It's traditional for AMD to camp outside an ongoing IDF event (at a nearby hotel suite), siphoning off a small portion of its visitors. In the backdrop of this year's IDF event in San Francisco, AMD showed off two of its upcoming flagship client processors, the socket FM2 A10-5800K "Trinity" APU, and socket AM3+ FX-8350 "Vishera" CPU. The two chips were shown running fully-loaded gaming PCs.

The FX-8350 was shown installed on a machine with ASUS Crosshair V Formula (-Z?) motherboard, liquid cooling, and Radeon HD 7970 graphics card. The chip was clocked at 5.00 GHz (4.80 GHz when the picture was taken), and running popular CPU-intensive benchmarks such as WPrime and Cinebench. The A10-5800K was shown running application demos, including a widget that displays real-time boost states of the processor and GPU cores.

TechPowerUp and PowerColor get together once again to bring you "Pimp my Rig" Contest 2012. Pimp my Rig is our undying quest for the fastest slowest rig on the planet, which will be pimped up with some rad new hardware courtesy of PowerColor, AMD, ASRock, and Cooler Master. The contest is divided into two rounds, 1 and 2. Winners of the first round, who qualify for the second round, stand to win prizes including Cooler Master HAF-XM chassis, CM Storm QuickFire Rapid keyboard, CM Storm Sentinel Adv. II mouse, AMD FX-8150 eight-core processor, and ASRock 990FX Extreme3 motherboard. The winner of the second and final round stands to win the grand prize - a PowerColor Radeon HD 7990 Devil13 dual-GPU graphics card. Contest rules and fine-print can be found in the link below. Good hunting!More information and to participate - TechPowerUp and PowerColor Pimp my Rig 2012

A leaked AMD document for retail partners spelled out specifications of the first three FX "Vishera" processors by AMD. The new CPUs incorporate AMD's "Piledriver" architecture, and much like the first-generation "Zambezi" chips, will launch as one each of eight-core, six-core, and four-core chips. The eight-core FX-8350 is confirmed to ship with 4.00 GHz nominal clock speed, with 4.20 GHz TurboCore speed. The six-core FX-6300 ships with 3.50 GHz nominal, and 4.10 GHz TurboCore speed. The quad-core FX-4320, on the other hand, ships with the same clock speeds as the FX-8350. In addition, the document confirmed clock speeds of several socket FM2 A-series APUs, such as the A10-5700 and the A8-5500.

It has been known since Computex that AMD plans to synchronize launch of its second-generation "Trinity" desktop APUs and second-generation "Vishera" desktop CPUs, in late-Q3 or early-Q4, 2012. In likely preparation for that, and to step up price-performance of its current lineup, AMD cut prices of its desktop CPUs and APUs across the board. These include price-cuts for Phenom II AM3 series, FX-series AM3+, and A-series FM1 CPUs and APUs. Some of the prices as down by as much as 22.9%. The Phenom II series chips are the ones with the biggest price-cuts. Find a list of chips with old and new pricing, and differences, compiled by CPU World, below.

AMD reportedly deferred the launch of its next-generation "Trinity" A-series accelerated processing units (APUs) for desktops, to October, 2012. The products were originally slated for August. The delay affects launches of most APUs in the socket FM2 package, including the A10-5800K, a top-performing part in the series.

Launches of the A-Series "Trinity" APUs appear to have been clubbed with those of the FX-Series "Volan" (Vishera silicon, Piledriver micro-architecture) processors, including the FX-8350 and FX-6300. Meanwhile, AMD is in the process of phasing out its low-cost socket AM3 processors (such as Athlon II AM3, and Phenom II AM3), replacing them with Athlon II FM2, Phenom II AM3+, and mid-range FX-Series AM3+.

