[HN Gopher] AMD's Strix Halo under the hood
___________________________________________________________________
AMD's Strix Halo under the hood
Author : kristianp
Score : 145 points
Date : 2025-03-14 09:23 UTC (13 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (chipsandcheese.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (chipsandcheese.com)
| mort96 wrote:
| I don't understand the name "Strix". It's a name a GPU and
| motherboard partner of theirs, Asus, uses (used?) for their
| products. It's impossible for me to read "AMD Strix" and not
| think of it as some ASU's GPU with an AMD chip in it, or some
| motherboard for AMD sockets.
|
| Aren't there enough syllables out there to invent a combination
| which doesn't collide with your own board partners?
| newsclues wrote:
| Strix https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strix_(mythology) Halo is
| the code name.
|
| AMD Ryzen AI MAX 300 is the product name. This continuing to
| use the code name.
| mort96 wrote:
| Well, it's a public enough code name that it surprises me
| that they just used Asus's name.
| damnitbuilds wrote:
| Confused me too.
|
| Did AMD not know?
|
| Or did AMD know and not care?
| 1una wrote:
| AMD makes exclusive deals with ASUS regularly. I guess
| they're just good friends.
| alecmg wrote:
| oh great, they are not using a confusing name anymore...
| wait, now they are using a stupid name!
| bombcar wrote:
| Spy X Family!
|
| AMD is captured.
| DCKing wrote:
| I don't think AMD really uses the name "Strix Halo" to market
| it to a large audience, it's just an internal codename. Just
| two other recent internal names are "Hawk Point" and "Dragon
| Range" internally, where Hawk and Dragon are names that MSI and
| PowerColor use to market GPUs as as well. Heck, PowerColor even
| exclusively sells AMD cards under the "Red Dragon" name!
|
| AMD's marketing names for especially their mobile chips are
| just so deliberately confusing that it makes way more sense for
| press and enthusiasts to keep referring to it by its internal
| code name than whatever letter/number/AI nonsense AMD's
| marketing department comes up with.
| Keyframe wrote:
| I understand it's internal codename, but also can't read it
| without thinking Asus. Especially considering I have Asus Strix
| 4090 in my rig.
| Tepix wrote:
| I think having a (small desktop) system with Strix Halo plus a
| GPU to accelerate prompt processing could be a good combo,
| avoiding the weakness of the Mac Ultra. The Strix Halo has 16
| PCIe lanes.
| aurareturn wrote:
| Max RAM for Strix Halo is 128GB. It's not a competitor to the
| Mac Ultra which goes up to 512GB.
|
| You shouldn't need another GPU to do prompt processing for
| Strix Halo since the biggest model it can realistically run is
| a 70B model. Prompt processing isn't going to help much because
| it has a good enough GPU but its memory bandwidth is only
| 256GB/s (~210 GB/s effective).
| izacus wrote:
| > Max RAM for Strix Halo is 128GB. It's not a competitor to
| the Mac Ultra which goes up to 512GB.
|
| What a... strange statement. How did you get to that
| conclusion?
| aurareturn wrote:
| Why do you think it's strange?
| izacus wrote:
| The original poster arrogantly and confidently proclaims
| that a device that costs like 2000$ isn't going to be
| able to compete against a 10000$ SKU of another device.
|
| I'm wondering how do you get to such a conclusion?
| porphyra wrote:
| The $2000 strix halo with 128 GB might not compete with the
| $9000 Mac Studio with 512 GB but is a competitor to the $4000
| Mac Studio with 96 GB. The slow memory bandwidth is a bummer,
| though.
| aurareturn wrote:
| but is a competitor to the $4000 Mac Studio with 96 GB. The
| slow memory bandwidth is a bummer, though.
|
| Not really. The M4 Max has 2x the GPU power, 2.13x the
| bandwidth, faster CPU.
|
| $2000 M4 Pro Mini is more of a direct comparison. The Mini
| only has 64GB max ram but realistically, a 32B model is the
| biggest model you want to run with less than 300 GB/s
| bandwidth.
| Tepix wrote:
| You will be limited to a much smaller context size with
| half the RAM even if you're using a smaller model.
| Tepix wrote:
| Running something like Qwq 32b q4 with a ~50k context will
| use up those 128GB with the large KV cache.
| Gracana wrote:
| Despite the hype, the 512GB Mac is not really a good buy for
| LLMs. The ability to run a giant model on it is a novelty
| that will wear off quickly... it's just too slow to run them
| at that size, and in practice it has the same sweet spot of
| 30-70B that you'd have with a much cheaper machine with a
| GPU, without the advantage of being able to run smaller
| models at full-GPU-accelerated speed.
