True. Another problem is that if they wait until the market is mature, it may well be all divvied up, with no piece of the pie left for AMD to take.
Yes, but that is kind of how Apple does it as well. They wait until the market is ripe and then enter with a product that has a different twist and creates a new niche in an existing market. The difference is that Apple always has a style and innovation that the others lack.
"When Quinn the Eskimo gets here, all the pigeons gonna run to him. "
AMD may have not been doing veyr well in the recent years, but, they made the first real quad-core proccessor, and were ahead for years with there athlon's until core duo came out, its certainly not going as well as it is now anymore, but saying that it just waits for other companies to make products is just silly...
October, 1994- AMD makes its K5, its 30% faster then intels current pentiums
march, 1998- AMD had arpox 47% of market, Intel 42
october 1998-first details in AMD of HyperTransport, a replacement for the PCI bus
AMD certainly had not been ahead of inel a lot, but they did have there times when it has been ahead and better than intel
i would advise researching a company before slamming them
OK Sherman (thought Prof Peabody would enjoy the B&R reference) - let's hop in the wayback machine - AMD was the core development team initially for Intel before spinning off to become AMD and becoming embroiled in IP suits with Intel as they tried to sort out who owned what designs and addressing some of the market tricks Intel was using against them. AMD has been advanced in their design work but horrible in combating Intel's influence and dirty tricks. They don't have the wherewithal to build new fab floors like Intel can to move chip design from drawing board to fabrication as quickly. Success is not just coming up with good ideas or advanced technology, but being able to market it successfully too. You can't just laud them for good chip designs and ignore the rest of the equation. Yeah Intel played dirty with them, but you either deal with it or knuckle under. SUccess is going from the bottom of the pile to a position generally acknowledged as the "top", whether its profitability, marketshare or whatever.
Tablets like the iPad or Galaxy Tab WILL eat into netbook and notebook sales, but only by a certain portion. It won't overtake netbooks and notebooks because there's still a genuine need for a notebook over an ipad in many different situations.
Imagine if all can openers were right-handed, then a company released left-handed can openers. Well at first, the left-handed can openers may seem as though they are overtaking the right-handed ones, but the reality is, it's not going to overtake them, just take the people away who need them.
People who buy an ipad buy one to do the basic essentials that an ipad does. Prior to the ipad they had to buy a netbook or notebook. Had the ipad always been around, the netbook and notebook market would not have done so well because there would have been that option for people who were looking for it.
This idea that the ipad will end netbooks at least is absolutely inane.
AMD may have not been doing veyr well in the recent years, but, they made the first real quad-core proccessor, and were ahead for years with there athlon's until core duo came out, its certainly not going as well as it is now anymore, but saying that it just waits for other companies to make products is just silly...
October, 1994- AMD makes its K5, its 30% faster then intels current pentiums
march, 1998- AMD had arpox 47% of market, Intel 42
october 1998-first details in AMD of HyperTransport, a replacement for the PCI bus
AMD certainly had not been ahead of inel a lot, but they did have there times when it has been ahead and better than intel
i would advise researching a company before slamming them
Yeah, I remember when AMD seemed like the ONLY choice for gamers because the difference between their cpu's and intels in games was so vast.
I don't think they'll be going away for a long while.
It is sort of a chicken/egg situation. CPU chip makers can't design a good mobile chip because they can't optimize it for any particular OS and an OS developer like MS can't design a good OS for mobile because they don't know what hardware it is going to run on.
That is why Apple's mobile devices are so seamlessly efficient. They optimize both hardware and software to only coexist with each other and no other configuration matters. In mobile, it is such a delicate balance due to the battery usage, heat and weight considerations that without extreme optimization it wouldn't have that magical quality that Apple does so well.
People who are really serious about software should make their own hardware. - Alan Kay
So we have Apple shifting the paradigm (again), and not just in form factor but in processing technology. Mobile chip technology was not advancing quickly until iOS was introduced and Android followed up with its drive for ad-revenue-producing marketshare. x86 was the benchmark standard for everything from towers to netbooks and tablets - in spite of the fact that netbooks demanded trade-offs in performance format and battery life for the consumer.