It is no news that AMD FX likes high clock speeds, even if they come at the expense of energy efficiency and heat. It's only when one such chips crosses 8.80 GHz (8805.64 MHz, to be precise), that it makes headlines. Thai overclocker "ksin" claimed to able drive the chip to its record speed using a base clock speed of 303.29 MHz, and multiplier of 29.0x. A scorching 1.86V core voltage was used. Other components include ASUS Crosshair V Formula motherboard, and 4 GB (2x 2 GB) of ADATA-made memory, clocked at 1417 MHz. Ksin didn't bother providing more details such as method of cooling, and that seems like a reason behind the CPU-Z Validation rejection.

Production of AMD's next-generation FX processor family, which are based on its "Piledriver" microarchitecture, will commence in Q3 2012, according to industry sources. Some of the first client processor models based on the "Vishera" silicon, will be the eight-core FX-8350, six-core FX-6300, and quad-core FX-4320. The three model names were earlier misinterpreted with an "x" prefix from a roadmap slide.

A few more details are known about these chips. For starters, the chips will be built on the existing AM3+ package, retaining compatibility with current AM3+ platforms. The chips will also retain dual-channel DDR3-1866 MHz integrated memory controllers, and Turbo Core 2.0. The main differences here, are increases in IPC (performance to clock-speed ratio), and the implementation of resonant clock mesh technology, which increases energy efficiency.

AMD today announced an agreement with GameFly, Inc., to give gamers who leverage the quality and performance of AMD CPUs and APUs easier access to GameFly's leading online video game rental and PC download services for a limited time. Gamers purchasing select AMD A-Series APUs, AMD Athlon II CPUs, AMD Phenom II CPUs or AMD FX Series CPUs in regions where GameFly is accessible receive a free, 30-day GameFly membership as well as a 20 percent discount on a new PC game purchase via the new GameFly PC store.

"AMD draws inspiration from gamers, game developers and the PC gaming industry," said John Taylor, director of Global Product and Technology Marketing at AMD. "Hand-in-hand with the AMD Gaming Evolved program, we continue to listen to gamers and fulfill our 'Gamers Come First!' pledge. AMD's close affiliation with GameFly shows our gratitude to gamers and to GameFly for recognizing how AMD represents best-in-class PC gaming experiences."

In what could be a blow for gaming PC users with lower-capacity SSDs (such as 60 GB, 90 GB, etc.), the minimum system requirements list of Max Payne 3, published by Rockstar Games, asks for at least 35 GB of free space on the installation drive. The game will likely ship in four double-layer DVDs, if not more. It could also make for an extremely huge download (over Steam, Amazon.com Digital Download, and GameStop. Other system requirements, particularly the requirements that the game is capable of taking advantage of, are particularly steep. For example, the game can take advantage of 6-core Intel Core i7-3960X, 8-core AMD FX-8150, the fastest single-GPU graphics cards in the market, as well as 16 GB of RAM.

AMD's FX-8150 was only mildly competitive with previous-generation Intel processors such as the Core i5-2500K, but to make matters worse, Intel launched its new "Ivy Bridge" Core processors that promise small but sizable performance improvements over its predecessors. The Core i5-3570K, for example, will be priced on par with FX-8150, if its price is left to itself. AMD has apparently cut prices of FX-8150 in Europe. Price aggregator Geizhals shows that the FX-8150 is available for as low as 179 EUR (incl. taxes). The PIB chip is now packed in a more cost-effective paperboard box, instead of the tin box AMD launched the SKU with.

AMD's upcoming "Trinity" family of desktop and mobile accelerated processing units (APUs) will use up to four x86-64 cores based on the company's newest CPU architecture, codenamed "Piledriver". AMD conservatively estimated performance/clock improvements over current-generation "Bulldozer" architecture, with Piledriver. Citavia put next-generation A10-5800K, and A8-4500M "Trinity" desktop and notebook APUs, and pitted them against several currently-launched processors, from both AMD and Intel.

It found integer and floating-point performance increases clock-for-clock, against Bulldozer-based FX-8150. The benchmark is not multi-threaded, and hence gives us a fair idea of the per core performance. On a rather disturbing note, the performance-per-GHz figures of Piledriver are trailing far behind K12 architecture (Llano, A8-3850), let alone competitive architectures from Intel.

