10.18.2007

AMD's Q3 2007 Report - How Deep Is The Hole?

In a market that saw Intel make $1.9B in profit, AMD continued to post another $400M loss. But everyting isn't gloomy for the Sunnyvale company. If anything can be said about AMD's luck, it appears that the market seem to be trying its very best to save it from dissolution. Exceptionally higher demand in Q3 helped provide significant gains in AMD's topline. The consistent gross margin increases from AMD and Intel shows that there is indeed a shortage of processors to go around. There seem to be an armistice in the price war at the moment which limits it only on the consumer mobile space. This allowed both companies to significantly increase revenue and ASPs sequentially.

AMD’s Q3 2007 numbers:
Revenue at $1.63B up $300M from last quarter
Operating loss cut in half to $226M from $457M in Q2
Gross margin is up at 41% from 33% last quarter.

Some key notes from the conference call include:

AMD planning to “ramp” 45nm in the 1st half of 2008. This means we could probably see AMD’s first 45nm mid Q3’08 the very least. This contradicts the rumour that came from fabtech that suggests a delay. AMD did mention a 6% increase in CAPEX to support the ramp.

AMD shipped “tens of thousands” of Barcelona CPUs in Q3. If I were to guess exactly how many while basing on how AMD plays around with words while never making understatements, I would say they managed to ship about 20,003 units. This is because you need at least two 10,000’s to be able to at least say “tens of thousands”. The 3 extra units were the ones sent out free to the 3 reviews sites.

AMD plans to ship “hundreds of thousands” of Opteron and Phenom Quad-cores in Q4. If you guessed that to be about 200,003, then you should look into becoming a physicist.

When asked to explain the abysmal Barcelona speeds and poor 65nm yields, AMD said that Barcelona’s problems have nothing to do with manufacturing or their 65nm process. I'm not sure how good their trouble shooting skills are, but either what they said is true or they really haven’t figured out that that is indeed the problem. AMD said that Barcelona’s yield is in-line with 65nm yields (There you go. A clue!). Instead, they suggested that K10 has an issue with "tuning the design to the technology". From an engineering point of view, that doesn’t really sound less frightening than "manufacturing issues".

Overall, AMD did beat the market estimates and is truly heading towards the right direction. Serious. If the trend holds and this market conditions remains, there is a very slim possibility of AMD breaking even (which i personally doubt). But again, the dynamics of a market with healthy demand is considerably different from one where they have to fight tooth and nail for a sale. It remains to be seen how much of the gains AMD made this quarter are bottom line improvements rather than gains acquired by simply riding out the current upside in the market.

42 comments:

Scott said...

AMD 45nm in 2008 is very hard to believe, they're still trying to get 65nm right.

I hope it works, we need the competition, but my faith in AMD has long since gone away.

Anonymous said...

Let's be clear about AMD's use of the word "ramp" - it means putting in equipment, not actual production. If I apply the definition to Intel they "ramped" 45nm in Q2'07... (or maybe even Q1).

Also the technical performance, like 65nm, will not be there at the onset - it will effectively be a lithography shrink only at the start of production.

"tuning the design to the technology", is code for poor yield and/or bin splits (at the very least). Welcome to the wonderful world of CTI, APM and all the other crap AMD spews about there Si process technology might! They had functional Si on Barcy back in Dec last year - how much time do they need to do this "tuning"?

Honestly, you just have to throw out everything AMD says with regards to manufacturing - they parse words which are very (intentionally misleading):
- launch meaning product shipping (instead of available for purchase),
- they use nebulous dates like "mid-year", H1'08, when the timelines are less than a year out and they should have far better granularity,
- they throw out crap like yields are "in line with expectations" - sure if you're expectation was for CRAP! Funny I though yields on 65nm were mature?!? If Barcelona is in line with 65nm, then that means Barcelona yield must be mature too, no?!?

The hidden trick here? AMD shows yield in one hand, and hides binsplit in the other - sure the Si is FUNCTIONAL, but the binsplits are CRAP as evidenced by the launch speeds and counting tri-core as a fully "functional" die (and did I mention it was innovative too!?!)


Not too sure about breaking even - if revenue was up ~25% this quarter, and AMD is forecasting in line with seasonal expectation (7%) next quarter - I just don't see it. ASP's would have to jump (and they're just won't be enough K10) or manufacturing cost would have to drop like a rock. Also you would have to have no additional acquistion charges (not sure if that is the case or not)

Anonymous said...

