AMD Closes The Operating System Research Center

[curaga]

WTF are you talking about?

Just guessing, but I think he means the same as me - with their linux cpu support guys kicked out, support for future AMD cpus will get worse.

[89c51]

Just guessing, but I think he means the same as me - with their linux cpu support guys kicked out, support for future AMD cpus will get worse.

They just reduced the number of devs. Probably a department that doesn't handle really core stuff.

[entropy]

They just reduced the number of devs. Probably a department that doesn't handle really core stuff.

Even then - where's the PR department to clear things up? What's their strategy, etc...
And if they think they don't need to, something is really wrong at AMD.

[Drago]

Borislav Petkov had many AMD related kernel patches accepted, and now he is laid off.

[oliver]

Maybe they closed a research center in Germany, to have everything closer to home in the USA/Canada?

Just saying ...

You really think AMD will cut one of their source, albeit small, from the linux users? Server running linux count very much here too! Why would they stop linux support when they just said they'd fully support coreboot. Granted that's not linux but still.

[XorEaxEax]

Really hope AMD pulls through with it's core business intact, certainly can't blame them for shutting down things like this which is a luxury in the state they seem to be in. Losing AMD would mean Intel losing any direct competition on the x86 architecture which of course results in prices going up and as history shows, technological stagnation.

[Spacefish]

Wow, currently i use an AMD processor / chipset, my next pc will definetly contain an intel cpu, because of the good onchip GPU driver support for linux!

I think AMD already lost the CPU market somehow.. I heard something a 1,5 years ago, that most of the engeneers for the new cpu architecture left the company because of bad working conditions.. I think this is the root of the problem for AMD, they now just put more cores on a die and increase the clocking frequency / use smaller structures, this works well for 1-2 year but after that (now) good luck!

I think AMD should concentrate on the GPU-Computing market, they deliver more raw computing power / watt, price than NVIDIA, their cards are pretty commonly used, still NVIDIA manages to get theire marketshare by providing a better platform (CUDA)...

Hope next Intel CPU´s don´t get that expensive, but we can switch to ARM anyway in 2-3 years i think (linux users can). Thats not needed, but a ARM CPU is cheaper and the price is always a big factor in consumer electronics.. (i think thats the reason why window tablets are damed to fail with this 80$ licences / device). Why not buy an android tablet thats 100$ cheaper

[RCL_]

The question you are not asking is whether they lost or gained money (short term, long term) with this move.

I think that they certainly gained in the short term (or they wouldn't close it) and possibly also in long term. Just laying off 20 developers gives them additional ~1-2 mln EUR/year to spend somewhere else, not to mention other costs involved in running a facility in Germany, which is neither a cheap country nor a tax haven. AMD CPUs won't stop working with Linux and there will always be people who they'll be able to contract (or who will volunteer for free) to add critical missing bits.

If we want to "punish" them financially, we could stop buying their hardware, but in fact this is a lose-lose situation. Linux users turning away from AMD stuff will disincentivize them to support Linux, while loss of our money (if it turns out to be noticeable for them, which I'm not certain of) will only make them lay off more people working on non- or less-profitable stuff.

Better think about what *you* could do to help others make money with Linux (e.g. pay for Linux version of software? Buy stuff with Ubuntu shops/SC?). If Linux becomes profitable enough, no one will be cutting short on its support ;-)

[deanjo]

Why would they stop linux support when they just said they'd fully support coreboot. Granted that's not linux but still.

They said that quite a while back under different management and with a lot more engineering talent then what they have now. There hasn't been any new AMD coreboot work for quite a while.

[BO$$]

The ati division must try and break loose again and let amd go down itself. AMD is going down.