AMD faces class action lawsuit over Bulldozer core counts

[HEXUS]

Bulldozer cores share a number of resources causing "performance degradation".

Read more.

[DanceswithUnix]

Dickey says that because the AMD processors he and others bought couldn't perform eight instructions simultaneously and independently they suffered from "material performance degradation".

Hmm, each module can issue 4 instructions which is two per core, so his 8 core cpu can issue 16 instructions per clock. "Perform" is more tricky, with a long 20 odd stage pipeline it will actually be working on hundreds of instructions per clock.

The average Tony Dickey doesn't have the technical background necessary to understand the Bulldozer CPU architecture

There, fixed that for him

[shaithis]

As much as I think this is cobblers, it's really not what AMD need right now - the tech market isn't like showbiz :S

[3dcandy]

Kick them whilst they're down...

[sykobee]

It's total cobblers, I read an article elsewhere that looked at the claims and basically said that the guy doesn't understand CPU design.

A Bulldozer can execute 8 threads simultaneously (and execute multiple instructions from each thread at the same time as well). The FP capability is shared, but FP isn't usually a factor when talking about CPU cores, which have always talked about integer first. http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/217672-analysis-amd-lawsuit-over-false-bulldozer-chip-marketing-is-without-merit

Hopefully AMD's lawyers will get this thrown out at the first stage.

[DanceswithUnix]

As much as I think this is cobblers, it's really not what AMD need right now - the tech market isn't like showbiz :S

True. I think though they have a far weaker case than the Pentium 4 class action (which I also thought was ridiculous, the benchmarks were there for everyone to see so if you bought a P4 you should have known what you were getting) so from the bit of the article that says:

Thus he feels that there are probably tens of thousands of other consumers whose trust in AMD was misplaced.

Well, the P4 payout was $15 per customer, so by his logic AMD could be down a few hundreds of thousands of dollars here. Hmm, that doesn't seem right

[cheesemp]

Would you buy a car because it had 2.0 litre 4 cylinder engine or would you check out reviews/power/torque etc and/or drive it yourself. Sounds a bit like an ambulance chaser hoping to get rich off lawyer fees... After all who would launch a lawsuit for (at most) ~$10 compensation.

[simonpreston]

Sounds a bit like an ambulance chaser hoping to get rich off lawyer fees...

He is asking for damages to cover this misrepresentation. Due to AMD's inaccurate "overstating of the number of cores contained in the chips," the suit calls for statutory and punitive damages, litigation expenses, pre- and post-judgment interest plus other injunctive and declaratory relief.

He sounds like an absolute chancer.

[DanceswithUnix]

So, who pays the lawyer fees if his case goes down the toilet?

Would you buy a car because it had 2.0 litre 4 cylinder engine or would you check out reviews/power/torque etc and/or drive it yourself. Sounds a bit like an ambulance chaser hoping to get rich off lawyer fees... After all who would launch a lawsuit for (at most) ~$10 compensation.

I think in that case a lot of people buy a silver one with nice cup holders. A stunning number of people who own a BMW believe it is front wheel drive. Most people *really* don't care about such things.

[scaryjim]

I eagerly await the outcome of his class action lawsuit against NVIdia over the 4GB GTX970 controversy, and against every major hardware manufacturer for their "up to" clock speed shenannigans and non-deterministic boosting...

Seriously, if I was going for a spurious class action suit against AMD at the minute it'd be against the "up to 1000MHz" claim on the R9 Nano, I think...

[duc]

You should read some of the comments on the Hexus Facebook page, suffice to say there is no hope.

[tuarim]

Good Grief!! I use an AMD FX-8350 at home and find this whole lawsuit thing a money grab. I do website design and use Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator frequently. Compared to the Intel I7 at one of my clients site, the AMD processes things faster, has less heat issues and, for me at least, tends to be all around better.

Now, if this was a case where it turned out that two of the cores were dummies, then yea, I can see filing a lawsuit because that would be false advertisement. But this case is just way to pathetic. Some folks just love to find ways of "making" money.

[DemonHighwayman]

I was reading comments on another site about this last week and somebody pointed out that AMD themselves had put forth a basic list of what a 64bit CPU should comprise of, this was done back when AMD were introducing the first 64bit 2 core chips. Anyway one of the items on said list was that each core should be accompanied by an FP. That is a rule AMD put forward, so in a court room this could cause problems.

I do just think this is just a money grab situation from another $$$ obsessed american though.

[DanceswithUnix]

Anyway one of the items on said list was that each core should be accompanied by an FP. That is a rule AMD put forward, so in a court room this could cause problems.

Each core is accompanied by FP, just not dedicated. The benchmarks show it clearly outpacing a quad core Phenom II at similar clock speeds.



Really, that isn't hard to defend.

[canopus72]

It is a totally BS and fraudulent lawsuit. This criminal (dickey) is an intel terrorist. In fact, I would not be at all surprised if intel 'encouraged' him to file this fraudulent lawsuit. Afterall, intel and NVidia have a long and sordid criminal history of trying to sabotage AMD. Anyway, from a legal and engineering perspective, this scumbag doesn't have a leg to stand on (and AMD should press criminal charges against him). See -

http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/217672-analysis-amd-lawsuit-over-false-bulldozer-chip-marketing-is-without-merit

[keithwalton]

Whilst the lawsuit doesn't have any merit it does make a point.

AMD's 8 Core / 8 Thread design performed similar to intel's 4 core / 8 thread (hyper threading) designs in most situations. In some tests where you could fully load all 8 cores it was quick. But most tests couldn't keep all cores fully utilized so often fell behind the 6 core phenom in both single a multi-thread apps.

Comparing these cpu's to intels of the time the rough ball park was 2 amd cores to 1 intel and around 10% clockspeed higher on the amd chip