Folks are completely misreading the fabtech article - it says mass ramp of 45nm in 2009 for logic and that is completely true...

The problem is people are thinking AMD actually will be buying/needing a lot of 45nm equipment in 2008 - they will have less than 1 fab of 45nm capacity (likely less than 1/2 of one fab as 65nm will still be most of the volume for F36 in 2008) and we are talking very few litho tools needed to support this. It's not like immersion is used on that many layers - we are likely only talking the 4 critical layers here.

AMD is a pimple on the back of the logic mass ramp... don't confuse AMD with starting to ramp part of a single factory with ASML's use of logic mass ramp - to attempt to do so is just a poor understanding of things by Fabtech (which is a bit surprising, as you wold think they would know better). Sure they hedged and said "could", but the article shows me fabtech does not have a good grasp of things.

Ho Ho said...

"Instead, they suggested that K10 has an issue with "tuning the design to the technology"."

Are they saying they made a CPU design they can't manufacture efficiently?

Anonymous said...

"Are they saying they made a CPU design they can't manufacture efficiently?"

When you are running your process on (or at least near) a cliff... it's not too easy to make process adjustments without either yield tanking, power spiking or clockspeeds slowing (see 65nm K8m, early K10)

While you always want to design with the manufacturing process in mind, my guess is the process was a bit of a moving target, with CTI you have to project out where the process will be in the future and you don't have the benefit of learnings of how the process interacts with previous gen design. And if you believe AMD is ramping 45nm in H2'08 (and I have some land I'd like to sell you if you do, come H2'08 AMD better keep there fingers crossed that there are no strange 45nm-K10 interactions. If there are, AMD will be generating a whole bunch more of those low clockspeed, ummm I mean energy efficient parts, that those customers are demanding.

While Intel's tick-tock strategy seems like just a bunch of PR speak, it actually is a very good manufacturing and design philosophy.

InTheKnow said...

While Intel's tick-tock strategy seems like just a bunch of PR speak, it actually is a very good manufacturing and design philosophy.

But AMD has Pipe to do the same thing.

Unfortunately, I think the name is a reference to the Frank Zappa line "what's in that pipe that he's smoking?"

Seriously, I think that looking at Intel's tick-tock approach vs AMD Pipe, you can see the real weakness of the CTI approach. AMD never has a stable de-bugged process to introduce a new architecture on. They are always in churn and no amount of magic APM dust is going to fix that for them.

Anonymous said...

AMD to rename Phenom X3 to Triathlon.

AMD wants to show how great their processors are:

Triathlon

Anonymous said...

I really had to wait this comment out. I gave it a day, and kept my big mouth shut. I soaked it all in. I read the financial reports and tech site opinions. Guess what I can up with after all the hype, spin and horseshit? They are still sinking miserably towards bankruptcy.

Everything the (well informed, may I add) guys on this site were 100 percent ON THE MONEY. I don’t give a flying frig in which way the tech press, Wall Street, and any other ass covering, agenda seeking bozo would put lipstick on this PIG.

For six months all we heard was how Barcelona was going to be the Intel killer! 40 percent’, they all swallowed it, hook, line, and sinker. Barcelona was DOA, just like the Doc said it was. Fabrication, technical, and yield issues have train wrecked the “wonder quad”, just like Guru, In The Know, and JumpingJack said it would. Like clairvoyant mystics, they all saw this coming!

AMD loses BIG money in 5 consecutive quarters to the tune 1.6 BILLION. They beat expectations by losing ONLY losing 400 million (Close to a half a BILLION) this quarter, and they are 5.5 billion in debt; this looks promising!?! What Star Ship did these people beam down from?

“Market share, market share”, they cry. Sure, I could maintain market share in anything if I cut costs to the point where I couldn’t make any money, in fact, LOSE MONEY! Therefore, staying competitive means selling at a loss? Wait, I’ll take 500 shares now!

Laptop sales are strong! Let’s see how strong they’ll be when power sipping, 45nM chips factor into the picture!

