AMD disses Intel Xeon in ads scattered around San Jose airport

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This is a spunky AMD that we have not seen in a while.

Reddit via digdug-jigjug. Click for original. (Image credit: Reddit via digdug-jigjug)

If you happen to fly into or out of San Jose airport, you might spot a series of ads disparaging Intel's Xeon processor family as being crusty old relics. AMD has gone on the offensive, and the message is clear—Xeon is not Epyc, as one of the ads states.

Epyc is the name of AMD's Zen-based server chips, and they're direct competitors to Xeon. Obviously AMD feels it has the edge, and we are witnessing a more aggressive effort by the company to market its newest silicon. This is a side of AMD we haven't really seen in a long time.

In one of the ads (shown above, courtesy of Reddit member digdig-jigjug), AMD basically calls Xeon a dinosaur. And in another post, Reddit member hellae posted a video of several Epyc ads at San Jose airport, all of which take aim at Xeon.

The airport ad campaign is an extension of one that began around March. There are several others out there too. Here are the ones we know about so far:

  • Xeon isn't Epyc.
  • Xeon was great. So was coal.
  • Nobody ever got fired for buying Xeon. Until now.
  • Xeon ruled. So did dinosaurs.
  • Don't trust a relic. Be Epyc.

AMD is feeling good about itself these days, and the company is apparently having fun mixing it up with Intel. In addition to the ads, when Intel announced it was giving away 8,086 special edition Core i7-8086K processors commemorating 40 years of x86 computing, AMD offered to swap them out with a Threadripper 1950X chip.

"Our competitor recently kicked off a sweepstakes to celebrate the first 40 years of the x86 processor by giving away 8,086 limited edition processors. We appreciate the advancements they’ve helped drive with the x86 architecture over the last four decades. But, we’re ready to take it from here," AMD stated on its Threadripper Exchange page.

"That’s why we’re giving 40 performance-hungry enthusiasts in the US an opportunity to celebrate the next 40 years of high-performance computing by trading in their commemorative processor prize for our CPU that enables you to work, play and create with heavy metal," AMD continues.

AMD is in a relatively good place right now. It just recently launched its second generation mainstream Ryzen processors, and it's getting ready to unveil new Threadripper CPUs for the enthusiast crowd, which could provide more marketing fodder.

Paul Lilly
Paul Lilly

Paul has been playing PC games and raking his knuckles on computer hardware since the Commodore 64. He does not have any tattoos, but thinks it would be cool to get one that reads LOAD"*",8,1. In his off time, he rides motorcycles and wrestles alligators (only one of those is true).