The key here for both AMD and Intel is to understand what the new paradigm is, and speak to it. You have the ARM architecture which is now effectively the standard for mobile computing, and against which new apps are built to run. Much more spartan but still carrying a decent load of features and power for the consumer.
This is where Apple is interesting in their approach, and why this is not anything like Apple vs. Microsoft. They are building platforms based on targeted user experience - which is resonating deeply with consumers. Where the handheld makers are just busy trying to come out with competing devices, and Android is just trying to build marketshare for ad-revenue for Google.
Gates wanted to dominate the PC market to simply dominate the market. He wanted to own the desktop and then the corporate computing space, thus establishing hardcore revenue streams that were reliable and profitable. The user experience only needed to be tolerable at best. Dell commoditized the hardware and delivery, HP drove peripherals on top of building boxes, and so on, all wrapped around x86.
Google is leveraging Android to drive marketshare also, but to establish Google's ad-revenue beachhead in the mobile space, because they have saturated the PC space already. There was nowhere to grow revenue. Again, Google only wants tolerable user experience, so Android handhelds sell nicely, at least until they can roll out ChromeOS on ultraportable devices. The effect is similar, but the drivers very different. Microsoft drove direct revenue, Google is driving secondary revenue.
What does this mean for Intel and AMD? Their focus has been largely (not exclusively however) on the x86 architectural standard, which provides the classic computing platform power and features, but requires a much higher power use overhead. They literally have to re-think their approach and deliver an ARM-style standard chip platform to compete in the ultramobile device segment which offers a lot more volume for their chips than the PC market does.
The PC market is only growing currently because developing countries are slowly growing economies that will support consumer PC purchases. And while these markets are very large in some cases - the writing is on the wall for PC makers. Once that market saturates (like it did here in the US), they need to differentiate or diversify. The next most popular segment with be ultramobile devices like the iPad. They have build to that segment or risk losing share and viability.
After netbooks were introduced there was a demand for more and more power. Eventually the top-end netbooks became almost indistinguishable from notebooks. I think the same will happen with tablets. When it does x86 will become more viable.
Whether AMD can take advantage of the trend is a whole different trend...
I suspect he is right on the money with respect to hardware or out of the plant costs. It will be interesting to see Apples earnings numbers for the quarter, but even with the massive expansion in iPad production I expect them to be very profitable.
Quote:
Um, what?? The iPad is at a super-low price point, which is one of the reasons it has taken off so quickly.
No not really because you are basically getting cell phone electronics for a very high price. Another way to look at this is to consider the price of the iPod Touch which is supplied with the same basic electronics.
Beyound that we have had Apple excutives state that they have pricing flexibility should the markets demand it. That is a clear indication that they are maintaining very stiff margians on the device. Probably pretty stiff even for Apple.
Then you have the boys at iSupply and their estimates of cost which I see as being some what high. Considering that the A4 is in mass production for use on several products and other common chips in Apples hardware they are likely getting the best volume discounts in the industry. ISupply could very well be high in their estimates.
If you don't buy any of those points pop open an iPad and a similarly priced netbook or notebook. Look at the differences in hardware which are pretty significant.
Frankly I'm surprised that this excutive would let this dirty little secret of Apples out of the bag. Further I'm surprised that you would question his comments as he is in a position to know about costs. I'm not surprised at all because I know at least a little about pricing in the industry but this guy knows a lot, in great detail. What is strange though is that you don't normally see excutives slipping up like this. Unless you are in direct competition with a company going on about anothers pricing is generally taboo. It could very well be that iPads success has impacted their ability to get design ins for their new Bobcat based Fusion processors. I hope not as Bobcat is pretty cool but if true it would indicate a major market shift.
In a nut shell, yes the iPad costs a lot and the pricing gets worst as the machine is fleshed out. Don't forget the incremental costs in flash and 3G hardware that are extremely high. Apple has to be laughing all the way to the bank.
After netbooks were introduced there was a demand for more and more power. Eventually the top-end netbooks became almost indistinguishable from notebooks. I think the same will happen with tablets. When it does x86 will become more viable.
