I see a title for this article and think "geez TechReport got a look inside at the inner workings that spawned the release of the Spider platform..... this could be interesting while disappointing initially maybe it will have some promise later next year or after a few bios revisions".... you know something that actually might be interesting and not this stupid drivel that I unfortunately read.

AMD didn't get you a test sample in time and tried to control the release...... well I guess it's time for threats and sour grapes.......

taken in context I see why the previous editorial was published as an attack for no other reason than the lack of what appears to be royal treatment...... "AMD could you hand me that stainless Wustoff knife by the caviar so that I can stick it in your back please.... so good of you..... what do you mean you won't..... why.... I'm shocked and to be honest so hurt by your lack of compliance to my whims".

1 editorial saying quite flatly that the Spider platform isn't ready yet with far to many flaws at the moment making it impossible to recommend.... there done so easy..... or to be a little nicer they could have said it's still to early to tell given the bugs but well see and possibly AMD had best get in gear now is not the time to screwup.

instead an article explaining now how TechReport was so naive up until today to believe what exactly?..... that AMD is in trouble, possibly dersperate,

judas priest I'm not saying you should commend AMD what I'm saying is why all the pissing and whining because AMD didn't send you 4 Spider platforms 6 months ago so that you could test the crap out of them before anyone else...... when by the indications I've seen Spider simply isn't ready yet....

what is it exactly TechReport brings to the table that would compell AMD to stand up and take notice aside from articles complaining about how they are so shocked and dismayed and heartbroken because AMD is in serious trouble and while struggling to survive they also aren't running with bells on to TechReports aid throwing review products at them by the skid load....I commend TechReport for it's articles presented in an unbiased manner but not for this.

as for AMD they will get great press when they release great product and not before..... aside from throwing sourgrapes at AMD what purpose did this editorial serve.

To Scott Watson:
Well here are some ideas of things that you and your colleges when you guys have some time, and stop beating AMD:

-Tests with PCIe 2.0 the performance increase or not?
- Is it good deal buy a pair of those cards (Ati/Nvidia) or not?
- Anandtech for example showed how crossfire scales badly compared to SLI, well these tests completely show the opposite, crossfire scales well and SLI bad. Who tells the truth? http://en.expreview.com/?p=53&page=5
- I think it’s strange that I have already got one MSI 790FX motherboard and that the only review I saw of it was from Poland. Isn’t this a joke?
- Tell me if I already got one X1950Pro card should I buy another X1950Pro?
- How will they perform with the 790FX chipset? With the RD580? With P965? 975? P35? …
- One 3850 VS two X1950PRO who wins?
- In this review http://www.sysopt.com/features/mboard/article.php/3712611 (page 5)
The results from the X1950PRO doubled with 3Dmark2006, how? Doesn’t websites like this exist to do tests that we don’t have time or resources to do but would like to see them done?
- How about overdrive, does it run OK? Can I overclock the first CPU to 3.0Ghz to improve single thread performance and keep the others at 2.2Ghz?
- Phenom looks bad at first sight but what processor Intel released besides Core 2 Duo was magnificent from the start?

Don’t websites like this have lots of tests to do like the ones I have talked in the previous lines? And don’t do them, because…

Also how about:
- an article bashing Nvidia because they don’t have PCIe 2.0 motherboards and AMD and Intel already have?
- Bashing Intel because they released a stupid processor that doesn’t have a chipset to run with and said DON’T give you any warranty with what you do with it, and even force you to upgrade again to X48?
http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/11/27/intel_core_2_extreme_qx9770/
Who says socket 939 to AM2 migration was big mistake and doesn’t see what Intel has been doing in the past year and half will all the different socket 775 versions with rather “complex” chipsets/cpus/motherboards combinations?
-Bashing Nvidia because of the 8800GT pre-launch.
-Bashing Nvidia and Ati because they failed to deliver psychics with their GPUs.
-Bashing Nvidia because their top chipset doesn’t support Intel 45nm CPUs.
…
AMD isn’t the only guy doing mistakes!

