Intel is confident in securing, and even expanding, its market position as we approach and enter 2022. In an interview with Computer Reseller News, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger talked about Intel's plans with consumer and server CPUs, how he is going to help partners, and how he sees competition from the likes of AMD, Arm, and Apple.
Starting with desktop products, Gelsinger seems confident that Intel is snatching away the initiative from AMD shortly – with the rollout of Alder Lake CPUs. "AMD has done a solid job over the last couple of years. We won't dismiss them of the good work that they’ve done, but that's over with Alder Lake and Sapphire Rapids," said the Intel CEO.
On competition with AMD and its consumer CPUs, Gelsinger went further to say, Alder Lake will secure both "performance leadership and energy efficiency leadership," for Intel. He reckons it is a "game changer," architecture.
With both consumer desktop and server CPUs Intel is again seeking to grasp the platform leadership role, with key new technologies like DDR5, CXL, and PCIe Gen 5. The next gen will help Intel again "design the platform for the industry," and in effect become part of the 'reference design' for PCs/servers.
Apple Macs leaving Intel behind hasn't fazed Gelsinger. Instead, he has been talking with important partners such as Microsoft and Dell on how to simply make the PC experience better, so people won't be so interested in Apple Mac computers. At the same time, he indicated Intel was working with partners who could help Intel-powered solutions encroach on the tablet/mobile space – to fight Apple, and to stop Arm devices growing upwards into traditional Wintel territory.
Interestingly, Gelsinger seemed to indicate that he was personally extricating his digital life from the "Apple closed garden," so will be motivated in this way to make Windows and Android devices better.
For more on the above, please head on over to the CRN website to digest the five-page interview feature.
Latest Steam HW survey data
With AMD and Intel's consumers tussle remarked upon above, it is interesting to have a sideways glance at the recently updated Steam HW survey data. In September, AMD looks to have firmly grasped 30 per cent plus market share of CPUs in use by Steam gamers. It made a similar beachhead in May, but the trend line indicates it will make further gains in the coming months.
Looking at the video card data, the biggest loser is the old GTX 1060, down 1.82 per cent in the most recent month. The biggest gainer seems to be AMD iGPUs, as featured in AMD's APU products. Also, we are pleased to report the first sighting of an RDNA2 GPU in the top 100 Steam GPUs – as the AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT claims a 0.16 per cent share… breaking into the chart at position 90-something.
