AMD Launches New Higher-End Kaveri APUs A10-7800 and A6-7400K 117
MojoKid (1002251) writes "AMD updated its family of Kaveri-based A-Series APUs for desktop systems recently, namely the A10-7800 and the A6-7400K. The A10-7800 has 12 total compute cores, 4 CPU and 8 GPU cores, with average and maximum turbo clock speeds of 3.5GHz and 3.9GHz, respectively. The A6-7400K arrives with 6 total cores (2CPU, 4 GPU) and with the same clock frequencies. ... The AMD A10-7800 APU's performance is somewhat mixed, though it is a decent performer overall. Its Steamroller-based CPU cores do not do much to make up ground versus Intel's processors, so in the more CPU-bound workloads, Intel's dual-core Core i3-4330 competes favorably to AMD's quad-cores. And in terms of IPC and single-thread performance Intel maintains a big lead. Factor graphics into the equation, however, and the tides turn completely. The GCN-based graphics engine in Kaveri is a major step-up over the previous-gen, and much more powerful than Intel's mainstream offerings. The A10-7800's power consumption characteristics are also more desirable versus the Richland-based A10-6800K."
What the fuck? (Score:5, Funny)
Based on the most commented articles, I thought this was a site for politics and social issues. What the hell is this technical bullshit doing here?
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Oh, not to worry. No one will comment on it.
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I can stomach a little of it, as long as they don't go off the deep end with actual discussion of assembling a system or god forbid picking up a soldering iron to actually build a thing. This isn't BYTE magazine in the 1970s after all, we've evolved beyond technical knowledge and skills
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Oops, sorry, I just got a dc-dc converter in the mail to run my AMD geode SBC off a marine battery. No solder involved though, so I guess it's ok, just a crimping tool [pololu.com]
Re:What the fuck? (Score:5, Funny)
Crimping? why that's fucking MANUAL LABOR, what the hell is wrong with you?!!
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why do you assume he's a middle class white dude ?
(i keed i keed)
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Oops, sorry, I just got a dc-dc converter in the mail to run my AMD geode SBC off a marine battery.
You probably should be sorry. The fastest Geodes are antiques (I have two of them right here, whee.)
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Oops, sorry, I just got a dc-dc converter in the mail to run my AMD geode SBC off a marine battery.
You probably should be sorry. The fastest Geodes are antiques (I have two of them right here, whee.)
I'm thankful. Total system board power draw: ~2W. Plus 2 watts for the SSD. Total power draw: 4 watts, while my converter will deliver 15 watts. Sweet or what? And it runs Linux like a champ. Even runs KDE, though video can be a little slow. Doesn't bother me a bit. I compile remotely anyway. Basically, the perfect shipcom.
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Product placement. It's advertising. I presume someone at Slashdot is smart enough to get paid for this, although that may not be a reasonable assumption.
And unsurprisingly (Score:2, Insightful)
Not everybody plays Crysis. I noticed you only mentioned CPU performance. I think the whole package is great. I can build a really small system that can do some passable 3D for little money.
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That's the point. AMD is putting a lot more into the GPU on chip so if what you want is graphics and you don't care so much about CPU, they are a good deal. Why buy more CPU than you need and get crap graphics?
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People keep pretending single thread performance matters, even though there is hardly any practical use for it for the avg consumer.
It is especially bad once you are after notebooks. Most notebooks sold are i3-5-7 with Intel's poor iGPU.
The only tasks that put some load on my PCs are:
a) games
b) video encoding
AMD does both better than intel, thanks to:
a) VASTLY superior GPU (besides performance, there is also quality / problems with games)
b) more cores
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It may not be the cheapest thing for business use or the fastest thing for uber-gamers, but it's better than any of the Intel chips you mentioned at being a DVR/Steam 'big picture" HTPC, which is why I'd be interested in it.
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Are you doing any transcoding or commercial detection/removal? That's the sort of multi-threaded and/or GPGPU workload I'd expect AMD's chip to be better for.
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Except the i3 has hardware video acceleration too and uses less power. It'll be a quieter HTPC and still perform media workloads better and quieter.
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Although I don't do it on my current HTPC, if I got one of these I'd be interested in removing commercials [mythtv.org] and/or transcoding to MPEG4 (or Theora, etc.). I would hope and expect that something so embarrassingly-parallel yet not implemented in hardware would be faster on one of these AMDs.
