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Another quarterly earnings report is out from AMD, along with the usual conference call and it seems all is going well over in camp AMD.

In a somewhat stark contrast to the recent Intel announcements, that 10nm is still some ways off and 7nm based CPUs have been delayed further, AMD are showing off how confident they are in their own tech. In their Q1 earnings report, AMD confirmed that RDNA 2 and Zen 3 on track for this year and they've pretty much just reiterated that for the Q2 report that went up on July 28. During the Q2 report, AMD CEO Lisa Su said:

While there continues to be some macroeconomic uncertainty and pockets of demand softness, our product portfolio is very strong, and our markets are resilient. We are on track to deliver strong growth in the second half of the year driven by our current product portfolio and initial shipments of our next-generation Zen 3 CPUs and RDNA 2 GPUs that are on track to launch in late 2020.

Zen 4 was also mentioned, although only very briefly on that they're 'in development' on it.

You can see the AMD revenue report here, and the conference call here which remains up for ~12 months.

As for what's next for AMD? They previously confirmed that we'll be seeing Zen 4 CPUs and RDNA 3 GPUs before 2022 so there's a huge amount of hardware coming up in the next few years to be excited about.

In related AMD news, a System76 engineer is currently porting over coreboot to newer Zen CPUs and Valve has contracted another developer to work on open source AMD GPU drivers.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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19 comments

dpanter Jul 29, 2020
Blood, meet bath.
Duke Takeshi Jul 29, 2020
Can't buy an AMD GPU as I'm doing machine learning and Nvidia cards are much better at that. So I'm waiting for the new Nvidia GPU series. For CPUs it's getting more interesting. I want to buy a complete new PC setup and since I guess a lot of gamers will upgrade their PCs for Cyberpunk 2077, I'd like to buy stuff sooner rather than later, but I think I will at least wait for the Zen 3 CPUs to release (and buy all the other stuff like mainboard, RAM etc. soon).


Last edited by Duke Takeshi on 29 July 2020 at 12:37 pm UTC
melkemind Jul 29, 2020
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I've been using Nvidia GPUs for over a decade, but I'm strongly considering a switch after this new release. Hopefully, they'll be powerful and well-supported.
Mohandevir Jul 29, 2020
since I guess a lot of gamers will upgrade their PCs for Cyberpunk 2077
requirements on Cyberpunk 2077 are pure speculation of gaming news sites, if the game will run on PS 4, not sure what they are basing those guesses on. Maybe because Witcher 3 at it's release was a very demanding game? not sure it will be the same this time, now games tend to be more flexible allowing you to downgrade the details to be able to run on not so powerful hardware.
PS4 will still be very relevant because now that PS5 is coming the trend is that PS4 will be very cheap, and when that happens probably it will be the most owned platform on the world.

PC requirements --> 4k, RTX.

They tend to forget that there is a world beside that and they think you are "unworthy" if you don't abide by those guidelines.

1080p, no RTX. That's my target. If the game supports this (which should be the case), I expect the requirements will be much lower... Just my two cents.


Last edited by Mohandevir on 29 July 2020 at 2:43 pm UTC
Linuxwarper Jul 29, 2020
RX 5700 XT prices is lousy. They were planning to sell it for $450 but slashed it to $400 before launch. It should cost $350 or less. Let's hope Intel can disturb the balance in GPU market like AMD has with Zen for CPUs.
Shmerl Jul 29, 2020
Can't buy an AMD GPU as I'm doing machine learning and Nvidia cards are much better at that.

They are not better, but Nvidia locked many AI libraries into using CUDA instead of portable APIs like Vulkan or OpenCL. So these libraries make it look like it's "better" because they simply don't work with anything but Nvidia.

That's why CUDA is so disgusting.


