AMD8000 chipsets best for Opterons

Just read a review of the AMD, VIA, and nVidia
chipsets for the Opteron and Athlon FX-51 on
Gamespy. The conclusion was that the AMD
chipset was the best but that the drawback was
that it was the most expensive of the three.

People have been knocking AMD chipsets due
to the memory of the old AMD750 and
AMD760 single processor chipsets but really,
the criticism is unjustified today. AMD8000 is
really the best chipset for AMD's 64-bit
processors. Only the AMD8000 uses
HyperTransport not only for CPU to chipset
but also inter-chip communications within the
chipset. VIA, for example, chose to recycle
their V-Link interconnect instead.

Just read a review of the AMD, VIA, and nVidia
chipsets for the Opteron and Athlon FX-51 on
Gamespy. The conclusion was that the AMD
chipset was the best but that the drawback was
that it was the most expensive of the three.

Hopefully this is true.. I think one of the great fallbacks from their
processors has been the fact that you had to use another mfgr's chipset.
It's nice for the option to be there but at the end of the day the best
person to build the chipset will be the processor mfgr.

AMD always releases the first chipset for a new cpu but does nothing
afterwards relying on third party from there on out. As we will notice in
upcoming bench's and new chipset releases amd's chipset will start to fall
behind in performance. I beleive they release the first one in order to have
a working platform then leave it to third party, beleive it saves them alot
of money really and is the main reason.



Neil


"rstlne" .@. wrote in message
...
Just read a review of the AMD, VIA, and nVidia
chipsets for the Opteron and Athlon FX-51 on
Gamespy. The conclusion was that the AMD
chipset was the best but that the drawback was
that it was the most expensive of the three.

Hopefully this is true.. I think one of the great fallbacks from their
processors has been the fact that you had to use another mfgr's chipset.
It's nice for the option to be there but at the end of the day the best
person to build the chipset will be the processor mfgr.

Ya beleive your right, don't believe they're setup to produce chipset...
Wish they would though be nice getting direct from amd instead of third
party.

Neil




"Ed" wrote in message
...
Also AMD doesn't FAB their own chipsets, they just design and test it at
their CA lab and have someone else FAB it, at least that's what I read
somewhere. ;p
Ed

On Mon, 06 Oct 2003 13:41:06 GMT, "Neil" wrote:

AMD always releases the first chipset for a new cpu but does nothing
afterwards relying on third party from there on out. As we will notice in
upcoming bench's and new chipset releases amd's chipset will start to
fall
behind in performance. I beleive they release the first one in order to
have
a working platform then leave it to third party, beleive it saves them
alot
of money really and is the main reason.



Neil


"rstlne" .@. wrote in message
...
Just read a review of the AMD, VIA, and nVidia
chipsets for the Opteron and Athlon FX-51 on
Gamespy. The conclusion was that the AMD
chipset was the best but that the drawback was
that it was the most expensive of the three.

Hopefully this is true.. I think one of the great fallbacks from their
processors has been the fact that you had to use another mfgr's
chipset.
It's nice for the option to be there but at the end of the day the best
person to build the chipset will be the processor mfgr.

"Neil" wrote:

AMD always releases the first chipset for a new cpu but does nothing
afterwards relying on third party from there on out. As we will notice in
upcoming bench's and new chipset releases amd's chipset will start to fall
behind in performance. I beleive they release the first one in order to have
a working platform then leave it to third party, beleive it saves them alot
of money really and is the main reason.

Hopefully, AMD will learn from their past mistake.

With Hammer, I have noticed AMD change in some ways.
Maybe it has to do with the fact that the Opteron aims
high, at the server market and other large scale applications
(even to the extent of being used in Cray's Redstorm
supercomputer).

AMD's high performance chipsets have always been
for their high end platform. For example, while the old
AMD750 and AMD760 chipsets for the Athlon were
lackluster compared to offerings from VIA and nVidia,
the AMD760MP/760MPX chipset for the Athlon MP
was initially a high performance chipset that in fact
compared favorably to Intel's Xeon chipsets. In a
review of the 1.2Ghz Athlon MP with AMD chipset,
the combination blew away the then top end Xeon
combination. Today, of course, the Xeon leads due
to newer chipset from Intel. AMD decided to focus
on Hammer instead which is reasonable.

The AMD8000 chipset is even more impressive
than the 760MPX when it was first released. You
will notice that for the first time, AMD's chipset
is superior to VIA and nVidia offerings at the
launch of the Athlon 64 and FX. Also, remember
that Opteron has been around for some time and
throughout that time, AMD8000 chipset based
systems lead.

AMD's integration of the memory controller onto
the CPU die also is another indication of AMD
taking control of something they used to be at
the mercy of third party chipsets for.

Maybe, just maybe, AMD will continue to improve
and market the AMD8000 as the high end AMD64
chipset.