Three Minutes: AMD on Barcelona
499198
Chipmaker exec describes upcoming launch of its first quad-core chip.
112897
AMD's Triple-Core Phenom processor, which will hit desktops at the beginning of next year, may be the oddball that the CPU market never expected. BetaNews spoke at length to one of the people who came up with the idea: AMD's desktop brand manager Simon Solotko. Is there enough of a market in-between high-end dual core and low-end quad-core, to sneak in a running attack up the middle?
326597
(InfoWorld) - Advanced Micro DevicesÂ (AMD) said Friday it wouldÂ begin shipping its "Barcelona" quad-core Opteron processorÂ in August, rebutting industry rumors that the chip faced manufacturing problems that could delay it until October. Although AMD has already lined up hardware partners like Sun MicrosystemsÂ to use the chip in high-end servers, some analysts had predicted that a delayed release could cause AMD toÂ lose business to Intel. However, AMD insists it is on schedule to produce both standard and low-wattage SE (special edition) versions of Barcelona, in a range of frequencies up to 2.0GHz. The new Barcelona chips will generate the same amount of heat as current Opteron chips, but improve computing performance by 70 percent for database applications or 40 percent for floating point jobs, Allen said. Future versions of both types will run at even higher speeds, allowing customers to further improve their energy efficiency, said Randy Allen, corporate vice president of AMD's server and workstation division. Intel competes for those same customers today with the dual-core Woodcrest and quad-core Clovertown Xeon processorsÂ launched last year, and plans to up the ante in the fourth quarter of 2007 with quad-core "Harpertown" server chip using smaller, 45-nanometer scale components. AMD will begin shipping Barcelona chips for sale in August, and expects server vendors to ship commercial products using the chip by September. AMD hopes those new servers are popular enough to help reverse a slide in market share and revenue in recent months. The company has posted losses of hundreds of millions of dollars for the past two quarters as it struggles to survive aÂ price war with Intel. Â
512501
AMD Opteron servers prove more power-efficient than Xeon-powered servers in tests.
31417
It's a big day for AMD, which is launching its Barcelona chip at last. Then Intel comes along with an earnings surprise.
693979
Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) has demonstrated the company's first dual-core microprocessors at its Austin, Texas, office, the company said Tuesday.
440132
Still carrying the weight of costs related to last year&#39;s&#160;acquisition of graphics vendor ATI, AMD recorded its fourth straight quarter of net losses Thursday.The company reported a net loss of $396 million, or $0.71 per share, for the third quarter, compared to net income of $136 million for the year-earlier quarter. Analysts polled by Thomson Financial had estimated a loss of $0.62 per share. The loss included a $120 million charge related to its acquisition of ATI last year.AMD recorded third-quarter revenue of $1.632 billion for the quarter ending Sept. 29, an 18 percent year-over-year increase.The company sold a record number of microprocessors during the quarter, AMD said in a news release. Microprocessor unit shipments increased 19 percent year-over-year and mobile processor shipments increased 68 percent, AMD said.After months of delays,&#160;AMD finally released its latest quad-core Barcelona processor in September.&#160;AMD is locked in a quad-core chip battle with Intel, which shipped more than 2 million quad-core processors during the quarter, Intel said in its earnings call on Tuesday.AMD has already lost ground in the market for server chips to Intel in recent quarters. AMD&#39;s quad-core Opteron processor, also called Barcelona, opened up a revenue stream for company during the quarter, the company said.
416610
(InfoWorld) - Server makers are showing their first systems based on Advanced Micro Devices'Â upcoming quad-core Opteron chip, known as Barcelona. Barcelona servers from Supermicro Computer, Tyan Computer, and Uniwide TechnologiesÂ are on show at Taipei's annual Computex exhibition, which started Tuesday. The appearance of the chips, which are scheduled to ship later this year, signals they are getting closer to the market. Detailed specifications of the chips and servers on display were not immediately available. AMD is counting on Barcelona to boost its sales, and market share, in the face ofÂ heated competition from rival Intel. Barcelona, which is manufactured using a 65-nanometer process, contains four processor cores on a single piece of silicon. By comparison, Intel's quad-core chips use two pieces of silicon, each containing two cores, strapped together inside a single package. AMD claims its design gives Barcelona a significant boost in performance -- as much as 50 percent to 80 percent -- over its current Opteron chips. Uniwide and Supermicro are showing Barcelona systems that take advantage of a power-saving feature of the chip. Called Dual Dynamic Power Management, this allows the processor cores and on-chip memory controller to draw power separately, which AMD said allows better performance and power management. AMD also promised an easy upgrade path for existing Opteron customers. Motherboards that support current Opteron chips can be upgraded for the quad-core chips by updating the BIOS. Dual-core chips can then be swapped for quad-core Barcelona processors, which use the same chipsets and processor sockets. Tyan and Asustek ComputerÂ are among the companies making upgradeable motherboards.
