Legendary CPU architect Jim Keller leaves AMD

[HEXUS]

Mastermind behind K7, K8 and forthcoming Zen architecture departs as CTO steps in.

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[shaithis]

Oh well, there goes AMDs last hope of getting back into the desktop CPU market!

[Corky34]

Question is did AMD let him go, or did he go of his own accord?

If it's the former then more fool AMD, if it's the later then I guess there's not much they could've done about it, at least he finished ZEN core before he left.

[RT-XD]

I wonder if this has anything to do with the rumor that Microsoft will buy out AMD

[nitro912gr]

Probably he was too expensive for amd at the moment, so he joined to make zen and now that it is as far as I know ready (design wise) he is leaving again.

Maybe he will join again if amd manage to get some profit with zen.

I have high expectations from zen and it happens to come out around the time I plan to upgrade my current system, I hope it will be good because I don't really want to jump ship to intel, but I will do it if I can't get a cpu that with good per core performance (in a good price ofc).

[sykobee]

Either he rejoined to design and see Zen through to the final stages, or AMD are now in a very bad position.

[Plasmastorm]

Looks like those share prices that went up last week may well be headed down again then

[HMind]

Oh well, there goes AMDs last hope of getting back into the desktop CPU market!

Well it aint all bad, zen will already be finished and taped out by now, and zen 2 will likely be just be an improved arch so the meat of the work is done.

[peterb]

No-one lasts for ever, so if AMD have any business acumen, they will have a team of designers (he probably didn't design them on his own!) under his leadership, and they will have another team leader in waiting. A change of leadership and/or key members is not always a bad thing. There is the danger of being stuck in a groove, and a change can inject new ideas, or allow other ideas to flourish.

Whether that is the case here, only time will tell.

[KenMishima]

Oh well, there goes AMDs last hope of getting back into the desktop CPU market!

How so? Zen's design was finished a long time ago, the thing already taped out months ago in fact. Zenv2 and maybe even Zenv3 are also finished in the design phase already. That's how these design processes work. His role is finished as an architect, and this is probably the last uarch he will ever make. He's in his late 50's and he's very well-off financially. I'd wager a guess and say there's a 99% chance he left of his own accord.

To wit, his original run with AMD back in the late 90's was much briefer than his latest run.

[Michael H]

There are so many possibilities as to why this may have happened it is probably unwise to read anything into this yet.

If he was fired it would have been bad news for AMD as it would have indicated a strong possibility that Zen was a dud, but leaving of his own accord could be because he disagreed with AMD's future direction or simply because he felt he has completed his project and has other challenges or offers on the table that appeal more.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

People can look at his work history:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Keller_(engineer)

He spent only 1 year at AMD before he left and that was years before the Athlon 64 was released,around the time the original Athlon was out.

His second stint at AMD was three times longer.

It only took a few seconds on Google to find it out.

[Sumanji]

Yeah you're right CAT, I originally overreacted at this article, but I should have Googled... guess I fell for the Hexus clickbait

It makes sense - if the meat of his work is done, he probably wants to move on to other projects and/or AMD can't afford to keep him employed and idle.

Really hope K12 and Zen are home runs for AMD...

[The Hand]

Here's to Zen hitting the ground running next year! It does make me wonder if Zen will be i7 beating in a few areas.. Definitely a Zen based system for me if so. I suppose there is nothing stopping Keller coming back to AMD again at some point in the future also.

[DanceswithUnix]

It makes sense - if the meat of his work is done, he probably wants to move on to other projects and/or AMD can't afford to keep him employed and idle.

Is it done? The article mentions Zen, but nothing of the upcoming ARM core. That is probably the interesting bit of work, and it is interesting work that keeps top engineers at a company.

I think x86 has peaked, if you have a Haswell or later I doubt you will ever have a reason to upgrade other than device failure. ARM is interesting, V8 is a modern arch and has the possibility to go faster than x86 (heck it is already up to i3 levels). I shall be very interested to see where he has jumped ship to.

[outwar6010]

Probably he was too expensive for amd at the moment, so he joined to make zen and now that it is as far as I know ready (design wise) he is leaving again.

Maybe he will join again if amd manage to get some profit with zen.

I have high expectations from zen and it happens to come out around the time I plan to upgrade my current system, I hope it will be good because I don't really want to jump ship to intel, but I will do it if I can't get a cpu that with good per core performance (in a good price ofc).

That makes sense. I doubt this would affect zen in any way as it takes years to design these processors and he was there for most of it from the beginning.