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AMD’s Richland Coming In June
Richland is set to replace AMD’s Virgo platform, powered by Trinity processors, and this change will happen in June 2013, most likely coinciding with Computex 2013.
AMD has just launched the first batch of Richland mobile APUs and we still have to see some notebook designs hitting the market. We wrote about mobile Richland APUs.
As of late last year Desktop Richland was always set to launch in June 2013 and the fastest of them is the A10 6800K, clocked at 4.1GHz and 4.4 with Turbo. It also features Radeon HD 8670D graphics that run at 844 MHz. This is the fastest Richland part and it comes unlocked, ready to replace the current AMD A10 5800K. In Europe, the A10 5800K currently sells for 112, while in US the same CPU sells for $129.00 (boxed).
The alpha dog A10 6800K is followed by A10 6700, A8 6600K (Unlocked) and A8 6500. AMD has a mix of 100W and 65W quad-core Richland desktop SKUs. There will be a single A6 6400K (Unlocked) SKU and the A4 6300, both dual-cores with 65W TDP.
Production ready samples were churned out in late January, while volume production is scheduled for late March 2013. The announcement was always scheduled for June 2013 and Richland last through most of 2013, until Kaveri with 28nm Steamroller comes on line.
AMD Goes Richland
There have been more than enough leaks dealing with Richland, AMD’s successor to the Trinity powered Virgo platform, and we even had a chance to see some leaks regarding its successor, codenamed Kaveri. As you may already know, Richland is planned to last through 2013 and it is clear that this is very important chip for AMD.
Based on the Piledriver architecture and built using 32nm technology, Richland will feature an integrated GPU that will be upgraded to Radeon HD 8000 series, a generation ahead of Trinity. As you know, there has been a lot of leaks regarding the Richland parts and the quad-core A10-6800K with Radeon HD 8670D graphics is expected to pack quite a punch. Best of all, Richland will still use the same FM2 socket.
According to our sources, the NDA will be lifted on 12th of March, 8am EST, and we are sure that we will see at least a couple of reviews as well as some additional info regarding the price and the availability date.
AMD Releases Vishera
Although it was detailed back in August last year, AMD has just now officially released its new “affordable” Vishera based FX-4130 quad-core socket AM3+ CPU.
The new CPU is part of AMD’s 4100-series and is based on Vishera core design with four Piledriver cores. It works at 3.8GHz base clock and can “turbo” up to 3.9GHz. It packs 4MB of L2 and 4MB of L3 cache and has a 125W TDP.
According to the slide over at Xbitlabs.com, the FX-4130 replaces the FX-4100 with the same US $101 price but should provide between 3 and 9 percent more performance.
As things get better with Globalfoundries and their 32nm process technology, AMD is expected to introduce new models based on cut-down versions of Vishera, according to the report.
AMD’s Roadmap Leaked
According to the latest AMD desktop roadmap, published by DonanimHaber, the Steamroller architecture could be delayed, which means Piledriver cores will power AMD’s third-generation APUs.
So what does this mean for consumers? Well, Richland APUs might not be quite as good as expected. AMD could optimize the x86 cores and go for more powerful graphics, but it’s hard to get excited about the next generation.
Vishera parts will also stick to Piledriver cores, backed by discreet Radeon 7xxx and 8xxx series graphics. However, we will see a new architecture in the low end. Kabini is apparently on track to launch next year, with Jaguar cores, refreshed graphics and an all new system-on-chip version, with an integrated on-chip Fusion controller hub (FCH).
What’s more, AMD will also offer quad-core Kabini parts, and who could say no to a dirt cheap E-series APU with four cores, good graphics and a ridiculous TDP?
AMD Makes More Cuts
There have been some rumors that AMD plans to drop prices on its older generation APUs as well as some AM3 Athlon II CPUs and as of yesterday, the new price list confirmed those cuts. Unfortunately the price cuts are not that impressive on the FM1 side but some AM3 Athlon II CPUs have seen a price reduction of over 30 percent.
The full list includes a total of six A-Series APUs and twelve AM3 Athlon II CPUs. The most impressive price cut in the A-Series was on the A4-3300 APU for 21.7 percent, or from US $46 down to US $36. The flagship A8-3870K got cut down by 9.9 percent while A6-3670K was cut down by far less impressive 3.7 percent.
The most impressive price cuts on the AM3 Athlon II side is on the Athlon II X4 640 and the Athlon II X2 265. The Athlon II X4 640 got cut down from US $98 to US $67, or 31.6 percent, while Athlon II X2 265 got cut down from US $69 to US $48, or 30.4 percent.
Two Athlon II CPUs, the X3 445 and the X4 638, were removed from the price list as they were most likely discontinued.
You can check out the full list and price cuts over at CPU-World.com.
AMD Goes Piledriver
AMD has released its Piledriver desktop
processors codenamed Vishera.
AMD showed off Vishera at IDF last month, an overclocked chip running at 5GHz. Now the company has taken the wraps off its eight-core Vishera chip, a processor that it hopes will finally bury memories of its disappointing Bulldozer Zambezi chip.