They cut CAPX to the bone. They sold all the tangibles, including the backyard. They sold Spanson. But, hey, they increased shipments! They also sold “tens of thousands” Barcelona’s! Then, after all this, THEY STILL LOSE 400 MILLION! What the hell can they cut during the 4Q to look better than this, office furniture, perhaps? What’s going to happen when 45nM is launched and INTC cuts the prices on Conroe again, hmmmm?

BREAK EVEN? MAYBE? N.F.W.!

Listen, all this spin and all this hype is to prevent/delay an AMD share price meltdown. The financial institutions, who bought into the hype over the past year, will have buckets of egg on their faces WHEN IT DOES. Those IDIOTS who bought into this bag of crap have to explain to their shareholders and bosses WHY THEY BOUGHT THE “SCRAPY LITTLE COMPANY” AND SOLD INTEL SHORT! This is gospel.

READ MY LIPS: BARCELONA FELL ON ITS FACE. IT WILL NOT SAVE AMD!

This is why everything INTC does is downplayed. INTC sells 3 MILLION Quads, ahh, no biggie. AMD, on the other hand, sells cripple triples, and it’s innovative!

I hear Max Factor has a sale on lipstick.
They better buy them by the “TENS OF THOUSANDS!”
Better yet, let’s send it over to the JPL for a set of wings!

ONK!ONK!


SPARKS

InTheKnow said...

Scientia said ...
This means FAB 38 will be operational at a low volume and can be incrementally expanded as needed.

Hector Ruiz said ...
fab 38 is going to be like a race car idling in the pit stop.

In one sense, Hector is closer on this one than Scientia. An idle fab is a lot like an idle race car. They both required a huge outlay of cash to build and they aren't worth a dime if they aren't performing.

But they are both wrong to imply that they will just throw a switch and out come the wafers. Tool installs and quals take weeks. And once the tools are up and running you still have to run the wafers through the fab. My rough guesstimate is that AMD will need ~1 quarter to see any output from any new tooling they install.

And while they are spending time and money to bring that capacity on line, Intel will be filling the orders, or AMD's customers will get left out in the cold.

Neither of these options is good for AMD.

Anonymous said...

Hi folks, this is my first time posting here. I've been lurking for a few weeks now and thought I'd chime in. I really like the discussions and contributions to this blog.

As an Intel employee it has been fun to watch things from the sidelines, even over at Scientia's blog, however, the quality of dialogue is vastly superior here. (some may accuse me of bias, but that's ok :) )

I'm impressed by the knowledge and experience many of the posters here have shown. Many of the assumptions and educated guesses of Intel's process and operations are strikingly spot on, while some may be a tad off ;)

Please keep up the good work and I'll comment from time-to-time from an insider's point of view.

Axel said...

Copied for posterity:

jumpingjack
It's being shut down to BE UPGRADED.... not to wait.

Scientia
However, since FAB 36 is projected to be able to handle the volume FAB 30 will indeed be taken all the way down.

No, I'm sorry but you gents are failing to read between the lines. If AMD had anticipated substantial continuing market share gains into 2008, they would not shut down Fab 30 entirely but instead would upgrade piecemeal while continuing 90-nm output in order to try to take more market share.

The bottom line is threefold:
- There isn't enough market demand for K8 to warrant the high fixed costs of operating Fab 30.
- AMD do not anticipate enough market demand for K10 in 2008 to warrant upgrading Fab 30 starting today.
- This returns AMD to one fab, with not much more die output capacity than they had in 2005 before the Fab 36 ramp, due to the rapidly increasing quadcore mix we will see in 2008.

In other words, AMD cannot afford to operate two fabs anymore and are doing this purely to save cost and wait and buy time for Bulldozer because K10 is not good enough to bring in the desired revenues. Yes they will slowly upgrade the tooling, the pace of which will mostly be dependent on the success of K10. I believe they are overly optimistic about the pricing they can command for K10 and in reality will not be able to bring Fab 38 on-line in 2008. I believe that AMD will be limited to a single fab throughout 2008, and will become severely capacity constrained as Intel drives demand for quadcore into the mainstream and AMD's product mix shifts towards 283 mm^2 die production.

And also, AMD said during the conference call that the details of "asset light" would not be revealed until they "do it". Info may be shared during December Analyst Day. I'm disappointed. The shareholders deserve to know what AMD plans in such a major restructuring.

Anonymous said...

Orthogonal,Hmmm!

