Benchmarking: Can AMD move the market?

WE'VE DISCUSSED HOW how Intel can heavily impact the direction of the software industry, while simultaneously leveraging SIMD instruction sets to ensure it remains one step ahead of AMD in appearance, if not in fact. Marketing, after all, has been Intel's core strength, and Santa Clara is a master at turning water into wine when it comes to waving its own banner.

Now we turn our attention to AMD's x86-64 technology and whether or not Sunnyvale has a shot at breaking a trend that decidedly favours its rival.

At first glance, Intel might seem to be holding all the cards, but things aren't always what they seem. In order to gain a bit of historical perspective on the current situation we turn our attention back to 1999 and the beginning of the great Rambus debacle.

Odd as it may sound today, there was a time when RDRAM technology had a cautiously positive reputation in the overall tech market. Back in 1997 and 1998 Intel aggressively backed it as a next-generation memory technology to be introduced as a high-end RAM type with SDRAM holding the mid-range and budget sectors until RDRAM could be ramped into those markets as well. There were rumblings of discontent, particularly from Dramurai who weren't thrilled with the idea of being turned from memory designers into glorified chip foundries, but Mighty Intel had spoken and that was supposed to be that. Even AMD, though it never used it, acquired a licence to produce systems built using RDRAM technology.

As time passed, however, Rambus' problems didn't vanish and the rumblings of discontent didn't fade into the distance. Intel's i820 chipset was delayed several times and missed its "set in stone" third quarter launch date, while evidence mounted that there were a variety of problems with RDRAM. Yields on the RDRAM chips were very poor, prices were stratospheric, and the design changes necessary to build a functional RDRAM motherboard were making life extremely difficult for Intel's engineers. All of these combined to form an increasingly negative market-view of RDRAM technology, but there were a couple of events that were particularly significant.

Intel's late launch of Camino (i820) with only two RIMM slots rather than the promised three left a sour taste in the mouths of many users, especially given the high cost of RDRAM and the perception that Intel had either chucked the chipset out the door in frustration, rather than finishing it, or that the RDRAM design was so obtuse that a fully-functional chipset design wasn't possible. The true history of events is somewhat harder to puzzle out, as Intel blames Rambus and Rambus blames Intel. Rambus, of course, blames everyone else except itself for its miserable failure, but that's neither here nor there.

Faced with lacklustre i820 sales and high RDRAM prices, Intel attempted to regain a measure of market success by creating and launching what might be its most disastrous product to date: The i820 MTH (Memory Translator Hub). The idea behind the MTH was for users to be able to use SDRAM in an RDRAM motherboard, thereby cutting overall system cost, but as it turned out, simultaneously slashing performance.

The i820's MTH design, however, had a fatal flaw that caused systems using it to periodically hard lock and crash. This forced a mammoth recall and fed public perception that the i820 motherboard was over-priced, badly designed and should be avoided at all costs.

The May 2000 revelation that Intel was in line to receive a massive bargain on Rambus stock ( here), only damaged the credibility of both companies further. Then, making matters worse, benchmarks leaked on Intel's website showed SDRAM-equipped motherboards beating RDRAM boards in several benchmarks.

In what might be the most unpopular move ever by a company, Rambus embarked on its goal of taking over the DRAM industry by courtroom fiat. It wasn't surprising, but it proved to be the last straw as far as consumers were concerned, and RDRAM never recovered, nor gained the immense market share it was supposed to. The idea of an IP company suing every DRAM manufacturer in existence for back-royalties on all SDRAM and DDR RAM, plus the promise of punitive licence fees for companies who fought in court somehow angered people who had the odd notion that companies should compete in a fair market, and Rambus became even less popular.

Looking back over the entire Rambus disaster, we see public opinion shifting from cautious optimism to rampant dislike and even hatred as Rambus became one of the most vilified companies in existence. Now let's factor AMD into the equation and see what happens.

Although AMD held a Rambus licence, the company never exercised it, nor cut a stock deal with Rambus. While Intel was mired in the muck of i820 (Caminogate) and the incredible expense of RDRAM, AMD made a great deal of market headway by not only offering a less-expensive processor, but pairing it with less-expensive RAM at the same time. The only Intel platform that officially supported a 133 MHz bus, and could compete, was the i820 Camino which came in two flavours - horribly expensive or totally unusable. A hole opened in Intel's product line and AMD took full advantage of it.

As market opinion began to shift against Rambus, AMD took the opportunity to throw its full weight behind DDR memory. Now, of course, DDR is king and RDRAM is rotting on the dung heap of discarded PC memory standards, but it wasn't supposed to happen this way.

According to our trend line, Intel should've won this round and we all should be using RDRAM. Instead, the AMD-backed standard won. Why? Because AMD identified the desire of the market more accurately than Intel did and gave people what they wanted.

By itself, AMD could never have forced DDR into the marketplace the way Intel attempted to force RDRAM, but without AMD there would've been nothing to stop Intel from ultimately jamming Rambus down the throats of consumers. What made the Rambus situation unique was the degree to which users disliked the RAM standard and wanted to avoid it. Buyers had essentially three choices: Buy a P4 based on RDRAM, buy a P4 based on SDRAM (with 386-like performance) or buy an Athlon-based DDR platform. The only thing that seriously hampered Athlon DDR adoption was that none of the chipsets at the time were all that impressive - had they been, the CPU might've yanked more market space away from the P4.

As it was, Intel saw both the desire of consumers and the fact that buyers had a valid alternative through which to exercise their desire and, rather than face losing market share to AMD, threw its own weight behind the DDR standard. AMD didn't force Intel to change to DDR, the market did - but without AMD that market would never have found its voice and hence never had any real ability to exert pressure on Intel at all.

So we have to amend our conclusion a bit. AMD can't muscle the computer industry in a new direction the way Intel can, but Sunnyvale is capable of functioning as a release valve and a solution provider to the point where Intel sits up and pays attention rather than risk losing its own market share.

The ultimate question is whether or not AMD's x86-64 technology has enough market demand behind it to force Intel to de-rail the Itanium processor. While Itanium isn't disliked in the same way Rambus is, the CPU is seen by many to be an overly-expensive proprietary solution that'll take a decade to fully adopt and cause no end of adoption hassles in the process. Whether this translates into a successful market for AMD's x86-64 technology remains to be seen, but it's not an exaggeration to say that it may be AMD's last, best opportunity to break the cycle of catch-up we've detailed here and seize control of the innovation market, at least for a while.

If x86-64 technology does catch, AMD will have stolen a march on Intel and Santa Clara will find itself at last briefly in the position of having to dance to Sunnyvale's tune. Priority #1 at Intel would be to rectify this situation but the cost in terms of market prestige, bragging rights, and failed investment in the Itanic would be immense.

AMD needs Athlon 64 to re-define the playing field and give it a home court advantage similar to the one they wielded in the first 18 months of the Athlon's life. The gamble is that it's managed to keep its fingers more tightly on the market's pulse and have a product that delivers what buyers are actually looking for. Given that Intel has sold less than 5000 Itanium CPU's all told it may have a real shot - or Athlon 64 could go down as AMD's ultimately failed "good try." One thing that's certain is that AMD will never truly excel so long as Intel is calling the shots. Compete, maybe, but surpass? No. For Sunnyvale, it's time to resign itself to playing second fiddle, or find a way to change the rules one more time. µ