{"id":121396,"date":"2017-10-17T11:25:38","date_gmt":"2017-10-17T09:25:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/?p=121396"},"modified":"2017-10-17T11:32:31","modified_gmt":"2017-10-17T09:32:31","slug":"amd-and-intel-have-made-buying-a-cpu-extremely-confusing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/hardware\/121396-amd-and-intel-have-made-buying-a-cpu-extremely-confusing","title":{"rendered":"AMD and Intel have made buying a CPU extremely confusing"},"content":{"rendered":"

AMD and Intel compete for desktop processor market share, with the companies both recently releasing new\u00a0chips that\u00a0offer great performance and value.<\/p>\n

However, a series of architecture design and naming convention decisions by both parties have resulted in PC owners needing a PhD in computer science to figure out which motherboard works with which CPU, and how powerful their new processor really is.<\/p>\n

If you feel overwhelmed, read below \u2013 you are not alone.<\/p>\n

Processors<\/h3>\n

The first change that caught me off guard was the naming of Intel\u2019s\u00a0low-power mobile processors for notebooks and laptops, which now masquerade as full-power chips.<\/p>\n

Previously, these could be identified thanks to their \u201cm5\u201d or \u201cm7\u201d naming convention \u2013 designating them as 4.5-watt, low-performance chips.<\/p>\n

Come the 7th-gen Kaby Lake mobile chips, and Intel dropped the \u201cm\u201d designation for the standard \u201ci\u201d brand \u2013 making it difficult for consumers to tell the difference.<\/p>\n

Intel then launched its next-generation high-end desktop chips, which have the \u201cCore-X\u201d designation and fit into a larger CPU socket than standard Core processors.<\/p>\n

However, the company placed products based on two architectures within the same generation \u2013 meaning customers must check whether their new Core X processor is based on Kaby Lake-X or Skylake-X architecture.<\/p>\n

For example, the Core i7-7740X is based on Intel\u2019s 7th-gen Kaby Lake-X architecture, while the Core i7-7800X is based on the company\u2019s 6th-gen Skylake-X architecture.<\/p>\n

This is potentially detrimental to consumers, as Kaby Lake-X chips can only take advantage of 16 out of 44 PCIe lanes on the high-end platform.<\/p>\n

This means you can only use half the RAM slots on the X299 motherboard with this CPU \u2013 while you can use more with chips based on Skylake-X.<\/p>\n

\"Intel<\/a><\/p>\n

Mobile vs Desktop<\/h3>\n

Intel has further befuddled consumers by launching mobile and desktop Core processors under the new 8th-gen designation, when the chips are based on different architectures.<\/p>\n

The 8th-gen desktop processors like the Intel Core i7-8700K are based on a new architecture named Coffee Lake.<\/p>\n

The mobile versions of these chips are based on older architectures. For example: the Intel Core i7-8650U has the same 8th-gen designation, but is part of the \u201cKaby Lake R\u201d family. This is a CPU lineup based on 7th-gen and 6th-gen technology.<\/p>\n

Despite their 8th-gen label, these chips are essentially built on the same design as the previous two generations of mobile processors.<\/p>\n

AMD has typically been straightforward with its processor naming conventions, but has caused a lot of confusion with chipset designations.<\/p>\n

Chipsets<\/h3>\n

Intel has traditionally used the X*99 and B*50 designations for its high-end and consumer motherboards respectively, substituting the * for the chipset series number.<\/p>\n

Intel\u2019s 6th-gen chips launched with X99 and B150 motherboards, while its 7th-gen chips launched with X299 and B250 motherboards.<\/p>\n

This naming convention is a consumer-friendly system, and implies that the company\u2019s 8th-gen chipsets should be named \u201cX399\u201d and \u201cB350\u201d.<\/p>\n

This progression was spoiled by AMD, however, which named its Ryzen Threadripper chipset \u201cX399\u201d and one of its Ryzen chipsets \u201cB350\u201d.<\/p>\n

While chipset names don\u2019t denote power or performance, AMD\u2019s coup on B350 and X399 make its platforms seem more advanced than their Intel counterparts.<\/p>\n

Following this, Intel had no choice but to disrupt its naming convention for its 8th-gen processors, naming its consumer platform \u201cB360\u201d instead.<\/p>\n

Intel has not launched its 8th-gen high-end platform, but it will be unable to use the \u201cX399\u201d chipset name when it does.<\/p>\n

\"Ryzen<\/a><\/p>\n

Backwards Compatibility<\/h3>\n

Intel has also created confusion among consumers with the launch of its 8th-gen processors and the chips\u2019 use of the\u00a0LGA 1151 socket.<\/p>\n

The use of the LGA 1151 socket could imply that they are compatible with existing 100 and 200-series chipsets used by 6th and 7th-gen processors, but this is not the case.<\/p>\n

The 8th-gen chips are only compatible with Intel\u2019s new 300-series chipsets and will not work with older LGA 1151-socket motherboards.<\/p>\n

This combination of business rivalry, design decisions, and compatibility issues means consumers will have to triple-check if their chosen processor will work with their motherboard as intended \u2013 whether they buy AMD or Intel.<\/p>\n

Now read:\u00a0<\/strong>Nvidia CEO says graphics processors will replace CPUs<\/strong><\/a><\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AMD and Intel compete for desktop processor market share, with the companies both recently releasing new\u00a0chips that\u00a0offer great performance and value.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":226,"featured_media":121312,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_enabled":true,"_sma_x_custom_text":"","_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[1051,1727,24037,24877,11568,24493],"class_list":["post-121396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hardware","tag-amd","tag-intel","tag-ryzen","tag-ryzen-threadripper","tag-skylake","tag-skylake-x"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/226"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=121396"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121396\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/121312"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=121396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=121396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=121396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}