As should be expected, the above article is now being circulated around the web, further bashing AMD:

AMD Receives Scathing Editorial From Hardware Review Site Tech Report
Scott Wasson is the proud owner of the hardware review site Tech Report. Much like techPowerUp!, the Tech Report seeks to review new hardware for informative purposes. However, he recently had some choice words to say about AMD, and how many product he's allowed to test from them: almost none. Wasson, in an editorial, chastises AMD for not letting review sites get their hands on new products before, or sometimes even after, a hardware launch. Wasson claims that when a company does this to a reviewer, it's "a classic and sure-fire indicator of a poor product." Wasson claimed that even Intel, who certainly had their fair share of not-so-hot products (namely, the Prescott series) was more than happy to provide a review sample of new products. Wasson concludes his editorial by saying AMD "would do well to handle its struggles with similar grace and class". Please follow the source link for the full editorial.

http://www.techpowerup.com/index.php?455...

Holy Flame Wars, Batman!

I do find it funny that users are making a huge fuss out of rehash of ill-fated 4x4 and that is a blog entry = editorial = writer's opinion.

IMHO, Intel's own Skulltrail is just as much as a joke as 4x4 *cough* I mean Spider.

The article was well written but incredibly long winded for such a simple fact! and as far as Intel being so full of class , judging from how many lawsuits they
have against them around the world for trying to put AMD out of business I would suggest they're full of something else! and of course when you have that kind of money it's easy to pay people to be classy on your behalf where is AMD is starting sell some of their business to Russian firms just to stay afloat so I don't imagine they have much time or finances for classy. and let's make no mistake Intel has marketed their products as superior all through the years when everyone knew AMD had the superior product. so if this writer wants to kick AMD while they're down in the guise of making some kind of point about class then that's fine because I've been watching AMD for many years and there truly an incredible innovative company whose class will be shown in their ability to survive such FLUFF not to mention the relentless unfair business practices of the chip giant Intel. I would also like to point out that contrary to the writers indication that AMD might be trying to hide a BAD or mediocre product that AMD's new spider phenom platform is going to mature into a much more desirable technology than most people or this writer realize right now.

While I have read your "article" on AMD's poor performance I was with you all the way until Even in the darkest days of the Prescott fiasco, Intel supplied reviewers with new product samples regularly. The grace and class with which Intel handled itself cultivated goodwill with PC enthusiasts, and that paid off when the time came for Intel to recover its competitiveness with Core 2 Duo. Things may be rather difficult for AMD for a period. The company would do well to handle its struggles with similar grace and class.

Huh??? Look I can understand the propensity to sometimes forget recollections of events in this day and age of rapid fire information, but Intel handling CPU releases with "class and grace" are you serious???

Let's jog the memory of the people of this board that can remember when Tech-Report and Anand were fledgling (yes I put the hyphen in tech-report... I still type it that way... poor little domain name) and Toms Hardware was the norm.

Why can't I find a Slot A motherboard?

First off when the Athlon first came out there was only 1 board manufacturer to actually make the VIA chipset for the Slot A Athlons and I believe it was Asus. These boxes if bought online (if you could find them) were completely white without any markings. Finding reviews were equally hard, why ?? Cause most reviewers couldn't even get the boards for reviews. Some tech sites actually asked the public to send in their boards, in order for a review to even be done for the Slot A Athlon processor. This was the case because Intel was preventing VIA from making a board for the Athlon chipset because it was their version of the Intel 440BX chipset (I believe) made for Athlon processors. The amount of lawsuits alone from this chipset would boggle the mind (bought any cool VIA chipsets lately?? thought not) and the amount of pressure experienced at Aces Hardware, and Vans Hardware were equally insane. Maybe if Intel had sprinkled enough "class and grace" we would still have Van around.

The race to the GHz Barrier

Now for those who want to zero in on the marketing PR angle, lets go there shall we. AMD had something like 6 months to a year zooming past Intel and "the 1 GHz Barrier" (I believe that was Toms article title). Anything over 1GHZ was almost impossible to find from Intel and if you found one it was priced insanely and had a VERY high failure rate and I can garauntee you that the reviews for these chips were sporadic at best. To top it all off those sites which were very critical for the P3 being late to GHZ, hard to find,or HOT, received the typical Intel treatment of not receiving this processor for launch for review. Yep Intel's class and grace were just all over these years of processor advancement. I think Tom was the only one with review samples of this processor at launch. I seem to remember review sites begging and pleading to use other tech site review samples here.

