AMD Unveils New Quad-Core Chip

AMD desperately needs new hit products to generate some revenue and shore up its profit margins. The company has lost $1.6 billion in the first three quarters of the year, and it is weighted down by $5.3 billion in debt.

Despite the technological advances AMD new products however, the various pieces of AMD's Spider package each face tough competition.

ATI's latest graphics chips, for instance, are considered a good value, but many of the most discriminating video gamers are partial to Nvidia's(NVDA Quote) new G8 family of graphics processors.

And Intel has been charging ahead with a steady stream of microprocessor releases. The company introduced its latest processor, dubbed Penryn, earlier this month, featuring circuits that measure 45 nanometers, vs. the 65 nanometers used by AMD's Phenom. And Intel is slated to release chips based on a new microarchitecture in 2008.

Meanwhile, AMD has acknowledged that its ability to ramp its new quad-core chips in volume has been slower than expected because of "design and process tuning" issues. The initial versions of the Barcelona chip have been available only at low clock speeds.