| SV_BubbleTime wrote:
| There's so much flux in LLM requirements.
|
| 2 to 3 tokens per second was actually probably fine for
| most things last year.
|
| Now, with reasoning and deep searching, research models,
| you're gonna generate 1000 or more tokens just as it's
| talking to itself to figure out what to do for you.
|
| So everyone's focused on how big a model you can fit inside
| your ram, the inference speed is now more important than it
| was.
| Gracana wrote:
| Absolutely.
|
| The thinking models really hurt. I was happy with
| anything that ran at least as fast as I could read, then
| "thinking" became a thing and now I need it to run ten
| times faster.
|
| I guess code is tough too. If I'm talking to a model I'll
| read everything it says, so 10-20 tok/s is well and good,
| but that's molasses slow if it's outputting code and I'm
| scanning it to see if it looks right.
| adgjlsfhk1 wrote:
| counterpoint: thinking models are good since they give
| similar quality at smaller RAM sizes. if a 16b thinking
| model is as good as a 60b one shot model, you can use
| more compute without as much RAM bottleneck
| terribleperson wrote:
| Counter-counterpoint: RAM costs are coming down fast this
| year. Compute, not so much.
|
| I still agree, though.
| aurareturn wrote:
| It runs DeepSeek R1 q4 MoE well enough.
| Gracana wrote:
| It does have an edge on being able to run large MoE
| models.
| Tepix wrote:
| Of course it's a competitor. Only a fraction of M3 Ultra sold
| will have 512GB RAM
| nrp wrote:
| Note that none of the PCIe interfaces on Strix Halo are larger
| than x4. The intent is to allow multiple NVMe drives and a Wi-
| Fi card. We also used PCIe for 5Gbit Ethernet.
| Scramblejams wrote:
| Love what you're doing, I'm in batch 4!
|
| Feedback: That 4x slot looks like it's closed on the end. Can
| we get an open-ended slot there instead so we can choose to
| install cards with longer interfaces? That's often a useful
| fallback.
| sunshowers wrote:
| Hi Nirav! Long time admirer.
|
| Gen 4 x4 or gen 5 x4? I saw that gen 5 x4 results in maybe a
| 3% decrease in 5090 performance compared to gen 5 x16.
| noelwelsh wrote:
| For me the question is: what does this mean for future of desktop
| CPUs? High bandwidth unified memory seems very compelling for
| many applications, but the GPU doesn't have as much juice as a
| separate unit. Are we going to see more these supposedly laptop
| APUs finding their way into desktops, and essentially a
| bifurcation of desktops into APUs and discrete CPU/GPUs? Or will
| desktop CPUs also migrate to becoming APUs?
| Tepix wrote:
| iGPUs have been getting ever closer to entry level and even
| mid-range GPUs.
|
| In addition there's a interest in having a lot of memory for
| LLM acceleration. I expect both CPUs to get more LLM
| acceleration capabilities and desktop pc memory bandwidth to
| increase from its current rather slow dual channel 64bit
| DDR5-6000 status quo.
|
| We're already hearing the first rumors for Medusa Halo coming
| in 2026 with 50% more bandwidth than Strix Halo.
| Gravityloss wrote:
| This has been the case for decades now.
|
| GPU:s have existed about 30 years. Embedded ones for 20 years
| or so? Why are the embedded GPU:s always so stunted?
| aurareturn wrote:
| Why are the embedded GPU:s always so stunted?
|
| Memory bandwidth. Besides LLMs, gaming on an iGPU will
| always be more expensive for the same performance as
| dedicated GPUs due to memory bandwidth.
|
| Before someone tells me consoles using iGPUs, keep in mind
| that consoles use GDDR as its main system memory which has
| slow access times for the CPU. In a non-console, CPU
| performance is important. GDDR is also power hungry so they
| can't be used as the main system RAM in a laptop form.
| pixelfarmer wrote:
| > Memory bandwidth.
|
| It is the thermal envelope that defines pretty much
| everything nowadays. Without active management of it
| chips would die a heat death very fast. Which also means
| chips are designed with a certain chip external heat
| management in mind. The more heat you can get out of a
| system and away from a chip, the more powerful you can
| design these things. And game consoles do have active
| cooling, i.e. they sit between desktop PCs and thin
| laptops, probably sharing the thermal handling capacity
| with larger gaming laptops, if anything.
| close04 wrote:
| Just look at how a discrete GPU vs. an integrated GPU look
| like in terms of size, power, cooling, and other
| constraints like memory type and placement. That's why both
| options still exist. If one size did it all, the other
| option would just die out.
