Worried about the future of GPU

jonneymendoza · 27 Oct 2020 at 10:41

I am actually worried now about future GPU's

in terms of stock, there is a mixture of reasons why stock goes out in seconds:

not much supply being made

pandemic so people staying home most so more time to play games

The resale market. people desperate to get a gpu so bad that they are willing to spend almost double the retail price

Bots being used to purchase all the stock in relation to the previous point

so sad. gpu was never this demanding

Back in the day you may have missed out on the first wee or two launch of a new gpu but after a couple of weeks to a month it was widely available well at least available to the point that once it went in stock, you had a couple of hours to make your mind up and grab it
this is so sad man

i fear it will happen with BIG NAVI

Lithium · 27 Oct 2020 at 10:56

You don't need to worry about it because it's a certainty that AMD won't have enough stock either. Remember XBOX + PS5 are launching too and they're running full pelt to make enough of components for Sony and Microsoft.

ukxenon · 27 Oct 2020 at 11:03

looking at it from a gaming point then this is a good thing..
stocks will come next year and people will get to scratch that itch

snips86x · 27 Oct 2020 at 11:04

Lithium said:
You don't need to worry about it because it's a certainty that AMD won't have enough stock either. Remember XBOX + PS5 are launching too and they're running full pelt to make enough of components for Sony and Microsoft.

According to AMD, they will have more than enough stock and even quoted that they will not have the same problem as nVidia.

otester · 27 Oct 2020 at 11:14

Just you wait until the miners upgrade from 5700xt to 6900 etc.

They'll make Nvidia stock problems look like a picnic.

RBImGuy · 27 Oct 2020 at 11:24

jonneymendoza said:
I am actually worried now about future GPU's

in terms of stock, there is a mixture of reasons why stock goes out in seconds:

not much supply being made

pandemic so people staying home most so more time to play games

The resale market. people desperate to get a gpu so bad that they are willing to spend almost double the retail price

Bots being used to purchase all the stock in relation to the previous point

so sad. gpu was never this demanding

Back in the day you may have missed out on the first wee or two launch of a new gpu but after a couple of weeks to a month it was widely available well at least available to the point that once it went in stock, you had a couple of hours to make your mind up and grab it
this is so sad man

i fear it will happen with BIG NAVI

nvidia used samsungs 8nm broken node.

jakspyder · 27 Oct 2020 at 11:34

New AMD GPU.
New nVidia GPU.
New iphone CPU.
New Snapdragons.
New AMD CPUs.
New Exynos CPUs.
New Playstation.
New xbox.

There is just no fab capacity left. And every single item is in high demand selling out.

jonneymendoza · 27 Oct 2020 at 11:38

RBImGuy said:
nvidia used samsungs 8nm broken node.

What does AMD use?

mattyfc · 27 Oct 2020 at 11:56

jonneymendoza said:
What does AMD use?

TSMC 7nm, it's a mature process and yields should therefore be very good. Will be interesting to see how much Navi 21 stock is available even with the consoles.

Fairly good chance there's loads of stock available I think, very good opportunity for AMD to gain market share maybe? Plus all the old Nvidia 20xx and Amd 50xx stock will then have to be reduced to clear as obsolete if Navi is actually available to buy.

Unless you're gaming above 1080p and ideally at 4k these new cards are largely pointless anyway. Could also be a lot of 30xx pre order cancellations if leaks for Navi 21 turn out to be accurate.

If you look at the steam survey, only 11% ish of PC gamers are using above 1080p still.

GPU market landscape could look very different quite soon.

PrincessFrosty · 27 Oct 2020 at 12:07

RBImGuy said:
nvidia used samsungs 8nm broken node.

The node isn't "broken", what on earth makes you say that? They just don't have the same kind of capacity as TSMC who make the 7nm chips used big Navi.

TSMC are also using the 7nm wafers for the PS5 and Xbox Series X APUs which are massively also backed up with preorders, I can't get either in the UK. So it's not very clear if there will be massive supply of TSMC 7nm for AMD, not with higher than usual demand for GPUs, miners, scalpers etc.

Cooper · 27 Oct 2020 at 12:13

PrincessFrosty said:
The node isn't "broken", what on earth makes you say that?

I think he meant Samsung get far fewer 'usable' GPU's out of each wafer of 8nm silicon, than TSMC get out of their 7nm silicon process. Which causes the shortage of supply problems.

GloriousMess · 27 Oct 2020 at 12:18

snips86x said:
According to AMD, they will have more than enough stock and even quoted that they will not have the same problem as nVidia.

Nablaoperator · 27 Oct 2020 at 12:28

PrincessFrosty said:
The node isn't "broken", what on earth makes you say that?

35% zero defect yields for nvidia
70% for AMD

After factoring edge defects:
24% nvidia
53% amd

I have used publicly available data on detect densities and chip sizes

pp111 · 27 Oct 2020 at 12:58

There is only so small they can make chips so I think GPU's will slowly become completely self-contained games machines, with the CPU doing almost nothing.

james.miller · 27 Oct 2020 at 13:01

Nablaoperator said:
35% zero defect yields for nvidia
70% for AMD

After factoring edge defects:
24% nvidia
53% amd

I have used publicly available data on detect densities and chip sizes

What were the chip sizes used out of interest?

PrincessFrosty · 27 Oct 2020 at 13:04

Nablaoperator said:
35% zero defect yields for nvidia
70% for AMD

After factoring edge defects:
24% nvidia
53% amd

I have used publicly available data on detect densities and chip sizes

Right, there's manufacturing tolerances in all manufacturing, some processes are more mature than others, it doesn't warrant labeling them as "broken".

Nablaoperator · 27 Oct 2020 at 13:08

james.miller said:
What were the chip sizes used out of interest?

Amd 505 to 536 mm2
Nvidia 628mm2

PrincessFrosty said:
Right, there's manufacturing tolerances in all manufacturing, some processes are more mature than others, it doesn't warrant labeling them as "broken".

I am being conservative it can be more like 20% nvidia, 60% amd

james.miller · 27 Oct 2020 at 13:12

Nablaoperator said:
Amd 505 to 536 mm2
Nvidia 628mm2

I wonder what the yeilds would be using 505-536mm2 on samsungs process?

Nablaoperator · 27 Oct 2020 at 13:16

james.miller said:
I wonder what the yeilds would be using 505-536mm2 on samsungs process?

It's straightforward. I have used a poisson distribution to estimate yields.
You would additionally need following parameters to run few permutations:
Tsmc defect density 0.06-0.09 per cm2
Samsung 0.14-0.2

Edit: Additionally I have assumed 30% edge defect rate for nv chip size and 25% for amd (these are chips at the wafer circumference that have to be discarded)

mattferg · 27 Oct 2020 at 13:28

jakspyder said:
New AMD GPU.
New nVidia GPU.
New iphone CPU.
New Snapdragons.
New AMD CPUs.
New Exynos CPUs.
New Playstation.
New xbox.

There is just no fab capacity left. And every single item is in high demand selling out.

New iPhone CPU isn't on the same 7nm process - it's 5nm TSMC.
Exynos is made in Samsung fabs on 5nm, not TSMC.
nVidia GPU is on Samsung 8nm process.

So the only things sharing 7nm TSMC are AMD CPUs, the consoles, big Navi and Qualcomm CPUS. Everything except the latter is all one company and fairly similar wafers.
Add in that Apple's 7nm capacity they no longer need is going mostly to AMD... who makes 3/4 of the things on your list...

...I think TSMC will be fine.