Became? Maybe you should check the chronometer before posting because as of 2010 this has not happened. Atom CPUs are considerably slower than CPUs found across notebooks from years ago, and that is before we even consider the newer Core-i chips that are on the market.
After netbooks were introduced there was a demand for more and more power. Eventually the top-end netbooks became almost indistinguishable from notebooks. I think the same will happen with tablets. When it does x86 will become more viable.
Whether AMD can take advantage of the trend is a whole different trend...
The major problem with netbooks was the switch to Windows on hardware that was barely powerful enough to give a good experience with an optimized netbook spin of Linux. So they really had no choice but to up CPU performance to run Windows in acceptable manner.
Microsoft was successful with their Windows push onto netbook hardware because the hardware companies didn't want to put the effort and support into a viable netbook spin. Contrast this to Apple who went all in with an entirely new approach to tablets. Apple was able to keep the user experience bearable even on a very low end processor while MS forced the hardware makers to more powerful netbooks just to keep Windows viable.
I have a hard time believing x86 will ever be a better choice on a performance per watt basis. It use to be that the x86 world was a couple of process nodes ahead of the rest of the industry but even then ARM was more power efficient. Now with all the focus on ARM the X86 process advantage is gone. In some cases ARM processors are taping out first on the leading nodes.
X86 big advantage is really its 64 bit nature. At the rate we are going ARM devices will run out of address space fairly quickly. Instruction set compatibility is out the window as these device are running new OS'es. About the only way I could see x86 success is if one of the two big players punted and decided to drop backwards compatibility. That means removal of legacy hardware to support instructions no longer needed with the idea to shrink the core significantly. In a literal sense strip the core of all unneeded hardware. That would include old addressing modes, memory management support, x87 and some of the old vector instructions. In the end you would have a 64 bit optimized x86 chip. It is a major refactoring of the family but we really don't need the legacy modes any more.
Became? Maybe you should check the chronometer before posting because as of 2010 this has not happened. Atom CPUs are considerably slower than CPUs found across notebooks from years ago, and that is before we even consider the newer Core-i chips that are on the market.
Many netbooks have become Mini notebooks because they gave up on ATOM, switching to any number of Intel chips. In a way his post was very perceptive.
Many netbooks have become Mini notebooks because they gave up on ATOM, switching to any number of Intel chips. In a way his post was very perceptive.
Maybe I did misread his post. It happens.
Personally, I wouldn?t call them netbooks for that very reason. Nor would I call a notebook with a full-sized keyboard a mini-notebook. I draw the line for each at those distinct points.
Tablets like the iPad or Galaxy Tab WILL eat into netbook and notebook sales, but only by a certain portion. It won't overtake netbooks and notebooks because there's still a genuine need for a notebook over an ipad in many different situations.
Imagine if all can openers were right-handed, then a company released left-handed can openers. Well at first, the left-handed can openers may seem as though they are overtaking the right-handed ones, but the reality is, it's not going to overtake them, just take the people away who need them.
People who buy an ipad buy one to do the basic essentials that an ipad does. Prior to the ipad they had to buy a netbook or notebook. Had the ipad always been around, the netbook and notebook market would not have done so well because there would have been that option for people who were looking for it.
This idea that the ipad will end netbooks at least is absolutely inane.
Look at it a little differently:
-- iOS is getting more robust as we speak, as is Android
-- iOS has largely completed the transition to the larger form factor
-- I am not sure if Android will make the transition, or will be replaced,
-- In any case we will likely have 3 (possibly 4) robust ARM OSes
-- Much of what Tablets and Netbooks do will be done on the the cloud or WiFi LAN
-- At some point the tablet will reach parity with the netbook in terms of price and work that can realistically be accomplished.
The question is when?
For some uses and users that has already happened.
When do you think an ARM tablet and ARM OS will be robust enough displace the vast majority of netbooks?
Asked another way:
1) how many apps do you use on the netbook that don't/won't have a tablet (or tablet/cloud or tablet/WiFi LAN) equivalent?
2) when will that happen?
It is following example is certainly not perfect-- but it's damn close.
You can be almost anywhere in the world.