AMD launched as many as five new FX Series processor models over the course of Q1, 2012. We're hearing from DonanimHaber that two more budget models are en route for Q2, 2012, likely April. These include the quad-core FX-4130, and six-core FX-6130. The FX-4130 features a nominal clock speed of 3.80 GHz, with a tiny Turbo Core boost, that takes it to 3.90 GHz. Interestingly, while the total L2 cache of this chip is 4 MB (2 MB per module), its L3 cache is halved to 4 MB, even as other SKUs such as the FX-4100 have full 8 MB L3 cache. The FX-6130, on the other hand, has a nominal clock speed of 3.60 GHz, with 3.90 GHz Turbo Core speed. Thankfully, AMD didn't tinker with the L3 cache, and users get all 8 MB of it. Both chips have rated TDP of 125W. Pricing is not revealed.

AMD plans to sell bundles of its FX-8120 eight-core processors in the AM3+ package, along with AMD FX-branded self-contained liquid-cooling kits. The SKU is up for pre-order on Amazon, for US $383.5 (incl. shipping). The part-number for this chip+liquid-cooling bundle is "FD8120FRGUWOX". The liquid cooler is originally made by Asetek, combined with the unlocked base clock multiplier of the FX-8120, it facilitates high overclocking. The cooler is not just a dumb closed-loop, but also packs sensors that connect to the system over USB (internal USB 2.0 header), that let you monitor it via Chill Control software.

Sunnyvale-based AMD Inc. has today launched two new FX Series processors, the FX-6200 hexa-core and the FX-4170 quad-core, and announced price reductions for the October-released FX-8120 and FX-6100.

The FX-6200 and FX-4170 are made on 32 nm process technology, and feature an AM3+ package, a TDP of 125 W, and 8 MB of L3 cache. The FX-6200 has a base clock of 3.8 GHz (4.1 GHz Turbo) and is up for pre-order @ 152.70 Euro while its quad-core sibling is set to 4.2 GHz (4.3 GHz Turbo) and is selling for 120.60 Euro.

The updated FX-8120 and FX-6100 prices stand at $185 and $145, respectively.

Before the end of this quarter AMD is set to introduce a bunch of fresh FX Series chips, including three boasting a 95 W TDP, the FX-4150 quad-core, the FX-6120 hexa-core and the FX-8140 octo-core.

The FX-4150 features a base clock of 3.9 GHz (4.1 GHz Turbo) and 12 MB of cache (4 MB L2 + 8 MB L3) while the FX-6120 has its cores set to 3.5 GHz (4.1 GHz Turbo) and packs 14 MB of cache. As for the FX-8140, it's clocked at 3.2 GHz (4.1 GHz) and has 16 MB of cache. All three models have an AM3+ package and are made using 32 nm process technology. No word on pricing yet.

AMD is pushing on with a desktop product lineup that's leveraging its Piledriver CPU and Graphics CoreNext GPU architectures in 2012. Apparently, the company will have a faster product development cycle to catch up with Intel's "Tick-Tock", as revealed in a roadmap slide scored by DonanimHaber. The current product lineup will remain unchanged in the first quarter of 2012. Then in the second quarter, AMD will launch a few more socket AM3+ FX-8000, FX-6000, and FX-4000 series eight, six, and four-core processors; along with the much talked about "Trinity" accelerated processing unit.

The fastest "Trinity" APUs will get a new brand identifier, the A10-5000 series. These APUs will pack next-generation "Piledriver" modular cores and Radeon HD 7600D series graphics. Around this time, AMD will also launch the Brazos 2.0 low-power APU for netbooks, nettops, and embedded computing devices. Brazos 2.0 will get the E2-1000 series branding. The big change is reserved for the third quarter of 2012, when AMD launches the successor of its less-than-lucky AMD FX "Bulldozer" processor family.

