AMD officially launches A-Series processors for notebooks

[Jos]

Continuing with its Fusion family rollout AMD has now officially launched their A-Series of accelerated processing units -- or APUs. Unlike the low-power flavor of Fusion chips already on the market, the C-Series (Ontario) and E-Series (Zacate) for netbooks and budget laptops, the A-Series (Llano) was designed with desktops and mainstream laptops in mind and will be the first from AMD made using a 32-nanometer manufacturing process.

AMD is taking direct aim at Intel's Core 2011 processors with seven laptop APUs across three families, available as the A4, A6, and A8. The dual-core A4 chips will compete with Core i3 processors, while the quad-core A6 is going after i3 and i5 chips, and the quad-core A8 will take on Intel's range topping i5 and i7. Here's a quick look at their specs:

Model	CPU clock	CPU cores	L2 cache	Radeon GPU	Shaders	GPU clock	TDP
A8-3530MX	1.9GHz/2.6GHz	4	4MB	HD 6620G	400	444MHz	45W
A8-3510MX	1.8GHz/2.5GHz	4	4MB	HD 6620G	400	444MHz	45W
A8-3500M	1.5GHz/2.4GHz	4	4MB	HD 6620G	400	444MHz	35W
A6-3410MX	1.6GHz/2.3GHz	4	4MB	HD 6520G	320	400MHz	45W
A6-3400M	1.4GHz/2.3GHz	4	4MB	HD 6520G	320	400MHz	35W
A4-3310MX	2.1GHz/2.5GHz	2	2MB	HD 6480G	240	444MHz	45W
A4-3300M	1.9GHz/2.5GHz	2	2MB	HD 6480G	240	444MHz	35W

All models support features such as HDMI 1.4a, DisplayPort 1.1, and USB 3.0, as well as multi-monitor setups, 3D gaming and 3D Blu-ray playback. A-Series chips will also offer the option of adding a separate discrete graphics card on top of the bundled GPU, in a setup called AMD Dual Graphics that is said to boost graphics performance by up to 75%. Furthermore, AMD is also touting 10-plus hours of battery life, or 50-60% more than comparable laptops from last year.

In terms of pricing, systems with the A4, A6, and A8 chips are expected to start around $499, $599, and $699, respectively. AMD expects more than 150 laptops and desktops to use A-series parts starting almost immediately. Toshiba has already announced the new Satellite P700, equipped with the AMD A6-3400M, while HP has updated eleven of their Pavilion and ProBook laptop models to include the latest AMD parts.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/44235-amd-officially-launches-a-series-processors-for-notebooks.html

 

[Guest]

its pretty sad AMD and websites have resorted to attacking Intel graphics, when all Intel has done is made what little they had, better, and AMD jumps on them like they're king of the effin jungle. AMD is doing this because the CPU side of their APU's offer nothing over their current Phenom's which is a lackluster and inefficient micro architecture. Intel never said that their old or new IGP/HD Graphics were designed to take on AMD or nVIDIA, only saying they are up to descrete graphics card level, albeit low end ones. AMD is a CPU chipmaker first, yet they got nothing to take on big blue, so they resort to cheap shots. man the eff up AMD! if Intel one day purchased nVIDIA, AMD would be fighting them with lawyers instead of some weak *** GPU comparison tests they try to embarrass Intel with.

 

[dividebyzero]

Ah, the trolls got an early start on this story ^ Colour me surprised!
Maybe we should let the reviews speak for AMD, and their positioning with regards Intel and Nvidia...
AnandTech
Tom's Hardware
Phoronix (Linux)
Hot Hardware
Legit Reviews
PC Perspective

 

[Guest]

Haha first guest just got WTFPwnd. If the graphics are better then why not flaunt it. Worst case scenario for us is intel finally get of their arses and stop holding back tech because of no competition.

 

[Burty117]

dividebyzero said:
Ah, the trolls got an early start on this story ^ Colour me surprised!
Maybe we should let the reviews speak for AMD, and their positioning with regards Intel and Nvidia...
AnandTech
Tom's Hardware
Phoronix (Linux)
Hot Hardware
Legit Reviews
PC Perspective

Thanks for the link to the Tom's hardware one, AMD does actually have a serious graphics horse with the A8 APU! and almost doubling the battery life over what Intel has?! thats impressive!

 

[Kibaruk]

Good sir if I may have 2 please!

Intel fanboy tears are delicious.

 

[Jibberish18]

Even though the CPU is seriously lacking today's horsepower compared to Intel, I'd still like one of these laptops. With the emphasis that is being placed on GPU's nowadays (even browsers), a good GPU is almost essential. I wish they would've redesigned the CPU's but I know why they didn't. Either way, the $200 bucks or less I maybe saving over a Intel laptop, I think I'd put towards the purchase of an overpriced SSD.

 

[zillion]

Im glad AMD is getting some marketshare in this category if this turns out to be true, i do wonder tho how they managed to manipulate the numbers to tell a 75% increase in gpu performance while adding a discrete gpu, either it is the increase from the build in gpu (which means the discrete gpu is too weak or the build in is too OP) or it is a 75% increase from a discrete (which means the discrete is crap).

Anyway this segment is not something branded at my needs.

 

[Guest]

I'm waiting for 28 and 22 nanometer processors, 35W TDP is high and 45W TDP is too much for a notebook... I want a more efficient thing.

 

[Jibberish18]

Guest said:
I'm waiting for 28 and 22 nanometer processors, 35W TDP is high and 45W TDP is too much for a notebook... I want a more efficient thing.

That's quite the quote. For one I don't think it's all about the die size that determines efficiency. Most of the inefficiency today seems like it stems from the amount of time it takes for voltage to go up and down. For two, the smaller you go, the harder it is to prevent power leaks. I remember reading a few years back that while Intel had already moved down to .45 nm processing, AMD was still refining its .65 nm process with the help of IBM.

 

[Guest]

I'll take the bottome one for use in a tasty lttle HTPC please .. then in years to come, when I move up to 4kx2k Ultrares, I can just ad another low power consuming discrete GPU. Whilst still saving the planet and my electrobills.
Amd just needs a bit of software that leverages their APU's .. like Games??

Which is the most popular operating system worldwide? not really windows, it just sells the most

 

[Guest]

Hey, but vga tdp + gpu tdp = 45W is good result

 

[Guest]

* Sorry I meant CPU+GPU

 

[Row1]

45 watt sounds pretty good, but i expect 32nm to be lower, also.
I built a low power low heat desktop around AMD 605E, supposed to be at 45 watt tdp.
So, when stressed, my computer uses at most 75 watts, per kill-a-watt.

That chip hasn't been available for over a year, so it is pretty old in CPU years.