Can anyone explain what prevents AMD from making x86_64 chips competitive with ARM on the lower end like in mobile phones? I doubt it's about ISA.

▲ axiolite 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Just price, I'd say. AMD / Intel are used to a certain margin on their products, and the low barrier to entry to create ARM CPUs, and fierce competition from giants like Broadcom, keeps margins very thin in this market.

The original smart phones like the Nokia Communicator 9110i were x86 based.

AMD previously had very impressive low-power CPUs, like the Geode, running under 1-watt.

Intel took another run at it with Atom, and were able to manage x86 phones (eg: Asus Zenphone) slightly better than contemporary ARM based devices, but the price for their silicon was quite a bit higher than ARM competitors. And Intel had to sink so much money into Atom, in an attempt to dominate the phone/tablet market, that they couldn't be happy just eeking out a small sliver of the market by only being slightly better at a significantly premium price.

▲ aurareturn 5 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

  Just price, I'd say.

I don't think it is price. Intel has had a bigger R&D budget for CPU designs than Apple. If you mean manufacturing price, I also doubt this since AMD and Intel chips are often physically bigger than Apple chips in die size but still slower and less efficient. See M4 Pro vs AMD's Strix Halo as an example where Apple's chip is smaller, faster, more efficient.

▲ shmerl 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I see, but why others like Qualcomm are doing it then? They are OK with low margins?

	▲	ACCount37 13 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Qualcomm has a massive "value add" because they own the modem. As well as a doom stack of patents on all things cellular. You need a modem if you want to make a smartphone. And Qualcomm makes sure to, first, make some parts of the modem a part of their SoC, and second, never give a better deal on a standalone modem than on a modem and SoC combo. Sure, AMD could make their own modem, but it took Apple ages to develop a modem in-house. And AMD could partner with someone like Mediatek and use their hardware - but, again, that would require Mediatek to prop up their competition in SoC space, so, don't expect good deals.

▲ wmf 8 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Their lowest end chips are probably competitive already. I think x86 support was removed from Android though.

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shmerl 8 hours ago | parent [-]

So why did for example Valve decide to use Qualcomm Snapdragon for Steam Frame and not some AMD APU?

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kube-system 8 hours ago | parent [-]

I have seen speculation that mobile app architecture compatibility was part of it

	▲	shmerl 7 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I see. But aren't they emulating x86_64 on ARM64 there anyway? Can't they emulate ARM64 on x86_64 the same way?