Last week we brought you news of Ubisoft's hard three machine activation limit on Anno 2070 and how it scuppered a review by Guru3D when they swapped out graphics cards. Guru3D's post then went viral on the web and it appears that this has put sufficient pressure or 'heat' on Ubisoft to relax the restrictions just a tiny bit, since they weren't going to use any more Ubisoft games for benchmarks. So what have they done? Allowed an unlimited number of graphics card swaps. That's it, everything else stays the same, so if other components such as the CPU, motherboard etc are changed, then one will still run into this frustrating brick wall and have to get in touch with customer support to reset the activations.

German tech website TweakPC did a before-after comparison of applying Microsoft's recently-released KB2645594 + KB2646060 Windows updates, which intend to improve performance of systems running AMD FX processors, by improving the way in which the OS deals with Bulldozer cores, using a top-of-the-line FX-8150 processor. The reviewer put FX-8150 through synthetic tests such as AIDA64 (CPU benchmarks, FPU benchmarks), Cinebench 11.5, MaxxPi (multi-threaded PI calculations), WPrime, Twofish AES, 3DMark (Vantage and 11), ComputeMark; and some real-world tests such as WinRAR, Resident Evil 5, and Battleforge. Barring Resident Evil 5, where the patched FX-8150 produced 4% higher performance and WinRAR, where it produced 3% higher performance, there were no significant performance gains noticed. The review can be accessed at the source.

Very quietly Microsoft has released two new patches available for the Bulldozer platform. According to the AMD blog these patches seem to offer little more then a 10% boost but the do improve over all performance. This is what Adam Kozak a product marketing manager at AMD had to say,

"Some of you may remember that AMD FX processors use a unique dual-core module architecture codenamed "Bulldozer", which current versions of Windows 7 were not specifically architected to utilize. In essence, for those with an AMD FX-8150 Processor, for example, Windows 7 sees the eight available cores and randomly assigns threads to them.

In initial testing of the upcoming Windows 8 operating system, we've seen performance improvements of up to 10% in some applications, when compared to Windows 7. This is because the system correctly recognizes the AMD FX processor architecture and cores. Thanks to close collaboration between Microsoft and AMD, Microsoft recently completed back-porting some of the Windows 8 scheduler code for AMD FX processors into a hotfix for Windows 7."

Besides the fact that they are carved out of the same piece of silicon by disabling components, all AMD FX series processors, from the quad-core FX-4000 series, to the eight-core FX-8000 series have one thing in common: they're all "unlocked", meaning they have an upwards-unlocked base-clock multiplier, which makes overclocking them a whole lot easier. Take that away and what do you get? A new Phenom II processor line. That's right, it is learned that AMD has a new line of Phenom II processors, eight-core for now, that are being carved out of the 32 nm Zambezi silicon.

Intuitively branded within the new Phenom II X8 and existing Phenom II X6 markers, these chips feature relatively lower clock speeds, meaning they will be priced low, competitive with Intel's sub-$200 Core i3 and Core i5 processors. AMD will also tinker with Zambezi's caches. The new chips came to light when some motherboard manufacturers leaked them on CPU support lists of certain motherboards, on their websites. For now we're getting to hear about two eight-core models, the 2.40 GHz Phenom II X8 2420, and 3.00 GHz Phenom II X8 3020; and two six-core models, the 2.50 GHz Phenom II X6 2520, and 2.80 GHz Phenom II X6 2820. Relevant details are tabled below. It beats us why AMD didn't take the opportunity (new silicon) to label these "Phenom III".

Welcome to the TechPowerUp 2011 PC technology Christmas special. We hope that you will enjoy reading it while tucking into your turkey, Christmas presents and a little too much wine... In this article, we go through the technology of 2011 that has had the most significance, the most impact and was generally the most talked about. It's not necessarily the best tech of 2011 which is the most significant though, since lemons can be just as significant as the ground-breakers in how they fail to deliver - and the backlash that goes with it.