1) Pick your speed
-- If within WiFi range use that (Home LAN, Office, Campus, City Center, HotSpot, etc.)
-- If not use cell!
-- if neither use locally stored docs & apps only.
2) Pick your compute power
-- cloud server
-- VNC to your home/institution/business computer
-- the mobile tablet device only
3) Pick your app
-- All the normal mobile apps (mail, calendar, browser, contacts, etc)
-- spreadsheet, wordprocessing, database
-- proprietary apps for special uses
I am sitting here (somewhere) with my iPad.
If I need some files I can access them:
-- locally on the device
-- WiFi or cell to my LAN
-- Cloud
-- WebDav server like iDisk
-- VNC to any PC permitting it.
So, I grab an .xls or .doc file from somewhere, manipulate it, modify it, and put it back *
If I want, I can create a preso with KeyNote, or a new wp or ss document -- even setup a new db -- grabbing images, music, videos, etc., as needed, from wherever I can connect.
Honestly, there are a few rough spots, such as: iPad Pages and Numbers apps don't support everything in their MS Office equivalents -- but, then, neither does MS Office for the Mac.
* As I type this, there is no iOS-provided way to wirelessly upload files to another computer or the cloud (other than email). However there are reasonable-priced apps that can do this. I suspect that this will be provided by iOS in the very near future-- along with the ability to navigate and share files among iOS apps.
Yes, I can't do Heavy CAD, Video Editing or PhotoShopping on the iPad -- but you can't do that on a netbook either. (Actually there are some pretty good apps for these on the iPad & more coming).
What I am trying to say is that at some point, the iPad becomes more usable [for many people] than a netbook or even a laptop.
For me that has already happened -- I have a 17" AluBook that hasn't been turned on since I got the iPad.
YMMV, but sooner, rather than later, the iPad or some follow-on tablet with a tablet OS, will be able to do what you want-- better, faster, easier (maybe even smoother than a netbook.
I think the tipping point will be sometime next year.
AMD is much smaller than Intel, they only have so many resources, and their resources are committed to other market segments for the near term. Nothing wrong with that ...
i wonder if AMD would have been more agile (to respond to market trends / forecasts) had they not purchased ATI.
Technically, you have to be of the same species to 'cannibalize' something. Cannibalism is about eating one of your own. (Uh, so I hear.)
I think the iPad is PacMan-ing netbook sales. You know: GobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGo bbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobb leGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobble
What AMD should have done is realized that they lost the battle for traditional CPU dominance. Cut back spending on this and reallocate to mobile (phones, tablets, etc). While they figure out their own proprietary mobile they could use some kind of bridging strategy like manufacturing ARM chips etc.
Now it's almost like they've waited too long for this. The mobile market is going to be dominated by Intel, Apple and Qualcomm. It's almost as though AMD needs to look yet another cycle ahead, but I don't think they can last that long.
Um, what?? The iPad is at a super-low price point, which is one of the reasons it has taken off so quickly.
He's talking about iPad's price point compared to notebooks, you can find notebooks that are similarly priced, for example on amazon you can find them from 550-900 bucks, well if your going to buy an iPad for that much money, are you really also going to buy a notebook that cost just as much money? Nope, because of iPad similar prices it's an "or" not an "and" decision.
i wonder if AMD would have been more agile (to respond to market trends / forecasts) had they not purchased ATI.
No they would not have survived if it wasn't for the ATi purchase. ATi had to happend or else AMD would have gone under, oem's weren't really buying AMD processors because they didn't include the total package: chipset, cpu, integrated graphics card. ATi gave them the chipset and integrated graphics. Also ATi is really the only thing making AMD money and so far they are doing very well with ATi 4000, 5000 series and with the release of 6000's and the soon to be released fusion the ATi purchase is really starting to pay off.
Technology moves ahead so fast in the microprocessor industry that success is determined primarily by your R&D. It is very hard to kick Intel off the top of that mountain because no one out-Rs and out-Ds them. The only time Intel fell behind AMD was when Intel made a strategic blunder with their product roadmap and had to backtrack and follow AMD's lead. But such an advantage is temporary because pretty soon the next generation of chip designs comes up and again its R&D that determines who wins. A strategy that depends on your competitors making strategic blunders is not a sustainable strategy.
