AMD Radeon R9 Nano Launches, Will Cost $650+ USD

[pal666]

GTX-970s at half the price of this monster that we all know will destroy it in performance simply because of AMD's drivers

nouveau will suck compared to radeonsi

[Luke_Wolf]

Beautiful. That should be the future of desktop, small computers. Not big cases that are so 2000.

No, no it really shouldn't. It makes absolutely 0 sense to go that route. The Desktop has 2 primary strengths over other form factors: Power, and upgradability. Small form factor computers are intrinsically limited on both, furthermore there is no purpose to making the desktop small, because as big of a unit as a desktop is it only takes up a relatively small space vs the required peripherals. If someone has the space for a monitor, speakers, a full sized keyboard, and a mouse, they most assuredly have room for the desktop unit. Anyone with real space constraints is going to use a laptop.

[johanb]

You have no idea what you're saying. First of all buy hardware with currently working drivers, that rule applies to any hardware vendor. Second of all Fiji's driver support will improve, and by the time it does availability will be higher with lower bins to choose from. You clearly have no idea how processors are fabricated and then diffused and binned.

Sure Nvidia performs much better, but it's mostly because AMDs OpenGL implementation is a pile of crap.

In it's current state, there is no reason except for open source drivers to choose red over green on linux. What could possibly change the game for AMD in the coming year or two however is vulcan and DirectX 12. If AMD even gets half of the performance boost it gets on DirectX 12 on Vulcan aswell, it would become a worthy competitor again. And thanks to the AMDGPU kernel driver, it will be easier to implement Vulcan for the open source drivers under linux. This is the chance for a breakthrough in open source graphics drivers for dedicated gpus. I might be a little optimistic, but there's currently nothing hindering this from happening. AMD GPUs have way more raw power than Nvidia cards at the same price, and here is a possibility for those cards to finally be great for something more than bitcoin mining.

[deppman]

Sure Nvidia performs much better, but it's mostly because AMDs OpenGL implementation is a pile of crap.

Obviously. Nothing like spending $670 on a graphics card and then getting a lousy buggy experience. Get a GTX980Ti instead for $620, and it works like a dream. Like it's worth the money.

In it's current state, there is no reason except for open source drivers to choose red over green on linux. What could possibly change the game for AMD in the coming year or two however is vulcan and DirectX 12. If AMD even gets half of the performance boost it gets on DirectX 12 on Vulcan aswell, it would become a worthy competitor again....

I don't see this happening. First, 20 years of ATI history shows that they will always have poor Linux support. I believe when I see it. Second, the AMD hardware only shines for draw call limited loads. Everywhere else, they are way behind (tessellation, ROPs, fill rate, etc)

[chithanh]

In it's current state, there is no reason except for open source drivers to choose red over green on linux.

Well the whole reason to choose Linux over Windows is open source, and the benefits you get from it.

Anyway duby229 is correct that first waiting for properly working drivers and then buying is probably the smartest strategy.

[boffo]

No, no it really shouldn't. It makes absolutely 0 sense to go that route. The Desktop has 2 primary strengths over other form factors: Power, and upgradability. Small form factor computers are intrinsically limited on both, furthermore there is no purpose to making the desktop small, because as big of a unit as a desktop is it only takes up a relatively small space vs the required peripherals. If someone has the space for a monitor, speakers, a full sized keyboard, and a mouse, they most assuredly have room for the desktop unit. Anyone with real space constraints is going to use a laptop.

Look at the mac pro. It's upgradable and it's small.
We don't have the upgradability that we once used to. Buy a new processor=>need a new motherboard, need a dvd/blueray drive=> nope you don't need one. Need more storage, buy a nas or build a ownCloud server and you will be able to access the data when you are not home. Do you need a pro sound card? buy an external, they are better. Do you need a wifi card? No you don't, it's already integrated.
Sure there will always someone that will have a special need and for most of those that will need something special there is usb 3. Everything is getting integrated + chips are getting stacked like SSD and HBM, but this is going to be true also for cpus, fpgas, gpus etc in the future.
The only thing that most people will upgrade is the GPU and the RAM. When they will want to upgrade the CPU they will buy a new pc.
There are reasons why the pc is in crisis, therefore innovations are welcome.

[adler187]

The $650 price tag makes a hell of a lot more sense than the rumored $500 price tag, considering the performance of the thing. You're getting a Fury X, but trading a small amount of performance for a much smaller form factor. Factor in also that the R9 Nano parts are basically the "cr?me de la cr?me" binning for the Fury chips, so supply will be limited and the price needs to be high.

Yeah, it's not for everyone (especially for Linux users), but for everyone saying the price doesn't make sense for the performance there's someone thinking "man this is perfect for my SFF pc!" With DX12 and Vulkan, the performance proposition will also be better, though it will probably be a few years for game availability for that to make much difference in practice.

[chithanh]

boffo
With most AMD platforms, you could upgrade the CPU to a newer generation without upgrading the motherboard. Notable exceptions were Socket 754 and FM1.

The Mac Pro is not particularly upgradeable compared to PCs from Dell, HP, Lenovo or others.
The reasons the PC market is in decline have nothing to do with upgradeability.

[boffo]

boffo
With most AMD platforms, you could upgrade the CPU to a newer generation without upgrading the motherboard. Notable exceptions were Socket 754 and FM1.

The Mac Pro is not particularly upgradeable compared to PCs from Dell, HP, Lenovo or others.
The reasons the PC market is in decline have nothing to do with upgradeability.

I like the AMD APUs and AMD GPUs, but if you are buying this card or a fury X or a Titan X, you really will not buy an AMD FX processor.
I didn't say that upgradability is one of the problem of the pc crisis, but that less and less people need it. So there is a market for small computers with a high computation's power.

[Nobu]

No, no it really shouldn't. It makes absolutely 0 sense to go that route. The Desktop has 2 primary strengths over other form factors: Power, and upgradability. Small form factor computers are intrinsically limited on both, furthermore there is no purpose to making the desktop small, because as big of a unit as a desktop is it only takes up a relatively small space vs the required peripherals. If someone has the space for a monitor, speakers, a full sized keyboard, and a mouse, they most assuredly have room for the desktop unit. Anyone with real space constraints is going to use a laptop.

Not if it's sitting next to your tv in the living room, especially if you have a small house.