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I take it you don't do a lot of multitasking or use VMs. My current 2.1ghz triple core phenom is fast enough on each core for the things I actually do, I'm upgrading to an 8 core 4.0ghz processor primarily for the additional cores. Being able to dedicate an entire core or two to a pair of VMs is much more useful to me than playing Crysis.
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It is a chip for cheap machines without high performance requirements. Sort of an entry level CPU and entry level GPU in one, with a bit more emphasis on the GPU than the i3.
And where you call the AMD "slightly less underpowered" in GPU, the i3 is arguably overpowered for typical office applications. Read, the A10-7800 can do those adequately.
Overall I think the A10-7800 has its market, for home use where you want to do a bit of everything or maybe as HTPC. It is nothing very impressive, but neither is an i
Re:And unsurprisingly (Score:4, Informative)
Theres value to be had if you use advanced CPU features, because all AMD processors tend to have the high-end features (ECC support, etc). Intel charges you through the nose if you want that stuff-- think that Pentium has virtualization support or AES-NI? The AMD sure does.
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Sadly, ECC RAM support was removed since Kaveri. You have to buy a 2012 AMD Piledriver if you want ECC support.
Updated? (Score:1)
These aren't exactly new news. I've had a 7850k since March/April. It's a nice CPU, with my main complains being that
a) It gets hot very quickly
b) The accompanying heatsink/fan is crap
The nice part:
The APU is quite nice for gaming. I haven't had any issues running most games at 1080p with graphics settings cranked, especially mantle-enabled stuff (BF4, etc). I've got dual-monitors, but I haven't played much which takes advantage of that so while gaming it's usually 1 for the game and another running monitor
Re:Updated? (Score:4, Insightful)
The "new" news is the release on the A8-7600; and only about 7 months late. Most of the reviews for that processor were published in January, which is shameful really.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/... [anandtech.com]
But now that it is out, it is at a good price, decent computationally, very good power envelope. It's a good option for productivity-only desktops, at a fraction of the price of a 7850K or an i3-4330.
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In terms of performance, the big difference seems to be a somewhat lower number of graphics cores and lower CPU clock, but the lower TDP (45W vs 95W) could make it attractive along with the price-point. I wonder how it does for heat compared with the 7850k.
From reviews it looks like gameplay FPS is slightly lower but playable. Still not many details on heat though
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How do you judge playable?
For instance in bf4 full-hd (or whatever it was, I've closed the tab) the 7850 seem to have done around 30 FPS.
It all depends on what you want though.
Also it showed TDP as 65/45 (turbo or no turbo?.)
70% the price for 75% the GPU and 84-90% the CPU power?
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From what I see, there's a 45W A8-7600 @ 3100/3300Mhz, and a 65W A8-7600 @ 3300/3800
The clock turn clock would be the second for either version, but the 65W's base close is equiv to the turbo of the other, and the 65W has a 3800Mhz turbo.
I didn't check my frame-rate on the 7850, but at 1080p (full detail) it didn't have any notable lag or tearing, so that's good enough for me.
Fast RAM required (Score:4, Interesting)
GPUs need fast memory access (Score:5, Informative)
CPU workloads tend to be something that so long as you've a bit of fast cache, memory speed isn't that important. That cache buffer is enough to get you extremely high performance. Not the case with GPU workloads. They are very memory bound. If you look at high end GPUs they have stupid amounts of RAM bandwidth compared to CPUs.
Well, if you try and do both on one chip, you are gonna need fast RAM if you want it to work well.
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http://www.eteknix.com/memory-... [eteknix.com]
http://semiaccurate.com/2014/0... [semiaccurate.com]
Can one calculate b/s simply from number of bits * clock?
17 GB/s for 2133 MHz DDR3?
The GTX 770 would put that at 224 GB/s ..
New AMD APUs are supposed to have "stacked memory" or something such though.
Re:GPUs need fast memory access (Score:5, Informative)
Almost - you also need to count memory channels, which on most desktops is two.
