BAPCo is a consortium of technology companies that make the SYSMark series of business application benchmarks for computers. Members include Intel, Microsoft, Dell, Lenovo, Samsung, HP, Sony, and a few others.

AMD, Nvidia, and VIA were also members until this week. They've all quit. Nvidia and VIA have stayed silent, but AMD is apparently pissed off enough to violate it's NDA and tell the world why.

These days we have a growing number of applications that are taking advantage of GPU power that would otherwise go to waste. Such as Adobe Flash, Photoshop, Internet Explorer 9, and Office 11. AMD says SYSMark doesn't account for GPU acceleration and uses test conditions that are biased and not realistic (ie. they favor Intel). Also they point out while there are lots of apps in the test suite, just a small number of them account for a majority of the final score.

Some say consortium heavily favors Intel changes and that could be a big reason why AMD couldn't get the changes they wanted and they quit with Nvidia and VIA. So now the only semiconductor manufacture in the consortium is Intel, along with a bunch of PC manufactures that sell mostly Intel computers.

AMD's blog on the subject is here.
http://blogs.amd.com/nigel-dessau/2011/06/21/1006/

BAPCo issued a response found in this story.
http://techreport.com/discussions.x/21169

BAPCo basically says everyone can make proposals that are voted on by the member companies. And AMD did support 80% of the proposals.

Though I can see how all those PC manufactures in the consortium would probably vote more for Intel than AMD. And since it wasn't just AMD that quit, it probably gives support that things weren't quite balanced.

BAPCo members are now: ARCintuition, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Hitachi Global Storage Technologies, Intel, Lenovo, Microsoft, Samsung, Seagate, Sony, Toshiba.

I did not see mention of Nvidia so they may of left before AMD.

You can kinda see the point of makers of graphics hardware not liking non GPU tasks taking up most of the reports. Also SysMark12 is not using he newest browsers, which do GPU acceleration.

But...

I think SysMark is mostly irrelevant. Most review sites have their own "normal" tasks and gaming tasks that are used for testing. As far as CPU/GPU hardware goes.

 

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I have to agree that when several big players all quit, that bares examination.

As a completely unbiased person, I disagree. AMD isn't the only company who left. That speaks volumes. Intel clearly has a motive to skew the test to benefit themselves. AMD makes valid "arguments." Your argument is an emotional one at best. I mean no disrespect towards you...and have learned a lot from you over the years. But even if you hadn't stated many times in the past that you were an Intel employee...this post would have made it obvious

At the end of the day...I love the fight between chip makers...can only benefit us in the end

 

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This has absolutely nothing to do with me being an Intel employee - hell, I'm just a manufacturing technician who processes wafers on high-tech machines. I work right now at the very back end of the wafer fabrication process - it's 2 days from when I see it to being packaged and sent to a customer.

The irony of this is that just a couple of years ago, AMD was imploring everyone to use these benchmarks because their chips were showing up quite well on the charts. And now, AMD wants to leave and tell the entire industry that these benchmarks don't show the true capability of today's CPUs? I just find it funny that one of the biggest CPU manufacturers decides to pull up stakes so quickly after endorsing 80% of the measurements.

An article from Engadget over the surprising exit from AMD & Nvidia:
http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/21/amd-resigns-from-bapco-consortium-denounces-sysmark-2012-benchm

 

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A lot has changed in two years. And being opposed to 20% of the changes isn't exactly a small number.

But also remember, AMD left AFTER Nvidia and Via did. Apparently Intel already pissed off two of the companies enough to quit.

Keep fighting as long as everyone doesn't go back to making their own versions of technology, forcing me to choose sides.

 

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