The problem with what you are saying is that they made another strategic blunder RECENTLY in not buying nvidia and having no real option for an integrated cpu/gpu unit, because developing a gfx platform on x86 (larabbee) went nowhere.
Comments
True. Another problem is that if they wait until the market is mature, it may well be all divvied up, with no piece of the pie left for AMD to take.
Yes, but that is kind of how Apple does it as well. They wait until the market is ripe and then enter with a product that has a different twist and creates a new niche in an existing market. The difference is that Apple always has a style and innovation that the others lack.
"When Quinn the Eskimo gets here, all the pigeons gonna run to him. "
so, let me get this straight: notebook and netbook makes are mad because Apple is outselling them with a superior product.
"Analysts expect Apple to sell 11 million to 12 million iPads this year,..."
"Market researcher Gartner has trimmed its global forecasts for laptop shipments, but still expects a 26% increase to 214 million units this year. "
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...googlenews_wsj
11 or 12 Million is far less than 214 Million. I don't think that they are mad. Or, at least, not because they are being outsold by the iPad.
AMD may have not been doing veyr well in the recent years, but, they made the first real quad-core proccessor, and were ahead for years with there athlon's until core duo came out, its certainly not going as well as it is now anymore, but saying that it just waits for other companies to make products is just silly...
October, 1994- AMD makes its K5, its 30% faster then intels current pentiums
march, 1998- AMD had arpox 47% of market, Intel 42
october 1998-first details in AMD of HyperTransport, a replacement for the PCI bus
AMD certainly had not been ahead of inel a lot, but they did have there times when it has been ahead and better than intel
i would advise researching a company before slamming them
OK Sherman (thought Prof Peabody would enjoy the B&R reference) - let's hop in the wayback machine - AMD was the core development team initially for Intel before spinning off to become AMD and becoming embroiled in IP suits with Intel as they tried to sort out who owned what designs and addressing some of the market tricks Intel was using against them. AMD has been advanced in their design work but horrible in combating Intel's influence and dirty tricks. They don't have the wherewithal to build new fab floors like Intel can to move chip design from drawing board to fabrication as quickly. Success is not just coming up with good ideas or advanced technology, but being able to market it successfully too. You can't just laud them for good chip designs and ignore the rest of the equation. Yeah Intel played dirty with them, but you either deal with it or knuckle under. SUccess is going from the bottom of the pile to a position generally acknowledged as the "top", whether its profitability, marketshare or whatever.
Imagine if all can openers were right-handed, then a company released left-handed can openers. Well at first, the left-handed can openers may seem as though they are overtaking the right-handed ones, but the reality is, it's not going to overtake them, just take the people away who need them.
People who buy an ipad buy one to do the basic essentials that an ipad does. Prior to the ipad they had to buy a netbook or notebook. Had the ipad always been around, the netbook and notebook market would not have done so well because there would have been that option for people who were looking for it.
This idea that the ipad will end netbooks at least is absolutely inane.
AMD may have not been doing veyr well in the recent years, but, they made the first real quad-core proccessor, and were ahead for years with there athlon's until core duo came out, its certainly not going as well as it is now anymore, but saying that it just waits for other companies to make products is just silly...
October, 1994- AMD makes its K5, its 30% faster then intels current pentiums
march, 1998- AMD had arpox 47% of market, Intel 42
october 1998-first details in AMD of HyperTransport, a replacement for the PCI bus
AMD certainly had not been ahead of inel a lot, but they did have there times when it has been ahead and better than intel
i would advise researching a company before slamming them
Yeah, I remember when AMD seemed like the ONLY choice for gamers because the difference between their cpu's and intels in games was so vast.
I don't think they'll be going away for a long while.
It is sort of a chicken/egg situation. CPU chip makers can't design a good mobile chip because they can't optimize it for any particular OS and an OS developer like MS can't design a good OS for mobile because they don't know what hardware it is going to run on.
That is why Apple's mobile devices are so seamlessly efficient. They optimize both hardware and software to only coexist with each other and no other configuration matters. In mobile, it is such a delicate balance due to the battery usage, heat and weight considerations that without extreme optimization it wouldn't have that magical quality that Apple does so well.