Last edited by Shmerl on 29 July 2020 at 4:08 pm UTC
logge Jul 29, 2020
I've been using Nvidia GPUs for over a decade, but I'm strongly considering a switch after this new release. Hopefully, they'll be powerful and well-supported.
Exactly doing that, too. Just my Nvidia experience goes back right after dual voodoo 2


Last edited by logge on 29 July 2020 at 4:54 pm UTC
CFWhitman Jul 29, 2020
I'm looking to upgrade my GPU from a Vega 56 when the RDNA2 cards come out. We'll see how practical it is at the time.
appetrosyan Jul 29, 2020
Can't buy an AMD GPU as I'm doing machine learning and Nvidia cards are much better at that. So I'm waiting for the new Nvidia GPU series. For CPUs it's getting more interesting.

You mean, “don’t have CUDA”?
Guerrilla Jul 30, 2020
I'm really looking forward to these new graphics cards. Hopefully between big Navi and Ampere, we'll get some reasonable prices.

Currently, price to performance is really skewed and no currently available cards are particularly interesting to me.
TheRiddick Jul 30, 2020
I really want a AMD GPU but they will need to basically COPY PASTE RTX/NGX features and match or beat 30 series in those areas for me to notice them.

Allot of people think RTX and NGX is nonsense-ware but a rude awakening is going to hit them hard in 2021 and 2022! (maybe even late 2020).

The primary thing that NVIDIA does that completely annoys me to no end is their inability to release driver support for Wayland!


Last edited by TheRiddick on 30 July 2020 at 5:02 am UTC
Breeze Jul 30, 2020
Lisa Su keeps saying 7nm is tight, sounds like reasonable availability may be well into 2021.
Mohandevir Jul 30, 2020
Allot of people think RTX and NGX is nonsense-ware but a rude awakening is going to hit them hard in 2021 and 2022! (maybe even late 2020).

I never said RTX won't become mainstream, but if it requires à 450$+ GPU, I'm bailing out. For me, flashy graphics is a nice to have, but should not be a necessity. Many AAA studios bet on the biggest and greatest graphics, but put much less effort in content and gameplay. I'll get into RTX, when it will be available for entry level gaming GPU, not before that. That's probably why AMD said it wasn't ready for Prime time and it's not all games that will use it, not for a couple of years still.

BTW...

https://www.notebookcheck.net/More-evidence-points-towards-AMD-s-RDNA2-Big-Navi-superiority-over-Nvidia-s-high-end-Ampere-RTX-3000-GPUs.482368.0.html

On AMD's RTX version (Radeon Rays):
https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Radeon-Rays-4.0-Released

Obviously, performances are still to be proven, but RTX is on the way to RDNA2 and if it's still to be believed:

"In November 2018, David Wang, AMD’s senior vice president of engineering at the Radeon Technologies Group, told 4Gamer, “Utilization of ray tracing games will not proceed unless we can offer ray tracing in all product ranges from low end to high end.”"

... We might end up with a Radeon Rays RDNA 2 sub 300$ AMD GPU before long.

Source:
https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/what-amd-plans-ray-tracing/

In the meanwhile, believe me, I'll turn off RTX without a second tought, if it's possible (if it ever shows up on non supported gpus).


Last edited by Mohandevir on 30 July 2020 at 2:37 pm UTC
Linuxwarper Jul 30, 2020
I really want a AMD GPU but they will need to basically COPY PASTE RTX/NGX features and match or beat 30 series in those areas for me to notice them.
Question for RDNA 2 isn't whether they can provide compelling features like DLSS and RTX, but if RDNA 2 will be supported with new features that come in 2021 or for RDNA3.

Imagine buying a RDNA2 card, which is 20%+ cheaper than Ampere equivalent) and in early 2021 you get RTX and AI upscaling or some other magical feature? That would be a big win.


Last edited by Linuxwarper on 30 July 2020 at 2:42 pm UTC
Mohandevir Jul 30, 2020
Since I began using Linux, I had a Radeon HD 6470, an Nvidia GT240, Nvidia GTX650, Nvidia GTX750ti, NVidia GTX960 and now GTX1660 Super... When will Nvidia offer a tearfree/stuttering free experience, ootb? In my personnal experience, it's always hit & miss between driver releases and between config setups. There is no "one size fits all" solution. I always have to tweak here and there depending on the game I play.

