Thursday, October 19, 2006

A Real Forecast

Although there have been many projections lately that favor Intel, it is my guess that these are based largely on old biases towards Intel. I believe that a more careful look at AMD and Intel shows that AMD's performance and current position are better than Intel's. And, although I believe that Intel hit bottom in the last quarter and will now grow, it seems likely that AMD will grow faster during 2007 and 2008.

For recent performance we can see that AMD clearly hit its stride in the fourth quarter of 2005. This quarter was the best quarter in Intel's entire history. Yet, AMD was able to increase its processor revenue share from 12% to 15% during this same quarter. It is staggering to think that AMD pulled revenue away from Intel while Intel was at its best. However, these gains by AMD left Intel unable to rid itself of its inventory overstock which increased 11% from the previous quarter. In contrast, AMD reduced its own inventory by 58%. Intel began to drop and hit bottom just two quarters later in Q2 06. Intel has been unable to rid itself of its overstock and it has continued to build since Q3 05. Today, AMD's inventories are less than half of what they were in Q3 05 while Intel's are 60% higher.

The best that can be said for Intel is that they've hit bottom and are slowly growing again. However, the frantic scratching in the dirt by some in an attempt to put a positive spin on Intel's numbers is truly amazing. I've seen people suggest that Intel is now doing better than AMD. Unfortunately, statements like this are purely delusional. The reality is that 2006 is a very bad year for Intel. This will be the largest processor revenue drop for Intel since 2001. Short of a miracle (which even Intel does not project) in Q4 06, Intel's total yearly processor revenues for 2006 will be much lower than 2005's and only about equal to what Intel received in 2004. In contrast, AMD's processor revenues for 2006 will be double what they were in 2004. I'm baffled how zero growth in two years versus 100% growth could be equal or ahead for Intel. Clearly, AMD has done very well and Intel has not.

AMD's processor revenues are up 33% from the Q3 05 while Intel's are down 21%. Faced with dismal numbers like these, those who favor Intel have resorted to looking only at this quarter versus last quarter. However, even here there is no place to hide. Intel's processor revenue's increased 8.8% from last quarter. However, AMD's increased 10.1%. The fact that AMD's margin dropped more from Q2 06 to this quarter has been tossed out with glee by those seeking to fabricate a better outlook for Intel. Howevever, the only reason that this is true is because Intel's had already dropped badly during Q2 06. Today, Intel's margin at 49.1% is still below AMD's at 51.4%. I find it amazing that some don't see how noteworthy this is. Intel has been consistently ahead of AMD and usually be several percentage points. Further, the overall drop has been far worse for Intel. Intel's margin dropped from a recent high of 61.8% in Q4 05 while AMD's dropped from a recent high of 58.5% in Q1 06. This is a 21% drop for Intel versus a 12% drop for AMD. None of these numbers favor Intel. Yet, one doesn't have to look very far to find people proclaiming that these are great numbers for Intel and that they show a glowing future. However, there is no reason to believe the phoney outlooks and no reason to look at Intel with rose colored glasses.

AMD has had very strong demand (up 50%) for its mobile chips. Unfortunately for Intel this is not likely to improve. AMD's 65nm mobile chips will be out soon and will have lower power draw which is a good thing for mobile. AMD is also certain to get a boost in mobile chipsets from ATI which takes away the strongest advantage that Intel has enjoyed with its Centrino line. A loss of share in notebooks is something new as this has been the area that Intel has held onto the strongest. Similarly, AMD's very aggressive move into integrated chipsets gives AMD a good boost for both corporate client computers and budget systems. The budget category lines up well with AMD's recent partnership with the two largest computer retailers in China. The client systems are likely to be a good complement to the already increased offerings by HP, Dell, Sun, and IBM in AMD servers.