Intel Employee, Hmmmmmm!

Insider, HOOO YAAA!



Allow me the first to say WELCOME!!! Keep those lovely Yorkies and dividend checks coming, sweethheart!!



Loves and Kisses,

SPARKS

Anonymous said...

"Many of the assumptions and educated guesses of Intel's process and operations are strikingly spot on,"

By the way, Orthogonal, thats GURU. He is shy and extremely modest. He forgets his given name. But, you can tell it's him by his style and "spot on" speculations!

SPARKS

pointer said...

Orthogonal said...
...
I'm impressed by the knowledge and experience many of the posters here have shown. Many of the assumptions and educated guesses of Intel's process and operations are strikingly spot on, while some may be a tad off ;)
...


actually, there is some possibilty of other intel employee(s) posting here too :)

OTOH, there is also some possibility of AMD employee(s) posting too (here or there)

Anonymous said...

Allow me the first to say WELCOME!!! Keep those lovely Yorkies and dividend checks coming, sweethheart!!

While I'd like to think I play a larger role in all of this than I actually do, all thanks should be to the folks up in Oregon (And some in Isreal). They've done one helluva job and are really hitting their stride now. Don't think that the past failures/missteps and criticism of the P4 days doesn't affect them. They're out to prove something now, they take it personal.

While I wasn't here during the hay days of the mid to late 90's, I get the feeling from the other old-timers that they feel the wind starting to blow that direction once again. I suppose it's probably due to the fact that ever since the dot com bubble burst and the loss of the performance crown in ~2003, Intel has been back on it's heels, trying to claw it's way back. Now that things are turning around, morale is much improved everyone is on-board with the plan ahead.

In the meantime, I'll continue to fry in the Arizona desert and hope to make my bid for P1268 (32nm) when it gets here in 2009.

InTheKnow said...

Lest anyone be confused by the drivel posted by Scientia regarding Intel's "destruction" of 45nm chips here ...

A current area of confusion is whether demoed chips are at all representative of actual production. It has become apparent that Intel's initial production from D1D is of very high quality. However, quality seems to fall somewhat as production is moved to additional FABs. In the overclocking community, it has been suggested that Intel's bulk production did not catch up to the quality of the early D1D chips until the recent release of the G0 stepping. This suggests that Intel's bulk production quality lags its initial production quality by a full year. This would seem to explain both having to destroy the initial 45nm chips.

I offer this in rebuttal.

The company said the strong sequential gross margin growth was driven by higher microprocessor volumes, lower 45nm start-up costs and lower microprocessor unit costs, partially offset by write-offs for manufacturing costs related to upcoming 45nm processors that had not yet qualified for valuation during the quarter.

Which of course means that most of the initial 45nm product release will show up as pure profit on Intel's books for Q4 since it was shown as a write off in Q3.

The accuracy of his speculation regarding quality of material from the ramping fabs is equal to that of his "destruction" theory.

Anonymous said...

In the overclocking community, it has been suggested that Intel's bulk production did not catch up to the quality of the early D1D chips until the recent release of the G0 stepping.

He's not very bright. The "early D1D" chips he must means the cherry picked ones for XS. There was no distinction between chips of different fabs, only chips of different weeks and minor revisions.

Anonymous said...

This suggests that Intel's bulk production quality lags its initial production quality by a full year. This would seem to explain both having to destroy the initial 45nm chips.

wow, this nearly made me flip my lid. Scientia manages to walk a very fine line where he knows just enough and speaks with enough confidence and authority to sound credible while managing to not sound so off is rocker that he can be confused with Sharikou.

There used be some truth to that statement. Many years ago, when Intel brought new fabs online, they would lag the development site in yields/bin splits for several months. It was for this very reason that Copy Exactly was instituted. This is where a process engineer shadows the engineers at the development site for 6-12 months and copies every thing about the process and tool setup. They even go as far as copying the routing of wires and position of auxilliary facilities around the tool to eliminate as many variables as possible.

Since the introduction of CE, every HVM site has matched yields/bin splits (and in a few cases exceeded) of the development site. There is no perceivable difference from product steppings from one fab to the next and I would challenge Scientia to actually prove such, but he never will since none exists.