582075
If there's one thing chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices knows how to do, it's make computer chips. And if there's another thing AMD knows how to do well, it's how to rib rival Intel in the media.
443590
AMD plans to launch a 1.9 GHz, 68-watt Barcelona chip that focuses on power efficiency, and a 2.0GHz, 95-watt version that focuses on price/performance.
523715
Going native in Barcelona AMD has demo'd its upcoming quad-core Opteron server processor, a few days after launching the gamer-oriented Quad FX, which despite its name is a dual-core part.â¦
585920
(InfoWorld) - AMD will delay its launch of the Barcelona quad-core Opteron server chip from its expected date in July until October, setting the company back in its effort to compete with new processors from Intel, according to analyst reports. Processor companies make more money selling server chips than desktop or laptop chips, so the move will hit AMD's 2007 earnings hard, pushing the company to lose $2.59 per share instead of only $2.48 per share, according to a report released Tuesday by Citigroup analyst Glen Yeung. "Barcelona is generally viewed to beÂ AMD's best opportunity to stem server share loss to Intel. While AMD's recent notebook win at Toshiba may balance any negative revenue implications to our current model, Barcelona's delay has negative implications for AMD's gross margin," Yeung wrote. His estimate is a larger loss than the consensus Thomson Financial forecast that AMD will lose $2.47 per share for 2007. The news comes at a bad time for AMD, which has promised for months that it would launch the chip in the second half of 2007,Â helping the company to rebound from the effects of a price war with Intel. AMD is already hurting,Â posting a $611 million first-quarter lossÂ in April, following on the heels of theÂ $574 million loss reported in JanuaryÂ for fourth quarter earnings last year. Barcelona is the key to taking that fiscal burden off AMD's shoulders,Â AMD CEO Hector Ruiz said on May 3 at the company's annual shareholder meeting. Although Intel is several quarters ahead in improving its chip manufacturing capabilities, AMD stays competitive by creating more innovative designs, he said. AMD claims Barcelona will deliver better performance on memory-intensive applications than Intel's Clovertown quad-core Xeon server chips that have been on the market since November. AMD stuck to its guns on Wednesday, insisting that it is still on schedule, and pointing as evidence to itsÂ demonstration on Tuesday of prototype Barcelona chips in serversÂ from infrastructure partners Supermicro Computer, Tyan Computer, and Uniwide Technologies at theÂ Computex trade show in Taipei. "We remain on track for a summer 2007 launch with partners shipping platforms in the third quarter," said AMD spokeswoman Marian Kelley. She blamed the delay rumors on Cray's announcement Monday that it expects revenue to drop because of a delay in shipping its quad-core Cray XT4 systems. In fact, Cray was referring to AMD's midrange Budapest processor, not Barcelona, she said. "The guidance that we've been giving and that we're sticking to is that Budapest will follow Barcelona in the second half of 2007," Kelley said. Despite AMD's assurances, other analysts echoed the Citigroup report, saying they have heard similar news from server vendors, distributors and board makers. On May 30, another report called AMD's promise to launch Barcelona in mid-2007 "a head fake" since the chip will not be available at full volume until August at the earliest, according to a note from analyst Patrick Wang at Thomas Weisel Partners. In contrast, Intel is expected to succeed in shipping its Penryn processors in the late third quarter or early fourth quarter. That timing will allow Intel to essentially catch up to AMD and soften the blow of losing sales to customers who see a performance advantage in Barcelona, Wang said.
299322
What may be the world's largest supercomputer is being built at the Texas Advanced Computing Center with AMD's Barcelona chips.
156092
Advanced Micro Devices Inc. announced delivery of its quad core processor, Barcelona.  It also said 15,000 Barcelona processors will be used in one of the world's largest supercomputers now being built at the Texas Advanced Computing Center.
316241
SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA - Advanced Micro Devices Inc.'s (AMD's) dual-core Opteron processor will fit into the same area occupied by its single-core product, helping to hold down manufacturing costs, AMD said Tuesday at the Fall Processor Forum.
443804
Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) said Friday it would begin shipping its &quot;Barcelona&quot; quad-core Opteron processor in August, rebutting industry rumors that the chip faced manufacturing problems that could delay it until October.
496710
What will the future hold for AMD?