Oh yeah... There is GSync that I was able to test on a GTX980m gsync laptop... Awesome, but does it means that I will have to change all my desktop monitors/GPUs because Nvidia can't seem to propose a good driver? Selling gimmicks again?

Between my GTX960 and GTX1660 Super, I briefly had an MSI Armor RX 580... It's been the best experience, all round, driver and performance wise, but did that thing was heating/noisy?! The cooling system failed after 6 months.

It made me mistrustful of AMD GPUs, but I was convinced, by more experienced GoL AMD users, to give Sapphire a shot... I'm looking forward to a Sapphire Pulse RDNA2 GPU, atm... Probably what will replace the actual RX 5600 XT.


Last edited by Mohandevir on 30 July 2020 at 3:17 pm UTC
tuubi Jul 30, 2020
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Between my GTX960 and GTX1660 Super, I briefly had an MSI Armor RX 580... It's been the best experience, all round, driver and performance wise, but did that thing was heating/noisy?! The cooling system failed after 6 months.

It made me mistrustful of AMD GPUs, but I was convinced, by more experienced GoL AMD users, to give Sapphire a shot... I'm looking forward to a Sapphire Pulse RDNA2 GPU, atm... Probably what will replace the actual RX 5600 XT.
The MSI Armor RX 580 OC was the noisiest GPU I've ever owned, and one of the fans died after less than a year of use. I swear I'll never trust MSI again.

My current Sapphire Pulse RX 5700 XT is nice and quiet.


Last edited by tuubi on 30 July 2020 at 3:34 pm UTC
Mohandevir Jul 30, 2020
Between my GTX960 and GTX1660 Super, I briefly had an MSI Armor RX 580... It's been the best experience, all round, driver and performance wise, but did that thing was heating/noisy?! The cooling system failed after 6 months.

It made me mistrustful of AMD GPUs, but I was convinced, by more experienced GoL AMD users, to give Sapphire a shot... I'm looking forward to a Sapphire Pulse RDNA2 GPU, atm... Probably what will replace the actual RX 5600 XT.
The MSI Armor RX 580 OC was the noisiest GPU I've ever owned, and one of the fans died after less than a year of use. I swear I'll never trust MSI again.

My current Sapphire Pulse RX 5700 XT is nice and quiet.

You comfirm what I was told by Shmerl.

It seems there are brands specialized in Nvidia and brands specialized in AMD... From what I get, MSI is in the Nvidia camp.


Last edited by Mohandevir on 30 July 2020 at 3:43 pm UTC
Shmerl Jul 30, 2020
It seems there are brands specialized in Nvidia and brands specialized in AMD... From what I get, MSI is in the Nvidia camp.

Yes, Sapphire is the primary AMD partner.
Aeder Jul 31, 2020
Can't buy an AMD GPU as I'm doing machine learning and Nvidia cards are much better at that. So I'm waiting for the new Nvidia GPU series. For CPUs it's getting more interesting. I want to buy a complete new PC setup and since I guess a lot of gamers will upgrade their PCs for Cyberpunk 2077, I'd like to buy stuff sooner rather than later, but I think I will at least wait for the Zen 3 CPUs to release (and buy all the other stuff like mainboard, RAM etc. soon).

Yes, this is very annoying. Their whole ROCm stack for machine learning and GPU Computing is not intuitive at all, and still suffers from a lot of issues. It's painful to install (it also installs to the /opt/ folder even when using the package manager), you get no guarantees it will work on anything that isn't the exact distro they want, it's only partially open source (apparently), it's not compatible with all their GPUs that have compute (because they prioritize the needs of specific customers), there's little documentation on how to get it to work (and it doesn't seem to be up to date), and most tools don't support it directly.

I wanted to use it to accelerate one of my machine learning projects and I just couldn't get it to work at all.

I just don't get how they expect it to ever be successful if it's this annoying to get it to work. A tool devs can't play with beforehand is a tool no one will use.

And even if people point out that NVIDIA's stack isn't exactly easy to use, if I have to choose between the user hostile but well supported stack and the user hostile AND poorly supported stack, then it's kind of an easy choice.


Last edited by Aeder on 31 July 2020 at 5:35 pm UTC
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