AMD Announces Its Most Advanced Mobile APU for Consumer and Commercial Notebooks

[btarunr]

AMD (NYSE: AMD) today introduced its new 2014 Performance Mobile APUs designed for ultrathin and high-performance mobile PCs, bringing the features and capabilities of the popular and powerful AMD A-Series APU family (codenamed "Kaveri") to power-efficient notebooks for both personal and professional use. The new mobile APUs mark the debut of Heterogeneous System Architecture (HSA) features and Graphics Core Next (GCN) Architecture for mobile devices, establishing them as AMD's most advanced mobile APUs to-date. Notebook and desktop systems powered by AMD's entire 2014 APU lineup, including systems from Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, Lenovo, Samsung, Toshiba and others also debuted at COMPUTEX TAIPEI 2014.

"AMD takes a major step forward today on our journey to transform and enhance the computing experience with the launch of the 2014 Performance Mobile APU family," said Bernd Lienhard, corporate vice president and general manager, Client Business Unit, AMD. "With a combination of superior total compute performance, stunning graphics and efficient power use alongside industry-first technologies, these new APUs set a new bar for cutting-edge consumer and commercial PCs."
The announcement of the 2014 Performance Mobile APU family features AMD's first FX-branded enthusiast-class APU for notebooks, and follows the recent introduction of AMD's 2014 Low-Power and Mainstream APUs.



Introducing AMD PRO
Responding to the needs of an evolving commercial marketplace for longevity, performance and stability in enterprise systems, AMD has introduced a professional line of the Performance Mobile APUs. Designed especially with business in mind, AMD PRO A-Series components offer outstanding stability and longevity, and enable open, industry-standard DASH manageability.

In conjunction with today's AMD PRO A-Series announcement, HP unveiled a complete lineup of Elite commercial PC designs featuring the AMD PRO series. The HP systems include the EliteBook 725, 745 and 755 G2 notebook, the EliteOne All-in-One and the EliteDesk desktop PCs.
AMD 2014 Performance Mobile APU Features

Revolutionary Architecture

• Up to 12 Compute Cores (4 CPU + 8 GPU) deliver amazing performance and responsiveness, bringing to life the full capability of the APU on various workloads and applications
• The breakthrough new Heterogeneous System Architecture (HSA) allows the CPU and GPU to work together in harmony by quickly dividing and directing the right tasks toward the appropriate cores for new levels of performance and efficiency in consumer and commercial desktop and notebook PCs, thus enabling a new era of compute capabilities with compute cores
• Award-winning Graphics Core Next Architecture with AMD Radeon R7 series graphics and compute capability
• Support for UltraHD (4K) resolutions and new video post-processing enhancements that make 1080p videos look amazing when upscaled on an UltraHD-enabled monitor or TV

Best Gaming and Entertainment Experience

• Support for AMD's acclaimed Mantle API that simplifies game optimizations for programmers and developers to unlock unprecedented levels of gaming performance3
• AMD Radeon Dual Graphics provide a performance boost from 49 percent to 108 percent4 for the ultimate gaming experience
• Experience-enhancing features such as AMD Quick Stream, AMD Steady Video and AMD TrueAudio technologies combine to deliver lifelike audio and video5

Performance Leadership

• A10-APU: Up to 50 percent better graphics performance6 and more than 1.2x the compute performance7 versus Intel i5-4200U ("Haswell")
• FX APU: Up to 58 percent better graphics performance8 and more than 1.13x the compute performance9 versus Intel i7-4500U ("Haswell")
• FX APU: Up to 40 percent more graphics performance-per-watt10 than our previous generation
• FX APU: Up to 30 percent more system compute-per-watt11 than our previous generation

View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[Steevo]

I just got a new laptop with a Haswell, but this is what I really wanted in it, much better GPU and no DX11 issues.

 

[HalfAHertz]

According to AT, not all of the chips have the extra functionality enabled:

Besides offering different levels of performance, AMD is also differentiating their Kaveri APUs based on other features. Eyefinity and TrueAudio support will be limited to the A10 and FX APUs; the A6/A8 APUs lose this functionality. Similarly, the A6 does not have Dual Graphics functionality; I didn't have much luck with Dual Graphics on Richland/Trinity laptops, but with the iGPU and dGPU both being GCN architectures now there's at least more potential to extract additional performance through CrossFire. Finally, note that the A6 APUs get ARM TrustZone functionality, whereas the higher-end A8, A10, and FX APUs do not.