| Plasmoid2000ad wrote:
| I think the market is very limited for high end iGPUs in
| practice with the compromises that occur with them.
|
| On Desktop, upgradability is very popular and obviously the
| returns from the cooling on discrete GPUs are immense. With
| GPU dies costing so much, due to their size and dependency
| on TSMC, pushing the faster but hotter is probably a cost
| effecient compromise.
|
| On Laptops with APUs, you currently ususally give up
| upgradeable memory - the fastest LPDDR is only soldered on
| (today), and the fastest solution would be on-die memory
| for bandwith gains that only really Apple is doing.
|
| Marketing wise, low core count Laptops appear to be hard to
| sell. Gaming laptops seem to ship with more cores than the
| desktop you would build - the CPU appears out-specced. I
| think this is because CPUs are cheaper, but that means a
| high-end APU would also need large CPU to compete. Now
| you've got a relatively unbalanced APU, with expensive hot
| CPU and relatively hot iGPU crammed in a small space -
| cooling is now tricky.
|
| This is going to be compared with cheap RTX 4060 laptops -
| and generally look bad by comparison. I think what's
| changing now to narrow the gap is Handhelds, and
| questionable practices from Nvidia.
|
| The Steam Deck kicked big OEMs into requesting AMD for
| large APUs.
|
| Nvidia seems to have influence on OEM AMD Laptops - Intel
| CPU and Nvidia GPU for years now seem to ship first, in
| larger quantities, and get marketing push despite CPU
| arguably being worse.
|
| Intel despite their issues seem to raising the iGPU bar too
| - their Desktop GPU investment seems to be paying off, and
| might be pressuring AMD to react.
| shadowpho wrote:
| >Why are the embedded GPU:s always so stunted?
|
| Because gpu want a lot of silicon. 5080 is 300 mm^2.
| Meanwhile ryzen 9xxx is 50 mm^2.
|
| Meanwhile CPU wants to use that wafer space for themselves.
| And even if you use 100% of the wafer space for GPU you
| will have a small gpu and no cpu
| Tepix wrote:
| The sentence "In addition there's a interest in having a lot
| of memory for LLM acceleration" was supposed to say "In
| addition there's a interest in having a lot of memory
| _bandwidth_ for LLM acceleration " but it's too late to edit
| it now.
| c2h5oh wrote:
| APUs are going to replace low end video cards, because they no
| longer make economical or technical sense.
|
| Historically those cards had narrow memory bus and about a
| quarter or less video memory of high end (not even halo) cards
| from the same generation.
|
| That narrow memory bus puts their max memory bandwidth at a
| comparable level to desktop DDR5 with 2 DIMMs. At the same time
| quarter of high end is just 4GB VRAM which is not enough for
| low details for many games and prevents upscaling/frame gen
| from working.
|
| From manufacturing standpoint low end GPUs aren't great either
| - memory controllers, video output and a bunch of other non-
| compute components don't scale with process node.
|
| At the same time unified memory and bypassing PCIE benefits
| igpus greatly. You don't have to build an entire card, power
| delivery, cooler - you just slightly beef up existing ones.
|
| tl;dr; sub-200 dollas GPUs are dead and will be replaced by
| APUs. I won't be surprised if they will start nibbling at lower
| mid-range market too in the near future.
| rcarmo wrote:
| My main gaming rig (for admittedly not very intensive games)
| has been a 7000 series Ryzen APU with a 780M, and my next one
| will also be an APU. It makes zero economic sense to build a
| discrete CPU system for casual gaming, even if I believe that
| APU prices will be artificially inflated to "cozy up" to low-
| end discrete GPU prices for a while to maximize profits.
| pjmlp wrote:
| Which is why for the games I play, a graphics workstation
| laptop like Thinkpad P series is much more useful,
| including GPGPU coding outside gaming, without being an
| heavyweight circus laptop whose battery lasts half-hour.
| sambull wrote:
| That new 'desktop' from framework appears to be just that with
| the AMD Ryzen Al Max 385
| nrp wrote:
| We have both Max 385 and Max+ 395 versions.
| foxandmouse wrote:
| Any word on putting that in a mobile device? So far there's
| only a hp business laptop and a gaming tablet... none of
| which appeal to the "MacBook crowd"
| Symmetry wrote:
| Having a system level cache for low latency transfer of data
| between CPU and GPU could be very compelling for some
| applications even if the overall GPU power is lower than a
| dedicated card. That doesn't seem to be the case here, though?