People who are really serious about software should make their own hardware. - Alan Kay
talk at Creative Think seminar, 20 July 1982
The key here for both AMD and Intel is to understand what the new paradigm is, and speak to it. You have the ARM architecture which is now effectively the standard for mobile computing, and against which new apps are built to run. Much more spartan but still carrying a decent load of features and power for the consumer.
This is where Apple is interesting in their approach, and why this is not anything like Apple vs. Microsoft. They are building platforms based on targeted user experience - which is resonating deeply with consumers. Where the handheld makers are just busy trying to come out with competing devices, and Android is just trying to build marketshare for ad-revenue for Google.
Gates wanted to dominate the PC market to simply dominate the market. He wanted to own the desktop and then the corporate computing space, thus establishing hardcore revenue streams that were reliable and profitable. The user experience only needed to be tolerable at best. Dell commoditized the hardware and delivery, HP drove peripherals on top of building boxes, and so on, all wrapped around x86.
Google is leveraging Android to drive marketshare also, but to establish Google's ad-revenue beachhead in the mobile space, because they have saturated the PC space already. There was nowhere to grow revenue. Again, Google only wants tolerable user experience, so Android handhelds sell nicely, at least until they can roll out ChromeOS on ultraportable devices. The effect is similar, but the drivers very different. Microsoft drove direct revenue, Google is driving secondary revenue.
What does this mean for Intel and AMD? Their focus has been largely (not exclusively however) on the x86 architectural standard, which provides the classic computing platform power and features, but requires a much higher power use overhead. They literally have to re-think their approach and deliver an ARM-style standard chip platform to compete in the ultramobile device segment which offers a lot more volume for their chips than the PC market does.
The PC market is only growing currently because developing countries are slowly growing economies that will support consumer PC purchases. And while these markets are very large in some cases - the writing is on the wall for PC makers. Once that market saturates (like it did here in the US), they need to differentiate or diversify. The next most popular segment with be ultramobile devices like the iPad. They have build to that segment or risk losing share and viability.
Whether AMD can take advantage of the trend is a whole different trend...
"Pretty high price points"??
I suspect he is right on the money with respect to hardware or out of the plant costs. It will be interesting to see Apples earnings numbers for the quarter, but even with the massive expansion in iPad production I expect them to be very profitable.
Um, what?? The iPad is at a super-low price point, which is one of the reasons it has taken off so quickly.
No not really because you are basically getting cell phone electronics for a very high price. Another way to look at this is to consider the price of the iPod Touch which is supplied with the same basic electronics.
Beyound that we have had Apple excutives state that they have pricing flexibility should the markets demand it. That is a clear indication that they are maintaining very stiff margians on the device. Probably pretty stiff even for Apple.
Then you have the boys at iSupply and their estimates of cost which I see as being some what high. Considering that the A4 is in mass production for use on several products and other common chips in Apples hardware they are likely getting the best volume discounts in the industry. ISupply could very well be high in their estimates.
If you don't buy any of those points pop open an iPad and a similarly priced netbook or notebook. Look at the differences in hardware which are pretty significant.
Frankly I'm surprised that this excutive would let this dirty little secret of Apples out of the bag. Further I'm surprised that you would question his comments as he is in a position to know about costs. I'm not surprised at all because I know at least a little about pricing in the industry but this guy knows a lot, in great detail. What is strange though is that you don't normally see excutives slipping up like this. Unless you are in direct competition with a company going on about anothers pricing is generally taboo. It could very well be that iPads success has impacted their ability to get design ins for their new Bobcat based Fusion processors. I hope not as Bobcat is pretty cool but if true it would indicate a major market shift.
In a nut shell, yes the iPad costs a lot and the pricing gets worst as the machine is fleshed out. Don't forget the incremental costs in flash and 3G hardware that are extremely high. Apple has to be laughing all the way to the bank.
Dave
After netbooks were introduced there was a demand for more and more power. Eventually the top-end netbooks became almost indistinguishable from notebooks. I think the same will happen with tablets. When it does x86 will become more viable.
