VIA's New Centaur Designed Isaiah CPU Architecture @ [H]

Quite impressive. I love my C7 processor, it hummed along for years as a great Linux server. The only reason I stopped using it was because it wasn't up to the task of realtime virus scanning. VIA has always made great stuff, I'm glad to see them taking this architecture to places beyond niche markets.

I'd really love to see something like the eeePC with a VIA in it. :)
 
I must say, I am pretty excited about this. Hopefully we'll see some benchmarks soon.
 
That shot of the CPU next to a dime is simply mind-boggling. :eek:
 
Is anyone else shocked as hell about this?

*sits down*

I mean seriously, a via cpu thats actually worth something performance wise? Sign me up!
 
While reading that article I kept thinking to myself how it would be really nice to use one of these in a HTPC, only 35 watts to cool will help keep it quite and small and it seems more then powerful enough to do the job. Maybe I am wrong as I don't truely know what it takes to run a HTPC or what the CPU is capable of.
 
Diablo2K said:
While reading that article I kept thinking to myself how it would be really nice to use one of these in a HTPC, only 35 watts to cool will help keep it quite and small and it seems more then powerful enough to do the job. Maybe I am wrong as I don't truely know what it takes to run a HTPC or what the CPU is capable of.
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This thing with a AMD or NV video card with HD decode that is passive cooled and it would be awesome. It is coming, there is no doubt.
 
all the gadgetry which could be improved by this processor set my heart aflutter.

They have whet my appetite.
 
Here is a nice close-up of a CN processor that Centaur sent me home with. Sadly, I have nowhere to put it. (And no, you don’t need to mail me suggestions.)
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LOL... too much General Mayhem
 
:eek:

I never thought I would see the day that I would stand here and say I want a VIA CPU. When they become available its going to find a good home in two of my HTPCs.
 
AceGoober said:
:eek:

I never thought I would see the day that I would stand here and say I want a VIA CPU. When they become available its going to find a good home in two of my HTPCs.
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Well, keep in mind that these will NOT be packaged as CPUs, but you will be able to buy them on ITX form factor motherboards. I was told there will not be a CPU for a socket or LGA setup. At least not planned for now.

http://www.via.com.tw/en/products/mainboards/

I think in the beginning you will only see them soldered on.
 
This is fantastic news. I hope this grows into something much better;) I wonder what chipset was used to play Crysis on.
 
Finally Intel will get some much needed competition, and from VIA at that! AMD appears to be whipping ATI into shape finally, hopefully they will be back in the CPU race again as well. I've always thought VIA CPUs were pretty good for their intended market segment, but it is very nice to see them try to reach into the performance sector while trying to maintain their power efficiency. Hopefully the price will be right, if so, then sign me up! Great news for hardware enthusiasts, I can see a lot of performance modding opportunities for these babies (among other things). Thanks VIA (and [H]) for the good news, keep up the good work.
 
Did they give you guys any indication of price or number of models? I mean, this is all well and good, but if it costs $400 (I exaggerate) for a cpu and mobo, it might not be worth it.aOn the other hand, if the two may be had for ~$150-$200, there are some evry interesting applications that come to mind for home-brews.
I've been wanting to build, from scratch, a PC to mount in my car. Little 7-inch touch screen from a gutted nav unit (like the touch screen EePC that guy made a few weeks ago). Build in a GPS reciever, bluetooth, Linux OS, maybe a big 500gb hard drive. The things you could do for VERY cheap, and now have the power to do it quickly and efficiently. NOT feeling like you are using an old sony Clie.
 
Agreed, it sounds like an interesting chip but pricing will determine exactly how interesting it really is IMO.
 
Hm... I wonder how well if folds and when they will bring out a dual core version...

 
Crysis on a VIA low power CPU? Yeah, i am happily surprised and looking forward to seeing what the chip can do all around.

hmm...soldered in a ITX MoBo...could be i have found my new HTPC platform :D
 
Kyle, I'm unclear on something here. OK, so Centaur is making them by hand and testing them in Austin. So where will they be produced under full production?
 
Great to hear that VIA is back in the game - we need competition, especially in the UMPC space.