| noelwelsh wrote:
| Strix Halo has unified memory, which is the same general
| architecture as Apple's M series chips. This means the CPU
| and GPU share the same memory, so there is no need to copy
| CPU <-> GPU.
| phkahler wrote:
| >> Are we going to see more these supposedly laptop APUs
| finding their way into desktops, and essentially a bifurcation
| of desktops into APUs and discrete CPU/GPUs?
|
| I sure hope so. We could use a new board form factor that omits
| the GPU slot. Although my case puts the power connector and
| button over that slot on the back so it's not completely
| wasted, but the board area is. This has seemed like a good idea
| for a long time to me.
|
| This can also be a play against nVidia. When mainstream systems
| use "good enough" integrated GPUs and get rid of that slot,
| there is no place for nVidia except in high-end systems.
| adrian_b wrote:
| There is no need for a new board form factor, because they
| have existed for many decades.
|
| Below the mini-ITX format with a GPU slot, there are 3
| standard form factors that are big enough for a full-featured
| personal computer that is more powerful than most laptops:
| nano-ITX (120 mm x 120 mm, for 5" by 5" cases; half the area
| of mini-ITX), 3.5" (from the size of the 3.5 inch HDDs,
| approximately the same area with nano-ITX, but rectangular
| instead of square) and the 4" x 4" NUC format introduced by
| Intel.
|
| With a nano-ITX or 3.5" board you can make a computer not
| bigger than 1 liter that can ensure a low noise even for a 65
| W power dissipation for the CPU+iGPU and that can have a
| generous amount of peripheral ports, to cover all needs.
|
| Keeping the low noise condition, one could increase the
| maximum power-dissipation to 150 W for the CPU+iGPU in a
| somewhat bigger case, but certainly still smaller than 2.5
| liter.
|
| I expect that we will see such mini-PCs with Strix Halo, the
| only question is whether their price would be low enough to
| make them worthwhile.
|
| The fabrication cost for Strix Halo must be lower than for a
| combo of CPU with discrete GPU, but the initial offerings
| with it attempt to make the customer pay more for the benefit
| of having a more compact system, which for many people will
| not be enough motivation to accept a higher price.
| icegreentea2 wrote:
| The bifurcation is already happening. The last few years have
| seen lots of miniPC/NUC like products being released.
|
| One of (many) factors that were holding back this form factor
| was the gap in iGPU/GPU performance. However with the frankly
| total collapse of the low end GPU market in the last 3-4 years,
| there's a much larger opening for iGPUs.
|
| I also think that within the gaming space specifically, a lot
| of the chatter around the Steam Deck helped reset expectations.
| Like if everyone else is having fun playing games at 800p
| low/medium, then you suddenly don't feel so bad playing at
| maybe 1080p medium on your desktop.
| adra wrote:
| Framework made a tiny desktop form factor version with this
| chip in it, so we'll if it gets much traction (at least among
| enthusiasts).
| juancn wrote:
| I would love a unified memory architecture, even for external
| GPUs.
|
| Pay for memory once, and avoid all the copying around between
| CPU/GPU/NPU for mixed algorithms, and have the workload define
| the memory distribution.
| DCKing wrote:
| Strix Halo is impressive, but it isn't AMD going all out on the
| concept. Strix Halo's die area (300mm2 ish) is roughly the same
| as estimates for Apple's M3 Pro die area. The M3 Max and M3
| Ultra are twice or four times the size.
|
| In a next iteration AMD could look into doubling or quadrupling
| the memory channels and GPU die area like as Apple has done.
| AMD is already a pioneer in the chiplet technology Apple is
| also using to scale up. So there's lots of room to grow for
| even higher costs.
| ryukoposting wrote:
| Interesting read, and interesting product. If I understand it
| right, this seems like it could be at home in a spiritual
| successor to the Hades Canyon NUCs. I always thought those were
| neat.
|
| I wish Chips and Cheese would clean up transcripts instead of
| publishing verbatim. Maybe I'll use the GPU on my Strix Halo to
| generate readable transcripts of Chips and Cheese interviews.
| keyringlight wrote:
| The Framework desktop seems like a next step.
|
| Although I appreciate the drive for small profile I wonder
| where the limits are if you put a big tower cooler onto it,
| seeing as the broad design direction is for laptops or consoles
| I doubt there's too much left on the table. I think that
| highlights a big challenge - is there a sizeable enough market
| for it, or can you pull in customers from other segments to buy
| a NUC instead. You'd need a certain amount of mass
| manufacturing with a highly integrated design to make it
| worthwhile.
