AMD's Dominance in the CPU market

AMD’s Dominance in The CPU Market In 2020

 The CPU market has been dominated by Intel for decades now, at least it was until 2019. Intel makes really good processors, no matter what the usage. For every work field, Intel has a segment, i.e. if you need to game or do video production and rendering, you can always go for the multi-core ‘core i3/i5/i7/i9’ series. The i3 offers 2 cores and 4 threads (can also be written as 2c/4t), i5 offers 4c/8t, i7 offers 6c/12t and the i9 offers 8c/16t or even 10c/20t designs. Intel CPUs are quite popular for their single core power. They provide high clock speeds for single core tasks, such as video production. The latest 10900K easily goes above 5GHz on single core when given a heavy task, such as a 4K render of Premiere Pro, although it is notoriously known for heating up to around 103℃. Even though Intel processors are really great for all sorts of usage, they are quite expensive. And to make matters worse, Intel has used 14nm++++++ and 10nm+ production for the 9th and 10th generation CPUs which are outdated as of now considering what AMD has been doing for the last 3 years. AMD left 14nm in 2017, started with 12nm, and got to 7nm in 2019. The 4000-series AMD CPUs are quite popular for a reason.

 Why the sudden AMD hype in 2020?

 Even if Intel processors were affordable, the biggest problems caused by them is the power consumption. The 10c/20t 10900K (core i9-10th generation Desktop CPU) is priced at $488, is made on 14nm production and takes 95W in power consumption. For comparison in a similar price budget, the Ryzen 9 3900X is priced at $430. The 3900X is a 12c/24t processor made on a 7nm TSMC process, TSMC is a Taiwanese silicon-based manufacturer, which runs on just 10W higher, i.e. 105W. For $60 lesser, you’re getting multiple cores, better multithreaded performance just for 10W higher, which is still justified since the 7nm process will decrease power consumption and increase longevity. AMD hasn’t been out there for a while but now it’s here with a bang. The beginning of the hype was with the AMD Zen 2 architecture which was completely different from the Zen or Zen+ architectures that were produced in 28,14 and 12nm processes. 

The latest 3000-series desktop CPUs and 4000-series mobile CPUs that are desktop-grade when it comes to functioning, AMD has conquered the trust of all major companies. Intel has server processor named Xeon that have very high core counts such as the 8380HL released Q2’2020 with 28c/56t which is the maximum core count of a Xeon CPU. It runs on a max Turbo frequency of 4.3GHz and a base clock of 2.9 GHz which is certainly not bad, 3GHz on 28 cores simultaneously is really good. The 8380HL is priced at $13000 and runs at 250W, built on 14nm. While the Xeon is worldwide popular, AMD release its Threadripper series, especially the 3rd generation Threadripper and the AMD EPYC server CPU. The 3 rd gen Threadripper that is the 3990X has a 64c/128t design, is made with the TSMC 7nm process and runs on 280W. It has a base clock of 2.9GHz and a Turbo boost of 4.3 GHz, i.e. you get a minimum of 3GHz on 64 cores at once! That is some mind-shattering processing power of a CPU. The 3990X does all of this while priced at $3600. That is one-third the price of the Xeon 8380HL.

The power of the 3990X is that it can literally run anything and everything with its processing power while being the cheapest all-powerful CPU out there. 

The AMD EPYC series was made for powerful server performance, i.e. decreasing processing latency on servers and increasing loading speeds for higher productivity. The 2nd gen AMD happened to be so powerful that now AMD has more than half of the tech industry around the globe using AMD products while Intel is still using 10nm processes on its upcoming 11th gen i9 CPUs.

Should You Directly Switch to AMD from Intel?

That’s one debatable question for the tech industry. The answer is, it depends. Even though AMD does a really good job when it comes to manufacturing products, AMD still hasn’t figured out product management as well as Intel has in its 52 years of existence. i.e. Things such as driver updates are done well by Intel while AMD updates have been notorious to cause performance issues. AMD is doing much better now but it still has issues. Intel is no matter what still ruling over the section of gaming. Intel’s 10900K has been declared ‘The best CPU for gaming’. AMD is the best for content creation and production. In a Blender render or an 8K Premiere Pro export, AMD will win by a great margin while Intel will throw 15-20 more frames than an AMD CPU in AAA titles. Let’s see a few benchmarks here:

 - • Cinebench R15 (Single Core)

• Cinebench R15 (Multi-Core)

 • Cinebench R20 (Single Core) 

 • Cinebench R20 (Multi-Core)

 As you can see above, in single core performance, the 10900K performs much better implying that in tasks such as gaming, the Intel core processors are better. Comparing the multi-core scores, the AMD Ryzen CPUs do much better. Therefore, for tasks such as video rendering, graphic rendering, artwork, etc. AMD has the lead.

 Conclusion: The AMD v Intel fight, a tech enthusiast’s recommendation would be to stick with what you need. If you’re a professional gamer in 2020, sticking with the 10th gen i9 processors are recommended since multi-threaded performance is not what you need but it also provides sufficient power for normal workloads too. If you’re a content creator, possibly a YouTuber, or are handling an institution with server workloads, the Threadripper AMD CPUs are recommended. If you like to game and/or create on the move, the 4000-series Ryzen laptops are recommended since they have the firepower for any sorts of processing and production. Always sticking to your usages is the best recommendation you can be offered. Intel v/s AMD fight is going to last until eternity, i.e. the end of humanity and technology. Sticking to ValueFor-Money is the best deal! 

Author: Rihan 

Image Credits: Google