However, I should note that 35W @ 2GHz is not at all impressive. Mobile Core 2 Duo CPUs (e.g. the Merom in my notebook) also draw 35W under load, and they have two cores at up to 2.66GHz. And as good as the new Centaur may be, I don't think it's going to be competitive with a Core 2 clocked higher with twice as many cores and 4x as much cache.

35W is way too much for a UMPC. The ULV Core 2 Solo U1500, for example, is clocked at 1.33GHz and has a TDP of 5.5W, which is about the limit of what you would want to put in an UMPC.

Note that VIA's current C7-m ULV processors also have similarly low TDP; model 772 draws 5W at 1.2GHz, similar to the Core 2 Solo (albeit with vastly poorer performance).

Also note that current Intel CPUs don't draw much power anyway when in C3. The key is limiting interrupts and other events that wake the processor. Obviously VIA's dual-PLL technology could come in very handy to minimize the time wasted in more power-hungry operational states, but the key is to keep the CPU sleeping as much as is possible.

I eagerly await benchmarks for the new Centaur. I don't like having to pay Intel $300 for a notebook CPU any more than you do. Not that my T7200 wasn't worth every penny.
 
bsoft said:
Great to hear that VIA is back in the game - we need competition, especially in the UMPC space.

However, I should note that 35W @ 2GHz is not at all impressive. Mobile Core 2 Duo CPUs (e.g. the Merom in my notebook) also draw 35W under load, and they have two cores at up to 2.66GHz. And as good as the new Centaur may be, I don't think it's going to be competitive with a Core 2 clocked higher with twice as many cores and 4x as much cache.

35W is way too much for a UMPC. The ULV Core 2 Solo U1500, for example, is clocked at 1.33GHz and has a TDP of 5.5W, which is about the limit of what you would want to put in an UMPC.

Note that VIA's current C7-m ULV processors also have similarly low TDP; model 772 draws 5W at 1.2GHz, similar to the Core 2 Solo (albeit with vastly poorer performance).

Also note that current Intel CPUs don't draw much power anyway when in C3. The key is limiting interrupts and other events that wake the processor. Obviously VIA's dual-PLL technology could come in very handy to minimize the time wasted in more power-hungry operational states, but the key is to keep the CPU sleeping as much as is possible.

I eagerly await benchmarks for the new Centaur. I don't like having to pay Intel $300 for a notebook CPU any more than you do. Not that my T7200 wasn't worth every penny.
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I didn't want to be the first pessamist of the group, but those were my first thoughts as well. Though, this is still the beginning & VIA definately targets a different audience. If history holds true, this processor with a decked out motherboard will be cheaper than most of Intel's plain CPU offerings
 
normalicy said:
I didn't want to be the first pessamist of the group, but those were my first thoughts as well. Though, this is still the beginning & VIA definately targets a different audience. If history holds true, this processor with a decked out motherboard will be cheaper than most of Intel's plain CPU offerings
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Ditto. I was expecting 10W or something. 35W is way too high. I mean some desktop processors have a 45 dissipation. There were turions with a 25W dissipation.
 
Now this is good news! Yes Intel and AMD make faster/more powerful processors. However they don't make nano-ITX or Pico-ITX boards. This will be expensive just like the current VIA small form factor boards are. To be able to have a computer the size of a deck of cards with the power to really do something is very appealing to me. You have my attention. Lets just hope it doesn't take VIA as long as it normally does to get this processor and the accompanying boards to market.
 
qdemn7 said:
Kyle, I'm unclear on something here. OK, so Centaur is making them by hand and testing them in Austin. So where will they be produced under full production?
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Spring 2008 shipping. Centaur's facility in Austin is just configured to be able to do production (outside of building the silicon) inside their one building. They actually get wafters in and have them packaged and running tests in a matter of hours. Will get pics up today.
 
Modred189 said:
Did they give you guys any indication of price or number of models? I mean, this is all well and good, but if it costs $400 (I exaggerate) for a cpu and mobo, it might not be worth it.aOn the other hand, if the two may be had for ~$150-$200, there are some evry interesting applications that come to mind for home-brews.
I've been wanting to build, from scratch, a PC to mount in my car. Little 7-inch touch screen from a gutted nav unit (like the touch screen EePC that guy made a few weeks ago). Build in a GPS reciever, bluetooth, Linux OS, maybe a big 500gb hard drive. The things you could do for VERY cheap, and now have the power to do it quickly and efficiently. NOT feeling like you are using an old sony Clie.
Click to expand...

