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At a small roundtable session with AMD executives at CES 2025 in Las Vegas, we asked the company for details about continuing shortages of its flagship gaming-optimized Ryzen 9 9800X3D — currently the uncontested best CPU for gaming — and when we can expect the supply to improve. AMD chalked it up to unprecedented demand and noted that Intel's "horrible" product, also known as Arrow Lake, has led to wildly increased demand that has pushed far beyond initial projections. In a separate roundtable, I also had the chance to ask Intel about its plans to fire back at AMD's dominating 3D V-Cache processors.
""We knew we built a great part. We didn't know the competitor (Intel) had built a horrible one," quipped AMD executive Frank Azor. "So the demand has been a little higher than we forecasted.""
Wow, the gloves are off! I can't wait for the Intel and AMD investor calls later this month. Who is in who's rearview mirror now? Competition really get's the semiconductor industry moving, absolutely.
Higher AMD demand is good news for TSMC. Their investor call is next week.
While I do think Intel is helping AMD's sales.. There were a lot of sources claiming AMD pulled 9800X3D in by a few months (to preempt Arrow Lake's launch). Pulling in like that means not having the volume ready you might otherwise.
While I do think Intel is helping AMD's sales.. There were a lot of sources claiming AMD pulled 9800X3D in by a few months (to preempt Arrow Lake's launch). Pulling in like that means not having the volume ready you might otherwise.
On the other hand, I suspect Intel might push out Arrow Lake to the market a little earlier than it should be. Otherwise several Arrow Lake's problems could have been identified before its official release.
On the other hand, I suspect Intel might push out Arrow Lake to the market a little earlier than it should be. Otherwise several Arrow Lake's problems could have been identified before its official release.
To me that is a "please Wall Street" move. Gotta keep that stock price up while laying the blame on the technical people. I have seen that many times in my career and it is always with public companies. Private ones know better than to treat customers badly.
I think AMD is attributing its own incompetence to the fact that Intel did not choose to offer 3D cache to the gaming market. AMD's inability to supply the laptop market is well-known. How would you expect them to handle high-cost 3D cache variants specifically for the limited gaming market just to create some halo effects?
I think AMD is attributing its own incompetence to the fact that Intel did not choose to offer 3D cache to the gaming market. AMD's inability to supply the laptop market is well-known. How would you expect them to handle high-cost 3D cache variants specifically for the limited gaming market just to create some halo effects?
I don't think their reason is valid. If they compare their X3D parts with their own non-X3D parts, there is a large performance gap. The gaming performance delta is due 3d cache. But it is limited to usages like gaming. With productivity benchmarks, especially with video editing, I think Intel products are much better than AMD's.
I don't think their reason is valid. If they compare their X3D parts with their own non-X3D parts, there is a large performance gap. The gaming performance delta is due 3d cache. But it is limited to usages like gaming. With productivity benchmarks, especially with video editing, I think Intel products are much better than AMD's.
Not really the only thing Intel has now is light load efficiency and also their horrible tile architecture is cause issues (Thanks BoB Swan For Designing it )
Not really the only thing Intel has now is light load efficiency and also their horrible tile architecture is cause issues (Thanks BoB Swan For Designing it )
I don't think their reason is valid. If they compare their X3D parts with their own non-X3D parts, there is a large performance gap. The gaming performance delta is due 3d cache. But it is limited to usages like gaming. With productivity benchmarks, especially with video editing, I think Intel products are much better than AMD's.
PTL fixes Horrible Design Choices of ARL/MTL and improves IP in various Ways PTL is just complete redesigned IP shouldn't have the issues ARL/MTL Faces
While I do think Intel is helping AMD's sales.. There were a lot of sources claiming AMD pulled 9800X3D in by a few months (to preempt Arrow Lake's launch). Pulling in like that means not having the volume ready you might otherwise.
Initially, AMD viewed Arrow Lake as a formidable competitor due to its superior process node. Additionally, the first wave of the Zen 5 launch did not receive much acclaim, both prompting AMD to expedite the release of the 9800X3D to boost Zen 5 series sales.
Regarding the bottleneck for the 9800X3D, I suspect it is related to packaging. This is because (1) the CCD is shared across the entire Zen 5 series, allowing for easy coordination, (2) the V-cache SRAM is shared by the X3D lineup, also facilitating coordination, (3) TSMC's packaging expansion resources are heavily focused on CoWoS, and (4) the 9800X3D uses second-generation X3D technology, which might require different packaging lines.
If packaging is indeed the bottleneck, the initial quantities of the 9900X3D, 9950X3D, and 9950HX3D could be very limited at launch.
PTL fixes Horrible Design Choices of ARL/MTL and improves IP in various Ways PTL is just complete redesigned IP shouldn't have the issues ARL/MTL Faces
I think AMD is attributing its own incompetence to the fact that Intel did not choose to offer 3D cache to the gaming market. AMD's inability to supply the laptop market is well-known. How would you expect them to handle high-cost 3D cache variants specifically for the limited gaming market just to create some halo effects?
Intel is struggling for many years and AMD has missed to see these signals on consumer buying patterns change. By limiting themselves on order to manufacture the new processors in large numbers AMD has shot itself. Blaming Intel's bad processors is immature. Yet, Intel CPUs are preferred by Laptop OEMs to pair with Nvidia GPU for almost high selling every model for last 2 yrs. This year wont be any different.
I don't think their reason is valid. If they compare their X3D parts with their own non-X3D parts, there is a large performance gap. The gaming performance delta is due 3d cache. But it is limited to usages like gaming. With productivity benchmarks, especially with video editing, I think Intel products are much better than AMD's.
Not true. AMD still leads in almost all productivity and professional workloads. Intel does better in specialized and very limited tasks.
However, Intel has large supply and most laptop OEMs have a well establish Intel based partners manufacturing parts needed in a laptop. AMD did not have good guidance and assured supply of chips, so is losing market share in laptops. AMD is doing extremely well in desktop.
Not true. AMD still leads in almost all productivity and professional workloads. Intel does better in specialized and very limited tasks.
However, Intel has large supply and most laptop OEMs have a well establish Intel based partners manufacturing parts needed in a laptop. AMD did not have good guidance and assured supply of chips, so is losing market share in laptops. AMD is doing extremely well in desktop.
Not true. AMD still leads in almost all productivity and professional workloads. Intel does better in specialized and very limited tasks.
However, Intel has large supply and most laptop OEMs have a well establish Intel based partners manufacturing parts needed in a laptop. AMD did not have good guidance and assured supply of chips, so is losing market share in laptops. AMD is doing extremely well in desktop.
The benchmarks do not show that. Arrow lake 285K application performance is almost the same as AMD's 9950X. It beats the 9950X in multi-thread by 1%, while being beaten by 4% in single thread.
www.tomshardware.com
Competition really get's the semiconductor industry moving, absolutely. 