Mamba: Athlon And DRAM Get Together 76
scottnews writes: "Tom's Hardware has posted this story about a new chipset for the AMD Athlon processor with 8MB of embedded DRAM in the chipset for 9.6 GB/s of sustainable bandwidth." Thatsa spicy meatball.
Again?! (Score:1)
Mamba vs. on-CPU memory controllers (Score:1)
Anybody know why there was so much available space on the chip? Is it b/c the die size is set by the number of pins needed to connect?
Re:AMD incompatibilities (Score:1)
So in fact, it was actually nVidia's "fault" for putting out cards that were not up to the offical AGP standard spec. But then again, if you weren't so full of M$-FUD you'd know that.
As for the Knowledge Base article, it simply states;
Cause: Memory that is allocated by the video driver is being corrupted.
So, isn't that the Operating System's fault, since it is allowing memory that the driver has allocated to be corrupted? I think perhaps it is...
Re:This all sounds cool on paper, but.... (Score:2)
Trust me, these guys are very good at what they do.
Re:just imagine... (Score:1)
Because I said "on my desk", not "on the desk of somebody who can offord to pay $2500 for a machine".
These days I buy slightly behind the bleeding edge, and replace my machines more often. It works out cheaper and keeps my performance levels up better than buying bleeding edge every 5 years.
Re:just imagine... (Score:1)
Re:just imagine... (Score:2)
I like this trend. I expect to see a computer with gigabytes of ram on my desk in a few years.
This all sounds cool on paper, but.... (Score:4)
I hope they do well, and I hope this come to realization. I also hope that VIA and AMD can produce better chipsets (like the AMD760), so that there are no more drawbacks to using a great CPU.
--
"How many six year olds does it take to design software?"
Re:Dang, someone was using their noodle! (Score:3)
It is pretty common for large regular structures like cache's to have a little extra that can be used if some of the memory is bad. I don't know if that is the case here, but it may be. It is also possiable that they can just map out part of it (so there might be a 7M version).
Even if so it will cost extra. There is extra time on the tester, and tester time isn't cheap. Also if it is better (or though to be better) there will be more buyers which can result in a higher price...or in research and devlopment intensave products lower prices, so who knows :-)
I'm sure it took longer to design as well. So the 8M of RAM isn't free, but it should be a lot cheaper then it normally would be, or at least more profitable to them.
Re:Why so much Bandwidth? (Score:1)
Slashdot effect (Score:2)
Re:just imagine... (Score:1)
Re:What the hell is Intel doing? (Score:1)
Oh. I first read that as "and a heatsink that requires a power supply". That would be one heck of a heatsink, eh?
--
Give me a candidate who speaks out against the war on drugs.
Re:What the hell is Intel doing? (Score:2)
However, the longer the current situation persists, the more erosion into name recognition Intel will suffer. Arguably, that is costing them more than the lost sales.
--
Give me a candidate who speaks out against the war on drugs.
Re:What the hell is Intel doing? (Score:2)
But as we said, that status quo is eroding every day so long as Intel sits on their fat arses and lets AMD get further ahead in performance (and further behind in recall rate). Businesses are dumb, but lots of them catch on eventually. Lots of those enthusiasts are also sysadmins.
If Intel lets it go too long, there is likely to be a catastrophic "landslide" shift in business's buying habits.
--
Give me a candidate who speaks out against the war on drugs.
Re:I agree, too many AMD articles. (Score:1)
Re:What the hell is Intel doing? (Score:1)
JoeSchmoe: Hey, I just got a new computer.
Geek: Oh yeah? What'd you get?
JoeSchmoe: It screams! It's an 800MHz Pentium with 256 Megs of RAM, 20 Gig hdd,
Geek: Nice, but I would have gone with an Athlon.
JoeSchmoe: A what?
Geek: An Athlon. You know, AMD?
JoeSchmoe: AMwho?
Sad but true.
galen.
Re:This all sounds cool on paper, but.... (Score:2)
Zetetic
Seeking; proceeding by inquiry.
Elench
A specious but fallacious argument; a sophism.
Re:Oops. (Score:3)
That said; it isn't free to utilize extra 'filler' silicon on the die, as this will lower yield as defects that prevously didn't drigger a fault since it was on whitespace, now causes a defective unit.
Free? yeah. (Score:2)
Ordinary Athlon - $600
Athlon with Mamba(TM) - $850
Cutting edge technology, now matter how "free", tends to overly inflate prices. 'Twould be nice if it didn't though.
_______________
you may quote me
Re:Oops. (Score:1)
Are there too many external connections so that the peripheral space for pin connect is at a premium? IIRC the EV6 protocol needs 64 data pins, 48 address pins plus who knows how many control signals. Say 140 per device, of which there are at least 3-4 (CPU1, CPU2, RAM & AGP/PCI). 560 plus powers/grounds.
Yup, they could be short of pin pad peripheral space, and have free silicon. Note that they cannot just simply manufacture in bigger process because it won't be fast enough.
