



There's no question that AMD 's Zen microarchitecture has been a boon for the company since it was first released in 2017 with first-generation Ryzen processors. We've gone from 14nm Zen, to 12nm Zen+, and we're now closing in on the release of 7nm Zen 2 processors (starting with the Ryzen 3000 desktop processors).

According to the latest figures from Mercury Research, AMD is continuing to claw away market share from perennial leader Intel. In the firm's Q1 2019 PC Processors Report, it's noted that Q1 2019 was the sixth quarter in a row that AMD has seen is overall share of the x86 process market increase.

AMD held a 13.3 percent share of the overall x86 market during Q3, which was a significant improvement from 8.6 percent in Q1 2018, and even represented an increase from 12.3 percent during Q4 2018. AMD has especially been strong in the desktop and notebook sectors, where the company saw its year-over-year quarterly performance increase by 4.9 share points for the former and 5.1 share points for the latter.

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AMD's penetration into the server market hasn't exactly cut Intel too deeply, and its share from Q4 2018 to Q1 2019 actually decreased by 0.3 share points. However, looking at Q1 2018 versus Q1 2019, AMD is still currently sitting at 2.9 percent versus 1.0 percent according to Mercury Research.

No matter how you look at it, AMD has a lot to be proud of with respect to performance in recent years. Zen 2 is shaping up to be big release for the company, and some reports are suggesting that we could see up to a 15 percent IPC lift versus current Zen+ processors.

With Intel still clinging to its 14nm++ architectures for the desktop platform -- albeit with continual process refinements -- it should be interesting to see if AMD can truly put the smackdown on Intel in the price/performance realm when Ryzen 3000 processors arrive in Q3. And given that there's the strong possibility that high-end Ryzen 3000 processors could bring up to 12 physical cores in tow, we'll be sitting back in our lawn chairs with a beer in hand to watch the fireworks...