Intel is pressuring AMD hard in 2-way servers. This is not surprising as Woodcrest has impressive SSE performance and works quite well with dual core and dual socket with the dual bus 5000 chipset. The only bad part is that this chipset uses FBDIMM which already has a limited lifespan. Worse still, this technology will not grow large enough to become profitable while Intel will have to continue support to the many customers who have already bought or are buying these systems. This will be a future drag on Intel although it only a small one. AMD would pull ahead on 2-way systems in Q2 07 except Intel should have a non-FBDIMM chipset available which will remove the disadvantages of the FBDIMM technology. So, AMD should be about equal on 2-way dual core systems which will prevent Intel's gaining back share. However, Intel will fall behind on quad core systems and will not be competitive on 4-way sooner than 2009. This is the case because, without CSI, Intel cannot use an integrated memory controller. Without both of these Intel simply does not have the base architecture to handle dual core 4-way or quad core 2-way or higher nor has Intel suggested upgrading to a quad bus chipset. AMD should continue to make gains in 4-way and should start making gains in 2-way after Q2 07. This does at least give Intel time for a couple of good quarters with 2-way however it is unlikely to make any strong reversals in servers. Worse still, Intel then loses the advantage until sometime in 2009.

The desktop is Intel's strongest position in the near term. Kentsfield will have little effect for Intel since this is a very small market and will be countered at the top end by 4X4. Secondly, Kentsfield will be countered in Q3 07 when AMD releases the native Altair quad core. Judging from the roadmap for Pentium E 1000 and Celeron D 400 chips, the desktop clock speeds will not increase as quickly as some have suggested. AMD should be able to counter these with Rev F and G chips while competing at the high end with dual core versions of K8L. There does not appear to be any advantage for Intel in Q3 07. This would suggest that Intel's sole strategy for pulling back ahead of AMD will be a move to 45nm. However, this move is not likely to be as successful as some have suggested. In 2008, less than half of Intel's FABs will be 45nm while both of AMD's 300mm FABs will be ramping to 45nm. The advantage of APM will finally be felt as this will make extremely rapid transfers between the two FABs possible. Intel on the other hand will still require two months to move a chip or process from one FAB to another; AMD will be able to do this the same day. Two similar FABs should allow AMD even tighter control over costs although AMD's costs will fall steadily through 2007 as FAB 36 continues to ramp. The costs for 65nm on the 300mm FAB 36 are far lower than the costs at 90nm on the 200mm FAB 30. Unfortunately Intel will not see this same reduction in cost as it is already using 300mm FABs and will already have converted most of its capacity to 65nm by year's end. These reductions in cost should pull up AMD's margin even if Intel continues the price war.

I believe that many (including people at Intel itself) still have not come to grips with the reality that Intel can no longer grow its way out of trouble. Further, Intel is facing a competitor who now has two FABs and is using 300mm. In 2002 or even into 2003, Intel's current price drops would have been far more effective. Today, they have merely slowed AMD's growth while hurting Intel more. Eventually, the reality that AMD now has products spread among desktop, server, and mobile as well as second sourcing from Chartered and soon chipsets from ATI will be unavoidable. It will also become clear at some point that AMD's HyperTransport consortium is paying off with a low pricing model along with the Torrenza initiative. Intel's copycat strategy is not likley to have the same benefit and will take two years to not catch up to where AMD is now. The proposed Geneseo and CSI standards are about as fast but still less flexible than the current HT 3.0 standard. It is entirely possible that HT could be at a 4.0 or even 5.0 standard by the time CSI makes it to hardware. AMD has at least two other possibilities to compete with Intel's 45nm in 2008. These include the possibility of using TTRAM or Z-RAM for cache. This is not an option for Intel as it requires SOI. Another possibility is using the GPU as a parallel coprocessor. This could negate any boost in SSE speed. Again, it is unfortunate for Intel that using a GPU for procesing is easier with HT than with using the FSB. And, whatever effort Intel does put into this would be wasted when CSI is released in 2009.