| jorvi wrote:
| > can you pull in customers from other segments to buy a NUC
| instead
|
| I've never understood the hype for NUCs for non-office
| settings. You can make SFF builds that are tiny and still fit
| giant GPUs like the RTX 3090 /4090, say less for something
| like a 4080 Super. And then you can upgrade the GPU and (woe
| is you) CPU later on. Although a high-end X3D will easily
| last you 2-3 GPU generations.
| woodrowbarlow wrote:
| i feel like high-end mini-ITX builds only became viable a
| few years ago with the introduction of 700W+ SFX PSUs.
| kccqzy wrote:
| The size of NUCs is much smaller than any SFF builds with
| RTX 3090. Some people just like smallness.
| bee_rider wrote:
| Closer to a phone than a laptop, in size!
| layer8 wrote:
| You can't mount an SFF build unobtrusively behind a monitor
| or under a desk, it's much larger and heavier than a NUC.
| phkahler wrote:
| Agreed, although this is the smallest I've seen:
|
| https://github.com/phkahler/mellori_ITX/blob/master/image
| s/m...
|
| It's currently got a 5700G - Zen 3 in it and 64GB RAM.
| I'd like the next one to hang on the back of a monitor or
| TV via the standard mounting holes.
| bee_rider wrote:
| You could fit a NUC in a pair of cargo shorts, FWIW. Or
| many bicycle under-seat bags, which was nice for biking to
| school without needing any backpack. They were in a sort
| of... qualitatively smaller size class than laptops.
| pixelpoet wrote:
| Yeah would it have killed them to read over it just once? Can
| they not find a single school kid to do it for lunch money or
| something? Hell I'll do it for free, I've read this article
| twice now, and read everything they put out the moment it hits
| my inbox.
| randomNumber7 wrote:
| As long as they cant even provide something similiar to a simple
| CUDA C API on consumer hardware i dont buy their stuff.
| pjmlp wrote:
| There is no such thing as simple CUDA C API, that is the
| mistake most folks do when talking about CUDA.
|
| It won over OpenCL, because it is a polyglot ecosystem, with
| first tier support for C, C++, Fortran, and Python (JIT DSL),
| plus several languages that have toolchains targeting PTX, the
| IDE integration, graphical debugger, compute and graphical
| rendering libraries.
|
| All of the above AMD and Intel could have provided for OpenCL,
| but never did when it mattered, not even after SPIR was
| introduced.
|
| Now they finally have GPGPU support for Fortran, C++, Python
| JIT DSLs, but a bit too late to the party, because contrary to
| NVidia it isn't like those tools are available regardless of
| the card.
| randomNumber7 wrote:
| The early versions had been only C. Then they added a lot of
| stuff.
|
| You don't need all the fancy stuff, but OpenCL (and even more
| so Vulkan) are too complicated when all you want to do is
| some gpu number crunching.
|
| Being able to write a kernel with something that looks like
| C. Having pointers on gpu and cpu and being able to call
| these kernels somewhat conveniently (like CUDA C) would be a
| great starting point.
| pjmlp wrote:
| Early meaning until CUDA 3.0 in 2010, we are now on CUDA
| 12.8, 15 years later.
| heraldgeezer wrote:
| Cool I guess for a mini PC but Im one of those desktop PC tower
| nerds :)
| hulk-konen wrote:
| I hope they make this in ATX (or mATX) form factor, toss out
| all the size, energy, and heat concerns, and add more ports and
| interfaces.
| FloatArtifact wrote:
| Seems like Apple's M2 is a sweet spot for AI performance at 800
| GB/s of memory bandwidth which can be added under $1,500
| refurbished for 65 gigs of RAM.
| crazystar wrote:
| Where for $1500?
| runjake wrote:
| Not on Apple Refurbs. That would cost you about $2200.
|
| And the M2 Max has a memory bandwidth of 400GB/s.
| sroussey wrote:
| I'm guessing a reference to M2 Ultra? Not sure about that
| price though...
| runjake wrote:
| M2 Ultra refurb was over $4,000, last I checked.
| swiftcoder wrote:
| I don't really like these "lightly edited" machine transcripts.
| There are transcription errors in many paragraphs, just adds that
| little bit of extra friction when reading.
| elorant wrote:
| But why did they choose to build this as a mobile cpu though? I
| don't need 128GB of unified RAM on my laptop. It's the desktop
| where things happen.
| cptskippy wrote:
| Because people are accustom to unified memory in laptops and
| also complain about the low amounts of ram and inability to
| upgrade.
|
| This solves those problems but apparently uncovers a new one.
