be a tad lower for what they offer. Not because BT is bad, but because the Haswell Pentiums are really great performing for dual cores and are cheap as a whole motherboard + CPU platform.

In fact, I just built a G3220 Haswell HTPC system and was completely shocked at how snappy it was. Completely surprised and impressed. I'd consider that the competition for these BT desktop boards if anything, since they're squarely aimed at the HTPC niche. On the AMD you have Llano in that price range, or very low end richlands. Llano is a dog. Richland? Eh. Kaveri is on another planet as the 7850k costs near 200$ and the motherboards for it cost about 100$. If you want an overclocking mobo anyway. So i'll just say that the G3220 + H81 is the price performance leader in the 100$ area. And with that being the case...the above board + CPU should really be closer to 70$ or something.

Excellent points.

We have seen in desktop over the last few years that the public just won't except moar cores instead of single thread performance, when the stronger single threaded processors come with multiple cores anyway.

I can't imagine a scenario where for the prices that have been mentioned in this thread, I would ever buy these desktop BayTrails over either a Haswell based Celeron or Pentium.

Maybe by the time Broxton variants roll out, things will be less clear, but for now, seems a pretty straight forward choice to me.

 

[witeken]

Why doesn't Intel tell anything about Willow Trail? Back in 2013, it seemed that Willow Trail would be the most interesting Atom of 2014: new microarchitecture, gen9 graphics, 14nm, and release in Q4, which isn't likely anymore. I hope it will still be released in Q1.

 

[mikk]

Q1 2016 maybe.

 

[Haserath]

Excellent points.

We have seen in desktop over the last few years that the public just won't except moar cores instead of single thread performance, when the stronger single threaded processors come with multiple cores anyway.

I can't imagine a scenario where for the prices that have been mentioned in this thread, I would ever buy these desktop BayTrails over either a Haswell based Celeron or Pentium.

Maybe by the time Broxton variants roll out, things will be less clear, but for now, seems a pretty straight forward choice to me.

I could understand them dropping their Core based Pentium and Celeron for these lower cost platforms.

Push people to the i3 while making the low end BoM less.

 

[witeken]

You're referring to this slide:

 

[blackened23]

I could understand them dropping their Core based Pentium and Celeron for these lower cost platforms.

Push people to the i3 while making the low end BoM less.

The cost of the desktop Bay Trail SKUs may not be entirely Intel's fault. I have a feeling it isn't. Right now, the Pentium Haswell G3220 is 61$ on sale at newegg. I'd say the Bay Trail chips themselves cost like 20$-30$, however the motherboard manufacturers which are integrating these chips are over-charging for the platform.

Which is unfortunate. Bay Trail could have a place on the desktop embedded market, but not if the motherboard makers are overcharging for the platform. I mean, I just bought a Haswell Pentium on sale for 60 bucks and an asus H81 mobo for 45$. That's 105$ total for CPU + Mobo a few days ago, and it performs like a beast. Seriously, i'm surprised and impressed by the performance of the Haswell Pentium...very impressive. If I wanted to game on this HTPC I could grab a 750ti, call it a day, and it will still significantly outperform the Kaveri platform which with a 7850k + mobo is usually around 300$ if you get an overclocking mobo. As opposed to 250$ for a Haswell pentium, H81 board, and 750ti GPU. Or whatever GPU you want really, if you roll with the red team for dGPUs. Which begs the question as to why the 7850 costs 190$. Seems absurd to me when you can get a better overall intel platform for cheaper as an HTPC, but whatever.

Anyway, I can't see why MSI would want to charge 90 bucks for a Bay Trail embedded motherboard. Doesn't make sense. Looking at Intel's price list, it isn't because of Intel. Intel charges very little for the Bay Trail chip itself. But being that it's BGA, the motherboard maker decides the cost of the total platform. And 90$ is way too much.

 

[ninaholic37]

I could understand them dropping their Core based Pentium and Celeron for these lower cost platforms.

Push people to the i3 while making the low end BoM less.

This is an interesting theory. How many people think that Core based Pentium/Celerons will soon disappear? Are those Haswell chips just Core i3-i7s that don't perform up to par so they knock them down to Celeron/Pentiums, or are they specifically created to sell as Pentium/Celerons from the get-go?

edit: If this change does happen, perhaps Core Pentium/Celerons will still exist but marketed as i3s (with a different model number). I could definitely see that happening... everything else seems to be "moving up" the brand ladder.

 

[coercitiv]

Anyway, I can't see why MSI would want to charge 90 bucks for a Bay Trail embedded motherboard. Doesn't make sense. Looking at Intel's price list, it isn't because of Intel. Intel charges very little for the Bay Trail chip itself. But being that it's BGA, the motherboard maker decides the cost of the total platform. And 90$ is way too much.

Intel J1900 - Recommended Customer Price TRAY: $82.00

 

[Enigmoid]

Intel J1900 - Recommended Customer Price TRAY: $82.00

These are not correct prices.