I don't see any great gains for Intel in the fourth quarter. I'm guessing AMD will increase at about the same rate and hold onto its roughly 22% volume share. I expect Intel to grow during 2007 and 2008 but I expect AMD to grow faster and increase share. I would expect Q1 07 to be Intel's high point with servers and Q2 07 to be Intel's high point on the desktop. Overall, I would expect Intel's revenue's in 2007 to match the 2005 revenues. I don't honest see how Intel could realistically take back share from AMD given all of AMD's proejcted advantages with cost, volume, and the partners and customers it has lined up. I expect AMD's margins to rise regardless of Intel's pricing strategy due to AMD's conintued drops in costs. AMD has clearly divested of the most unprofitable sections of the company while Intel has made a less serious effort. Intel may have to revisit the issue of divestment if it cannot get its margins up. I don't see any possible way for Intel to grow at 30% while AMD grows at only 15% during 2007. Intel show grow but AMD should grow faster.

These are comments I made in December 2004.

I've been thinking lately about what is going to happen in the next year. I know that some are desperately hoping and that others are at least suggesting that Intel will make a comeback. But, so far, I can't see it.

The comeback for Intel didn't happen. AMD retained its share during 2005.

It is clear that Intel's dual core strategy is threefold:

1. Release dual core Prescott chips to slow down the erosion of the workstation/low end server market. This won't actually work very well since these chips will be starved for bus bandwidth. Expect Intel to pump up the cache. This strategy would put another company out of business but with all of that spare fab capacity Intel will only take an embarassing margin hit.


This was pretty accurate. Intel released Smithfield and then followed up with Presler. The dies are large and Intel still uses the large cache approach on the Xeon units. These processors have been ineffective against Opteron.

2. Release dual core Dothan based chips to slow down the erosion of the desktop market. Intel is hoping that just one of the benchmarks will favor this chip. This is not a great strategy but it really is all Intel has since, without being able to keep up with Prescott, Intel's only other choice is to fall farther and farther behind.

Yonah based on Dothan was next. Yonah was also not very impressive on the desktop.

3. Work on something more reasonable for 2006. This is Intel's real strategy although they won't actually admit this to their shareholders, employees, or customers. Intel is praying that they can get something out the door in 2006 that will give them a fighting chance.

At the time, no one else was talking about a new design for 2006. The talk was that Intel was going to release something competitive in 2005 which did not happen.

In all honesty, I don't think Intel has hit bottom yet nor do I think AMD has hit its full stride. I think things will be better for AMD and worse for Intel in 2005. Maybe in 6 months things will look better for Intel in 2006 but right now not even that looks promising.

Since my past comments seemed to have been accurate perhaps my latest ones will be as well. It appears to me that AMD will exit 2006 in the strongest position it has ever been against Intel. This should be a good reason for a positive forecast for AMD.

23 comments:

gdp77 said...

You are assuming too much. If intel makes it on time at 45nm then nothing will stop them from adding more cache, more decoders....more... more... They will continue their "brute force" approach, which could give them the lead up to 2009 (CSI).

However if they have problems achieving 45nm then AMD+ATI platform will regain the market leadership.

Darth Solarion said...

There are times when people make designing processors sound so easy, which also belies their ignorance.

Scientia from AMDZone said...

If intel makes it on time at 45nm

Then they will have a die shrink of their 65nm processors. This could help in terms of power draw on notebooks and also clock speed on the desktop. This would give Intel a boost.

then nothing will stop them from adding more cache, more decoders....more... more...

Another decoder won't help. More cache will only help with the server chips. And, as I mentioned before, AMD could be planning to use TTRAM or Z-RAM which would improve their cache memory cell density and allow them to economically use more cache. Intel cannot use TTRAM or Z-RAM because these require SOI.

They will continue their "brute force" approach, which could give them the lead up to 2009 (CSI).

Brute force won't work. You see, Intel will hit the wall with quad core and dual socket. To move any higher they only have large cache to rely on and this won't be as effective as distributed memory. They will probably try to push hard to DDR3 but this will put them at a cost disadvantage. You really have to understand that Intel was counting on FBDIMM and CSI. Without these two, their entire server strategy is derailed.

However if they have problems achieving 45nm then AMD+ATI platform will regain the market leadership.

It depends. If AMD is serious about using GPU processing this could give AMD the lead no matter what Intel does. Let's just say that it looks like AMD may have options that are much more real than Intel's fantasyware TeraFlop chip and photonic processing.

