AMD says it's "ignoring" netbooks, will focus on ultraportables
By Nilay Patel 
posted Nov 14th 2008 6:02PM
posted Nov 14th 2008 6:02PM
It seemed earlier this week that AMD's new Conesus chips would take on Intel's dominant Atom platform in the netbook market, but it sounds like that was just wishful thinking -- according to CEO Dirk Meyer, the chipmaker is "ignoring the netbook platform" in favor machines "above that form factor." AMD says that it's seeing high return rates on netbooks, a phenomenon it's chalking up to an unsatisfactory user experience on smaller machines. Of course, that doesn't quite jive with the sales numbers being posted by Acer, ASUS, and HP -- and although return rates are indeed higher for Linux machines than for XP, we're puzzled as to why AMD cares about anything other than raw chip sales to OEMs, since we were under the impression that that's how AMD makes money. Of course, really smart companies don't just sell what people want, they convince people to want what they sell, and that seems to be AMD's tactic: it says that the higher-powered, dual-core Conesus with ATI RS780M graphics will deliver a full-featured user experience that more people will spring for, even if it's in a slightly larger package. We'll see if this strategy plays in the market -- while we'd love to see a machine like the Inspiron Mini 12 with some real horsepower in it, it's hard to argue with a $280 Atom-based Eee.
Reposted from GIZ:
Thats ultimate bull he obviously doesn't know what hes talking about.
1. Amd could have a massive market share if the create a good chipset which intel don't have yet.
2. 95% of netbooks returned in the uk alone which comes to about 20,000 units were returned because of linux.
[www.techradar.com]
This article was about carphone wharehouse alone.
(Disclaimer: Actual percentage much smaller.)
only because they didnt know anything about linux...or took the time to learn more about it......
@jerry
that may be the case
but in a arguemenative angle
would you REALLY want to take the TiME to learn how to use something
just so you can check your email, or some other simple task ??
Yeah which is why linux will never progress until they start to provide a simplistic environment like windows or OSX. I mean how hard is it to develop a dedicated installer for applications outside out of the repositories. I've used Ubuntu, kubuntu OpenSuSE, Fedora, Mandriva, debian but None of them are good enough to take me away from windows. I've never tried OSX but I might one day. The only linux os that has come close to windows was kubuntu. But linux is too far away for consumers to bother use it. But it is catching up.
Bad move by AMD, Letting the competitors win without giving a fight!
I'm buyin what AMD is sellin. I'm not really feeling this whole netbook craze. I'm thinking this is more of a economic issue then anything. AMD probably didn't have very much R&D money going for netbooks. And it would definitely cost them more money to get into the game now, and on top of that, you wouldn't even see a chip until 2010. So. I dunno if it's the best move by AMD, but its the smartest.
Hey, look at that cow full cash over there. Let's ignore it entirely.
You know sometimes I feel sorry for AMD, getting crushed by Intel in most markets but then I remember all the times they've been complete asshats and passed up on chances like this.
Seriously AMD if you want to claw back some territory you need to COMPETE, not just litigate to maintain your position. The low power/low cost small laptop market is obviously here to stay, any idiot can see that. And although a few companies have dropped the ball on what a 'netbook' should be, many others are going in the right direction. And the allure of a small, light, low cost albeit low power notebook good enough for note taking, travel, communications, entertainment purposes is obviously quite great for a lot of people, enough to sell stuff anyway.
Right, but it's not going to remain the cash cow it is now.
It's a hype. Sales will start to dip down after the market gets saturated with these things. AMD doesn't need to get into this market, but that's only if they can actually compete with Intel in different form factors.
They can't seem to compete anywhere. AMD needs to consolidate and put out a good CPU in any form factor to gain a foothold. And that's what AMD should do first. Use R&D for something you already know about, not a new market entirely.
Damn!!, I was waiting for AMD to jump in so I could get a netbook on the cheaper.
best thing about most netbooks.....you can buy the cheap linux version and throw osx on it. Tell people that and give them instruction on how to do it and watch the return rates drop VERY LOW.
As long as they get to two major requirements for ultraportables right, then I'll be happy with their decision: weight and battery life. Right now I have Eee PC 901 but I'd gladly get an 'ultraportable' if the weight and battery life is the same, regardless of the form factor.
UMPC's HAhahahahha!haha!!11
AMD, the thing that will make UMPC's successful is a revolutionary interface that fits their form factor. Your technology will not influence that and hence not influence the market. You're basically hoping someone will come up with a good idea to set the market off and completely ignoring one that is already successful. If you want to influence the mobile market, accelerate Shrike, make it a mobile platform, and put it in netbooks.
Sorry, WRONG. Thanks for playing!
PRICE is the dominant factor in netbook sales. Most of these machines aren't the buyer's first/only computer. They're for kids or college students or moms or the living room coffee table, or just something to carry around all the time. And they sell because they're CHEAP. Since pretty much the only thing they're used for is internet access, the current gen Atoms are JUST FINE. Sure I expect to see updates to Poulsbo or whatever, but mostly I expect the vendors to focus on BATTERY LIFE at the expense of performance, which is what all of us would likely prefer.
