The Six Five team dives into all things chips coming out of CES 2022.
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Transcript:
Patrick Moorhead: So, let’s move to the next topic here, which are I know we just talked about a few chips, but these are kind of the chips aside from automotive, particularly from AMD and Intel, and some GPUs from NVIDIA, and also a shout out to Synaptics, as well. First off, AMD. Sorry, let’s actually start with Intel here with a special goodbye to the industry’s friend, GB. Actually, we’re going to talk about that, so let’s move on here.
Intel released its 12th gen notebook parts originally earlier in the year. Actually, at the end of last year they brought out their desktop 12th gen, and I think the highlight of their 12th gen is its big little architecture. And I know that’s an ARM trademark, but I like the idea because it explains it. Essentially, you have performance cores and you have efficiency cores. P cores and E cores. Very hard to manage those between them, particularly in the operating system, which is why Intel worked pretty closely with Microsoft on it. There were a couple fits and starts which actually, Daniel, was about a CPU ID for games as opposed to not running well, it just wouldn’t load, but they got through that. They made some enhancements. And I think at least for ARM architecture and Intel, this whole notion of big little is a big deal here.
So, Intel came out with some pretty beefy notebook processors. They have a P Series. Sorry, they have an H Series, they have an HK Series, and they have two other series, and in fact we had Chris from Intel on to go through it. U Series is for ultramobile. P Series kind of sits in between the legacy H Series and the U Series. Anyways, if you’re not confused now… No, actually go in and read the article. Here’s my net net in comparison to AMD, which I’ll talk about. I think Intel did move the needle on this in terms of potentially gaining a little bit of ground on AMD. AMD brought out their 6000 Series, and again, I haven’t benchmarked any of these, but when I do some back of the envelope, I feel like even if I consider what AMD brought out, there will be room for Intel to move up a little bit.
I’ll put the asterisk that Intel has 80% markets share, but it appears as if they’re way behind, but not in notebooks. It’s actually a much more even type of competition between the two companies. Intel also brought out discreet graphics for notebooks and we’re expecting those to come out in the first quarter. They leverage all the special features that come with the graphics like ray tracing, Xe, super sampling, and Deep Link. The one question on Deep Link I have, AMD had this technology a while back that kind of leveraged integrated GPU and discrete GPU, used both the GPUs. AMD actually got rid of that feature because it required two kind of symmetrical GPUs. Otherwise, you really weren’t getting much of a boost at all. So, I’m really looking into that really hard.
AMD brought out… Not only did they bring out the 6000 Series mobile, which is six nanometer based on a Zen 3+ core. The graphics also is RDNA 2 and all the fun features that go along with that, like FSR. We will see. On the GPU side, AMD brought out an inexpensive card, the 6500 XT, that is a couple hundred dollars that I can’t even imagine though them shipping stuff like that in volume, but I have to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Last but not least, NVIDIA brought out a GeForce RTX 3080 Ti or Ti, regardless of which camp that you’re in, featuring MAX Q, with 16 gigs of RAM. I think this had a lot to do with keeping AMD at bay.
Daniel Newman: I’m just going to take a breath. That was so much. You know, Pat, you kind of had it. Your article is great, and so we’ll make sure that we put this into the show notes so that people can read it, because you really broke everything down. You broke down the automotive stuff. You broke down the PC stuff, the discrete graphics stuff, and you hit it across the board. We’re starting to see a turn in the supply side. It’s going to be interesting to watch if that sustains, but we’re starting to see that get into better shape, and we’re continuing to see innovation.
I said this when we talked about notebooks, and I’ll talk specifically about this. In the end, all this technology is really the underpinnings of things that people want to be able to accomplish. So, you got things like commercial and evo, where there was a number of announcements where they’re trying to make a series of PCs that are really ideal from a security and an operational standpoint for that mobile workforce, and you’ve got the gaming community here, Pat. You need more power. We’re seeing mobile notebooks now that are becoming increasingly capable of handling cloud gaming and next generation gaming, because just like mobile gaming, we’re seeing that there are certainly the people that sit there at their desk and can game all day, and you’re seeing the people that want to be on the train, and some of them now with 5G technology, always connected devices, are going to want to be able to game on a bigger format device while being mobile.
And having all that to say in the next year, Pat, I think you’re still going to see what’s going to be interesting to consumers and businesses is going to be lighter, thinner, more powerful, but less power consuming PCs that last longer. One of the things that immediately caught my eye with AMDs announcement was the potential 24-hour battery life. Now, of course that was under very, very friendly circumstances. No WiFi. Who uses a device that way? Nobody. But can we get to the point with these new architectures where these devices can truly last? And Pat, I pull new dead laptops out of my bag when I travel way too often.
Patrick Moorhead: Hot bag. Yep.
Daniel Newman: I don’t even know how it was on, let alone dead, but I get there, I’m like, “Gosh. I’m plugging it in again.” And this, by the way, is all variants and varieties, because we have them all. Having put that into perspective, as I see it, it’s the outcome that still matters. But as geeks, we always do love all these little specs and advancements. New packaging, new process. This year, hopefully as we get to the last topic in a few minutes, we’ll talk about why PCs are still hot and why all these chips are going to continue to drive the demand into the future, Pat. But I think we got to keep moving.
Patrick Moorhead: Yeah. Thanks for the comments, Ian, by the way. On discrete graphics desktop, I was told Q1 as well. I think it’s interesting if it was wiped from the website. And it’s funny, Ian, on Ti or Ti, in the briefing Intel’s GM said Ti, and I had my son, Pico, listen to that too. He was like, “Ti? Huh? What is that?”
Author Information
Daniel is the CEO of The Futurum Group. Living his life at the intersection of people and technology, Daniel works with the world’s largest technology brands exploring Digital Transformation and how it is influencing the enterprise.
From the leading edge of AI to global technology policy, Daniel makes the connections between business, people and tech that are required for companies to benefit most from their technology investments. Daniel is a top 5 globally ranked industry analyst and his ideas are regularly cited or shared in television appearances by CNBC, Bloomberg, Wall Street Journal and hundreds of other sites around the world.
A 7x Best-Selling Author including his most recent book “Human/Machine.” Daniel is also a Forbes and MarketWatch (Dow Jones) contributor.
An MBA and Former Graduate Adjunct Faculty, Daniel is an Austin Texas transplant after 40 years in Chicago. His speaking takes him around the world each year as he shares his vision of the role technology will play in our future.