Benchmark-Palooza / Quake Wars

Before the Pentium 4 came out (the Willemette core) it was VERY slow to ramp and VERY late. It wasn't until 6 months after this release when Intel hit 2GHz that the tide was turning. However, before I continue lets touch on the era that I like to call Benchmark-Palooza. At this time we had all review sites, Tech-Report included, which had to question and completely revamp their testing policies and the programs which were used in benches. Why?? Because at this point in time Intel was sharing it's "class and grace" by aligning itself with Benchmark Consortiums and creating synthetic benchmarks which would interface with programs like Word, Excel and Access, I believe it was Futuremark/Workbench (I could be wrong on the name on that one) that would in turn run tests that would prevent a mispredict in the branch prediction unit of the Pentium 4 cores. Normal user operation would cause some serious latency in refilling the Pentium 4 pipeline. The problem of this was bad enough that a previous synthetic benchmark Intel win would become a Athlon win if the tests were performed correctly.

In addition to this you had the Quake wars, which were different SSE patches which were released in order to correct the problem of Athlon SSE instructions not being used at all. This era was just insane, we all were vying to try the the latest patch to re-enable the SSE instructions that the Intel compiled SSE patches would intentionally disable if it wasn't a Genuine Intel Processor. In addition to all of this you had Intel sending out whole boxes not just CPU's for review in order to make sure that all of the Intel compilers were used. Definitely not as bad as testing behind closed doors.... but come on ... that's bad or we can call it "class and grace" if you want to.

CPU Throttle-Gate

This whole era of Intel retardation didn't end until the Northwood core when Intel was finally indisputably in the lead. But once the Athlon64 debuted and Prescott was up to bat, this cycle started all over again. CPUs that were sent out for this processor didn't land in all reviewers at the same time ... not even close... Tom's Hardware had his for sure.. but the others were sporadic at best again. Then you had custom made coolers that went along with the processor to ensure the processor wouldn't die. Once the retail coolers went out we then continued onto CPU-Throttle Gate..... where Intel processors were throttling left right and center in order to not overheat. Why?? Because the CPU's were set to throttle more aggressively for the retail version in order for the CPU to stay alive. This first batch of Prescotts were recalled and/or had production halted and a later respin was made to fix the problem. Were review sites included in all of this trouble..Nope. You had Prescott scores all over the place some were the retail processor and some were the review samples. It must of been that Intel "class and grace" you were talking about that made this era so much fun.

Intel didn't get a clue until Core. Then it was raining processors Hallelujah!
This is the way I remember it. Some things may be off a little but I'm sure I got most things correct.

Overall I don't mind Tech Report or any other review site reporting tech news and / or doing objectionable reviews. But don't try to rewrite history... just tell us how it is. AMD is screwing up..PERIOD.

WaltC...very well said!

I really kind of glossed over most of this article when it became clear to me what the tone was, but the point at which I nearly fell on the floor laughing was reading about Intel's "class and grace"! LOL! Are you kidding me? I would expect that kind of naivety from the fanboys that inhale this sort of drivel, but from a fellow 'journalist'?

This is the same Intel that spent 3 years denying that the Athlon core even existed as a threat ("We believe the Celeron competes effectively against our competitor's best"); dismissed all the journalists and industry analysts that actually saw AMD64's platform development and thought it meritorious ("We believe the notion that users want to run 16GB of RAM is silly"); and downright insulted journalists who, at the height of the roasty-toasty Prescott era, dared to ask when they were going to finally abandon the horrid Netburst architecture and actually innovate for the first time in 6 years ("You're French, aren't you?"). And let's not forgot the graceless and classless manner in which Craig Barrett & Co attacked Negroponte's then-nascent OLPC initiative ("We believe that near-starving, semi-literate children in Africa & Asia want a full-functional modern computing experience and not a half-baked platform")!?

