AMD plans 12-core processor for early 2010

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David Flynn23 April 2009, 7:09 PM

AMD’s ambitious roadmap stretches from the six-core ‘Istanbul’ due for a June launch to a 12-core superslab for servers and workstations by next year.


Here’s yet another sign that we’ve swapped the megahertz wars for the core wars. AMD wants to double its already ambitious core count from six to 12 on server and workstation processors within the next 12 months.

During this week’s earnings announcement the company revealed that it had not only brought forward the release of its six-core Istanbul processor to June, but wanted to ship eight-core and 12-core processors by early next year.

However this 12-core beast, known by the oddball codename of “Magny-Cours”, will be built by strapping together a pair of six-core Instanbul chips. The following year AMD expects to shift from a 45nm to 32nm process.

On the mobile side of the fence, AMD recommitted to its strategy to chase the potentially explosive market for ‘thin and light’ consumer notebooks.

CEO Dirk Meyer said that the company’s Yukon ‘ultrathin notebook’ platform – which aims to partner budget-priced silicon with ATI graphics sufficient for 1080p HD video and low-impact ‘casual gaming’ – would move to dual-core by the middle of this year.

The double-barrel chip, dubbed Congo, would be offered to notebook manufacturers alongside the single-core Neo.

This sets AMD on a collision course against Intel’s release of its ‘Ultra’ processor, which has the exact same market in its sights. The processor, and several ‘thin and light’ Ultra-class notebooks from leading brands including Asus and HP are tipped for the spotlight at Taiwan’s Computex trade show in the first week of June.


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petert (Senior member):

What's the point of adding more and more cores until the underlying OS (ie Windows!) and associated applications can properly thread and use them?

23 April 2009, 7:34 PM (11 months ago)report abuse Send to a friend reply

Jarrod Spiga (User):

What do you mean? Windows supports multi-core systems and has done so for years. As far as applications go, do you really need Word or Firefox utilising more than one core? Why add complexity to an application when it's not needed? Take note of the context - these processors are aimed at workstations and servers, not your run of the mill desktop.

For me professionally, having large numbers of cores on a single socket is great news, especially for the transcode farms that I manage at work. We already use quad-socket, hex-core servers in order to maximise the number of simultaneous processing that can occur, to minimise licensing costs and transcode time. We'd take a six-core 2.4GHz CPU over a quad-core 3.0GHz model any day.

And as far as Magny-cours being an oddball name, it's not really that different to codenames used in the past. Magny-cours is a town in central France, most famously known for the Circuit de Nevers Magny-Cours, the racetrack that host hosted the French Formula One Grand Prix from 1991 until last year.

23 April 2009, 9:10 PM (11 months ago)report abuse Send to a friend reply

djsflynn (APC staff):

Quoting Jarrod Spiga:
Magny-cours is a town in central France, most famously known for the Circuit de Nevers Magny-Cours, the racetrack that host hosted the French Formula One Grand Prix from 1991 until last year.

Ah, of course - that's in keeping with the other processor codenames being after F1 tracks - thanks Jarrod!



24 April 2009, 12:46 AM (11 months ago)report abuse Send to a friend reply

Raindog (Senior Forumologist):

The upcoming AMD Albert-Park CPU series comes with a detailed environmental impact statement.
The Albert Park core optimises its operation and energy consumption by delaying processing of key instructions until twilight.

24 April 2009, 9:57 AM (11 months ago)report abuse Send to a friend reply

djsflynn (APC staff):

LOL! In fact, some F1-following friends of mine say the races have in recent years become quiet a bit boring, so maybe the new chips are designed to spend most of their time in a low-power snooze mode...

24 April 2009, 12:59 PM (11 months ago)report abuse Send to a friend reply

The Big Baboo (User):

Quoting Raindog:
The upcoming AMD Albert-Park CPU series comes with a detailed environmental impact statement. The Albert Park core optimises its operation and energy consumption by delaying processing of key instructions until twilight.

Core Blimey :) At's a bit of a mouthful in't it guvna ;)





25 April 2009, 11:56 AM (11 months ago)report abuse Send to a friend reply

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