When it comes to the best performance for the price in the semiconductor space, two major brands have been toe-to-toe since the late 80's; This article concerns itself with the mid-level computing performance which is not the highest or lowest, but the mainstream retail buyers most lucrative bang for the buck.
AMD (NASDAQ:AMD) and Intel (NASDAQ:INTC). The new generation of consumer is always seeking the best price-to-performance ratio when shopping for computer hardware, and now, with the arrival of the market's highest performing 6-core processors, investors are on the sidelines wondering what AMD's new Ryzen desktop processor means in the semiconductor battle.
AMD's (NASDAQ:AMD) Ryzen processors have proven themselves to be powerful and, simply put, a good bang for the buck when compared to Intel's (NASDAQ:INTC) Core-i5 processor. Pit both Company's $250 offerings against each other and the Ryzen comes out on top when it comes to multi-threaded applications. Let's take a look at the technical comparison below.
But wait! Don't label the AMD Ryzen 5 1600X as the winner just yet. When it comes to gaming, the Intel Core i-5 7600k comes out on top. But just barely. This is subject to change as games have yet to be optimized for Ryzen's multi-core architecture.
Is AMD's Ryzen processor enough to blow away the competition, upend brand loyalty, and spontaneously push the stock above its 12-month rally of 350%? No. Not quite.
AMD (NASDAQ:AMD) has had a 12-month rally of over 350%
When it comes to Intel (NASDAQ:INTC), the Company is the leader in the cloud-computing and server space, commanding over 90% of the data center market share. Intel announced in March of this year that it is in the process of buying Mobileye (NYSE:MBLY), effectively positioning itself in the driverless car market.
When it comes to AMD (NASDAQ:AMD), the Company holds around 30% of the desktop GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) market share. This number is up from last year when savvy consumers leaned in the direction of AMD's Radeon GPUs. AMD is well established in console gaming market with its custom chips powering Sony's (NYSE:SNE) PlayStation 4 and the Microsoft's (NASDAQ:MSFT) Xbox One.
Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) chart
Let's not forget, however, that Intel has a patent licensing deal with one of AMD's major contenders, Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA). And as things stand at current, Nvidia's new Pascal architecture is no match for AMD's Polaris platform.
Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) chart
The choice for investors is a complicated one and it all boils down to perspective. In the long term, both companies are in good hands fundamentally as the semiconductor market is set to be rife with opportunities as "The Internet of Things" phenomenon progresses. Will AMD's Ryzen Processor be enough to continue it's rally? That remains to be seen. The battle of the semiconductors rages on.
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