I kind of think that's the wrong move. They've been pushing and marketing all these features so hard and at the same time chose to limit their spread.

 

[NC37]

Just hope AMD doesn't go running their mouths off saying they have the first consumer 12 core CPU on the market. If they think they can get away with it, they will.

I kinda question why stop with so few GPU compute cores? Why not just add a feature where the GPU can be disabled for graphics entirely? Shift more cores over to help compute. Unless of course they're working on this and we'll see it in the future. Really some will not be using the IGP and it would be a neat idea to dedicate them while they run off discrete GPUs.

Course with all first gens....it'll likely suck compared to the 2nd and 3rd gens.

 

[john_]

I kind of think that's the wrong move. They've been pushing and marketing all these features so hard and at the same time chose to limit their spread.

It is a wrong move. Intel can do stuff like that because they are playing alone. Nvidia can do stuff like that thanks to their strong brand name and because we are used to their arrogance. But if AMD do stuff like that it will only alienate part of their loyal customers. I can understand the idea to differentiate their products but they have to realize that they are SECOND in BOTH markets. After delaying for about forever the A8-7600 on the desktop, because they possibly realized that it was so good that it would kill the A10 sales, they are doing a second stupid move here that will probably kill TrueAudio and will eliminate an advantage their chips have over Intel+Nvidia setups. Add to that that they still say nothing about AM1 and Beema and AMD is getting really serious in business but in all wrong ways from the consumer point of view.

 

[Lipton]

It is a wrong move. Intel can do stuff like that because they are playing alone. Nvidia can do stuff like that thanks to their strong brand name and because we are used to their arrogance. But if AMD do stuff like that it will only alienate part of their loyal customers. I can understand the idea to differentiate their products but they have to realize that they are SECOND in BOTH markets. After delaying for about forever the A8-7600 on the desktop, because they possibly realized that it was so good that it would kill the A10 sales, they are doing a second stupid move here that will probably kill TrueAudio and will eliminate an advantage their chips have over Intel+Nvidia setups. Add to that that they still say nothing about AM1 and Beema and AMD is getting really serious in business but in all wrong ways from the consumer point of view.

I think it's the right move to make and you made a good argument for that move:
"After delaying for about forever the A8-7600 on the desktop, because they possibly realized that it was so good that it would kill the A10 sales,"
From my perspective, this is exactly why they need to keep some features exclusive to FX/A10 in order to get people buying those instead. Only time will tell if it's a good strategy, but I think it's the right move to get higher profit margins on a few segments, which is something they naturally want. And who knows, in the future [some of] these features might in some form or another trickle down in the lower segments if they see a clear demand there.

 

[john_]

I think it's the right move to make and you made a good argument for that move:
"After delaying for about forever the A8-7600 on the desktop, because they possibly realized that it was so good that it would kill the A10 sales,"
From my perspective, this is exactly why they need to keep some features exclusive to FX/A10 in order to get people buying those instead. Only time will tell if it's a good strategy, but I think it's the right move to get higher profit margins on a few segments, which is something they naturally want. And who knows, in the future [some of] these features might in some form or another trickle down in the lower segments if they see a clear demand there.

I abandoned my plans to replace my second AM3 setup that I am using for office/internet stuff with the A8-7600 a few days back. I have been waiting from the first reviews to get that chip. Even if I haven't abandoned that plan, these latest news about disabled features would have been the icing on the cake(the cake is the module architecture). I don't see me with an FM2+ in the future and I am an AMD exclusive on the cpu part(in gpus Nvidia or AMD is the same for me if the price/performance ratio is good enough).
Others, even worst, will just go for an Intel set up having less features to justify going for a Kaveri.
AMD should stop worrying about internal competition. It doesn't matter if you have internal competition if you have zero market share.
I really don't know why this company keeps shooting it's feet when it is running in front of the competition.

 

[TheinsanegamerN]

FX APU: Up to 58 percent better graphics performance8 and more than 1.13x the compute performance9 versus Intel i7-4500U ("Haswell")
congratulations, your 35 watt "quad core" can beat a dual core intel chip that pulls 17 watt. how does it compare to the likes of a 37 watt, say, i5 4300m? the slowest quad core i7, the 4702, would wipe the floor with amds quad core.

 

[R0H1T]

FX APU: Up to 58 percent better graphics performance8 and more than 1.13x the compute performance9 versus Intel i7-4500U ("Haswell")
congratulations, your 35 watt "quad core" can beat a dual core intel chip that pulls 17 watt. how does it compare to the likes of a 37 watt, say, i5 4300m? the slowest quad core i7, the 4702, would wipe the floor with amds quad core.

