AMD Announces The Athlon 200GE With Vega 3 Graphics, 2nd Gen Ryzen/Athlon PRO

[mbello]

I agree that AMD's processor lineup look nice on paper but when it comes to products we can actually buy we still end up with Intel as the best option.
I don't know whether this is due to supply constraints from AMD or low interest from OEMs and distributors, but it sucks.

AMD are you listening?

[GrayShade]

I agree that AMD's processor lineup look nice on paper but when it comes to products we can actually buy we still end up with Intel as the best option.

One thing I don't get is why the more expensive processors don't have integrated graphics. If I buy a Ryzen 7 or a Threadripper, I'd rather not pay $100 more for a GPU, assuming I'm not interested in gaming.

[misGnomer]

One thing I don't get is why the more expensive processors don't have integrated graphics. If I buy a Ryzen 7 or a Threadripper, I'd rather not pay $100 more for a GPU, assuming I'm not interested in gaming.

It would be convenient, wouldn't it.

Alternatively AMD could, perhaps, offer a cheap ultrabasic passively cooled current-gen miniature display card - refreshed every other year or so - that can drive 2d graphics even on hi-res screens but very little else.

Of course if they were too good some people would just use them to e.g. update the display connectors on aging Intel systems. One could imagine a few lost Athlon GE sales, but there's also mindshare, customer goodwill and even environmental credentials to be earned besides serving sections of the Ryzen 7 / Threadripper crowd.

[GrayShade]

It would be convenient, wouldn't it.

Alternatively AMD could, perhaps, offer a cheap ultrabasic passively cooled current-gen miniature display card - refreshed every other year or so - that can drive 2d graphics even on hi-res screens but very little else.

Of course if they were too good some people would just use them to e.g. update the display connectors on aging Intel systems. One could imagine a few lost Athlon GE sales, but there's also mindshare, customer goodwill and even environmental credentials to be earned besides serving sections of the Ryzen 7 / Threadripper crowd.

Yeah, I recently wanted to buy a lower/middle-end system and settled on an i3-8100, which compares quite favourably to Ryzen 5 2400G.

[Tomin]

One thing I don't get is why the more expensive processors don't have integrated graphics. If I buy a Ryzen 7 or a Threadripper, I'd rather not pay $100 more for a GPU, assuming I'm not interested in gaming.

That's probably because they are currently doing dies with two CCXs and no graphics and dies with one CCX and graphics so it's either 8 cores or 4 cores and graphics. Intel seems to bundle graphics on (almost) all of their processors. Maybe some future processor has two CCXs and some (small) graphics there. It's also power constrained, Ryzens have slightly higher TDP values than Intel processors.

[chithanh]

Did it? Because apart from some vocal minority none gives a shit.

I think the existence of the HAP bit (aka. "ask ME nicely do please disable itself"), plus the fact that OEMs like Dell offer "ME disabled" computers (presumably through similar mechanism) tells us that it is just not a vocal minority.

[starshipeleven]

I think the existence of the HAP bit (aka. "ask ME nicely do please disable itself"), plus the fact that OEMs like Dell offer "ME disabled" computers (presumably through similar mechanism) tells us that it is just not a vocal minority.

HAP bit was mandated by US gov, which can be a minority in the worldwide market but wields tremendous power. Even a large lobby of consumers can't just phone Intel and ask them nicely to go fuck themselves like the US gov did.

Dell is just one of the OEMs, and one of the ones that sell also laptops with Linux, so they are obviously trying to cater to this minority and see if they can get into a new niche. Same for the Purism and other small OEMs that do the same, they are making it for a market niche.
FYI: Apple always catered to a market niche, they created their very own religion for the sake of creating the niche where they can sell products. Does not mean that suddenly every buyer wants the notch in smartphones, or that everyone wants ultraslim laptops with only a couple USB-c ports.

[grok]

I've checked on anandtech, there will also be Athlon 220GE and 240GE.

This Athlon 200GE is good to have, AMD has been too weak on the low end for too long. It's been so long though that few users will buy a low end desktop + monitor anymore when a laptop costs the same or less. At least it won't be slower than a 2C/4T Intel laptop.

Still a bad time to get one (RAM prices)
Athlon 200GE + 16GB RAM + low end NVMe SSD + hard drives would fly.

[grok]

That's probably because they are currently doing dies with two CCXs and no graphics and dies with one CCX and graphics so it's either 8 cores or 4 cores and graphics. Intel seems to bundle graphics on (almost) all of their processors. Maybe some future processor has two CCXs and some (small) graphics there. It's also power constrained, Ryzens have slightly higher TDP values than Intel processors.

Another little bit : AMD CPUs with integrated graphics have 8x PCIe instead of 16x PCIe. Traces are reused for the display outputs.

Die area would be a problem as well, and even memory bandwith.
We'll have to see what they do with Zen 2 on 7nm, in theory they could make an APU die with two CCX plus graphics, a CPU die with three CCX and no graphics.

[chithanh]

HAP bit was mandated by US gov, which can be a minority in the worldwide market but wields tremendous power. Even a large lobby of consumers can't just phone Intel and ask them nicely to go fuck themselves like the US gov did.

What I wanted to point out is that even if it is a minority, it can't just be labelled "vocal". It holds considerable purchasing or other power.

Another little bit : AMD CPUs with integrated graphics have 8x PCIe instead of 16x PCIe. Traces are reused for the display outputs.

I expected that (same was done for DisplayPort on RS780), but I haven't seen confirmation of that until now. If true that would put AMD in a bad position as Windows (since 1803) allows FreeSync/Adaptive-Sync on NVidia cards if output is routed through a FreeSync capable iGPU. And Intel reconfirmed their plans to support Adaptive-Sync in the future. This could lead to the following paradoxical situation:

Ryzen CPU + NVidia GPU -> no FreeSync, only G-Sync
Intel CPU + NVidia GPU -> FreeSync