VIA is not looking at building a high cost premium set of "elite" SKUs with this part.
 
bsoft said:
Great to hear that VIA is back in the game - we need competition, especially in the UMPC space.

However, I should note that 35W @ 2GHz is not at all impressive. Mobile Core 2 Duo CPUs (e.g. the Merom in my notebook) also draw 35W under load, and they have two cores at up to 2.66GHz. And as good as the new Centaur may be, I don't think it's going to be competitive with a Core 2 clocked higher with twice as many cores and 4x as much cache.

35W is way too much for a UMPC. The ULV Core 2 Solo U1500, for example, is clocked at 1.33GHz and has a TDP of 5.5W, which is about the limit of what you would want to put in an UMPC.

Note that VIA's current C7-m ULV processors also have similarly low TDP; model 772 draws 5W at 1.2GHz, similar to the Core 2 Solo (albeit with vastly poorer performance).

Also note that current Intel CPUs don't draw much power anyway when in C3. The key is limiting interrupts and other events that wake the processor. Obviously VIA's dual-PLL technology could come in very handy to minimize the time wasted in more power-hungry operational states, but the key is to keep the CPU sleeping as much as is possible.

I eagerly await benchmarks for the new Centaur. I don't like having to pay Intel $300 for a notebook CPU any more than you do. Not that my T7200 wasn't worth every penny.
Click to expand...

I would suggest that TDP numbers are worthless to actually go by. These devices pull 1/5 of TDP under normal loads. Quite frankly, TDP is even calculated differently between companies so the "industry standard" is somewhat worthless. If Core 2 actually fit into the same power envelope, there would be no need for Silverthorn.

I updated the article with this. (I should mention here that TDP numbers are somewhat misleading. Under normal usage models a 2GHz would likely fetch between 2w to 5w. Update - 012408:0800)

One thing I can report for sure, is that I continually monitored the 1.2GHz demo which happened to be sitting right behing me in our meeting room. At idle you could not tell the heatsink was even touching something hot.....which I guess it was not. :) Under full load after about 60 seconds the surface of the PASSIVE heatsink would peek out at 115F.
 
Prmetime said:
Now this is good news! Yes Intel and AMD make faster/more powerful processors. However they don't make nano-ITX or Pico-ITX boards. This will be expensive just like the current VIA small form factor boards are. To be able to have a computer the size of a deck of cards with the power to really do something is very appealing to me. You have my attention. Lets just hope it doesn't take VIA as long as it normally does to get this processor and the accompanying boards to market.
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QFT.

Centaur is actively squashing bugs right now and Glenn Henry gave no indication of big problems in that area. Again, we saw hundreds of working CN CPUs being tested, not just two that all the engineers had to share.
 
My initial reaction is "wha? Cryix CPU on [H]ard???" I'm glad to see VIA and their technology partners moving the architecture further however. I was always impressed by the devices VIA began producing with their new acquisition years back; however, the fact that they were focusing on such devices meant to me that the third-place runner in the PC CPU market had basically bowed out of the game. I still don't expect them to topple AMD or Intel by any means, but the fact that VIA and their partners have such extensive SFF and ultra portable experience really does lead me to believe that this can be a product that can compete with the big boys. Here's hoping; competition is always a good thing, and I'm glad to see Cyrix back in it - even if it is under a different name/architecture.

- James
 
This thing is only single core, and it plays crysis?

Minimum specs for Crysis are
Intel Pentium 4 2.8 GHz (3.2 GHz for Vista), Intel Core 2.0 GHz (2.2 GHz for Vista), AMD Athlon 2800+ (3200+ for Vista) or better
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http://www.crysis-online.com/Information/System Requirements/

Are you telling me that this new mobile part is the same or better than a 2.8ghz p4? Or a 2.0Ghz c2d?

How much do they overclock, and when are there going to be dual core desktop versions? Sign me up.
 