Scientia from AMDZone said...

Are we going to see this features on AMD's 65nm process or until they get 45nm?

I wouldn't expect TTRAM until 45nm. We've already seen the K8L dies and their cache memory cells are still large.

Anonymous said...

'Tis really hard to understand what you are trying to say. Is this entry about your past predictions, future?
At least you could've made a concise outline like..
1. AMD gains market share
2. AMD gains more OEMS
3. AMD and ATI do something together

Anonymous said...

Please tell me who 'some' are and why would anyone even want to 'desperately' hope that Intel make a comeback? What good does it do anyone to hope that Intel makes $2 billion as opposed to $1 billion?On the other hand, there is no shortage of Sharikou, MMM...

What was this talk of Intel releasing something competitive in 2005?

http://techreport.com/reviews/2006q2/core-duo/index.x?pg=16
"Based on what we've seen, one can't help but conclude the Core Duo's performance per watt is unmatched in the world of PC processors. The Core Duo is obviously the best mobile CPU on the market, more than doubling the peak performance of the Pentium M while operating in the same power envelope. What's more shocking is the fact that the Core Duo T2600's outright performance is easily superior to Intel's supposed flagship desktop processor, the Pentium Extreme Edition 965. Given its performance, the Core Duo is clearly well-suited for desktop use, where performance is king but quiet computing is still a blessing."

Raw wattage and performance per watt creams all. In response to your Yonah on the desktop.

Scientia from AMDZone said...

Okay, I made some edits to my article similar to Red's suggestions. I've also deleted several comments to get this thread back on track.

The best way to see AMD's position on manufacturing and demand is to read their Quarter Earnings Transcript

Anonymous said...

I did not say AMD fanbois are common, but like a black sheep, easy to point out. I know a good site where one can find tons wishing Intel's financial hardship:) Yes, there are those that refuse to look at AMD's CPUs, but that is out of ignorance and preference, not hatred. Please show me somewhere where there are tons of ravaging Intelliots screaming 'AMD sux!'

Ash, I think you're confusing Kentsfield with 4x4:) Kentsfield has benches, 4x4 was running at 100% CPU, with the Classic theme, two IE windows[with video though clearly not HD], 1 game demo, and an encoder encoding a small resolution file.

I hope Nvidia and Microsoft can join the game also:)

Scientia from AMDZone said...

Well, if we go by processor volume it would be reasonable to assume that there are about 3.5X as many Intel fans as AMD fans.

I don't know but I would assume that 4X4 is under NDA until release. I also wonder what benchmarks AMD will show with the Barcelona demo.

My basica point is that AMD will grow faster than Intel in 2007. I think the analyst who said that Intel will grow 30% while AMD grows 15% in 2007 is totally bonkers.

Anonymous said...

Basing fanbois by volume? Wow..We should have a lot of Microsoft, Walmart, Google fanboys
Apple fanboi: Microsoft sucks! Microsoft 'fanboi': Shut up Apple n00b
Apple fanboi: OMG you're such a fanboy!
:)Or you could say that Intel has 3.5X[made up number] capacity;)

http://www.amd.com/us-en/Corporate/VirtualPressRoom/0,,51_104_543~110132,00.html
Expect Sony Vegas and Nero for apps, and for some reason, they're teaming up with Bioware, Cakewalk, Crytek, Havok, Irrational Games, and Midway. They could back away from benchmarking if it makes them look bad.. And focus on 'megatasking':D
http://www.nickfire.com/photo/digitallife/digitallife%20160.jpg
All enjoyed on 'The Father of x86 Mult-Core' :D

For some reason, I'm expecting virtualization benchmarks from Barcelona:D

Anonymous said...

To Edyros, I did not compare Scientia to Sharikou, I said that you can find biased AMD fanbois without even trying. Please find me somewhere swarming with Intelliots and quote them:)

Back on topic, I agree, 30% for Intel and 15% for AMD is very far off:) Who is the hack that claims this?

Inventory overstock? Is there inventory understock?:) While flash and chipsets are up, CPUs are down. AMD's drastically reduced inventory hurt, not helped them this quarter.