AMD screws up again.
I believe the intention of AMD is to bring ultra-portable prices down and fill the market between netbook and ultra-portable.
I'd buy a sub-$1200 ultra-portable in a heartbeat.
AMD really should've made one. On the subject of netbooks, the Dell mini inspiron 12 is out on dell.ca.
Base price is $579 which incl.
- Atom Z520 1.33GHz
- Vista Home Basic
- 1GB DDR2 @ 533MHz
- 40GB 1.8" 4200RPM PATA HDD
- 3-cell battery
- GMA 500
Quite pricey if you ask me; there are other configurations available w/ $80 discount.
only 1gb of ram with vista? how well can that possibly run?
AMD has shot themselves in the foot. Dwindling economy = netbooks
Who is running AMD again? *rolls eyes*
Nah... It's a smart move.
Atom is good at what it does right now, and the direction of a low-power netbook line is very different from a desktop/server line. That means that they need high R&D spending to compete in the first place, in a sector with very, very, very low margins, when they could be putting the effort into server chips with $1,000 per chip margins on qualified parts. Intel have the cash to burn to allow them to corner a low-margin market like this, and they can afford to take the loss, but AMD can't.
AMD are also more production-constrained, and re-purposing an existing fab line for netbook-grade CPUs is a waste in profit terms and sunk cost for the conversion. They can't afford to have half a fab producing huge quantities of barely-profitable processors in the long run when they might need that line to produce high-margin desktop chips.
It's a smart move to maximise profits from existing infrastructure at this point. The netbook market is great for consumers (I love my two Acer Aspire Ones!), but like the console market (as Intel found out with the original XBox), there's not much money there for the cost of entering the market and tying up resources.
With the direction AMD has taken in the gfx market, it makes sense to me.
'More power in smaller packages'. It won't perform near C2D of course, but at least it'll be much more powerful than Atom and more power efficient than C2D. Exactly what ultra-portables need.
Why concentrate on a market at all? You sell chips. Sell chips and let actual computer manufacturers decide on what to do with the chips.
AMD is just so full of fail right now.
This could be a smart move for AMD. If they're correctly prognosticating the long term sales rates of netbooks, then the money they save on R&D and resources for an Atom competitor could outweigh potential sales into the market. This will be especially true if they make the strong push into the market that lies between netbooks and notebooks. A very lightweight notebook in the 10"-13" range with a CPU/GPU/Chipset combination to provide better battery life without sacrificing much processing power would pull away sales from both the notebook and netbook market, and would not rely on being purely a secondary purchase.
I like their decision. Netbook is for kids and absolutely useless.
I can check my E-mails on any smartphone now. To buy Netbook it's just wasting money.
I have a Notebook already.
I will save those money and put it against my next UMPC.
I want a powerfull pocketable UMPC to run any software and game,
not a huge Netbook just to check my E-mails.
"I like their decision. Netbook is for kids and absolutely useless."
That's basically what AMD seems to have concluded. Have the suits at AMD actually gone out and looked at something like the Aspire One? It seems they last went out late 2007 and saw an Eee 701, concluded "these things suck", and haven't taken their heads out of their collective asses since.
I somewhat agree with what AMD is saying... it would be nice to see an Inspiron 12 with some balls and a decent video card.
With that said, it's sad that AMD is making up bullshit to cover the fact that they didn't do any R&D on low-power chips.
AMD will screw up if they ignore this market
What about the upcoming ultraportable chipset called Bobcat? Isn't that JUST for ultraportables....
I think the word you want is "jibe", not "jive".
Good job I LOVE the way this is going. Bottom line is AMD is losing money to intel and I just absolutely love it! and if AMD goes down in flames and we pay more for intel, so what? I have the money. Besides, with more money goes more funding for R&D and better processors. IMAGINE....They have all the consumers money and constantly pump out the most amazing processors ever imagined or thought up. Well I think we have a winner, and it is ok, by than Intel will have enough money to offer former AMD employees jobs. See, everyone wins, except nerds, geeks, and the extremely poor. If you want the ultimate gaming rig PAY FOR IT. If not play flash games.
Oh yea and...............Console gaming for life!!! Console gaming ftw!!!
Were you fired by AMD's gaming department or something? AMD is the only competition Intel has, and if we loose them, then yes, prices will go up. The only problem is, that extra money will not go to R&D or better processors because no competition = no motivation to innovate. Any extra money will just go into the pockets of executives. Hmmmm maybe you're an Intel exec...
