(13 votes, average: 4.54 out of 5)
Loading ...Let me first give a nod to my colleague Margaret Lewis, who blogged about her experience at the GigaOm Structure ’09 event, particularly around hearing comments from Facebook’s Jonathan Heiliger, vice president of technical operations, first hand. While I was 1,500 miles away in Austin, I think I squirmed in my seat just as much as Margaret when AMD was lumped into the category of vendors that “just don’t get it.”
As an industry, we need to accept that he makes some good points.
While in raw, classic benchmark terms, we continue to deliver great leaps in performance, I suspect the Facebook IT and programming model doesn’t look like “classic benchmarks”. It’s probably more PHP and Java than C++.
Oh dear, I hear the cry go up, we are about to talk about the problem of benchmarking, and synthetic benchmarks at that.
Let’s face it: synthetic benchmarks are essentially a useful evil. Everyone wants to know how a certain technology performs against a standardized test, but what happens when that test bares no real resemblance to the real work people do? You get a huge disconnect.
And this spans everything from notebook battery life to the debate of ACP vs. TDP in servers.
For hyperscale data center customers ― customers who build massive server farms that typically power cloud environments — when a benchmark is a tiny bit off compared to real world implementations, it can get magnified, a lot.
I propose that what the industry needs is flexibility: different tests for different kinds of usage models, and this is something we definitely “get” – but maybe have been too slow to deliver on.
We also need servers that deliver efficient performance, not only raw performance.
This is exactly why we introduced the Quad-Core AMD Opteron™ EE processor – a fully featured processor at 40W ACP. And, it’s exactly why I’m excited we are introducing the Six-Core AMD Opteron HE processor this week. For more on that, please read Andy Parma’s blog that looks at the performance advantages of this new processor.
This continues our tradition of bringing highly efficient, power-optimized solutions to market to meet the demands of customers small and large – from small businesses to massive server farms.
In the future we plan to focus much more on smart processors that meet varying needs depending on what applications our customers run. But we can’t do this alone – we need to work with our ecosystem partners, both OEMs and ISVs, to make sure all the necessary parts are working together.
Taking it a step further, we want to build tests that help our customers anticipate the performance and efficiency gains you’ll see from our processors. Real world tests.
Nigel Dessau is senior vice president and chief marketing officer at AMD. His postings are his own opinions and may not represent AMD’s positions, strategies or opinions. Links to third party sites are provided for convenience and unless explicitly stated, AMD is not responsible for the contents of such links sites and no endorsement is implied.
#1 by Daniel - July 15th, 2009 at 08:25
Well written, and many good points there.
#2 by John A. Bilicki III - July 15th, 2009 at 16:48
I ask the people when they complain about brownouts if they would like to try and reinvent the electrical grid on their own; I have yet to have someone give me a serious yes. From a web programmer’s point of view I’d say ask Jonathan Heiliger to come to town and help design the next line of AMD CPU’s. Not my thing, probably not his. My AM3 CPU literally doubled FPS in my games with the same video card over my Opteron 185 and the heat output dropped dramatically. I doubt however that Facebook has upgraded any given entire floor of servers. Thanks AMD for the awesome platform that does exactly what I need at a price I can agree with.
#3 by asH - July 15th, 2009 at 19:48
My concerns are with AMD’s marketing, for so long AMD and Intel have been rivals; that is also the world view. Now that AMD’s mission statement has changed, and are now building products geared towards customer needs, AMD is no longer on the same path as Intel. Sure paths may diverge in instances of time, but versatility allows AMD to ‘follow the money’ so to speak. Which brings me to my concern; the new Opterons were created without DDR3 compatibility for and customer needs towards legacy systems, brilliant! Low power high efficiency, without the need to upgrade ($$) to new systems (new moBos, high priced DDR3), but, because of past practice when similar products of both AMD and Intel were always compared (till the cows come home) for TOP GUN awards, it is not the case this time with Opterons & Core i7 (apples to oranges), and unless one can figure it all out , it leaves folk baffled and AMD open to attack, unless due diligence is done. It is things like this that lends towards more negative than positive branding of AMD.
#4 by asH - July 15th, 2009 at 22:50
My concerns are with AMD’s marketing; for so long AMD and Intel have been rivals, and that too is the world view. Now that AMD’s mission statement has changed, and are now building products geared towards customer wants and needs, AMD is no longer on the same path as Intel, sure paths may converge in instances of time, but the new versatility allows AMD to ‘follow the money’ so to speak. Which brings me to my concern; the new Opterons were created without DDR3 compatibility primarily directed towards base customer needs, brilliant! Low power high efficiency, new features, all without the need to upgrade ($$) to new systems (new moBos, high priced DDR3); just pop in the new Opteron and calculate savings (THE SELLING POINT!). Past practice of similar products from both AMD and Intel have always been compared (till the cows come home) for TOP GUN awards; this can’t be the case this time with Opterons(DDR2) vs Core i7(DDR3) -apples to oranges- each has its pluses and minuses when compared to each other. In situations like these John public may not have the time to figure it all out and will rely on print for answers , which will leave folk baffled and AMD open to unreasonable attack. It is things like this that lends towards more negative than positive branding of AMD.
#5 by Jason Frothingham - July 16th, 2009 at 12:47
Three words for you Mr. Dessau: Phoronix Test Suite.
#6 by John Fruehe, AMD - July 17th, 2009 at 10:11
Let me jump in from a server perspective.
We are seeing a very interesting change in regards to Opteron comparisons to the competition. Performance is but one vector in comparing two systems, especially two diverging systems. Most enterprise customers will tell you that performance is important, but they will add two caveats: “enough performance” is more critical than “top performance” and that performance is probably fifth or sixth on the list of concerns when making buying decisions.
Today’s economy is driving customers, more than ever, to consider price/performance as a far more critical consideration than raw performance. We see it not only in tenders coming directly from customers, but we also see it in where customers vote – with their dollars.
This week AMD released the new six core AMD Opteron SE processors, but while these will be the highest performing six core processors that we offer, the SE SKUs will represent only a small portion of our Istanbul shipments. Far more customers are deploying standard power and low power AMD Opteron processors in their systems. This is a clear indicator that, while performance is important, it isn’t the principle driver in 95% of the server purchases.
The branding for AMD Opteron processors continues to be strong because our brand stands for power efficiency, stability and outstanding price/performance – and these tenants will continue with future products because that is what our customers demand.
#7 by asH - July 17th, 2009 at 18:32
In these economic times a Brilliant idea..is it possible to know when the new processors pay for themselves, and add to the bottom line (energy costs)
it’s a green chip
#8 by asH - July 17th, 2009 at 18:53
is it possible to switch out to lower (power)power or green power supply’s.
#9 by Yuhong Bao - July 20th, 2009 at 01:42
Have a look at the comments to this coverage by AnandTech. It may be that the Facebook’s software is at fault:
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=15713
#10 by Martin - July 28th, 2009 at 03:59
The performance of a websites applications is depend on :
1. How the I/O is distributed around the available processor in a server.
2. How many the web applications executed remotely.
The first one because many network controller can not keep up among demands that could be count for millionth times ping and data transfer that must be distributed to million user around the world. The answer is :
1. The webserver have the best network controllers like products from commex technologies.
2. The webserver have the latest microprocessor from AMD like Istanbul that using HT Assist.
3. The chipset must have IOMMU capabilities.