I definitely agree with you. Though AMD's comeback with Ryzen really surprised me and I don't think other companies can't replicate comebacks like that.
After the Bulldozer fiasco who would think AMD would be where they are today?
After the Bulldozer fiasco who would think AMD would be where they are today?
Makes me wonder exactly what happened there. Did GloFo hit trouble and give up? Did AMD tell them they weren't going to use them anymore, leading to them giving up? Basically, who dumped who?
I mean... for people who remember AMD's original breakthrough with the Athlon, it's not super surprising.
Although it feels a bit like a problem with Intel as well. I think, too much time wearing the crown can be bad for a company. Although some companies don't seem to suffer from that problem - Nvidia and TSMC being 2 pretty good examples.
NVidia indeed seems an outlier, although arguably the GPU division of AMD hasn't had the same overhaul that the CPU side had.
Being #1 is bad for everyone and everything period. History has shown us time and time again that the #1 spot inevitably falls from grace, the only question being how disasterously. There is no exception.
#2 and below are where you want to place if your primary interest is continued, ideally permanent, long-term prosperity.
AMD didn't really do so much. It was TSMC that saved them.
AMD's success was also due to their new Zen architecture and move to chiplets. TSMC alone wouln't have been enough to save them if their architecture would have sucked.
AMD still used Glo-Fo for the first gen Ryzens and still do for the I/O die in some chiplets because it's cost competitive.
It they would have just ported their failed Bulldozer architecture to TSMC, that wouldn't have helped them at all.
Your original claim that "AMD didn't do much" and it was "TSMC that saved them" is a blatantly false. You are grossly misinformed if you believe that.
Moving to TSMC definitely helped later, but it was the original Zen architecture that put them back in the game.
The CPU was competitive with Intel in real world scenarios and was very well received when it launched in 2017; eg: https://www.pcworld.com/article/412262/ryzen-review-amd-is-b...
The point is that the architecture and CPU design was the thing, not the later switch to TSMC which didn't happen until Zen 2 in 2019.