The fact that he's able to assert manufacturing difficulties in Intel's process and confusing it with a common accounting practice and using it as the foundation of his argument while willfully ignoring the blatant problems AMD is having with their process, show just how much he's grasping at straws to sound relevant.

Anonymous said...

writing off unusable inventory ain't da same as destroying it what an idit durrrr

Anonymous said...

I will clarify --

Axel Said:
"Copied for posterity:

jumpingjack
It's being shut down to BE UPGRADED.... not to wait."

My statement was not intended as any analysis of the idea, rather a point that Scientia was trying to claim that AMD would shut down Fab 30 to save money.... this was incorrect, I stated AMD was shutting down Fab 30 to upgrade to 300 mm which has always been AMD's plan...

In terms of gradually upgrading piecemeal, they could very well do this... or the reasons for the move.. I did not think it through enough to really formulate an intelligent opinion, other than to simply rebut the Scientia mis-info.

Jack

Anonymous said...

“Don't think that the past failures/missteps and criticism of the P4 days doesn't affect them. They're out to prove something now, they take it personal.”

Do me a favor; you tell those boys, I still Cherish My P4 478 3.06 and 955EE as much as I LOVE my Q6600. Further, it ain’t no wind blowing. Its frig’in Tsunami and it’s headed in AMD’s direction, big time.

Call, me a lunatic (as many people do), as I have a small glass, wall mounted curio cabinet with all my beauties going back to i8086 mounted and lit. It’s in my miniature computer lab for all to see.

You are on the west coast; I am on the east coast. I can’t tell you how disgusting it was to see huge posters on Park Ave. of “The Imitator” touting the world’s fastest processors. (I commute to N.Y.C every morning)

Further, if I may speak for others on this site, we all KNEW it was personal, and some have stated so. However, you just verified it.

Hmmm, P1268 … P Twelve Sixty Eight …Got a nice ring to it! Good Luck, I hope you get it.

Keep up the fabulous work. You could pass this message on, in it’s entirety for all to see.

As this share holder never doubted INTC for .33 billionth of a second.

(By the way, they took down the goddamned posters a year ago.)

SPARKS

Roborat, Ph.D said...

abistein said...

I don't think you are right. It is plainly not what Intel said. Those 45nm chips are not too less in quantity, but too low in quality. In other words, what scientia's said seem more likely.

Here is what Andy Bryant said:


Offsetting this were the inventory write-offs we took as we ramped a new 45 nanometer process and built products that did not qualify for sale in the third quarter and therefore could not be classified as inventory.

And a while later he said again:

we saw a little bit of bad news offsetting that with the write-offs on the 45-nanometer products that aren't yet qualified for shipment.

Had it been because of stockpiling he would've said so, and I don't think it's necessary to write off assets to account for stockpiling while inventory is the right mechanism for the precise purpose.


now we know that Abistien doesn't understand the concept of factory certification for a new product introduction. He confuses "not qualified for sale" and "not YET qualified for shipment" as something to do with the performance of the product instead of the factory receiving certification after meeting product quality (REL).

Roborat, Ph.D said...

Othogonal said:... Many years ago, when Intel brought new fabs online, they would lag the development site in yields/bin splits for several months. It was for this very reason that Copy Exactly was instituted.

Just to add colour to your statement. CE! was started as a scrap prevention/yield improvement tool based on the idea of same inputs drive same outputs. It was during 1260 development they they started the idea of simultaneous certification pulling in HVM sites and using CE! earlier in the development. The result of course is vertical yields across all sites on the 1st quarter of product launch.

whatever Semiconductor for Dummies book Scientia might be reading at the moment, it must be really old. The idea that HVM sites lag behind the development site is quite the opposite today particularly for Intel.

Roborat, Ph.D said...

Axel:
The bottom line is threefold:
- There isn't enough market demand for K8 to warrant the high fixed costs of operating Fab 30.
- AMD do not anticipate enough market demand for K10 in 2008 to warrant upgrading Fab 30 starting today.
- This returns AMD to one fab, with not much more die output capacity than they had in 2005 before the Fab 36 ramp, due to the rapidly increasing quadcore mix we will see in 2008.


I believe you are right on. I was planning to write something similar with the way AMD is slowing going asset-lite mode, shutting down another Fab and pretending everyone won't notice.
To add to that, the 8% increase in operational cost is indeed alarming. I'm beginning to sense that AMD is losing a lot of wafers due to bad 65nm yields. Barcelona has yet to make an impact negatively.

