AMD Zen 3 "Family 19h" Enablement Beginning With The Linux 5.6 Kernel

[smitty3268]

If Zen 3 really does implement SMT4 I'm going to have a "Sayonara Intel" party.

It may happen eventually (Zen 4?) but the current rumor is that it's no longer targeted for Zen 3.

[muncrief]

It may happen eventually (Zen 4?) but the current rumor is that it's no longer targeted for Zen 3.

Yeah, I thought it sounded a bit too good to be true that it would happen with Zen 3, especially since the design is supposedly done and already out the door. Zen 3 is going to be awesome in any case, and I might just hold 2 parties. I just bought an R7 3700x, but I'm seriously considering buying a Zen 3 just to simultaneously reward AMD and spite Intel. I'm in my 60s and will never forgive Intel for trying to force the globe to convert to Itanium by lying and saying 64 bit x86 was impossible, until AMD came to our rescue and forced their hand. And like I said before they've never been content to produce a good product for a fair price, and instead financially raped consumers at every opportunity.

So as far as I'm concerned they need to be financially pummeled until their company collapses, and a fair and worthy competitor to AMD rises in their place. We need competition, but no one needs greedy and unethical companies like Intel.

[betam4x]

Zen 3 (Zen 4000 series) will not have 'SMT4'. Slides have already leaked; Zen 3 is a higher performing version of Zen 2, with another 15% performance improvement. (No complaints from me)

Zen 4 (Zen 5000 series) will be on 5nm, feature PCIE5, and DDR5.

[xnor]

If Zen 3 really does implement SMT4 I'm going to have a "Sayonara Intel" party.

Why? What compute-heavy application do you think consumers are running that would benefit from this and outweigh the cons?

And why do you think Intel can't do the same? Both companies could have produced 4-way SMT chips in past years...

[muncrief]

Why? What compute-heavy application do you think consumers are running that would benefit from this and outweigh the cons?

And why do you think Intel can't do the same? Both companies could have produced 4-way SMT chips in past years...

Because I'm an embedded systems designer in my 60s and have watched Intel financially rape consumers whenever they had the opportunity, for decades. I even remember when they lied through their teeth and claimed 64 bit x86 was impossible, so the entire globe would have to replace all their systems with Itanium, again just out of sheer unbridled greed.

Of course, thankfully, AMD came along and saved us by calling their bluff and introducing AMD64, which destroyed Intel's unethical dream.

As for SMT4, why not? If implemented correctly it will enhance the power of next generation CPUs, whether one actually needs it or not.

With AMD it's upward and onward, with more and more advanced technologies at fair prices.

With Intel it's stagnation, with progress only occurring when it's absolutely forced upon them. And as I said, always at draconian prices because they are unethical and unashamed corporate predators.

As far as I'm concerned Intel cannot go out of business fast enough. And then I'd love to see a worthy and ethical competitor to AMD rise in their place.

[smitty3268]

Zen 3 (Zen 4000 series) will not have 'SMT4'. Slides have already leaked; Zen 3 is a higher performing version of Zen 2, with another 15% performance improvement. (No complaints from me)

Zen 4 (Zen 5000 series) will be on 5nm, feature PCIE5, and DDR5.

Zen 3 is actually a fairly different architecture from Zen 1, Zen+, and Zen 2 from all accounts - at the very least, it will have a radically different cache configuration, and I think it's safe to assume a fair number of other changes at the same time since Zen 2 also did that and Zen 3 is being described as a much bigger change. The 7nm+ manufacturing process is presumably significantly different from the 7nm process as well, since it's based on EUV. Although I do agree SMT4 is definitely not present.

[torsionbar28]

Why? What compute-heavy application do you think consumers are running that would benefit from this and outweigh the cons?

It sounds like you've confused the "Zen" architecture name with the "Ryzen" consumer product line. Zen 3 is an architecture, not a product. While you're correct in that consumer peecee's would not benefit much from SMT4, EPYC datacenter cpu's are where the big money is, and SMT4 would be very welcome in that space.

[xnor]

As for SMT4, why not? If implemented correctly it will enhance the power of next generation CPUs, whether one actually needs it or not.

You have just evaded my question and asked "why not"... You don't seem to understand what you're talking about.
Why not?! Because it adds cost, complexity and will actually cause a decrease in performance for common workloads. There are more cons but let's leave it at that.

[muncrief]

It sounds like you've confused the "Zen" architecture name with the "Ryzen" consumer product line. Zen 3 is an architecture, not a product. While you're correct in that consumer peecee's would not benefit much from SMT4, EPYC datacenter cpu's are where the big money is, and SMT4 would be very welcome in that space.

Ha! No, I'm a retired embedded systems designer (hardware/firmware/software) and know the difference between the differing Zen architectures and their product names.

[muncrief]

You have just evaded my question and asked "why not"... You don't seem to understand what you're talking about.
Why not?! Because it adds cost, complexity and will actually cause a decrease in performance for common workloads. There are more cons but let's leave it at that.

Well, performance depends upon how how the architecture is implemented, how threads are scheduled, and whether or not some are placed on tertiary threads when they shouldn't be.

Yes, it adds complexity, but processors are going to get more complicated as they evolve.

SMT4 has certainly not been implemented very well thus far, but I have faith that AMD can do a much better job. And so long as the SMT mode can be configured in BIOS, or even better on the fly, it can either add performance under heavily threaded workload scenarios, or have negligible impact on lightly or single threaded ones.

The thing is that with AMD it's onward and upward, delivering new strategies and technologies with high yields at low prices. While their competitors like Intel are stuck in the past, only doing what they have to when forced by competition, and charging outrageous prices for whatever it is.