AMD promises ‘Freedom of Choice’ as GPP takes hold

AMD promises Freedom of Choice as GPP takes hold

AMD promises ‘Freedom of Choice’ as GPP takes hold

Over the past few weeks, there has been a lot of rumours and speculation regarding Nvidia’s Geforce Partner Program (GPP), a divisive deal which allegedly forces the company’s AIB (Add-in-Board) partners to make their gaming brands Geforce Exclusive or face ill-treatment. Partners of the program will reportedly receive engineering support and money to market Geforce hardware, placing non-signatories in a disadvantageous position.

If the reports surrounding GPP are accurate, Nvidia’s AIB partners like ASUS, MSI and Gigabyte will be forced to create new hardware sub-brands for Radeon hardware. ASUS has already announced their new AMD-specific AREZ sub-brand for Radeon graphics cards, with GPUs being set to arrive in May in selected regions. 

AMD has responded to GPP in a new Radeon blog post entitled Radeon RX Graphics: A Gamer’s Choice”, highlighting a gamer’s “freedom of choice” and their “commitment to true transparency”. While GPP is not mentioned outright in the article, it does state that AMD will work closely with “all our AIB partners” and will have “No anti-gamer” or “anti-competitive strings attached” to their hardware.

Elsewhere in the post, AMD also references the high price of G-Sync monitors, stating that do not plan on “penalizing gamers with proprietary technology “taxes” and limiting their choice”. The company also references their work with JEDEC on HBM2, Microsoft on DirectX, Khronos on Vulkan and game developers on GPU Open to create value for all consumers/gamers, rather than create proprietary technologies.   

AMD has confirmed that several AIB partners plan to create new Radeon exclusive sub-brands for Radeon RX graphics hardware, though as we have seen with ASUS, nothing is expected to change significantly outside of branding. Even so, it appears to Nvidia’s Geforce Partner Program has eliminated the Radeon name from many of the world’s most iconic and recognisable GPU brands.  

 
     Over the coming weeks, you can expect to see our add-in board partners launch new brands that carry an AMD Radeon product. AMD is pledging to reignite this freedom of choice when gamers choose an AMD Radeon RX graphics card. These brands will share the same values of openness, innovation, and inclusivity that most gamers take to heart.

The freedom to tell others in the industry that they won’t be boxed in to choosing proprietary solutions that come bundled with “gamer taxes” just to enjoy great experiences they should rightfully have access to.
The freedom to support a brand that actively works to advance the art and science of PC gaming while expanding its reach.

 

ASUS officially reveals AMD-exclusive AREZ sub-brand - releases in May

  

AMD’s new “Freedom of Choice” marketing is exceptionally aggressive, fueling consumer distaste for Nvidia, who have long been dominant in the GPU market and mired in controversy thanks to technologies like PhysX and GameWorks.  

In the face of GPP AMD has decided to turn Nvidia’s controversy to their advantage with a bold marketing strategy, though if today’s rumours are to be believed, it looks like the GPU industry will heat up in a big way over the next few years. 

With real-time Ray-Tracing becoming a more common topic of discussion and an evident desire from Intel to enter the dedicated graphics/gaming market it looks like things are about it heat up over the next few years. There have also been reports of a post-GCN graphics architecture from AMD, which opens up the potential for a Radeon Ryzen-like architectural leap, which is certainly something we would love to see. 

What do you think of AMD’s aggressive ‘A Gamer’s Choice’ marketing campaign? You can join the discussion on AMD’s Freedom of Choice’ marketing campaign and GPP on the OC3D Forums.Â