| ForTheKidz wrote:
| > Because people are accustom to unified memory in laptops
|
| Surely the vast majority of laptops sold in the last _five
| years_ don 't have unified memory yet.
| zamadatix wrote:
| I've never seen a good technical comparison showing what's
| new between "Unified Memory" vs traditional APUs/iGPUs
| memory subsystems laptops have had for over a decade, only
| comparisons to dGPU setups which are rarer in laptops. The
| biggest differences comparing Apple Silicon or Strix Halo
| to their predecessors seems to be more about the overall
| performance scale, particularly of the iGPU, than the way
| memory is shared. Articles and blogposts most commonly
| reference:
|
| - The CPU/GPU memory are shared (does not have to be
| dedicated to be used by either).
|
| - You don't need to copy data in memory to move it between
| the CPU/GPU.
|
| - It still uses separate caches for the CPU & GPU but the
| two are able to talk to each other directly on the same die
| instead of an external bus.
|
| But these have long been true of traditional APUs/iGPUs,
| not new changes. I did even see some claims Apple put the
| memory on die too and that's what makes it unified but
| checking that it seems to still actually be "on package",
| which isn't unique either, and it wouldn't explain any
| differences in access patterns anyways. I've been
| particularly confused as to why Strix Halo would now
| qualify as having Unified Memory when it doesn't seem
| anything is different than before, save the performance.
|
| If anyone has a deeper understanding of what's new in the
| Unified Memory approach it'd be appreciated!
| kbolino wrote:
| I believe, but don't know for sure, that classic iGPUs
| still behaved like discrete PCI devices under the hood,
| and accessed RAM using DMA over PCI(e), which is slower
| than the RAM is capable of, and also adds some overhead.
| Whereas, modern unified memory approaches have a direct
| high-bandwidth connection between RAM and the GPU, which
| may be shared with the CPU, bypassing PCI entirely and
| accessing the memory at its full speed.
| wmf wrote:
| Yes, around 90% of laptops sold in the last ten years have
| unified memory.
| aurareturn wrote:
| Because desktops are a much smaller market and AMD caught the
| Apple Silicon FOMO.
| alienthrowaway wrote:
| IMO, the likely cause is AMD capitalizing on multiple OEMs
| having Steam-Deck envy and/or setting the foundation for the
| Steam Deck 2 with near-desktop graphics fidelity rather than
| 800p medium/low settings users have to put up with.
| bangaladore wrote:
| Compete with Apple is my guess. There is a decent market for
| super high end laptops.
|
| Framework (I believe) made one of these into a purchasable
| desktop.
| ThatMedicIsASpy wrote:
| I wonder if you could actually put these into a socket or
| issues would occur.
| neogodless wrote:
| While I think the market is small, and they don't release a
| lot of these, AMD has sold desktop / socketed APUs in the
| past.
|
| They tend to come out much slower than the laptop chips, or
| the "CPU-only" desktop chips.
|
| This is one of the more recent examples: https://www.amd.com/
| en/products/processors/desktops/ryzen/80...
| jchw wrote:
| People keep saying "to compete with Apple" which of course, is
| nonsense. Apple isn't even second or third place in laptop
| marketshare last I checked.
|
| So why build powerful laptops? Simple: people want powerful
| laptops. Remoting to a desktop isn't really a slam dunk
| experience, so having sufficient local firepower to do real
| work is a selling point. I do work on both a desktop and a
| laptop and it's nice being able to bring a portable workstation
| wherever I might need it, or just around the house.
| dietr1ch wrote:
| This is a really good point. It's not easy to use both a
| laptop and a desktop at the same time. There's challenges
| around locality, latency, limited throughput, unavailability
| that software can't easily deal with, so you need to be aware
| and smart about it, and you'll need to compromise on things.
|
| I'd work from my workstation at all times if I could. Tramp
| is alright, but not too fast and fundamentally can't make
| things transparent.
| icegreentea2 wrote:
| 128GB is actually a step down. The previous generation (of
| sorts) Strix Point had maximum memory capacity of 256GB.
|
| The mini-PC market (which basically all uses laptop chips)
| seems pretty robust (especially in Asia/China). They've
| basically torn out the bottom of the traditional small form
| factor market.
| alienthrowaway wrote:
| "Mobile CPU" has recently come to mean more than laptops. The
| Steam Deck validated the market for handheld gaming computers,
| and other OEMs have joined the fray. Even Microsoft intends to
| release an XBox-branded portable. I think there's an market
| opportunity for better-than-800p handheld gaming, and Strix
| Halo is perfectly positioned for it - I wouldn't bet against
| the handheld XBox running in this very processor.