2 channels * 64 bits/channel * 2133MT/s / 8 bits/byte = 34128MB/s = 33.3GB/s
GPUs tend to use very wide, high-speed memory, because they need a lot more bandwidth than CPUs because graphics stuff doesn't cache as easily. Some data for comparison:
R7 240: 2 channels * 64 bits/channel * 4500MT/s = 70GB/s
R7 260X: 2 channels * 64 bits/channel * 6500MT/s = 102GB/s
R7 270X: 4 channels * 64 bits/channel * 5600MT/s = 175GB/s
R9 280X: 6 channels * 64 bits/channel * 6000MT/s = 281GB/s
R9 290X: 8 channels * 64 bits/channel * 5000MT/s = 312GB/s
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I should had thought about dual channel myself =P
The 17 GB I saw mentioned was from a wiki and it make sense that answered for the single memory module :)
I thought later about using R290X because it likely had the greatest number, GTX 770 happen to be what I consider "good but not insanely extreme" :), good enough to beat an APU platform but not something which wouldn't be considered by most (or well, maybe so, but not out of reach for them at least :))
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Fast RAM is mainly important for graphics. AMD has a more powerful IGP, the Intel equivalent performs worse and so requires less. That is why Intel went with embedded DRAM [intel.com] on their best IGPs (brand name "Intel Iris Pro Graphics 5200"), though none of these are retail chips but only for laptops and AIOs. Personally I'm of the opinion that either you don't care about the GPU at all and it doesn't matter, or you should care enough to get a decent graphics card. Putting a CPU+GPU on a 65W power budget won't eve
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I think there are levels in between, such as having some older games that you want to play at decent quality but not the latest stuff.
This said, the AMD IGPs tend to be limited by RAM bandwidth. Discrete graphics cards with similar numbers of shaders tend to beat the AGPs in graphics. I think AMD needs either quad-channel memory (too expensive?) or stacked VRAM on the APU itself. Without that, it is only a matter of time until Intel's HD graphics catch up...
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It's because on the APUs there is no dedicated graphics memory. The graphics units use the main memory as was always the case with all integrated graphics chips for a long time. Using the main memory for GPU tasks is a serious performance penalty, that's why it's normally recommended to use faster memory with APUs if you care about GPU performance.
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It's good for niches of users, like those who insist on building a small PC (to compensate for a too big penis?) or why not the family Windows PC where users only care about being able to run a game at all (either now or four years down the road).
Else, the CPU performance is sure fairly disappointing (and Windows itself is disappointing, ugly and manages to be both simplistic and complex, I miss the days you could use 2000/XP and be done)
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But you can set the thing to 45 watt. You just need some airflow and very good heatsink.
Well, if you want CPU performance get a 35 watt Intel i3 ; the AMD CPU is worse and slightly hotter but will better run games (and some rare GPGPU or HSA software). That's all. And if I was building a SFF PC, I'd probably look for quad core Atom (or the same named Celeron), Kabini and successors or even Tegra K1 (but that one isn't strictly a PC)
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Yeah, set it for 45w max and you end up with the CPU side of it constantly getting throttled and the performance sliding even further into the dirt. But you're right about GPU dependant loads. But if that was my usage case, I'd probably wait for Isis Pro to trickle down to Intel's low-end.
Benchmarks from the smaller 7600 only show a modest performance hit from going to 45W, approximately 10%. Isis Pro is a brute force solution to the problem (huge on-chip RAM) and is likely to stay quite expensive for a while because of die-size and limited production. A discrete GPU is probably the better option at that price point (ie replace the cheapest $450 Iris pro with $450 cpu + GPU), unless if low power consumption is an absolute priority.
Affordable on-chip graphics RAM may become standard in future
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Number of cores or core frequency is irrelevant.
It's about how much work can be done for a given amount of power.
If a dual core CPU running at half the frequency outperforms a quad core cpu, something is very wrong.
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Name dual core CPU running at half frequency that outperforms one of the new quad core AMD CPUs at mulit-threaded tasks, pretty please.
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Naming Conventions (Score:1)
I really hate the current naming conventions for CPU's.
you go buy a computer and it only says Intel Core i5... WTH. Is it sa Gen 1 i5 or a Gen 4 i5 there's a big difference. Sure I can look it up and check out specifics but how the heck is a regular consumer supposed to know?
and then lets not get started on the Xeon... what we can't even add a simple identifier to the name? a 2002 Xeon sure as heck isn't the same as a 2013 Xeon chip.
Then AMD... just feels like a cluster-F--- of names and numbers.
GPU's reall
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With an Intel CPU, Look at the part number to figure out the generation.
xxx is first gen
2xxx is second
3xxx is third
4xxx if fourth
I assume the 5th gen will start with a 5
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AMD have the most awful marketing I can think of. Here [archive.org] is archive.org's backup of an old (now deleted) Wikipedia article which nicely summarised the 'AMD Vison' lies.