Look at the i5 Haswell's. Retail prices are lower than ark prices.

 

[Nothingness]

Look at the i5 Haswell's. Retail prices are lower than ark prices.

Are you sure? Newegg vs ark shows they are very close.

 

[blackened23]

Well that seals the deal. G3220 the value leader for an under 100$ system. I personally don't think AMD has anything that can touch it, since amazon has the 3220 for 60$ right now and you can find H81 mobos for 40$-50$ easy. It honestly makes all of the AMD stuff in that price range or even in higher price ranges look like a joke, and it also makes the embedded BT stuff look like a hilarious joke. For 100$ you can get a llano or MAYBE an extremely low end Trinity for 100$ on the AMD end. Which is worse in every way to the 3220.

You simply can't touch the G3220 for value IMO. Let's look at what else you can get for a low end HTPC type system. First Bay Trail embedded system for 90$. Yeah, no thanks. 10$ more gets you the much better Haswell dual core. Even if you compare this to a 7850k Kaveri which costs around 190$ and an overclockable FM3 mobo costs 100$+ if you want a good one. So a 7850k platform costs 250$ if you get a crap motherboard that doesn't OC, or 300$-320$ if you get an overclocking mobo. And you don't get a dGPU. While you can get a G3220, H81 motherboard, and a GTX 660ti, 750ti, or whatever you want for 200$ which will be superior to the 7850k's integrated graphics. Makes the choice clear if you want a great dGPU for gaming on an intel platform which is low cost.

Anyway back to bay trail for desktop. Like I said, I love the Bay Trail tablets i've seen. But desktop? Seeing a Bay Trail at 90$, yeah, no thanks. Enigmoid is NOT incorrect, however. BGA prices are highly negotiable by OEMs. This isn't an LGA processor that intel ships to amazon and bam, they sell it as is. It is sold to an OEM and they do embed it onto a design.

That tray price shows 80$, are we to believe MSI made their embedded mobo for 10 bucks. Nah. BGA prices are negotiable, while LGA prices are a little closer to retail. But the point still stands. 90$ for the embedded Bay trail is really absurd. I hope that situation is fixed considering how good the dual core Haswell Pentiums are.

 

[Vesku]

Well, these low power low cost chips have a place in 'desktop' with mini-itx form factor. Less perormance than the 1007U/1037U mini-itx but should be more passive heatsink options. I don't think desktop BayTrail is quite low enough cost yet though, the J1900 Asrock is ~$100 versus 1037U can be had for ~$60-70. Dual core Baytrail isn't quite enough for mini-itx imo, except perhaps as a router/gateway.

 

[coercitiv]

BGA prices are negotiable, while LGA prices are a little closer to retail. But the point still stands. 90$ for the embedded Bay trail is really absurd.

You wrote an entire post detailing how Intel meant the desktop Bay Trail platform to be cheaper than $90 and now you're blaming MSI and others for sticking with the recommended price from Intel?

 

[Nothingness]

Enigmoid is NOT incorrect, however. BGA prices are highly negotiable by OEMs. This isn't an LGA processor that intel ships to amazon and bam, they sell it as is. It is sold to an OEM and they do embed it onto a design.

Well for me retail price (what Enigmoid was talking about) is what *I* pay, not what OEM pay. I'm sure the latter pay much less than what I pay or what is on Intel price list

But the point still stands. 90$ for the embedded Bay trail is really absurd. I hope that situation is fixed considering how good the dual core Haswell Pentiums are.

I do agree.

 

[blackened23]

You wrote an entire post detailing how Intel meant the desktop Bay Trail platform to be cheaper than $90 and now you're blaming MSI and others for sticking with the recommended price from Intel?

What the heck? I said from the get-go that the price is too high. Scroll up and read pal. The Haswell dual core Pentiums make the Bay Trail and everything AMD has in a similar or higher price range look like a hilarious joke. The Haswell pentium is THAT good. The fact that AMD's price comparable product for a full system is Llano or Trinity underscores that fact.

The baseline G3220 is 60 bucks on amazon. Add a H81 motherboard for 40-50$. How does AMD compete with that? They don't unless you want an inferior performing part. How does embedded bay trail compete with that? Bay Trail, same applies. Bay Trail BGA needs to be about 30$ less than 90$ to be compelling. I don't disagree with that. I am not defending the price, the 90$ price is a hilarious joke. But I am saying vendors like MSI or Asus can NEGOTIATE these prices. What they pay is not what someone else who buys in low volumes pays. But like I said. It doesn't freaking matter.. Bay Trail at existing prices for embedded systems is a joke (while the mobile tablet versions are VERY GOOD), so BT can't hope to compete with the dual core Haswell Pentiums unless they lower in price by quite a bit.

So that price needs to be lowered, stat, for the embedded Bay Trail to be compelling. 10$ less than a G3220 platform is not a big enough gap. It should be more like 30$ minimmum less than a G3220 platform.