January: Intel Sandy Bridge i5 & i7

Released on January 9th, the new Intel Core i5 & i7 processors were based on Intel's second generation Core architecture built on a 32 nm production process (HEXUS review). They included an IGP (Integrated Graphics Processor) physically on the same piece of silicon along with HyperThreading. These new dual and quad core processors soundly beat all previous generations of Intel processors in terms of processing performance, heat, power use, features and left AMD in the dust. Therefore, Intel badly needed some competition from AMD and unless you have been living under a rock, you will know how that turned out in October with the launch of Bulldozer. Sandy Bridge was a sound win and is generally considered to be the only architecture worth considering at this point. The i5-2500K is currently at the sweet spot of price/performance. It comes at a stock speed of 3.3 GHz, but typically overclocks to an amazing 4.5 - 5 GHz with a decent air cooler and without too much difficulty in getting there. Models in the budget i3 range were released at various times later. See this Wikipedia article for details.

To the surprise of many, last week, Microsoft rolled out a patch (KB2592546) for Windows that it claimed would improve performance of systems running AMD processors based on the "Bulldozer" architecture. The patch works by making the OS aware of the way Bulldozer cores are structured, so it could effectively make use of the parallelism at its disposal. Sadly, a couple of days later, it pulled that patch. Meanwhile, SweClockers got enough time to do a "before and after" performance test of the AMD FX-8150 processor, using this patch.

The results of SweClockers' tests are tabled below. "tidigare" is before, "nytt" is after, and "skillnad" is change. The reviewer put the chip through a wide range of tests, including synthetic CPU-intensive tests (both single and multi-threaded), and real-world gaming performance tests. The results are less than impressive. Perhaps, that's why the patch was redacted.

AMD launched its AMD FX processor family with two eight-core parts (FX-8150, FX-8120), a six-core part (FX-6100), and a quad-core one (FX-4100), apparently a newer, slightly faster six-core FX processor is just around the corner, the FX-6200. Since all AMD FX processors are unlocked out of the box, the FX-6200 is essentially a speed-bump. Out of the box, it is clocked at 3.80 GHz, with 4.10 GHz maximum TurboCore speed. It features six cores, 6 MB total L2 cache, and 8 MB total L3 cache. Its TDP is rated at 125W. In a presentation to retailers sourced by DonanimHaber, AMD pitched the FX-6200 to have about 10% higher performance at Mainconcept HD to Flash conversion, than the FX-6100 (3.30 GHz nominal, 3.90 GHz max. turbo).

AMD's new flagship Bulldozer "FX" series of processors have turned out to be mediocre performers in almost every review and benchmark going, sometimes even getting bested by the existing Phenom II and certainly no match for their Intel competition. To add to this tale of fail, it now turns out that AMD didn't even know how many transistors they have! Anand Lal Shimpi of AnandTech received an email from AMD's PR department and this is the revelation he had to share with us:

This is a bit unusual. I got an email from AMD PR this week asking me to correct the Bulldozer transistor count in our Sandy Bridge E review. The incorrect number, provided to me (and other reviewers) by AMD PR around 3 months ago was 2 billion transistors. The actual transistor count for Bulldozer is apparently 1.2 billion transistors. I don't have an explanation as to why the original number was wrong, just that the new number has been triple checked by my contact and is indeed right. The total die area for a 4-module/8-core Bulldozer remains correct at 315 mm².

AMD's new Bulldozer "FX" series of processors may be very lacklustre performers in reviewer's benchmarks and have garnered considerable scorn in enthusiast circles, but they're a very good performer for AMD's bottom line. Incredibly, they are selling out as soon as shops get them in stock - and they are not even priced very competitively against Intel's offerings, so perhaps the "It's an 8 core CPU!!" marketing is working well on the uninformed "enthusiast" after all? Mind you, what enthusiast, however uninformed, wouldn't know exactly how these products perform? Every tech website and computer magazine has covered these chips by now. The mind boggles.