Llano APUs Shipping

[Nightbird]

http://blogs.amd.com/fusion/2011/04/04/%e2%80%9cllano%e2%80%9d-apu-is-shipping/
This really caught me by surprise, I thought it was coming after Bulldozer for some reason.

I hope [H] be reviewing this as compared with Intel CPU+Discrete for the around the same price, though this may be passed over due to the low performance.

 

[AMD_Gamer]

Great news,

last chance to buy AMD stock before it skyrockets.

 

[maxius]

wtfbbq llano was to behind bulldozer lol nice to see its going out the door now LAUNCH IT FFS

 

[pxc]

Llano was supposed to launch late last year, before BD in early 2011. Revisionism lulz.

Cool that it's out though. Now where may one buy it? I don't care about the IGP graphics performance much, but I want to see the GPGPU performance. It should beat the pants off all other IGPs, but majorly lag in memory bandwidth limited games since it lacks that local memory bandwidth.

 

[Topweasel]

Llano was supposed to launch late last year, before BD in early 2011. Revisionism lulz.

Cool that it's out though. Now where may one buy it? I don't care about the IGP graphics performance much, but I want to see the GPGPU performance. It should beat the pants off all other IGPs, but majorly lag in memory bandwidth limited games since it lacks that local memory bandwidth.

Everything is supposed to have launched last year. But that's the way the cookie crumbles CPU's have always and this includes Intel had such a long development process that a delay of even a year is still only 10-15% increase in development time. As they get closer to the original launch windows its usual for them to get pushed back. Very few have had the squeaky clean launch windows like SB or Prescott had. Even the K8 was 6 months late.

 

[sublimestuff]

It should beat the pants off all other IGPs, but majorly lag in memory bandwidth limited games since it lacks that local memory bandwidth.

Hmm.. So for a laptop, do you think an i3 + Mobility 5650 would be faster? Most 5650m's have 1GB DDR3 while the upcoming A8-3510MX is rumored to have about the same # of SPs.

 

[mesyn191]

Yea it'd probably be faster at higher resolutions. At low resolutions they'd probably perform about the same though.

 

[pxc]

Hmm.. So for a laptop, do you think an i3 + Mobility 5650 would be faster?

Very likely. Of course power consumption is a trade-off if using the discrete Mobility 5650 vs integrated Llano HD 6xxx graphics.

Llano uses basically the same CPU cores as Athlon II processors. The leaked geekbench scores shows there might be some minor improvements, but that's expected. Llano CPU cores still aren't in the same class as i3 CPU cores.

2nd gen BD APUs are due next year IIRC. The mobile chips I saw listed on a slide appeared to be half-dozers and quarter-dozers.

 

[sublimestuff]

The leaked geekbench scores shows there might be some minor improvements, but that's expected. Llano CPU cores still aren't in the same class as i3 CPU cores.

2nd gen BD APUs are due next year IIRC.

Thx for the geekbench heads-up! So slightly better than a Core 2 Quad, which is good enough really as im interested in a gaming laptop. Your point about bandwidth is more of a concern though. Hopefully not more than a 10% to 15% hit vs 5650m. OTOH, the perf/watt is very tempting. If i can play Oblivion with 4xAA @ high details on a Llano chip, im set for a long, long time.

 

[pxc]

If it had a L3 cache like Phenom II it might be in C2Q class, but without it it's more like an Athlon II.

More likely a 30%-50% hit. I'm not sure about Oblivion at those settings. Even the Mobility HD 5650 isn't exactly a beast. It's OK if you don't mind playing demanding games in low or medium quality without AA.

Mobile Llano isn't due until Q3 in the recent-ish roadmap I just looked at.

 

[Nightbird]

If it had a L3 cache like Phenom II it might be in C2Q class, but without it it's more like an Athlon II.

More likely a 30%-50% hit. I'm not sure about Oblivion at those settings. Even the Mobility HD 5650 isn't exactly a beast. It's OK if you don't mind playing demanding games in low or medium quality without AA.

Mobile Llano isn't due until Q3 in the recent-ish roadmap I just looked at.

It's not going to be a speed demon given that it is combining a 100$ processor + 50$ GPU. If this CPU can be had for 150$ though, it should sell pretty well compared with PCs with 200$ i3s but no discrete graphics.

The mobile version should be even more popular. Biggest question should be how much tablets will cut into PC sales in the next year I guess.

Make the GPU potion of the chip big enough and FUSION should be in one of the next gen consoles, then we can't complain consoles are holding games back (It'll be slow PCs instead holding games back )

 

[Ualdayan]

Very few have had the squeaky clean launch windows like SB or Prescott had. Even the K8 was 6 months late.

Hehe, did you just say Sandybridge was a squeaky clean launch?

 

[jeremyshaw]

Hehe, did you just say Sandybridge was a squeaky clean launch?

in terms of timing, it was. Platform fell short, however.

 

[Aaron11]

still waiting for BD...

 

[sublimestuff]

Make the GPU potion of the chip big enough and FUSION should be in one of the next gen consoles, then we can't complain consoles are holding games back (It'll be slow PCs instead holding games back )

http://img19.imageshack.us/img19/7169/amdllano11.jpg

According to the slide, Llano will be at best around 2x the gaming performance of SB. Nice but Ivy Bridge is supposed to double up on SB. And seriously, i think bandwidth will be an issue no matter how many cores Fusion may have. Wish there was more information from AMD.