You mean something like this

Granted most of the tests in that review focus on gaming (IGP) but AMD's not half bad in everyday tasks, especially considering the price of i7-4702MQ

 

[Jorge]

Contrary to the nonsense spewed... the mobile Kaveri models are quite capable and will sell very well due to their performance. No apology is required for superior GPU performance.

 

[HalfAHertz]

Wait , what ???

20% IPC improvement ? What are they comparing it to ?

 

[Steevo]

FX APU: Up to 58 percent better graphics performance8 and more than 1.13x the compute performance9 versus Intel i7-4500U ("Haswell")
congratulations, your 35 watt "quad core" can beat a dual core intel chip that pulls 17 watt. how does it compare to the likes of a 37 watt, say, i5 4300m? the slowest quad core i7, the 4702, would wipe the floor with amds quad core.

I have a 4702MQ in my new laptop, paired with 8GB of 1866 and a Evo. I would still rather have better graphics, and 35W is highly conservative for this chip, plus DX11 has yet to actually work, Uniengine fails to launch, other DX11 stuff fails to run correctly.

 

[arbiter]

I have a bold idea, instead of doing amd's top part vs intel part with mid to low end igp on it which seems to be case for most these slides you see, take one not with HD 4400 which are what AMD tout's are fair, not the 4600 like one in link R0H1T provided but using the HD5000 series gpu? Top gpu on both chips against each other, intel has one in same TDP class so why not a fair fight instead of these intentionally weighed in AMD's favor battle?

i7-4702MQ has HD 4600 on it.
2 quoted in AMD numbers i5 4200u and i7 4500u are HD 4400 gpu's.

 

[HalfAHertz]

I have a bold idea, instead of doing amd's top part vs intel part with mid to low end igp on it which seems to be case for most these slides you see, take one not with HD 4400 which are what AMD tout's are fair, not the 4600 like one in link R0H1T provided but using the HD5000 series gpu? Top gpu on both chips against each other, intel has one in same TDP class so why not a fair fight instead of these intentionally weighed in AMD's favor battle?

i7-4702MQ has HD 4600 on it.
2 quoted in AMD numbers i5 4200u and i7 4500u are HD 4400 gpu's.

That's all fine and dandy if you don't care about the price but please consider that the HD5000 one cost as much as 3 top APUs.(500$+ last time I checked)

 

[arbiter]

That's all fine and dandy if you don't care about the price but please consider that the HD5000 one cost as much as 3 top APUs.(500$+ last time I checked)

i am lookin at the prices per tray on intel's site and they have plenty of them in same price range so what is your next excuse? in i5 range, price for tray is only 30$ more so not that much. i7 range is about same to.

 

[HalfAHertz]

i am lookin at the prices per tray on intel's site and they have plenty of them in same price range so what is your next excuse? in i5 range, price for tray is only 30$ more so not that much. i7 range is about same to.

You might be right. There isn't a lot of information on sku prices for laptop manufacturers. I think it's because each OEM has to negotiate its own rates. Could you please share your sources?

On intel's website I found out the following information:

The cheapest i7 with HD5000 on intel's site starts at 426$
The cheapest i5 with hd5000 graphics starts from 315$
the cheapest i3 with hd5000 graphics starts from 315$ as well.

The prices for mobile kaveri are not out yet. But I don't think they'll be much higher than low to mid 200s for the top sku. That would mean that AMD would be a no-brainer vs an i3, but once you get to i5 levels of performance, things start to get more blurry.

 

[arbiter]

You might be right. There isn't a lot of information on sku prices for laptop manufacturers. I think it's because each OEM has to negotiate its own rates. Could you please share your sources?

On intel's website I found out the following information:

The cheapest i7 with HD5000 on intel's site starts at 426$
The cheapest i5 with hd5000 graphics starts from 315$
the cheapest i3 with hd5000 graphics starts from 315$ as well.

The prices for mobile kaveri are not out yet. But I don't think they'll be much higher than low to mid 200s for the top sku. That would mean that AMD would be a no-brainer vs an i3, but once you get to i5 levels of performance, things start to get more blurry.

Intel's site is where I got my info to, i5/i7 chip with hd4400 and ones with 5000 are only around 30$ price difference which not any difference. i3 yea i didn't look at i3 since that wasn't used in a comparison so.