I don't think any self-respecting journalist could seriously use the terms "class and grace" to describe the Intel corporation. Which brings me to an even more nagging issue: why does TechReport now feel the need to exceed it's mandate? Of all my favourite tech sites, TR seems to be the first and only that is harping on the "O my God AMD is going to completely collapse and disappear by screwing themselves into oblivion" bandwagon. While I and everyone else here has some perspective to render on that, I don't think it falls under a technology review website's purview. It is completely premature and amnesic, and not constructive.

"AMD would have avoided communicating the messages it did to us and, by proxy, to the public. Among them: "we're not confident in our products," "we're not a particularly well-run organization,"" WTF?! I never saw that press release. Scott, you should save this sort of Jonathan Schwartz-like rant for your private blog.

Not to put too keen a point on it, but I don't think I've ever seen such an account written about any other "enthusiast platform" initiative. Tearing into AMD because they sometimes don't make things as convenient for tech web sites as these sites might like things to be doesn't strike me as a particularly informative point to make. To that end, I have a couple of points I'd like to make:

1) It's a well known fact that Intel is now and always has been at least 10x the size of AMD. Curiously, some web journalists who've been around long enough to know it don't seem to think this kind of fiscal disparity means much of anything substantial when it comes time to roll out new products.

2) Yet, there's absolutely no doubt in my mind that current x86 cpu tech as well as current state of the art 3d tech is the direct result of product introductions made by AMD and its other half of late, ATi. Basically, it was Athlon/A64 that put Intel on the road to Core 2, and it was ATi's R300 that put nVidia on the road to nV4x and everything that has come since. I will not even attempt to describe what current cpu and 3d tech state of the art would be had Athlon & R300 never existed. It's too frightening to imagine. So it seems to me that tech sites everywhere have, through the years, gotten just as much from AMD/ATi as they have from Intel & Everybody Else.

And talking about class...Hmmmm.... Just what was so "classy" about Intel dumping Core 2 into the market just to hurt AMD? I think everybody knows that Core 2 was a newer and better cpu than the former reigning champ--the A64. Right? So was it "class" that led Intel to bargain-bin price Core 2 from the start?

Please don't tell me that Core 2 had to be priced so much lower than A64 because Core 2 was so inferior...;) Fact is, Intel could have maintained higher-than-A64 prices for Core 2 right from the start and Intel would still have been able to sell plenty of them because Core 2 proved a newer and better cpu than the venerable A64--which held the title for years. Right? I mean, back in the old days prior to Athlon, Intel wasn't at all squeamish about charging $1k a pop--but that was back when Intel had a clear monopoly on the high end of x86 cpu production.

So, OK, this class act known as Intel decides to wage a price war with AMD at the very moment it releases what it knows to be a superior x86 cpu architecture. Since we've established that Core 2 is both newer and better than A64, Intel didn't start the price war out of the fear that nobody would want its Core 2 cpus, did it? Yes, the class act known as Intel decided to wage a price war with AMD during the introduction of Core 2 simply to better its odds for finally being able to run the pesky AMD out of town on a rail. Yea, that's real class alright.

Frankly, I think AMD has shown immeasurably more class and grace than Intel over the years, and further, I think that the difference between the two companies is such that had their respective market positions been reversed during the last decade Intel would certainly not have survived the challenges that AMD has both met and overcome. Intel has never had to overcome such conditions--in its history.

So, I think there are more ways to measure class than by looking at it from the very narrow perspective of the self-interest of a tech web site. I know that many tech sites consider themselves unofficially and loosely allied with hardware manufacturers, because from time to time these web sites promote the products these companies make. So the sites are thinking, "Why won't you send me some product to pimp for you? I'm trying to do you a favor here!" or something very much along those lines...;) And, when for whatever the reason that doesn't happen at the personal convenience of some folks, some sites become miffed as though there was something personal going on. And then personal--and somewhat petty, I might add--remarks, like who has class and who doesn't, get thrown around. I find this kind of commentary not only completely off the subject, but churlish and beneath the level of professionalism that Tech-Report has maintained from its beginning.

I've seen similar commentary from other established web sites through the years, and I don't like it any better coming from them, even though I have to say that in comparison TR usually manages to avoid such displays of hurt feelings. Not really applicable to TR, some other sites act as if various companies "owe" them this or that for various unofficially rendered services. Some web sites think they are in a position to throw around mandates at various companies, and when those companies fail to say "How high?" when those sites say "Jump!" the resulting editorial commentary can be vicious. I just don't consider that a professional approach to anything.

