Re: if September's A64s have the same or similar PR scheme as the AXPs, then AMD will need them to rank credibly higher than the XPs
I'm not quite sure what you mean. Why not have a 2.08ghz 2800+ AthlonXP for $300 and a 1.5ghz 2800+ Athlon-64, also for $300? I have no idea what the actual numbers will be, maybe a 2800+ Athlon-64 would be a 1.4ghz or a 1.6ghz part, but 1.5 x 1.15 (15% due to on die memory) x 1.2 (20% due to extra registers and 64-bit operations) = 2.07.
Whatever. Your post was interesting and might explain something that has been looking a bit strange. AMD has been keeping the prices of it fastest Athlons higher than makes sense, given that overclockers have shown they've clearly been downbinning parts. Look at this pricing comparison with Intel: http://www.siliconinvestor.com/stocktalk/msg.gsp?msgid=18801597
AMD seems to be maintaining higher prices for 2800+ and 3000+ than make sense - unless they are going to be shipping an alternative 2800+ part, that has some factor that adds additional appeal to it, a lot sooner than Q4. AMD probably will want to motivate its customer base to move from the 32-bit chips to the 64-bit chips. They can either do that by slashing 64-bit chip prices or by keeping 32-bit prices high enough to make the move to 62-bits "free."
I wonder if the Athlon-64 release is going to be a lot closer to July than December?
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