| zbrozek wrote:
| I really want LPDDR5X (and future better versions) to become
| standard on desktops, alongside faster and more-numerous memory
| controllers to increase overall bandwidth. Why hasn't CAMM gotten
| anywhere?
|
| I _also_ really want an update to typical form factors and
| interconnects of desktop computers. They 've been roughly frozen
| for decades. Off the top of my head:
|
| - Move to single-voltage power supplies at 36-57 volts.
|
| - Move to bladed power connectors with fewer pins.
|
| - Get rid of the "expansion card" and switch to twinax ribbon
| interconnects.
|
| - Standardize on a couple sizes of "expansion socket" instead,
| putting the high heat-flux components on the bottom side of the
| board.
|
| - Redesign cases to be effectively a single ginormous heatsink
| with mounting sockets to accept things which produce heat.
|
| - Kill SATA. It's over.
|
| - Use USB-C connectors for both power and data for internal
| peripherals like disks. Now there's no difference between
| internal and external peripherals.
| gjsman-1000 wrote:
| > Why hasn't CAMM gotten anywhere?
|
| Framework asked AMD if they could use CAMM for their new
| Framework Desktop.
|
| AMD actually humored the request and did some engineering, with
| simulations. According to Framework, the memory bandwidth on
| the simulations was _less than half_ of the soldered version.
|
| This completely defied the entire point of the chip - the
| massive 256 bit bus ideal for AI or other GPU-heavy tasks,
| which allows this chip to offer the features it does.
|
| This is also why Framework has apologized for non
| upgradability, but said it can't be helped, so enjoy fair and
| reasonable RAM prices. Previously, it had been speculated that
| CAMM had a performance penalty, but Framework's engineer on
| video saying it was that bad was fairly shocking.
| arghwhat wrote:
| I do not believe they were asking for CAMM as replacement for
| soldered RAM, but as an upgrade for DIMMs in desktop.
|
| CAMM is touted as being better than DIMMs when it comes to
| signal integrity and possible speed. Soldered of course beat
| any socket, in-package beats any soldered RAM, and on-die
| beat any external component.
|
| That AMD Strix Halo is unable to maintain signal integrity
| for any socketed RAM is a Strix Halo problem, not a socket
| problem. They probably backed themselves a bit into a corner
| with other parts of the design sacrifying tolerances on the
| memory side, and it's a lot easier to push motherboard design
| requirements than redoing a chip.
|
| If this _wasn 't_ a Strix Halo issue, then they would have
| been able to run with socketed memory with a lower memory
| clock. All CPUs, this one included, has variable memory
| clocks that could be utilized and perform memory training as
| even the PCB traces to the chip cause significant signal
| degradation.
| kimixa wrote:
| For signal integrity issues increasing the link power can
| often overcome some of the issues caused by longer traces
| and connectors in the line - while less of an issue for
| desktop devices, then that goes against the ideal of a low-
| powered device with limited cooling. Doubly so as it's hard
| to re-clock in the timescales needed for intermittent use
| power saving, so will be using that extra power when idle.
|
| I suspect the earlier comment about "Half the performance
| with CAMM" is likely at iso-power, but that might still be
| a pretty big dealbreaker.
| arghwhat wrote:
| More power is to overcome switching losses and parasitic
| reactances. You can increase drive strength up to a limit
| to overcome this, but a slight clock reduction will make
| things work at the same power.
|
| CPU's and GPU's reclock extremely fast to my knowledge,
| but what we're talking about isn't dynamic reclocking,
| just limiting the max clock as suitable to the system
| design.
|
| We already see this when we have laptop silicon that run
| faster clocks when using soldered RAM compared to when
| the same silicon is using socketed counterparts.
|
| That this wasn't an option probably mean that they're
| either far too close to the limit, or unwilling to allow
| a design that runs below max speed.
| sunshowers wrote:
| I'm curious how much the CUDIMM thing Intel is doing, where
| the RAM has its own clock, can help in the CAMM context. The
| Zen 4/5 memory controller doesn't support it but a future one
| might.
| Tuna-Fish wrote:
| The problem was specifically routing the 256-bit LPDDR5X out
| of the chip into the CAMM2 connector. This is hard to do with
| such a wide bus, because LPDDR5X wasn't originally designed
| for it.
|
| LPDDR6X is designed for it, and an use CAMM2.
| gjsman-1000 wrote:
| Judging by that LPDDR5X was announced in 2019; and LPDDR6X
| was just announced in 2024... we're still a full
| laptop/desktop cycle away.
| simoncion wrote:
| > - Move to single-voltage power supplies at 36-57 volts.
