Time scales

You have a much too short-term view of processor development. It takes four years to develop a CPU, somewhat less for a GPU, but not much less (if you don't count shrinks and minor updates that happen every year).

A brain drain now will not affect R700, probably not R800, but somewhere after that it starts to show (and according to an earlier article by theinq, even the specification of R900 was closed by last fall). And you can't help the situation by hiring more engineers a couple of years down the line. The work of those engineers would start showing up only after several years.

There is too much criticism of CPU and GPU companies for not reacting fast enough to the performance advantage of their competitors. You have to understand the time scales, and even the company that has the advantage keeps moving forward.

multicore CPU/GPU

Is it practical, in a multicore CPU, for some of the cores to be CPUs and others to be GPUs? A quad core with two of each type would be ideal for most mid-range computers. AMD, with ATI in-house, seems perfectly placed to do this.

DAAMIT!

"Are they saying "Daamit, I had enough of this""
--- Charlie Demerjian : THE DAAMIT SALESMAN

"I happen to quite like the current batch of ATI GPUs - while they may not be the highest performers, they are pretty fast still for comparatively low power consumption and, of course, price."
--- Does it mean that you like a product that offers lesser than what you have paid for?