When it comes to Intel I can see only one imperative in play, and that is this: run all competition, including AMD, out of business. Everything else Intel does, imo, is peripheral to that central imperative. That's exactly why AMD has Intel in court today, if there might be some confusion on that point.

We forget a lot that AMD is tiny compared to Intel.

The giant company employees people in PR, and generous compensation.

Their job is to outwit you.

They are quite successful.

Ergo: many people are induced to spend $200, 250 or $350 or more to get a modest increase in performance (in most cases) that cannot be subjectively noticed most of the time (compared to a new Windows install or hard drive defrag), and your old configuration was usually (in most cases) quite good already, etc.

They are the sheperds, and most of us are the sheep.

Hey, WaltC, if you wanna put on the blindfold and let AMD stick it to you every which way that's your business. But you're on your own there, man.

AMD's recent behavior is the most disgusting and deceptive I've seen from the tech industry since the Phantom game console debacle. And as I type those words I'm struck by the similarity between Phantom and Phenom.

Good luck on your crusade to save the deceiver.

Fanboys make me gag.

I don't think this is sour grapes at all for Scott. I think informing the readers about the issues behind the actual review is a good insight into how the company has changed, and potentially how they can grow stronger out of this experience. Scott's comments towards AMD are not out of spite, but rather pointing out the problems in their approach to this release. We all want and NEED AMD to be a strong competitor, and pointing out their weaknesses as well as their strengths helps keep them healthy. Oddly enough, I wrote a piece yesterday morning concerning the culture clash going on at AMD PR. It will be published at PC Perspective tomorrow.

I think anyone who perceives Scott's piece to be about "hurt feelings", "getting even", etc ought to sign-up for a reading comprehension course. I've personally read quite a few of those over the years, and this doesn't read that way at all. The key differentiator being the promise to go to other sources for hardware if necessary to continue doing the job his readers expect. In order for "win-win" to work, it needs to be "win-win". . .if its not, then its time to move on to another model.

I would rather them be patient, and intelligent about release than be hasty just to meet the originally planned launch date.

AMD is just trying to build up as much strength as possible as to compete with intel, you give them crap about releasing products that cant compete, and yet when they are working on optimizing something with already promising results to look forward to, you do a little "report" about how horrible of a company they are.

They push innovation through competition and keep product cost low. Whats not to like by a consumer stand point?

All this is, is complaining coming from a publisher whos been inconvienced.

Stop griping, im done reading your oppinions.

Tearing into AMD because they sometimes don't make things as convenient for tech web sites as these sites might like things to be doesn't strike me as a particularly informative point to make.

Are you serious?

It doesn't have a damn thing to do with TR, Anand, Ars or any other tech web site, but it has everything to do with the fact that AMD knew they were releasing a buggy, inferior platform and yet they attempted to manufacture positive press in a duplicitous fashion which ignored that reality, primarily through an ill-advised and poorly-implemented PR campaign that insulted the intelligence of not only the tech journalists but ultimately the intended consumers of their product.

AMD made their bed, now they can sleep in it.

AMD is really digging itself a hole with this type of behaviour, I think they need to stop trying to go toe-to-toe with Intel pretending like everything is fine. It just makes their hardware seem all the worse, when in reality it isn't half bad.

They should accept that they're once again in second place and play their cards accordingly, there's still the possibility of producing better products in the future. Playing with smoke and mirrors does nothing to encourage interest in the products, they should be straight up about the merits and weaknesses of their products and price them aggressively.

I don't want to buy a product that I'm not confident in even if it is cheaper, right now I find it hard to even consider AMD. I know it must be a difficult time for them as in both the CPU and GPU markets they're facing extremely solid competition from outstanding products, but the point is that AMD's products are only slightly slower in most cases - the problem is that they want to pretend like they aren't. That's the impression I get.

If AMD can't win outright on performance they should focus on offering better value in some way, whether it be with bundles/features/whatever. It just seems like AMD is trying to spin things positively rather than actually doing something positively.