Anonymous said...

Come on, Doc. It's all standards and perspective. They don't know the difference.

From their perspective, chips with a weak process and bum core qualify for revenue. If they raised their standard to INTC's, AMD's Cripple Cores would be trash. It's all how you slant your bias, obviously.

I'm sure AMD would LOVE to go through INTC's garbage, anyway. 'One mans garbage is another mans treasure.' That’s of course if you buy into this line of s**t.

SPARKS

Anonymous said...

Besides, let's get serious for second. Look what I found......Juicy!


http://pc.watch.impress.co.jp/
docs/2007/1018/kaigai394_01l.gif

SPARKS

Anonymous said...

Ahh..poor scientia, he also lacks a finacial background in addition to a technical one....

"A commonly repeated rumor was that AMD was teetering on the edge of bankruptcy and would likely have to file after another bad quarter or two. However, it is clear from the reduction in stock holder equity this quarter that AMD could survive at least another year with similar losses each quarter."

Ummm...folks...you don;t need to go to 0 cash to declare bankruptcy, while I have no doubt Dementia is a FIERCE monopoly game player, the rules in the real world are slightly different.

"
Intel was often described as moving its 45nm timetable forward one quarter while AMD was often described as falling further and further behind. This notion evaporated with Intel's admission that its early 45nm Penryn production was not competitive with its own mature 65nm products and had to be disposed of."

"Presumably the Penryn chips that will be available in Q4 07 will be from D1D."

I'll repeat for the FIFTIETH TIME - despite Dementia's assumption that D1d = development fab = low volume, D1d is roughly the size (capcity-wise) of AMD's F36! However since D1d is also still producing some 65nm, it would probably be closer to 1/2 fab of capacity. To put this in perspective AMD's 65nm production in ALL OF F36 is ~2/3-3/4 worth of a built out fab.

"AMD's statement countered rumors of a slipping 45nm schedule by repeating its timetable of first half of 2008."

Scientia fell into the trap AMD is hoping the press will fall into as well (and some will ikely do this). When AMD states "ramping" in H1'08,this DOES NOT MEAN PRODUCT IN H1'08 - it means they are putting equipment in! Go back and review what AMD said about 65nm where they were ramping F36 in H2'06... when did actual product make it to the market? January 07. It is simply astounding how little knowledge Scientia has in this area.

"ntel's supposed one quarter pull in for 45nm was clearly ficticious since Intel's own Tick Tock schedule would be Q4 2007 or exactly two years since 65nm in Q4 2005."

First 65nm product - January06 (mobile part)
First 45nm product - Nov 07

Not quite a 1 qtr pull in but still faster than 2 years. Once again Dementia is comparing shipment of 65nm product to 45nm product available in order to put things in a less favorable light.

"AMD's statement was a bit of a surprise since the previous timeline had been "midyear" for 45nm"

It is still mid year - ramping in H1'08 means equipment in and qual, product cert and then actual production would be mid year at BEST (later Q3 more likely).


"If AMD really is on this track then half of Intel's previous process lead will be gone in another two quarters."

I have written numerous posts on this Dementia is superficially comparing initial product available date (actually he's cooking the books by comparing INtel product available to AMD's "shipping-ish" date). He excluides the fact that the performance of AMD and Intel's 45nm processes will be substantially different and without high k/metal gate on 45nm, AMD will likely NEVER match Intel's 45nm process capability. But in Scientia's little world apparently schedule is the onlu thing that matters who cares if the wheels are falling off and the process engine is sputtering...

Scientia's thoughts on D1d chips are laughable as many posters are pointing out...

"This suggests that Intel's bulk production quality lags its initial production quality by a full year"

Scientia hitting the bottle!

Intel has consistently stated 45nm in H2'08. DESPITE Scientia's repeated claims of Q1'08, Intel will launch 45nm products Nov 12... it appears late only because Intel has been executing SO WELL RECENTLY that folks assumed Intel would pull in 45nm.

"Will the additional partners that have joined IBM and AMD in SOI research allow AMD to match or even exceed Intel's process tech?"

