AMD Bulldozer Microprocessors May Not Bring Dramatic Performance Boosts.

Analysts and market observers have expected Advanced Micro Devices' code-named Bulldozer microprocessors to tangibly boost performance compared to the company's today's chips. But while from architectural standpoints Bulldozer looks impressive, the company itself does not make claims about extraordinary performance improvements. In fact, "per-core" performance of the new Bulldozer-based processors will be only slightly higher compared to contemporary chips.

"From a performance standpoint, if you compare our 16-core Interlagos to our current 12-core AMD Opteron 6100-series processors (code named “Magny Cours”) we estimate that customers will see up to 50% more performance from 33% more cores. This means we expect the per core performance to go in the right direction - up," explained John Fruehe, the director of product marketing for server/workstation products at AMD.

While "per core" performance of Bulldozer may not be that impressive, the new chip designs may allow AMD to clock the forthcoming microprocessors higher without increase of power consumption and heat dissipation or to pack more cores into the next-generation processors without any running into thermal problems.