Quick Notes: Navi Refresh and RDNA2 Both In 2020, According to AMD
by Ryan Smith on January 28, 2020 9:00 PM EST
As part of today’s FY2019 earnings call, AMD CEO Dr. Lisa Su had a few words to say about AMD’s future GPU plans – an unexpected nugget of information since we weren’t expecting AMD to reveal anything further at this time.
In short, for this year AMD is planning on both Navi product refreshes as well as parts based on the forthcoming RDNA 2 GPU architecture. To quote Lisa Su:
In 2019, we launched our new architecture in GPUs, it's the RDNA architecture, and that was the Navi based products. You should expect that those will be refreshed in 2020 - and we'll have a next generation RDNA architecture that will be part of our 2020 lineup. So we're pretty excited about that, and we'll talk more about that at our financial analyst day. On the data centre GPU side, you should also expect that we'll have some new products in the second half of this year.
All told, it looks like AMD is setting themselves up for a Vega-like release process, launching new silicon to replace their oldest existing silicon, and minting new products based on existing and/or modestly revised silicon for other parts of their product stack. This would be very similar to what AMD did in 2017, where the company launched Vega at the high-end, and refreshed the rest of their lineup with the Polaris based Radeon RX 500 series.
AMD's GPU Roadmap As Of July 2019
But as always, the devil is in the details. And for that, we’ll have to stay tuned for AMD’s financial analyst day in March.
Source: AMD FY2019 Earnings Call
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TheinsanegamerN - Wednesday, January 29, 2020 - link
Performance wise they sure did. They launched a nuVega 64 (the 5700xt), the nuVega56 (the 5600xt) and the nu580 (the 5500xt). the 5500 and 5600 were both badly overpriced, maybe 10-15$ cheaper then the previous gen parts with no noticeable advantage. The high end was left high and dry. Again.Spunjji - Wednesday, January 29, 2020 - link
So not what they did, then.Moving somebody else's goalposts is still moving the goalposts. The comment was about re-branding, not about how you personally feel aggrieved by AMD's inability to compete at the high end.
nevcairiel - Wednesday, January 29, 2020 - link
Exception that proves the rule?They sure did it consistently before it. And it sounds like they may go back to that.
Hul8 - Wednesday, January 29, 2020 - link
Even if AMD didn't do it with Navi, they've done rebrands and mild refreshes multiple times in the past decade. The one exception doesn't preclude them doing it now.The comment was was about 2020, and why they would refer to both "Navi refresh" and "RDNA2" as two distinct entities.
Trying to figure out what's behind AMD's PR material gets much harder if you dismiss things too easily; bury your head in the sand and go "Navi wasn't a rebrands so AMD doesn't do rebrands, la-la-la-la-la-la-la..."
Korguz - Wednesday, January 29, 2020 - link
hul8 and nvidia hasnt done this as well ??Hul8 - Wednesday, January 29, 2020 - link
Your fanboysim is showing. Why are you bringing up Nvidia, when this news item and discussion is about AMD and their plans - trying to speculate what AMD will do?Hul8 - Wednesday, January 29, 2020 - link
As an aside, I've been on AMD graphics since 2014, because I felt their products and prices made the most sense for me. I'm not a big spender, though.I also hope they'll catch up to Nvidia across the product stack and can put up a fight even once Nvidia progresses to ~7nm.
I just don't identify thru a company - they're all in it to make money (off us).
Hul8 - Wednesday, January 29, 2020 - link
*since 2010, actually. Forgot about the 5850...Korguz - Thursday, January 30, 2020 - link
Hul8 im just point out that you seem to blame amd for rebranding.. but keep in mind, nvidia does it as well.. in some cases worse then amdfanboy of nvidia ? hardly, out of 6 comps have, 2 run 1060s, the other 4, amd cards, froma 5870, to a 5970.
Hul8 - Thursday, January 30, 2020 - link
@Korguz Why do you keep bringing Nvidia in this? Everyone knows their shitty practices, but they in no way redeem AMD of theirs.While rebrands seem to be the unavoidable reality of the GPU market - especially for OEMs, since they want constant "new" products, that doesn't mean that *each and every company* that does them shouldn't be held accountable. Each separately, and without regard to "he did it first" or "he did it too" (which are defenses only applicable to playground).