 

[Tehpwnzah]

sweet

 

[Topweasel]

Hehe, did you just say Sandybridge was a squeaky clean launch?

Yeah I meant based on its launch window compared to earlier road-maps. Hell even waiting till good motherboards were available and its still on time.

 

[mesyn191]

According to the slide, Llano will be at best around 2x the gaming performance of SB. Nice but Ivy Bridge is supposed to double up on SB. And seriously, i think bandwidth will be an issue no matter how many cores Fusion may have. Wish there was more information from AMD.

Ivy Bridge is also supposed to cost more and come out late this year.

 

[kirtar]

Ivy Bridge is also supposed to cost more and come out late this year.

Ivy Bridge is simply a process shrink of Sandy Bridge (although I think the IGP will be upgraded), so it may not necessarily cost much more

 

[Untitledone]

Cant wait to see how these things work. I would like to make a low power cheap computer.

 

[amdgamer]

I absolutely cannot wait till these things work their way into laptops. I suppose they wouldn't be bad for a low power HTPC build either.

 

[mesyn191]

Ivy Bridge is simply a process shrink of Sandy Bridge (although I think the IGP will be upgraded), so it may not necessarily cost much more

If they're truly doubling the GPU performance and/or adding on package RAM it'll cost significantly more, just a die shrink or no for the CPU.

 

[fattypants]

I absolutely cannot wait till these things work their way into laptops. I suppose they wouldn't be bad for a low power HTPC build either.

I'll be buying two for these reasons.

 

[JMccovery]

I wouldn't mind getting my hands on a A8-3550P or a A8-3560P.

I really want to see the motherboards that they'll work on.

Hmm... 4 cores, integrated GPU, integrated PCI-E, single-chip "chipset"... AMD and Intel are becoming more and more alike

 

[Silent.Sin]

First pics of a Llano caught in the wild? http://diybbs.zol.com.cn/10/11_98403.html

First 2 are supposedly bulldozer, rest are Llano and the FM1 socket. Yes I know the post date is suspect, but I can't find much evidence of photochoppery. The CPU-Z screen is the most odd part of the post. Theories for the separate core/CPU drop down include the new power-gating techniques or CPU-Z just failing to recognize the CPU correctly. Could just be an artifact of the engineering sampliness of it too.

After crossing my eyes for a long time I came up with these pin counts from those pictures:

FM1 socket: 905 pinouts
supposed Llano CPU: 905 pins

AM3+ socket: 940-942? pinouts
supposed BD CPU: 940 pins

Those counts could have some...interesting consequences over in that AMD Bulldozer may be compatible with AM3 boards thread.

Ongoing discussion in SA: http://semiaccurate.com/forums/showthread.php?p=106582

 

[CaptNumbNutz]

After crossing my eyes for a long time I came up with these pin counts from those pictures:

FM1 socket: 905 pinouts
supposed Llano CPU: 905 pins

How did Llano get only 905 pins, but have a graphics and a PCIe controller onboard also? Llano is based on the K10.5 core, and even the current CPU's based on that core (e.g. Phenom 2) have 940 pins. My first guess would be they dropped it down to single-channel memory, but it has already been confirmed it has a dual channel DDR3 controller.

The only thing I can think of is the graphics communicates directly over the existing pins dedicated for chipset communication, and thats where the rest of the video hardware resides. Maybe they eliminated a bunch of pins used for power circuitry?

I would appreciate anyone with more hardware knowledge chiming in on the subject.

 

[Topweasel]

How did Llano get only 905 pins, but have a graphics and a PCIe controller onboard also? Llano is based on the K10.5 core, and even the current CPU's based on that core (e.g. Phenom 2) have 940 pins. My first guess would be they dropped it down to single-channel memory, but it has already been confirmed it has a dual channel DDR3 controller.

The only thing I can think of is the graphics communicates directly over the existing pins dedicated for chipset communication, and thats where the rest of the video hardware resides. Maybe they eliminated a bunch of pins used for power circuitry?

I would appreciate anyone with more hardware knowledge chiming in on the subject.

Probably power. FM1 probably is going to be limited to sub 90 watt CPU's with included graphics which mean don't expect the greatest clocks even with it using a smaller process K10.5 cores.

 

[mesyn191]

How did Llano get only 905 pins, but have a graphics and a PCIe controller onboard also?

An on die PCIe controller with that few pins it probably can't support many lanes. Intel's i3/5 chips have 16 lanes total with around 200 more pins for instance and the PCIe standard will consume the same number of pins for both, same for dual channel DDR, though the power pins necessary will be different I doubt there would be THAT much of a difference. Its likely AMD limited Llano to less lanes, like maybe 12 or even 8. This makes some sense since Llano is supposed to be a mainstream consumer part that is inexpensive. Heck AMD could only have 4 lanes for all we know. Remember their chips required over 900 pins while Intel was making due with 775 pins for Core 2.

The only thing I can think of is the graphics communicates directly over the existing pins dedicated for chipset communication, and thats where the rest of the video hardware resides.

Don't think so. AMD is using a variant of the same chipset they use for the net books for Llano. This means it has the DAC and a bunch of system I/O stuff but that is about it.

Maybe they eliminated a bunch of pins used for power circuitry?

Reaaaally don't think so. After all its a updated Stars core, its likely the number of power pins will remain the same. They've probably ditched HT to make it fit.

I would appreciate anyone with more hardware knowledge chiming in on the subject.

Even if you've got the hardware knowledge many details on Llano still aren't known, all we have are some fairly detailed and reasonable rumors at this point.