|
| Why? And why not 12V? Please be specific in your answers.
|
| > - Get rid of the "expansion card" and switch to twinax ribbon
| interconnects.
|
| If you want that, it's available right now. Look for a product
| known as "PCI Express Riser Cable". Given that the "row of
| slots to slot in stiff cards" makes for nicely-standardized
| cases and card installation procedures that are fairly easy to
| understand, I'm sceptical that ditching slots and moving to
| riser cables for everything would be a benefit.
|
| > - Kill SATA. It's over.
|
| I disagree, but whatever. If you just want to reduce the number
| of ports on the board, mandate Mini SAS HD ports that are wired
| into a U.2 controller that can break each port out into four
| (or more) SATA connectors. This will give folks who want it
| very fast storage, but also allow the option to attach SATA
| storage.
|
| > - Use USB-C connectors for both power and data for internal
| peripherals like disks.
|
| God no. USB-C connectors are fragile as all hell and easy to
| mishandle. I hate those stupid little almost-a-wafer blades.
|
| > - Standardize on a couple sizes of "expansion socket"
| instead...
|
| What do you mean? I'm having trouble envisioning how any
| "expansion socket" would work well with today's highly-
| variably-sized expansion cards. (I'm thinking especially of
| graphics accelerator cards of today and the recent past, which
| come in a very large array of sizes.)
|
| > - Redesign cases to be effectively a single ginormous
| heatsink with mounting sockets...
|
| See my questions to the previous quote above. I currently don't
| see how this would work.
| arghwhat wrote:
| > Why? And why not 12V? Please be specific in your answers.
|
| Higher voltages improve transmission efficiency, in
| particularly for connectors, as long as sufficient insulation
| is easy to maintain. Datacenters are looking at 48V for a
| reason.
|
| Nothing comes for free though, and it makes for slightly more
| work for the various buck converters.
|
| > God no. USB-C connectors are fragile as all hell and easy
| to mishandle. I hate those stupid little almost-a-wafer
| blades.
|
| They are numerous orders of magnitude more rugged than any
| internal connector you've used - most of them are only
| designed to handle insertion a handful of times (sometime
| connectors even only work once!), vs. ten thousand times for
| the USB-C connector. In that sense, a locking USB-C connector
| would be quite superior.
|
| ... on that single metric. It would be ridiculously
| overcomplicated, driving up part costs when a trivial and
| stupidly cheap connector can do the job sufficiently. Having
| to run off 48V to push 240W and have no further power budget
| at all also increase complexity, cost and add limitations.
|
| USB-C is meant for end-user things where everything has to be
| crammed into the same, tiny connector, where it does great.
| wtallis wrote:
| Graphics cards have finally converged on all using about the
| same small size for the PCB. The only thing varying is the
| size of the heatsink, and due to the inappropriate nature of
| the current legacy form factor (which was optimized for large
| PCBs) the heatsinks grow along the wrong dimension and are
| louder and less effective than they should be.
| wmf wrote:
| There's a rumor that future desktops will use LPDDR6 (with
| CAMMs presumably) instead of DDR6. Of course CAMMs will be
| slower so they might "only" run at ~8000 GT/s while soldered
| LPDDR6 will run at >10000.
| Tuna-Fish wrote:
| LPDDR6 won't go that low, even on CAMM2. The interface is
| designed for up to 14.4Gbps, with initial modules aiming for
| 10.6Gbps.
| runjake wrote:
| When, if ever, will this be released as a bare
| processor/memory/motherboard combination that I can buy and throw
| in my own case?
|
| Does anyone know?
| colejohnson66 wrote:
| Framework Desktop
|
| https://frame.work/products/desktop-diy-amd-aimax300
| Timshel wrote:
| Framework is selling the board as a stand alone:
| https://frame.work/fr/en/products/framework-desktop-mainboar...
|
| Too bad there isn't a full PCIe (might not be enough bandwidth
| left) :(.
| runjake wrote:
| I was looking to see if they sold only the motherboard just
| last night and failed. Thanks!!
|
| $1,299 (64GB) and $1,599 USD (128GB) for the motherboards.
| Yikes, but I get why.
| wmf wrote:
| Here's one motherboard: https://frame.work/products/framework-
| desktop-mainboard-amd-...
|
| I wouldn't be surprised if Minisforum also offers a
| motherboard.
| sourtrident wrote:
| Fascinating how Strix Halo feels like AMD's spiritual successor
| to their ATI merger dreams - finally delivering desktop-class
| graphics and CPU power in a genuinely portable form factor. Can't
| wait to see where it pushes laptop capabilities.
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