Became? Maybe you should check the chronometer before posting because as of 2010 this has not happened. Atom CPUs are considerably slower than CPUs found across notebooks from years ago, and that is before we even consider the newer Core-i chips that are on the market.
After netbooks were introduced there was a demand for more and more power. Eventually the top-end netbooks became almost indistinguishable from notebooks. I think the same will happen with tablets. When it does x86 will become more viable.
Whether AMD can take advantage of the trend is a whole different trend...
The major problem with netbooks was the switch to Windows on hardware that was barely powerful enough to give a good experience with an optimized netbook spin of Linux. So they really had no choice but to up CPU performance to run Windows in acceptable manner.
Microsoft was successful with their Windows push onto netbook hardware because the hardware companies didn't want to put the effort and support into a viable netbook spin. Contrast this to Apple who went all in with an entirely new approach to tablets. Apple was able to keep the user experience bearable even on a very low end processor while MS forced the hardware makers to more powerful netbooks just to keep Windows viable.
I have a hard time believing x86 will ever be a better choice on a performance per watt basis. It use to be that the x86 world was a couple of process nodes ahead of the rest of the industry but even then ARM was more power efficient. Now with all the focus on ARM the X86 process advantage is gone. In some cases ARM processors are taping out first on the leading nodes.
X86 big advantage is really its 64 bit nature. At the rate we are going ARM devices will run out of address space fairly quickly. Instruction set compatibility is out the window as these device are running new OS'es. About the only way I could see x86 success is if one of the two big players punted and decided to drop backwards compatibility. That means removal of legacy hardware to support instructions no longer needed with the idea to shrink the core significantly. In a literal sense strip the core of all unneeded hardware. That would include old addressing modes, memory management support, x87 and some of the old vector instructions. In the end you would have a 64 bit optimized x86 chip. It is a major refactoring of the family but we really don't need the legacy modes any more.
Dave
Became? Maybe you should check the chronometer before posting because as of 2010 this has not happened. Atom CPUs are considerably slower than CPUs found across notebooks from years ago, and that is before we even consider the newer Core-i chips that are on the market.
Many netbooks have become Mini notebooks because they gave up on ATOM, switching to any number of Intel chips. In a way his post was very perceptive.
Many netbooks have become Mini notebooks because they gave up on ATOM, switching to any number of Intel chips. In a way his post was very perceptive.
Maybe I did misread his post. It happens.
Personally, I wouldn?t call them netbooks for that very reason. Nor would I call a notebook with a full-sized keyboard a mini-notebook. I draw the line for each at those distinct points.
Tablets like the iPad or Galaxy Tab WILL eat into netbook and notebook sales, but only by a certain portion. It won't overtake netbooks and notebooks because there's still a genuine need for a notebook over an ipad in many different situations.
Imagine if all can openers were right-handed, then a company released left-handed can openers. Well at first, the left-handed can openers may seem as though they are overtaking the right-handed ones, but the reality is, it's not going to overtake them, just take the people away who need them.
People who buy an ipad buy one to do the basic essentials that an ipad does. Prior to the ipad they had to buy a netbook or notebook. Had the ipad always been around, the netbook and notebook market would not have done so well because there would have been that option for people who were looking for it.
This idea that the ipad will end netbooks at least is absolutely inane.
Look at it a little differently:
-- iOS is getting more robust as we speak, as is Android
-- iOS has largely completed the transition to the larger form factor
-- I am not sure if Android will make the transition, or will be replaced,
-- In any case we will likely have 3 (possibly 4) robust ARM OSes
-- Much of what Tablets and Netbooks do will be done on the the cloud or WiFi LAN
-- At some point the tablet will reach parity with the netbook in terms of price and work that can realistically be accomplished.
The question is when?
For some uses and users that has already happened.
When do you think an ARM tablet and ARM OS will be robust enough displace the vast majority of netbooks?
Asked another way:
1) how many apps do you use on the netbook that don't/won't have a tablet (or tablet/cloud or tablet/WiFi LAN) equivalent?
2) when will that happen?
It is following example is certainly not perfect-- but it's damn close.
You can be almost anywhere in the world.