Kind of comical - this is IBM driving the ship with a bunch of other folks drafting! Might I remind you AMD is PAYING IBM for the technology - there is a REASON for this. They are not EQUAL partners and contributing equally, nor are the additional players consequential. Without IBM, AMD's process would be nowhere - the success/failure of future technology nodes are ~95% dependent on IBM...

I guess the only thing about this comment is that at least Scientia seems to be acknowledging that IBM's (um...I mean AMD's) current process is NOT AS GOOD AS INTEL's!

"Is AMD's faster adoption of Immersion a technical advantage or a technical curse?"

Neither - he clearly doesn't understand technology - it will be purely a cost (INCREASED COST for AMD) and schedule risk (on the downside). Intel will be printing the same 45mn feature sizes, they'll just be doing it with cheaper cost and on proven high volume equipment and earlier than AMD. One of the even bigger lies AMD has perpetrated on the press is that moving to immersion early is a good thing and it is laughable that Dementia and Abinstein actually think this is CEHEAPER! (If folks care to know some facts on this let me know).

"but it does seem that a near term loss of, say, $100-200 Million would be considerably better than the current $400 Million loss."

And in other news Scientia is predicting the sun will rise in the east tomorrow... 100-200Mil in losses would be considerably better than a $400Mil loss? Really? How does he come up with such insight - I don't think folks would have realize that a 100mil loss is better then 400mil if he hadn;t pointed it out! Outstanding financial analysis!

"Since Intel's 45nm ramp is slower than AMD's"

Intel said 65-45nm crossover in Q3'08. When is AMD's crossover again? How can he just pull this stuff out of the air and not support it? What data is he using here. If it is FASTER, than AMD should be >50% TOTAL (total meaning all CPU output including Chartered, not just this Enron type accounting of only looking at a single fab) by eearly Q1'09? Possible? Maybe. Likely? I wouldn't bet on it.

Anonymous said...

This in a nutshell is what is wrong with Scientia and Abinstein's blogs and why folks just shouldn't bother anymore:

Scientia: "Actually I am still confused why the 45nm chips wouldn't have been added to inventory. Isn't that the way it is normally done?"

Abinstein: "Actually I don't. What is factory certification and how come it doesn't happen with Yonah or Netburst 65nm last year?"

So when confronted with folks who may have a little more knowledge, they plead ignorance...

I would be perfectly fine with this and tell folks to educate them, but how can Scientia devote part of his main blog to talking about how Intel is handling 45nm chips produced in Q3, and then say he is confused or not sure of how it is done. He speaks like an expert in the main blog, yet then acknolwedges he is confused - why did he make such RIDICULOUS AND AGAIN UNSUPPORTED COMMENTS in the first place, if he didn't know any better?

As for Abinstein - the guy is a joke... he makes comments about everything, when confronted with facts he usually changes the argument, or says irrelevant and dismisses it. He too also spoke authoritatively about Intel's 45nm chips, yet doesn't have a clue between factory cert and product cert! He apparently is an expert on architecture (that he does seem to have some knowledge on), process technology (which he has a high school, at best, level of understanding), manufacturing (simply no clue other than selectively cut and pasting what he reads) and finances (I wouldn't trust him to balance my checkbook).

I would say folks should stick to what they know but then we would probably never hear from Abinstein again and Scientia's blogs would no longer be 10,000 words long (it'd be more like 50)

Keep up the good work ROBO!

Anonymous said...

I wonder how
I wonder why
Yesterday you told me 'bout the blue blue sky
And all that I can see is just a bankruptcy

Anonymous said...

It'll be interesting now that several commentors on Dementia's have indicated the ridiculous of his assertions about Intel destroying their early 45nm production because it was inferior to 65nm. He thought this because he misinterperted a statement by Otellini as he lacks any sort of financial background, yet somehow felt qualified and compelled to draw an absurd (and wrong) statement as it was a potentially negative data point (of course it has been shown not to be the case) for Intel.

Funny when things are shown to be wrong at it doesn't change his preconceived conclusion (that he tries to fit the data to), he will update his blog. It remains to seen if he will update this misinformation as well?!?

As it is the only thing propping up his absurd "45nm is not in as great a shape as those Intel fanboys think" assertion, it is probably unlikely he will correct it. (Unless of course he can twist/spin some other data to once again fit his predetermined conclusions).