Re:I hope they focus on compatibility now. (Score:1)
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Re:Again?! (Score:1)
Dang, someone was using their noodle! (Score:2)
L3 cache integrated into the chipset. Except it doesn't really COST anything, because it's only taking up what used to be wasted space!
And in the process they cut L3 latencies (off the norm anyway) by 50% and are sending back to the CPU hella bandwidth.
I like.
I want.
Give! Sorry, tech widthdrawl...I'll get over it in an hour or two
Re:Why so much Bandwidth? (Score:2)
It's still more bandwidth than required, but more of it can be used than you think.
Re:Dang, someone was using their noodle! (Score:2)
Re:Great news, but... (Score:2)
As you said, the fact that it's on the chipset is cool as hell. However, there are additional advantages to putting it on the chipset over traditional L3 caches. Lower latencies and higherbandwidth are the big ones.
Re:Why so much Bandwidth? (Score:3)
Just because the memory talks to the chipset at 100 or 133mhz doesn't mean that the chipset talks to the cpu at that speed. In fact, that's one of the things that makes the EV6 bus design so flippin cool. The chipset on the K7 talks to the CPU at an effective 200 or 266mhz. Lots of bandwidth.
Re:always liked them (Score:3)
This is a chipset created by Micron. You know, the guys who are really good at making embedded SDRAM. There was a big noise about it about a year or two ago before it fell off the charts. Looks like they did something usefull with it this time
So when you get right down to it, AMD can only gain from this. They can't loose, because they're not the ones making it.
Re:Great idea, but.. (Score:3)
"can we make this any smaller or rearrange it to use space better?"
"Nope, sucks don't it."
"Yeah."
The Micron guys didn't try to do that. They thought "what else can we fit in there" *evil grin*
Re:Why so much Bandwidth? (Score:1)
Re:What the hell is Intel doing? (Score:1)
Re:Free? yeah. (Score:1)
The L3 cache is built into the motherboard. Specifically the Northbridge which interfaces the CPU to the memory, among other things. Previously the Micron chipset, designed to use DDR SDRAM, did just that. And apparently they found a lot of empty space on the Northbridge design and decided to put some extra cache on it to reduce the memory latency.
A good thing. And likely at little to no cost.
Because. The silicon was going to be used anyway, now its just actually going to have DRAM cache etched onto it now. read: no extra materials.
Re:Great news, but... (Score:1)
The L3 is *not* buffering the CPU to core logic. It's buffering core logic to main memory.
Very cool. Makes bandwidth go boom and latencies go flop.
Re:The new dream (Score:1)
Re:Why so much Bandwidth? (Score:1)
Re:Why so much Bandwidth? (Score:2)
L3 Cache (Score:1)
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Re:just imagine... (Score:1)
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Re:just imagine... (Score:2)
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Re:What the hell is Intel doing? (Score:2)
Disclaimer: this is a "I heard from a 'reliable source'"-type rumour.
<rumour>
That said, a good friend of mine worked at Intel c.1998 as an intern. He states that Intel at the time lost money on every Celery they sold. How does the processor division stay profitable? The Xeon processors. If this was indeed the case (he didn't work for the finance area, he worked as a geek there), and if it still is the case, then Intel suits must be laughing their arses off as they hand AMD the "enthusiast" crowd, and they take the server arena. Most businesses I know still won't trust AMD with their servers, so even the current crop of 2-way-only Xeons (which are probably just regular PIII's mated to the slot-2 package) can recoup the losses in the consumer arena.
</rumour>
That said, the Athlons seem to be great processors (though I've never used one--the newest box here is a Mobile PII-366 =P)). Maybe that's why AMD is so keen on getting in on the server market?
Just looking at the books of both AMD and Intel can be rather revealing; in The Register's words, AMD is still a chimp compared to Intel's 800lb gorilla.
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Re:Good For AMD (Score:2)
Still good for AMD, as this is a chipset designed to support the AMD Athlons. Yeah, it's a Micron chipset, but AMD has said repeatedly in the past that they're not in the chipset business. Of course, after the 760MP chipset announcement, I tend to take that with a bit of salt.
Then again, this may be a killer uniprocessor chipset, but I would've loved to see a 4+way MP chipset with specs otherwise similar to this, taking full-advantage of the EV6-protocol that the Athlon uses.
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What what what?!? (Score:1)
Everything else was forgivable, but that is sacriledge! Out with you! Shoo!
:)
No one mentions drawbacks to this (Score:1)
On-die caches are more dense than logic, and cause sharp decreases in yields for silicon wafers. The larger the proportion of the cache on die, the easier it is to cause the chip to fail. By just throwing huge amounts of cache onto a chip, you do four things:
1. Decrease yields.
2. Increase power consumption, which of course increases waste heat.
3. Increase die size.
4. Decrease clock speed ramping possibilities.
This huge amount of cache will not only cause larger power consumption, higher chipset temperatures, and higher chipset prices it will also reduce overclocking possibilities.
