Who Controls the User Experience? AMD’s Carrizo Thoroughly Tested
by Ian Cutress on February 4, 2016 8:00 AM ESTThe ‘Who Wants AMD In A Laptop?’ Problem
AnandTech readers and editors have both recognized the concerns that OEMs have when using AMD products. Disregarding specific details of support provided to the device manufacturers, few of them feel the need to develop high end designs around AMD silicon due to both previously poor performance and equally poor end-user sentiment. Unfortunately for AMD, this is a somewhat deep pit to dig themselves out of, and their situation isn't helped by now skeptical OEMs. As a result, even when AMD has new designs ready for release, prominent users and OEMs alike remain reserved until independent or internal confirmation of AMD's latest claims. While the major OEMs, such as Dell, HP, Lenovo and ASUS will happily produce several models to fill the gap and maintain relationships with AMD, none of them will actively market a high-profile AMD based device due to the scope of previous AMD silicon and public expectation. If a mid-to-high end device is put in play, numbers are limited, distribution is narrow and advertising is minimal.
This was perhaps most poignant when discussing Carrizo with other media at the recent Tech Day. Other media expressed concern about the low number of laptops with AMD’s processors, noting that they are few and far between. One website owner even mentioned, anecdotally, that in his forum there is a specific section dedicated to AMD notebook owners or to-be-owners, where they track the latest models and attempt to find where it is in stock. As a result, when the members of that forum were looking for certain devices, they would have to collaborate to purchase and ship them across regional boundaries due to the limited distribution or merely the lack of access, even in North America and Europe.
Meanwhile recent comments about Carrizo from our own readers was quite telling - some associate AMD with bargain basement devices, often fitted with low grade panels at low resolutions/poor color reproducibility or poor industrial design that fails within a couple of years of use due to thermal cycling, battery degradation or device design concerns. This condemnation of previous devices was somewhat universal, to the point where individual end users are noting how few OEMs are even taking up the mantle with AMD products. Searching in a brick and mortar shop shows a similar story - for every 10 or 20 Intel machines, they may only be a single AMD model, and that the model is a low-end budget laptop.
Despite this, OEMs should take care when deciding their future design profile. One comment from the launch of Carrizo was particularly telling - 'I would buy a Dell XPS13-esque machine with this', where the XPS13 is a halo OEM design for Intel’s Broadwell platform that received excellent reviews both for design and aesthetics. The comments on the news of Carrizo, after filtering the obvious fans of both Intel and AMD, were positive based on the information provided by AMD. However a small set of users is never sufficient to trigger OEM interest, especially when the comments of those users are based on unverified performance claims and the lack of independent testing. When an OEM looks into creating a halo type device such as the XPS13, they are reliant on both the processor manufacturer in providing an ample supply of chips with the performance they need, as well as the client market's interest in such a platform at a given price.
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ImSpartacus - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
Holy shit, I haven't seen that many pages in a long time. You don't see this much content very often. Gotta love dat chorizo.close - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
ImSpartanus, they're just writing a comprehensive article. I'm sure they put in good work with all of them.ImSpartacus - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
I think this article provides a pretty delicate and nuanced treatment of chorizo and its place in the market (both potential & actual). There's no doubt that the circumstances demanded it. This was not business as usual and I'm glad Anandtech recognized the need for that additional effort.We're fooling ourselves if we pretend that any journalistic entity puts the sane amount of effort into every project. We're talking about living, breathing humans, not robots.
fmcjw - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
I found the language convoluted, verbose, and difficult to read, compared to, say, Anand's straightforward and logical writing:"Nonetheless, Intel’s product line is a sequence of parts that intersect each other, with low end models equipped with dual core Pentiums and Celerons, stretching into some i3 and i5 territory while still south of $1000. In this mix is Core M, Intel’s 4.5W premium dual core parts found in devices north of $600."
"south of/north of"... can't you just put in "below/above"? And all that "intersecting of parts", can't you just say from the Atom to Pentiums, Celerons, i3's, and i5's....
The whole thing reads like they're paying you to score a high word count. Lots of information to extract here, but it can be 3 pages shorter and take half as long to read.
Cellar Door - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
That is why Anandtech has video adds on their main page - designed for people like you. Who simply lack reading comprehension past 8th grade and find it hard to understand. Just watch watch the video on how to loose weight that auto-plays on the side.Or... try Tom's Hardware - they cater to your demographic.
ImSpartacus - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
There's no question that Anand had a powerful way of writing that was uniquely simple yet educated you nevertheless. And for a layman that reads this sort of stuff to learn new information, that's very attractive and I kinda miss it (along with Klug).However, I give Ian a pass because he at least attempted to use other brand of conveying his ideas. In certain sections he used special table-like fitting to separate "parallel" sections/stances so that the rader would be more apt to compare them. So there's at least some effort, though he surely could do better.
10basetom - Saturday, February 6, 2016 - link
fmcjw does have a point, but in all fairness it is much harder to explain techical stuff in layman terms than it is to be long-wordy. Carl Sagan was the master of it on TV, and Anand was excellent at it on paper.JMC2000 - Sunday, February 7, 2016 - link
I didn't find anything wrong with the language Ian used, as this is piece is still on a technical level, but can be understood by the layman that knows a bit more than just what the stickers on the outside tell.To me, the phrase "parts that intersect each other" lays out that there is a myriad of options where configurations overlap, where as saying "from the Atom to Pentiums, Celerons, i3s and i5s" indicates that there is a pricing structure that is related to general CPU performance, which there really isn't when it comes to low-end machines.
plonk420 - Monday, February 8, 2016 - link
"south of/north of" sounds better than "greater than/less than," which is more correct than "below/above"Sushisamurai - Thursday, February 11, 2016 - link
yeah, colorful language is nice. Dumbing down adjectives or descriptions can often construe the true message IMO. This way, it paints a more descriptive/colorful picture.Keep up the good work Ian.