Am I the only one that wants to know how it Folds? Because, if they can get the price down to what a low end AMD or Intel setup costs.... wow. You could have a cluster of 10 of these things running at (guestimate) around 300 watts. Think of the power savings!
 
I think the biggest thing that will make or break it as a potential HTPC is if anyone will come up with a board that has a PCI Express slot, or at least built in video that can actually accelerate h264 video, preferably without having to be tied down to only one or two programs. If that happened I would buy it in a heartbeat.
 
EDIT: MY FUBAR - CN will be 20w TDP, NOT 35w!!! Centaur just corrected me on the figure.
 
Ryokurin said:
I think the biggest thing that will make or break it as a potential HTPC is if anyone will come up with a board that has a PCI Express slot, or at least built in video that can actually accelerate h264 video, preferably without having to be tied down to only one or two programs. If that happened I would buy it in a heartbeat.
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I would suggest for now you would be better off going with a AMD/NVIDIA video card with the decode on a mobo such as this.

http://www.via.com.tw/en/products/mainboards/motherboards.jsp?motherboard_id=550

I would guess they would surely make something like this.

VIA still owns S3, and they were telling me they were expecting a new Chrome GPU that would have HD decode needed, but did not sound sure on any time frame.
 
Michael Daly said:
You're reading my mind. Now are the MBs going to be in the $100 (like the Intel ITX) or $300 (like the MSI T7nnn CPU) category?
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Well, it all comes down to what the market demands. If they can sell all they can make at $300, well then more power to them. I don't however think that is the market they are going to try and penetrate though.

I see products like this CN in notebooks in very small form factors that shoot for that less than $400 price point just like the Cloudbook. And yes, I would like to see this in an ASUS EEEPC too.(or whatever the hell they call it, still waiting to buy one in 8GB with the camera in black :) )

The president of Centaur was using one of these OQO devices for the hours he was in talking to us. I think I am going to try and pick one of these up and give it a try.
 
okey if amd and via teamed up together, or more like ATI though, this is a market segment where AMD isnt yet, so a partnership might be good for both!.

intel is in the market so thats a no good deal though, but amd will come to, and thats when the never ending fight will start, no breaks like it is in cpu's now, and was with videocards due to 2 companies, with 3 we will see more progress though.

but well, i thought of a VIA based ITX system, and now this WOOOAH!. its the best time to get payment a 3870 X2 and the via system soon =) my htpc will feature it, or my bed pc, dunno where to have it yet, but i want it.

a 20 Watt TPD is just crazy, if this is absolutly max ill be just amazed by it, does any via systems feature PCI-E port ?.

i actually thought of my current project, you fellas remember the old macs with CRT screen and comp inside, now is it in lcd screens, ive mounted a amplifier (very powerfull indeed, matching speakers and a 15" screen inside, maybe ill fit a via system there instead of the current laptop i planned to use =)
 
Lothar the Lotharian said:
Look no further than the Everex Cloudbook. I could imagine a gen2 of this product with the new chip in it, since it's supposed to be pin compatible.
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I was just going to mention the Cloudbook.

For those of you who don't know what a Cloudbook is... think of an Asus Eee PC... with longer battery life (5 hours quoted) and a 30GB hard drive instead of 2-4GB flash. In most other ways it is the same... 2 pounds, similar dimensions, same 7" screen, webcam.

It will supposedly start becoming available at Walmart.com starting... tomorrow, 1/25/08. Oh yeah, also at ZaReason.com. Cost will be $399.
 
I've been feeling the urgency to build another HTPC but based around a VIA setup. The only draw back this time round, instead of using a Hauppauge PVR-150 (etc), I wanted to get into the FTA Satilite scene instead. Most cards do not support hardware encode for recording / placeshifting. The current availible VIA CPU's are definetly not up to the task. So this new CPU will be a pleasent welcome.

As always with the wonderful news, I hope the multimedia side of things also improves. Their current highend GPU is feeling rather antiquated.
 
If they make enough money from this, they'd be wise to add a few cores and start scaling it up a bit. If it can get performance that good at 20w full load, I'd like to see what they could do with 100w.
 
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