If it was just that easy to throw 8mb of cache onto a silicon wafer, Intel would have done this to their processors ages ago. The problem is that yields are poor (part of the reason Xeon processors are so expensive) and they don't ramp up very well (the reason why Xeons with larger caches are harder to get in higher speeds, and basically don't overclock worth anything).
What I want to know is what in GOD's name was the transistor budget for the chipset? 8mb of cache is going to cost easily over 100 million transistors! That means their transistor budget as at least 250 million transistors...which is about 8x as big as current CPUs...something doesn't make sense...
Re:Oops. (Score:1)
Another Chipset? (Score:1)
Great idea, but.. (Score:1)
but the one question on my mind, HOW THE HELL DO THEY NOT NOTICE 40% of the die NOT BEING USED!!!!!!!!
But better yet, are we to expect a dual(or more)-CPU version of this chip?
*drools*
Re:Why so much Bandwidth? (Score:1)
The new dream (Score:1)
Dual-1.5ghz Mustangs
Mamba board
256MB DDR SDRAM
Nvida's Next-card
That ought to be enough workstation for a while.
Good For AMD (Score:2)
The specs look pretty good too The AMD 760 MP chipset is a DDR SDRAM solution that can support two 266MHz FSB Athlons. The chipset has advanced buffering to enable maximum transaction concurrency
Re:just imagine... (Score:1)
The machines are custom-rolled by http://www.intrex.com, a vendor local to the Triangle region of North Carolina. We've been very impressed with their performance.
Re:just imagine... (Score:1)
Re:just imagine... (Score:2)
What?!? In a few years? How about today?
We are buying 1GHz Thunderbird machines with 1GB of SDRAM for $2500 ea. And that's in a rackmount chassis. Put it in a regular desktop case and use the savings to get an AGP video card and LVD SCSI hard disk.
Taboo? (Score:1)
Slashdotted (Score:3)
Re:Dang, someone was using their noodle! (Score:1)
Re:Dang, someone was using their noodle! (Score:2)
always liked them (Score:2)
Oops. (Score:5)
Heh. They "noticed" that 40% of the die space was unused?
ENGINEER BOB: Hey Steve, I just noticed that we're only using 60% of the die space on the Samurai.
ENGINEER STEVE: Hmm.... Damned if you're not right! How did that slip past us in the months we spent designing it? Good thing you're on the job, Bob!
Re:What the hell is Intel doing? (Score:1)
Re:I hope they focus on compatibility now. (Score:1)
And you bet that the FPU in the Athlon will smoke an Intel chip computing the lightmap. In fact send it to me, ill run it.
Sanchi
Re:Now toss in graphics... (Score:1)
Re:Great news, but... (Score:2)
just imagine... (Score:1)
Without any additional RAM, you could play a MEAN game of DOOM with that thing. You could even run Windows 3.11 with Word and Excel open AT THE SAME TIME...
Re:Good For AMD (Score:1)
wtf ARE you on?
Go read the article instead of rushing to post early, and you'll notice that this design is not from AMD at all, but from *MICRON*.
You know, the (second?) largest manufacturer of DRAM in the world, and the first company to stand up to RAMBUS's bullying tactics - and now this!
Go Micron!
:)
Re:Good For AMD (Score:1)
Be careful what you wish for...! :)
What the hell is Intel doing? (Score:3)
What is Intel going to come out with to top an Athlon at 1.5ghz (and that's with AMD's current core)...
A P4 with a whopping one pound heatsink and that requires a new power supply?
You know, I won't buy one, if I can buy an Athlon that I may even be able to keep my A7V for. (And for a few hundred dollars less, as well.)
Why so much Bandwidth? (Score:2)
Re:Why so much Bandwidth? (Score:2)
Re:Good For AMD (Score:4)
This isn't about that at all. This is Micron's new chipset, Mamba. It is the successor to Samaurai, their DDR reference chipset. When they built Samaurai, they found they had not used 40% of the die space, so they added an 8MB DRAM cache to it. The cache is 50% lower latency, with a 9.6GB/s bandwidth; it is completely different from the 760MP buffer, which is strictly a BUFFER not a cache, and only allows some reordering to improve performance.
Now toss in graphics... (Score:1)
But, what would be real cool would be adding a decent graphics core with enough embedded memory to still run fast.
Ah, now that would be nice....
Re:AMD incompatibilities (Score:1)
Also, this Microsoft Knowledge Base article [microsoft.com] chronicles the AGP memory addressing problem with the Athlon chipsets. This has been logged as an official "errata" by AMD. This includes the VIA and AMD chipsets.
Re:Look who's talking. (Score:1)
Re:just imagine... (Score:1)
Beowulf (Score:1)
Could you imagine a Beowulf cluster of these babies!!!
Gimme Karma!!!!!!
Re:This all sounds cool on paper, but.... (Score:1)