AMD’s Vishera processors will continue to use Socket AM3+, meaning it is a drop-in upgrade for those customers lumbered with Zambezi processors.
The firm announcing four models all branded with the FX moniker. The low-end Vishera chip is the quad-core FX-4300 clocked at 3.8GHz boosted up to 4.0GHz, with 4MB of Level 3 cache.
The firm has kept feature parity throughout its Vishera FX range aside from core count and total Level 3 cache. Therefore AMD’s six-core FX-6300 still sports the same 1MB of Level 2 cache per core but has a total Level 3 cache of 8MB and is clocked at 3.5GHz that can be boosted up to 4.1GHz.
AMD’s top two Vishera parts, the FX-8320 and FX-8350 sport eight cores and have 8MB of Level 3 cache. The difference between the two chips is their clock frequencies, with the FX-8320 running at 3.5GHz and boosted to 4.0GHz while the FX-8350 is clocked at 4.0GHz and is boosted to 4.2GHz.
The firm’s decision to clock its FX-8320 and FX-8350 so closely is largely academic, as all Vishera chips feature an unlocked multiplier. AMD even plays up the overclockability of Vishera and touts 5GHz as being reachable with water cooling. Insiders have even said it can reach 5GHz with strong air cooling.
As for AMD’s Piledriver architecture, the firm claims it offers improved branch prediction and improvements to Level 2 cache efficiency and scheduling. Overall the company is sticking to its longstanding line that Vishera is a 15 percent performance increase over Bulldozer, and while that might well be true, Bulldozer was so far behind its competition in single-threaded performance that a 15 percent gain is needed simply to achieve parity, let alone a lead.
AMD Makes Cuts
AMD has cut its third quarter revenue and gross margin forecasts citing weak demand.
AMD’s lacklustre Bulldozer processor line has left the firm desperately trying to compete with Intel in the desktop market while its more impressive accelerated processor unit (APU) range has been rebuffed by Intel’s multi-million dollar ultrabook marketing push. Now AMD has revised down its estimate of third quarter revenues, which it says will be around 10 percent lower than the previous quarter.
Even more worrying for AMD is its lower forecast for gross margin, the difference between selling an item and the cost to make it, down from 44 percent to 31 percent. Effectively AMD said its cost of doing business has risen considerably higher, although it laid most of the blame on an $100m inventory writedown.
AMD couldn’t avoid admitting the blindingly obvious and said that its writedown of inventory was due to “lower anticipated future demand for certain products”. The firm has suffered through a disappointing 2012, and earlier this year it announced a $580m loss back in April.
Intel Going High-Performance
Intel has been hinting that it is developing high-performance lower power server chips to speed up cloud services or data-intensive applications like analytic.
Apparently this will involve the integration of a converged fabric controller inside future server chips. This will make server communication faster while helping data centers operate at peak efficiency.
Raj Hazra, vice president of the Intel Architecture Group said that Fabric virtualises I/O and ties together storage and networking in data centres. If you add in an integrated controller you get a wider pipe to scale performance on cloud platforms. He said that the integrated fabric controller will appear in the company’s Xeon server chips in a few years as part of Intel’s cunning plan to bring the controller to the transistor layer.
AMD Details Vishera
AMD will launch three eight-core processors led by the AMD FX 8350 but it also plans to launch two six-core processors for people who like to spend a bit less.
The AMD FX6350 is a 125W six-core with a 3.9GHz base clock and 4.2 maximum turbo core clock. It comes with 14MB of cache, supports DDR 3 1866 and comes in AM3+. Naturally this is a 32nm SOI product just as its predecessor as AMD is not ready for 22nm fun yet.
The runner up is a 3.5GHz clocked six core that turbos to 4.1GHz, all that while staying in 95W TDP envelope. The name is FX 6300 and these two boys should launch together. The rest of the specification is the same as with faster brother. These two processors will replace the Zambezi based FX 6120 and FX 6100. These parts as well as FX 6200 that is also a part of Zambezi legacy are all selling between $190 and $250 which is definitely not a lot of money for quite powerful processors.
Intel Goes Wireless
Maho Bay is a desktop platform wrapped around the recently launched Ivy Bridge desktop processor and Intel plans to enrich this platform with a Wireless mini card offer of its own.
The plan is to make new SKUs based on half Minicard (mPCIe) standard and offer it with its boards that have support for PCIe 1X or faster. Maho Bay also allows some combinations with Sandy Bridge processors and will allow the use of these mini Wireless cards on older processors with new boards. It looks like the Panther Point chipset is necessary even for older Sandy Bridge processors on Maho Bay platform.
The top range card with premium performance is Intel Centrino Ultimate N 6300, and the card has virtually the same specification like its mobile brother. It supports Intel Wireless Display as well as Intel My Wifi technology and quick driver connect.
Since it is using 3×3 antennas and MIMO standard it us capable of achieving speeds of 450Mbits per second and it does support multiple streams. It supports dual band 2.4 + 5 GHz and Intel Vpro. This is still a 802.11n based product as Intel hasn’t really jumped the gun to support 802.11ac in 2012.
It looks like it is too early for Intel to embrace this new standard due to its very limited market penetration.