My Wish List for Computex 2019

With the year nearing its half way mark, a new Computex dawns at us yet again; This time, the event date has ever so slightly moved forward to the end of May (28^th to be exact) and I am sure as hell excited for what is to come in the PC space in these 2 years.

Here is my wish list for the things that I’d really like to see coming to Computex (even though some in most likelihood, is not going to happen). Of course, they are listed in no particular order:

Navi 12/10 and Next-Gen details

Probability rating:  
Navi 12 – 30%
Navi 10 – 10%
Next-Gen – 5%

I think it has come to no surprise that everyone, including me, is eagerly awaiting any news of their new upcoming Navi GPU. The new architecture on the block is meant to replace the venerable GCN architecture that has been around since the 7000 series cards circa 2012 (7 years, oh my I’m getting old). Not only is this great for pushing the graphics boundary upwards, but also for pushing the prices downwards for consumers so that the much vaunted 4k60 isn’t only achieved on flagship products, but on their high-end products as well.

With the smaller Navi chipset rumoured to appear somewhere in the second half of this year, I’m sure they’ll at least talk about it during the show, but as with all other commentators, show us the numbers man! We need to know that team red’s graphics division still has it kicking and isn’t wallowing on their knees after a disappointing Vega release.

For Navi 10, the brunt computing force of the 7nm node has allowed AMD to remain somewhat competitive with the release of the Radeon VII earlier this year with a whopping 16Gb of HBM2 memory based on the existing Vega architecture. But that kind of performance has only allowed AMD to achieve parity with the 2080/ 1080ti in gaming workloads for the same price. Not quite good enough to drive future titles at 4k60 (like Cyberpunk 2077).

Hopefully with the new architecture, AMD will be able to reach this target at a much more reasonable price point closer towards the traditionally-already-high-end $500 USD mark. Will AMD rise again to uppercut Nvidia in the jaw like the Red Phoenix, the R9 290 once did in 2013? We’ll see.

For next-gen, I expect CEO Lisa Su to be tight lipped about their future projects in the graphics division, but hopefully they will at least show us a roadmap that will compete with 2020’s upcoming challenger, Intel.

Here’s hoping we find out something at Computex.

AMD teases Next-Gen Consoles at Computex.

Probability rating:
Partnership reveal – 20%
Architecture confirmed – 0%

I think it is basically safe to say right now that AMD is once again the sole manufacturer for both Sony and Microsoft’s next generation console that is also rumoured to be a 2020 release. With Crytek’s real-time ray tracing demo that was rumoured to run on a current-gen Vega 56, it stands to say that we would definitely get something similar when the new Xbox and the PlayStation is released. Expect 4k60 to finally be achieved… for real this time.

On the CPU front, we might yet see another “better than expected” (their words not mine) increase in single core compute workload when Zen 2 hits the market later this year. This means that AMD might finally reach performance parity with Intel, roughly 16 years since the original release of the Athlon 64. What a time to live!

Of course, this means that the baseline performance for Next-Gen consoles are already pegged to the performance of their desktop counterparts, barring any custom modifications from Microsoft or Sony.

Jensen Huang announces 1660/1660ti mobile chipsets with more to come

Probability rating:
Announcement – 30%

Let’s face it, Nvidia’s RTX series of cards didn’t exactly launch on Laptops with much excitement or fanfare. Primarily, this would be attributed to the incredibly expensive nature of RTX tensor cores that frankly is failing to impress me even in the desktop front (for the price-tag).

Compounded with the fact that such resource intensive process for gaming really shouldn’t be in a mobile form factor the first place, it might just be the kick that Nvidia needs to finally release non-RTX mobility series of cards at a reduced price point that will hopefully (at least) bring mid-end gaming laptops back to a reasonable price range.

Raja Koduri, the man himself, fronts Intel’s sneak peek for their upcoming 2020 GPU that beats both AMD and Nvidia.

Probability rating:
Announcement – Negative 10 percent

Raja, on the off-chance that you might be reading an article from a new, tiny outlet based off Singapore… WHERES MUH VEGA PERFORMANCE!??!? *ahem*

This would be amazing, a show stopper probably. Raja could possibly drop the mic with Intel’s presumably new GPU logo, only showing that and walk off the stage; he would still be cheered and heralded through the end of times. He returns to the stage with an intricate black box labelled “ES” and starts handing out Press samples of Intel’s GPU to the cheering crowd. He flickers the remote in his hands and the projection flips to a towering chart, indicating team blues’ 300% performance advantage over the competition. The crowd is roused to applause and standing ovation. Fun times.

In an alternate universe where numbers don’t make sense, this might possibly happen but I guess it would be wishful thinking on my part.

On the more logical plane known as real life, we likely would only expect to see comparative numbers at best when it comes to price/performance given how their “big chip” Iris Pro graphics are still not a match against Vega 11’s performance. While it may be some time before Intel closes the distance with 2 companies that basically has 30 odd years of head start within just one generation, Raja may very well be the person to do it! Eventually…maybe at Computex 2020?