It would make sense that AMD's revenue rise, since even with the price cuts, they're still gaining market share. When both companies stabilize[Intel transitions away from Netburst][AMD having capacity], we should be able to compare them as though they are orange and kumquat;)

Intel's margins also include motherboards, chipsets, flash. A diversified 49.1% is very good compared to an 11% drop to 51.4%[PS, what else does AMD make for money?]

I am very surprised at the 50% on mobile and kudos to whoever made that happen:) I believe the best thing that Turion has over Core 2 is gaming and price, while Core 2 has battery life and overall performance.

So Intel has forecasted numbers for Q4 but AMD has just said seasonally strong. What do you make of that?

Scientia from AMDZone said...

Intel's inventory has been increasing for the past year. It isn't normal inventory; it's overstock. I'm not in the mood to argue semantics and if that is what you want to do; I'll start ignoring your posts as a waste of my time.

Typically, inventories would be high in the 3rd quarter and then drop in the fourth quarter. This is the normal pattern to handle the surge in 4th quarter volumes.

Your characterization isn't correct however. AMD was not hurt at all in the 3rd quarter because of inventory; it was unable to produce enough chips to meet demand and therefore didn't make as much money as it was theoretically possible to make. It also lost 2% in margin because of quickly shifting production from desktop to mobile. The actual problem is that AMD will be hurt in the 4th quarter if it cannot build enough inventory to meet 4th quarter sales.

To put this a different way, AMD has not been hurt in terms of actual position since they increased processor volume by 18%. if the unit volumes hold then this will produce more income in the future and this quarter was a temporary low. Or to say this another way, the only way that you can argue that inventory hurt AMD is to say that Intel was hurt identically in the same quarter for reasons apparently unrelated to inventory.

AMD has been fighting with capacity constraints since 2003 so this is nothing new as some comments on sharikou's blog have suggested.

I have to say though that I lose most of my respect for your opinion when you suggest that:

A diversified 49.1% is very good compared to an 11% drop to 51.4%

This is way off. Intel had the same diversification in Q4 05 when it's margin was over 61%. Intel's drop since then has been 20% versus AMD's drop from a high in the following quarter of 12%. A 20% drop is worse than a 12% drop and there is no pretending otherwise.

I also have no respect for people who insist that Intel is better off because of diversification and then rush to use this as an excuse for low margins. Intel's diversification has not changed much at all in the past two years and their margins have been higher. The current low margin for Intel is probably mostly due to low prices for processors but could also be related to higher costs. We know that 2% of AMD's drop was due to the change in production and that 2% won't have an effect next quarter. We also know that AMD's costs will continue to drop so their margin will rise even if prices stay low. In contrast, we have no particular reason to expect Intel's margins to rise if prices stay low. If you know of any actual reason for Intel's margins to rise then please state them.

Yes AMD definitely avoided specifics in the third quarter guidance. I can think of several reasons they might do this.

Anonymous said...

If you have excess inventory, though you'll be stuck with it, at least you'll have a better chance to supply future sales. If you don't have enough, you'll not be able do supply demand and not be able to make up those sales, and cause others to defect[Intel with its chipsets and the recent AMD ramblings].

"But the other 3 points, the 60% or so of the margin, is really to a rather precipitous decline in desktop ASPs."
"Gross margin was 51.4%, down from 56.8% in the second quarter of 2006, largely due to lower desktop ASPs, as prices declined faster than cost reductions, primarily in the desktop area."

AMD is more dependent on their CPU business, Intel is still barely behind overall gross margin with its other products as well as providing dividends. So Intel used to make TONS of money on their stuff, now they make LOTS;) Intel has projected ~50%[51% without share based compensation]for Q4 though.

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/95794/dell-speaks-out-over-amd-shortages.html
I don't think gross margins will improve any time soon;) Whatever makes them more money though.

That's nice that you tell us that you can think of several reasons they might do this..;) They also did not project the numbers from Q2 to Q3 and in Q1, projected "55-60%" for Q2. Intel seems more stable with its forecasts.