1) Pick your speed
-- If within WiFi range use that (Home LAN, Office, Campus, City Center, HotSpot, etc.)
-- If not use cell!
-- if neither use locally stored docs & apps only.
2) Pick your compute power
-- cloud server
-- VNC to your home/institution/business computer
-- the mobile tablet device only
3) Pick your app
-- All the normal mobile apps (mail, calendar, browser, contacts, etc)
-- spreadsheet, wordprocessing, database
-- proprietary apps for special uses
I am sitting here (somewhere) with my iPad.
If I need some files I can access them:
-- locally on the device
-- WiFi or cell to my LAN
-- Cloud
-- WebDav server like iDisk
-- VNC to any PC permitting it.
So, I grab an .xls or .doc file from somewhere, manipulate it, modify it, and put it back *
If I want, I can create a preso with KeyNote, or a new wp or ss document -- even setup a new db -- grabbing images, music, videos, etc., as needed, from wherever I can connect.
Honestly, there are a few rough spots, such as: iPad Pages and Numbers apps don't support everything in their MS Office equivalents -- but, then, neither does MS Office for the Mac.
* As I type this, there is no iOS-provided way to wirelessly upload files to another computer or the cloud (other than email). However there are reasonable-priced apps that can do this. I suspect that this will be provided by iOS in the very near future-- along with the ability to navigate and share files among iOS apps.
Yes, I can't do Heavy CAD, Video Editing or PhotoShopping on the iPad -- but you can't do that on a netbook either. (Actually there are some pretty good apps for these on the iPad & more coming).
What I am trying to say is that at some point, the iPad becomes more usable [for many people] than a netbook or even a laptop.
For me that has already happened -- I have a 17" AluBook that hasn't been turned on since I got the iPad.
YMMV, but sooner, rather than later, the iPad or some follow-on tablet with a tablet OS, will be able to do what you want-- better, faster, easier (maybe even smoother than a netbook.
I think the tipping point will be sometime next year.
.
AMD is much smaller than Intel, they only have so many resources, and their resources are committed to other market segments for the near term. Nothing wrong with that ...
i wonder if AMD would have been more agile (to respond to market trends / forecasts) had they not purchased ATI.
I think the iPad is PacMan-ing netbook sales. You know: GobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGo bbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobb leGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobbleGobble
Now it's almost like they've waited too long for this. The mobile market is going to be dominated by Intel, Apple and Qualcomm. It's almost as though AMD needs to look yet another cycle ahead, but I don't think they can last that long.
"Pretty high price points"??
Um, what?? The iPad is at a super-low price point, which is one of the reasons it has taken off so quickly.
He's talking about iPad's price point compared to notebooks, you can find notebooks that are similarly priced, for example on amazon you can find them from 550-900 bucks, well if your going to buy an iPad for that much money, are you really also going to buy a notebook that cost just as much money? Nope, because of iPad similar prices it's an "or" not an "and" decision.
i wonder if AMD would have been more agile (to respond to market trends / forecasts) had they not purchased ATI.
No they would not have survived if it wasn't for the ATi purchase. ATi had to happend or else AMD would have gone under, oem's weren't really buying AMD processors because they didn't include the total package: chipset, cpu, integrated graphics card. ATi gave them the chipset and integrated graphics. Also ATi is really the only thing making AMD money and so far they are doing very well with ATi 4000, 5000 series and with the release of 6000's and the soon to be released fusion the ATi purchase is really starting to pay off.
Technology moves ahead so fast in the microprocessor industry that success is determined primarily by your R&D. It is very hard to kick Intel off the top of that mountain because no one out-Rs and out-Ds them. The only time Intel fell behind AMD was when Intel made a strategic blunder with their product roadmap and had to backtrack and follow AMD's lead. But such an advantage is temporary because pretty soon the next generation of chip designs comes up and again its R&D that determines who wins. A strategy that depends on your competitors making strategic blunders is not a sustainable strategy.
The problem with what you are saying is that they made another strategic blunder RECENTLY in not buying nvidia and having no real option for an integrated cpu/gpu unit, because developing a gfx platform on x86 (larabbee) went nowhere.