Microsoft asked AMD to boost Xbox Series S, Series X production

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The continued shortage of Xbox and PlayStation consoles has been a story since these platforms launched in November. The shortage isn’t unique to console gaming – there are hardware availability issues on PCs and consoles, as GPUs recently released by Nvidia and AMD remain hard to find, as do AMD’s Ryzen 5000 processors. .

According to Phil Spencer, director of Xbox, the company has been answering questions related to Xbox production for weeks.

“I have people [asking], ‘why haven’t you built more? Why didn’t you start earlier? Why didn’t you ship them sooner? All of those things, ”Spencer said on a Major Nelson podcast, as spotted by VGC.

“It’s really a question of physics and engineering. We’re not holding them back: we’re building them as fast as possible. We have all the assembly lines running. I was on the phone last week with Lisa Su at AMD [asking], ‘how can we get more?’ So this is something that we are constantly working on.

I’m not to say that there is nothing AMD can do to improve Microsoft’s situation, but the company’s ability to change the situation is probably limited. AMD’s involvement in the chip is limited to its design – the actual work of manufacturing and shipping in sufficient volume is done by TSMC.

There may indeed be certain buttons and dials over which AMD has indirect control, or it might be able to work with TSMC to improve performance if a number of Xbox Series X SoCs | S are fair barely missing specification. Small adjustments to improve yield and performance are common. From the mid to mid-2010s, it was not unusual to see AMD or Intel introduce a new variant of an older chip, but with a lower TDP compared to what they shipped right out of the gate. . These improvements reflected low-end optimizations.

But, while AMD may be able to boost Xbox production by reducing orders for other 7nm product families, the company will be limited by TSMC’s 7nm capacity. Last fall, several reports suggested that TSMC would be able to build 140,000 7nm wafers per month by the end of 2020. In the first half of 2020, TSMC’s WPM (wafers per month) was estimated at 110K. This implies that the company increased its 7nm capacity by 1.27x throughout the year.

Obviously, that wasn’t enough, and Nvidia’s decision to build with Samsung on 8N instead of typing on TSMC’s 7nm wasn’t enough to save Ampere’s uptime either. Nvidia is currently slated to switch to TSMC 7nm for additional amp output in 2021, which could put even more pressure on the situation.

Relief could come in the form of levies on 7nm mobile demand as businesses move to 5nm. Currently, a number of companies have told consumers to expect better product availability after the March to April 2021 period, which could reflect anything from bringing new capacity online to improved yields, to reduced usage of 7nm as companies move to 5nm. Companies may even expect stop levels to drop by then, which could lead to slowing demand, especially in the short term. Once people can safely leave home again, we will likely see spending on video games and home entertainment shifting back to other types of recreation, even if the pandemic creates a long-term increase in consumption. number of people who buy consoles, subscribe. streaming services or working from home.

The best data we have on the relative performance of the two console makers comes from VGChartz. They’ve compiled their sales estimates for the first six weeks since launch (Switch data is aligned with its launch, not current sales). The results are not particularly great for Microsoft, although we would like to point out that only a very limited amount of data can be extracted from the first six weeks, especially at a time when console sales continue to be limited. All indications suggest that Microsoft and Sony continue to sell any consoles they can make.

US sales are a better story for Microsoft. Although the Xbox Series S | X is still lower than the PlayStation 5, it is around 30%, not nearly 50%. It’s also the only region where the Xbox actually beats Switch in terms of global sales. Everywhere else, Switch leads, including Japan.

So far, the evidence points to the PlayStation 5 vastly outperforming the Xbox Series (both flavors) globally, with tighter (but still favorable to Sony) competition in the United States. It’s unclear if AMD can do anything to get more console SoCs into the hands of its partners. Plus, isn’t it the PlayStation 5 that was supposed to face severe supply constraints?

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