I HAD little respect for him, I now have ZERO respect for him. We all make mistakes, but a man with INTEGRITY will stand up and own up to them. A WISE man also will know his limitations and not try to draw absurd conclusions on data/statements he knows very little about. (And then in Dementia's case then use his own IGNORANCE as an excuse for them misinterpertation!)

I think it is clear to all now that Scientia has neither integrity or wisdom. (But the blog still makes for good entertainment due to the absurd reasoning and argument skills!)

At least here people can and will challenge folks for data and supporting links.

InTheKnow said...

However since D1d is also still producing some 65nm....

I believe this statement to be in error.

D1D is producing 45nm and developing 32nm. I don't think any of D1D's capacity is devoted to 65nm at this time.

If you are thinking of chipset development on 65nm I'm pretty sure this has all been moved to D1C next door some time ago.

Anonymous said...

How deep is the hole? It is about to get deeper, much deeper. If, by chance, you thought that AMD didn’t miss the boat with its quad Core, think again. At $266 these things (like I said they would) are going to fly off the shelves. Q6600 is THE mainstream quad. Every vendor and his distant cousins are going to pop these bad boys in their machines. I made the prediction Barcelona would be a non event. Here’s the proof. Sub $1000 quads are going sit very nicely under the Christmas tree in home media machines.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/cpu/
display/20071017085352.html



Then, there is this other tidbit for those morons out there who thought Uncle Sam was going to take apart THE single most powerful worldwide industry leader we have.


http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/22/
washington/22ftc.html?
_r=2&oref=slogin&oref=slogin


That not hole, it’s a chasm.


SPARKS

Anonymous said...

AND, if ANYONE doubts INTC's 45nM process, take alook here and see how K10 will get it's ass kicked no mater what speed they launch it at.


http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums
/showthread.php?t=162638


Save your money Giant, The Yorkies are going to BAD ASS!

GAME OVER!


SPARKS

GutterRat said...

anonymous wrote,

This in a nutshell is what is wrong with Scientia and Abinstein's blogs and why folks just shouldn't bother anymore:

Scientia: "Actually I am still confused why the 45nm chips wouldn't have been added to inventory. Isn't that the way it is normally done?"

Abinstein: "Actually I don't. What is factory certification and how come it doesn't happen with Yonah or Netburst 65nm last year?"


abinstein is a tool. He is so desperate to remain relevant since his 15 minutes of fame passed that he's resorted to praising Sharikou in his latest blog entry.

Intel Fanboi said...

Abinstein's time has passed. He is just another ideologue trying to defend an indefensible argument.

Plus, his latest blog has 23 comments in one month, of which 9 are his own.

We need some fresh meat. I am bored of Christian Howel and Abinstein.

Unknown said...

Apple sells over 2 million Macs, earning them over 900m in profit! Each one of those Macs were Intel based.

I hear that Hector Ruiz is going green with envy at how much cash Intel and Apple are raking in.

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2007/10/22results.html

Unknown said...

Save your money Giant, The Yorkies are going to BAD ASS!

Oh yeah. Come January a Yorkfield will be sitting in this rig. :D AFAIK, only the Yorkfield XE is being launched in November.

Anonymous said...

"only the Yorkfield XE is being launched in November."

Giant!!!!

That's the idea! When wifey asks "hun, what do you want for Christmas", man do have an answer for her!

Think of it!

1600 FSB!
DDR3 1600!
X48 (I'll do the swap in Feb)

Triple Black Ice W.C.

Target 4.2 GHz stable. HOO YAA!!!

CLOCK TILL YA ROCK!!!!


SPARKS

Anonymous said...

Just curious - are the ATI "one time" acquisition related charges done now?

If so that was ~120Mil for the last few quarters (each) so if this expense is gone, I don't think it is entirely impossible that AMD could break even in Q4.

At some point they have to stop the acquisition related expenses, no? (or is that the Henri Richards end of year bonus slush fund?)

Anonymous said...

Lol, hey you ought to know how deep the hole is robo, you've pumped enough of them! And, you did a great job pumping mine.

Anonymous said...

You got that right, sparks, he's pounded mine plenty of times. Orgy this weekend guys?

Anonymous said...

Lol, I might get enough of pounding your two asses but not anytime soon! And, yes, I know how deep quite a few holes are. I need to find some AMD fans though cause, boy, those guys are tight asses, lol!