Joke post?
i think you seriously dont understand the concept of competition. the biggest reason for why intel is so far ahead of amd right now in terms of processing technology is because amd handed intel their asses with their 64-bit processors. this lead to intel delivering the core 2 duo. intel may have eventually released something like this, but without amd in their way to compete it would have taken longer for it to reach the market. what's the point of innovating and spending gobs of money in R&D costs if there isnt a reason to? whether or not you like amd is a moot point, amd has to stay around if you want to continue to see great chips on a regular basis from intel.
i think you seriously dont understand the concept of competition. the biggest reason for why intel is so far ahead of amd right now in terms of processing technology is because amd handed intel their asses with their 64-bit processors. this lead to intel delivering the core 2 duo. intel may have eventually released something like this, but without amd in their way to compete it would have taken longer for it to reach the market. what's the point of innovating and spending gobs of money in R&D costs if there isnt a reason to? whether or not you like amd is a moot point, amd has to stay around if you want to continue to see great chips on a regular basis from intel.
Can these guys make up their minds?
looks like EK missed his rabies shot today...
This is really kinda pathetic. Intel's stock isn't exactly soaring at 13.50 a share, but AMD certainly takes the cake at 2 dollars a share. Why? Because of people like Dirk Meyer. Investors just finished buying their kids netbooks so they could be cool like all their friends, and there's not an AMD chip in site. Then having AMD's CEO say "We're ignoring netbooks?" Sad. He could of at least had some class and said "We think that angle is sufficiently covered and we've decided to jump ahead a step and work on something more full featured" or something like that.When I hear a CEO say they're ignoring something I run in the other direction...
As far as them focusing on ultraportables, I don't think Intel is intending on just making netbooks as they are today. I think they're introducing the idea now so that when they release a more powerful set of netbook destined chips, people will know what they are. Innovate or die is what it is right now and AMD is dying. To the people who say there is no market for netbooks, that's just a lie. Everyone at my school is getting them for note taking and working on buses/metro on the way to class, and also just surfing the web or chatting in between classes. It's smaller, lighter, more convenient, and cheaper. That's the biggest screw up in my opinion: there are people who don't have a need for a truly full featured laptop and that can't afford it. The netbook market includes a lot of people that were excluded from the laptop craze.
Whether it is a smart move or not, time will tell, but I suspect the latter.
I would have loved AMD to have produced a System-on-Chip (processor, graphics, sound, USB, SATA, WIFI), that was compact, low powered, and competitively priced. Pair it with RAM and a hdd/ssd, and you have a simple, comprehensive computer.
That would result in netbooks with smaller, easier to assemble logic boards, and more room for a properly internal battery, which would last longer due to the reduced power requirements of the SoC.
Quite smart by AMD, creating their own market. No need to burn cash on a low profit market by clashing heads.
oh what the hell with the double post?
lol amd
No No No, I understand at best what we both think are theories and may or may no happen and we are so rooted and stubborm in beliefs on something that we say that is the way it is going to be. truthfully I don't think it just goes to executives pockets, whether I know how competition works or not is a moot point. What my point is, if I were running Intel, and I was the only chip maker, I'd pump out new cool stuff all the time and dump money into R&D, because longterm that makes and keeps my pockets fatter. Makes sense to me, maybe because I am not a money hungry exec, fortunately I do have the money to spend on any chip I want when I want. The other thing is I have worked in IT about 7 years. Frankly I am tired of gamers and geeks and their cult following of AMD. I pretty much hate these geeks anyway. I do respect professionals who do work to create, manufacture, fix, and regulate it hardware. But geeks and gamers I pretty much want to punch in the face. Basically this is why I hate AMD AND because I have bought several AMD's in the past until 2003 and everyone has underperformed and pissed me off as compared to Intel, and we are not talking stupid games here folks, I am talking anything and everything else. Today's generation think PC's are just for games. Well I am old school. Console Gaming For Life!!! I still have an original atari in box in a glass case in my office. Quite magnificent I must say!
And no, I haven't had my shots today!
While a longtime fan of AMD, they have yet to spark much of my recent interest (for about 2 years). But this is a good move, I'm very skeptical that netbooks will really take off until they can be better utilized by the poor-er world. Lastly of course AMD wouldn't fully embrace the term 'netbook' which if I'm not mistaken was coined by their arch-nemesis INTEL.
Netbooks will be huge in 2009 once more people become aware of models other than the ones by Acer and HP. I just bought one for my girlfriend yesterday (which she loves) and plan on getting my own next year. Consequently I have no plans to get another "real" laptop or desktop for at least another 3 years. Big mistake to miss where the market is going.
They have to, since they are way too late on netbooks, even later than VIA.
As long as they still sell their chips to netbook makers I'll be happy. I'm waiting to buy a netbook until someone uses a chip that has a 1GB cache versus the 512MB that everyone has currently.
To the person who asked if 1GB is enough to run Vista...yes it is, depending on what version you are running and what features are enabled. People keep confusing system RAM and video RAM when it comes to Vista. At 1GB system RAM you are fine, albeit 2GB is better, but with Aeroglass and Flip3D, you need better video than what comes stock in a good portion of 'budget' laptops.