Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD)

[Wouter Tinus]

With the yields implied by their published defect density number and the huge die size, they would do well to limit the supply, but they're not going to recoup their investment by only servicing the HPC market. Add in Phenom and at 283mm2, poor yields and performance problems I'm still wondering what it is that's going to get them back to profitability? Dual core with be just as much of a challenge against Penryn and they'll have to drop prices again just to unload those DCBBs.

I too have a hard time seeing Barcelona as a savior for AMDs financials. It will make some things a lot better (performance) but some other things a lot worse (costs, unit capacity). But while supply is limited it might be a good idea to keep prices up to get the most cash into the bank, and HPC will be about the only scenario where (cheaper) Penryn won't be competitive when they do. On the other hand keeping Barcelona relatively expensive could make them look weak in other segments of the market and cast a negative halo.