Thanks for the Inside scoop, Damage.

It is nice to know the reasons why things go bad, as well as why they are good.

I dated someone who did PR for Motorola once, and a lot of the times she admitted stuff the PR / SPIN people could be handled better.

"Eagle-eye hindsight, old Alvarny the Quick used to call it."

I don't understand all this crap being given to AMD. Granted, now I probably will go with whoever is best in a year from now, but was everyone giving Intel this much crap over Prescott? What ever happened to letting something mature, or being patient with it?

Well, this article cements it. I was brought to techreport by a friend who said you can always find an impartial review here. Tomshardware sold out to Intel the day they posted the video of the Athlon smoking and catching on fire when the heatsink was removed. It appears techreport has just joined Toms in being yet another AMD basher.

Personally, I've never purchased an Intel product, and I can assure you I'm none the worse off. My worry is if the AMD bashing campaign continues , all the newbies will buy Intel products; AMD will go away, and cpus will once again cost $1200 each.

I continue to believe that AMD deserves the benefit of the doubt. I'm hoping some grass root sites will pop up soon, that haven't been tainted by Intels touch, and once again we can read some 'impartial' reviews.

Plus

Seems like a lot of people replying here missed the point of this article. Its not about them being sour at AMD for not getting them a test sample, its a matter of WHY did they not give them a test sample.

To me, if a company is unwilling to allow reviewers the ability to inform us... the consumers on the ups and downs of a product... then to hell with them. For any company to be two faced about their motives, leads me to never wanting to deal with them. This move on their part clearly spells "Its the latest and greatest! Buy without being informed!"

On the other hand, I can also imagine if AMD is in all honesty protecting the release of this new product because it is in-fact a good chip, and they would rather certain reviewers not twist the truth or mess it up.

Either way, I too take my hat off to the TR staff for making it very clear as to their motives for these new hardware and not releasing half ass reviews based on PR chips.

Now the movie escapes me... but allow me to share with you a quote that sums up this situation.

"May it never be said that your anal retentive attention to detail does not produce positive results!"

We could always go the "gray market" route, acquiring a chip from other sources and publishing test results as soon as possible.

that'd be pretty ballsy.

I think it's about traditional things on Intel side which AMD is lacking.
Intel has "uber" product lines (in term of the top market segment which is damn expensive)
for long long time (Extreme Edition, Extreme series and so on).
When the earlier Intel "uber" products confronted with AMD rising star products,
yes, AMD win proudly and cost less.

Now Intel still has 'uber" products but the tide was turned by new microarchitecture.
AMD just launched their special products (Black edition)
which I don't have any idea whether it can do well on the market or not.

Also the habit of feeding units for testing to tech websites,
I think big companies should learn to do good things (or bad things) traditionally.
No matter what how cool/sucks products they have in hand
they are absolutely for selling.
Just spread it out to the world and let the people know and decide.

At last, BIG BIG Thanks for TR team for your hard works.
I always enjoy reading TR articles.

AMD is in trouble ,but now understend them for all the times ( 3 years) they did good ,very good TR is upset because the lack of samples

.Compering 2.2GHz Phenom with a Intel 3.2 QX isn't fair

I've made this comment before, but I really think you need to point out that these opinion articles are part of your blog. It's a big link on the front page, you get your occasional reader in here who might not notice, or mistake it for a review or part of a review, and you have people saying, eh? what is this? "This is anger without reviews."

Greetings!

Clone made a point.
Its so easy, and popular sport, to bash AMD lately...

Some great editorial content there without a bunch of pompous grandstanding like you see of many other sites.

I just donated to TR, you guys rock.

*deleted for sounding like a crazy ranting person*

also, i'm really excited to see how many spider pictures you guys have found. :)

Well let's not even bring up the fact that they issued convertible bonds. That's either a sign of a CEO being duped by Wall St. or hating the shareholder.

/off topic

Tech Report and Anand have been top of my list for PC-related technical reviews for the past 3 years or so. For me, these sites will obviously continue to be top of the list, for the reasons stated and implied in this article. Thanks Scott. Keep up the great work.

BTW, in paragraph 7 of your article you might like to unswizzled the typo "3780" to read "3870"....