So Erlindo, please actually quote some folks saying 'AMD sux!';) And to make it easier, you can try and dig for JumpingJack, Joset, ElMoIsEviL.
JumpingJack: AMD's naming is great, it is clear it is consistent and you can look at the name and pretty much know how it performs relative to the others in the family of processors.
ElMoIsEviL: http://forumz.tomshardware.com/hardware/short-CPU-History-ftopict204992.html Surely you will not be able to find that many Intel's from Sharikou;)
Joset: Speaks of technology, nanometers, very anti amd;)

Anonymous said...

I'd like to see two HD videos on the same desktop as well as 2 games not demos and an encoding at the same time:)
http://www.hothardware.com/image_popup.cfm?image=big_mega1.png&articleid=891&t=a
Does not look like it as said by..
http://www.hothardware.com/viewarticle.aspx?page=2&articleid=891&cid=1

Anonymous said...

http://forumz.tomshardware.com/hardware/Intel-AMD-wow-Digital-Life-ftopict204643.html
"I didn't get to play with it much as there was no mouse but I did view the HD movies and game demos.."
http://www.nickfire.com/photo/digitallife/digitallife%20119.jpg
I doubt that those videos are HD, especially the one in the lower left.

http://www.hothardware.com/image_popup.cfm?image=big_mega1.png&articleid=891&t=a
Is this the pic you refer to? Looks like the same demos running at Digital Life. In addition to the 2 demos, there is one encoding and one video.


http://www.nickfire.com/photo/digitallife/digitallife%20160.jpg
'The Father of x86 Mult-Core' They BSed on that one, is there any reason to believe that AMD's 'megatasking' is any better than Kentsfield?

Anonymous said...

Die shrink has not been tossed out, native quad has been in the rumor mill and never official from Intel, a new core was never meant for 2007.

Clocks of Pentium E and Celeron D 400 are not intended to compete with Conroe. If they clocked up Pentium E and friends, they would also need to clock up Conroe, but then there would be no point as that would be total X2 murder.

45 nm should do better than Kentsfield, higher clocks and cache to make up for the terrible memory bandwidth.

FX62 is pushing at 2.8@125W. FX74/FX76 at 3.0/3.2must really burn then. X6800 is at 2.93@75W with 3.0 coming later[we already have 5160 3.0 at 80W]. Yes presumably 65 nm should allow faster clocks, yet we'll have 2.6GHz this December and a 3.2 90 nm in Q307.

Kentsfield having trouble competing with 4x4?..We'll only have to wait a little more but it seems AMD is the one scared to show it off.

Intel trading mobile for desktop?...

Intel also fired a ton of people for ultra cost reduction.

http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=527642&category=BUSINESS&BCCode=HOME&newsdate=10/21/2006
Maybe, but maybe not on the AMD+NY thing.

What effect do you believe Intel wanted on AMD in Q306? I don't think they forecasted the 20% drop in stock and according to AMD, 60% of the margin drop was a result of desktop ASPs.

Anonymous said...

Erlindo, I really like your posts:) You: Biased person that does not agree with Scientia who is JumpingJack, Joset, ElMoIsEviL from the Intelliotized THG! Me: Biased? Show where I 'attack' or they 'attack' AMD. You: Biased person, THG sucks!

There are documents running around with 45 nm CPUs with bigger cache and faster clocks. I suppose its all for show:p

All of them having a 125W stamp doesn't mean they'll all run at the same temps. FX62 is barely past PE 965 levels. Each subsequent release will be even hotter, and with AMD's 65 nm so great, they plan on releasing 3.2 on 90 nm a quarter before Altair.
http://techreport.com/onearticle.x/10091
"The power and cooling requirements are too great, they say, for DIYers to handle."
Even with your theoretical 15W, 80W/90W is still better than 125W.
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article169-page3.html
They seem to measure 10% more for Intel's max.

http://www.nickfire.com/photo/digitallife/digitallife%20119.jpg
Perhaps not HD because they are low resolution and blurry:)
Which picture[link please] are you referring to? If the one during Digital Life had to run Classic, 100% CPU, and running 2 game demos, 2 grainy videos, and an encoding, how would it be possible for them to run what HotHardware ran?

World's best is an exaggeration but at least there is some truth to that;) Quadfather is not the father of x86, not the father of multi core, really not the father of anything. So if they go total BS on that one, how are any of us supposed to believe that megatasking is any better than Kentsfield?

Anonymous said...

Is it safe to say that a high clocked Intel CPU would cream a low end AMD CPU in 'memory intensive' situations, in supposedly memory intensive apps like DivX, Vegas, 3ds Max? I didn't say higher clocks and cache would increase bandwidth, but that those gains would overcome the memory insufficiency.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/09/10/four_cores_on_the_rampage/page14.html#editors_opinion
http://voodoopc.blogspot.com/2006/10/intel-kentsfield-general-observations.html
There's some on Kentsfield multi tasking. If Intel has been meek on Kentsfield, AMD must be ultra meek to relegate its public debut to Digital Lie.

Scientia from AMDZone said...

If you have excess inventory, though you'll be stuck with it, at least you'll have a better chance to supply future sales.

Not really. If your chips are not in demand now then why would they be in demand in the future when they will be more outdated?

If you don't have enough, you'll not be able do supply demand and not be able to make up those sales, and cause others to defect

I guess by this logic Intel would never sell more C2D's than what they offered in the first quarter.

AMD is more dependent on their CPU business,

Where did you get this idea from? Actually, now that AMD has ATI, they should have almost exactly the same ratio as Intel. CPU's are most of Intel's business.

Intel is still barely behind overall gross margin with its other products as well as providing dividends.

As I've already said, trying to justify low margins with diversification is a false argument because Intel had the same diversification when it was at 61% margin. Also, I never go by dividends. Don't waste my time with them. I go by gross revenues and gross margin and then look at money spent on R&D, capitalization, and cash available.

Anonymous said...

Seasonalities and price war should initiate demand for those durned Netburts;)

Huh? How did you conclude that? Intel will never be able to take back AMD's gain during its shortage but it is able to sell more in the future. Just like these rumors that Dell is sucking AMD dry and leaving Intel to sell tons that AMD won't be able to get back.

Yep, CPUs are most of Intel's business..But what else does AMD do in significant volume besides CPUs? AMD+ATI=even lower margins?

For a person that preaches mannerism, you're quite nice telling me to not waste your time, being baffled at my analysis, and telling others to try and use common sense when they were simply commenting;)

Do you not think it's weird that for a powerpoint, the best pic they could find was blurry, blank trailer, etc?

Intel has previewed Kentsfield at IDF Spring, shown numbers during IDF Fall, leak samples everywhere. AMD has shown 4x4 to folks behind closed doors and non formally debut it at Digital Life.

Anonymous said...

If the data wasn't being fed fast enough..Then Kentsfield wouldn't have 60%+ gains.

Anonymous said...

At the end of Q2, Intel had 'a quarter's worth of sales'. At the end of Q3, they reduced CPU inventory to 'less than one quarter's worth of sales' and expecting that to diminish into Q4. Those old chips will probably be at extremely low price points or perhaps be sold out by the time Pentium E and Celeron D 400 come.

Well, if Kentsfield is bottlenecked, then shouldn't it not show gains after a certain clock? We see from THG's preview that apps and benches scale with the clock.

AMD's higher margins+ATI's lower margins=lower margins for DAAMIT.

That baffled comment was for Scientia:) He's asking me to not waste his time because I'm confused between semantics such as 3 years and never:)

Ok, with the power of 4x4, why did they pick a pic with an empty window to put in the power point? And why did the 4x4 system need to scale down to Classic from Luna?

We know a lot about Kentsfield..Not much about 4x4[still no official specs and benches]. I wouldn't call that good;)

AMD is better at the low end, but it can't supply them all.. Yes, system integrators hate them so much that it resulted in less CPU inventory as opposed to Q2 and they're forecasting less inventory in Q4:)

High Power Rocketry said...

: )