They were telling people that low-end machines would be fine for playing DVDs, but wouldn't cope with ripping CDs.
I really want to like you, AMD...
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s/Vison/Vision/
Will AMD APUs ever support ECC RAM? (Score:1)
I have a strong preference for using ECC RAM when I build a new computer.
I would be perfectly happy to use an APU to make a very quiet computer, but the chipsets that support the APUs don't have ECC support.
I admit I'm probably a weird outlier. People who want APUs probably don't want to pay extra for ECC RAM most of the time. Still, will there ever be even one chipset that will add ECC support?
Is there any technical reason why ECC shouldn't be used with an APU?
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They will probably make some version for the server market, but it will certainly be on another socket. The socket AM3+ does support ECC (if you choose the right motherboard, ASUS usually do...) but the upgrade path is probably stuck forever at the FX8350. It isn't a bad chip, actually quite good for multithreaded loads, but it's getting old... If you want ECC for cheap you could buy a lower-end socket AM3+ processor like the FX4350, otherwise Xeon is clearly the better choice.
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The socket AM3+ does support ECC (if you choose the right motherboard, ASUS usually do...)
Yeah, I have standardized on Asus for all my builds, and the ECC support is one of the reasons.
If you want ECC for cheap you could buy a lower-end socket AM3+ processor like the FX4350
My most recent build was an FX8xxx part. FX8350 I think.
otherwise Xeon is clearly the better choice.
I have made the choice to not give Intel any of my money if I can help it. I don't like the unethical games Intel plays (example [agner.org]).
Proce
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"Yeah, I have standardized on Asus for all my builds, and the ECC support is one of the reasons."
God I hope you never have to RMA with them. Last time I did it, they wanted me to send them $600, THEN they'd send me a new GPU, THEN I could ship mine back, THEN they'd redeposit the money in my account.
I just tossed the card and bought something other than Asus.
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The technical reason is probably along the lines of the memory controller in the chip doesn't support it.
The memory controller hasn't been in the chipset since before the K8 architecure over 10 years ago
You're kidding, right? (Score:2)
Performance is comparable if we compare against Intel's lowest end CPU?
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FPS per Dollar Champ (Score:4, Informative)
Umm.. These benchmarking sites, and comment threads like this one constantly miss the point.
The AMD A-Series processors do NOT equal intel chips when you run synthetic CPU benchmarks.
The AMD A-Series absolutely KILLS IT when your goal is to throw together a dirt-cheap gaming rig on a budget.
If all you need is a new motherboard, CPU & RAM, and you intend to reuse your old case, hard drives, and peripherals - The AMD A10 chips and their integrated Radeon graphics offer outstanding FPS for the dollar when compared to the alternative of building an intel system w/discrete Nvidia GPU.
Did you really think people are sticking AMD APUs in cases with neon-accented cutout windows and holographic 3D skull case stickers to optimize their VBA performance in large Excel workbooks?
No, they want consistent 90 fps in Shooter DuJour, and they want it for only a few hundred bucks.
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However, a cheap dedicated Radeon card for $70 will still slaughter the latest APU in gaming performance.
The best bang for buck cheap gaming system these days would be based on the unlocked dual core Pentium CPU combined with an entry level Radeon card.
OpenCL, HSA? (Score:3)
They seem to have missed some really important benchmarks.
Clearly on the graphics side, the APU kills the i5.
The interesting thing was HSA which allows low latency CPU/GPGPU workloads, which allows the (relatively slow) GPU to work on a MUCH wider range of problems than any comparable product. Early indications, such as the LibreOffice spreadsheet program had the A10 killing even the top end i7s.
For other less extreme examples, the A10 was comfortably outpacing the i5 by a factor of 2 or more.
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There are no HSA applications (just a few tech demos) and it doesn't look like they are going to appear any time soon.
HSA will only work on kaveri CPUs, which are maybe 0.001% of the market. Maybe if Intel adoped HSA then there would be some more motivation for developers to support it.
It's a laptop chip... (Score:4, Interesting)
What most people don't realize is that the desktop version is basically an afterthought. The chip has been optimized for laptops, where it does make some sense (adding a discrete GPU is not an option after purchase and laptops with discrete GPUs are quite more expensive, so the comparative advantage is more important). AMD knows they can't win on the desktop, which is why they didn't bother with extreme caches, 4-module (8-core) versions and cherry-picked chips with crazy TDPs. Personally, I'm much more excited with the laptop version of Kaveri, such as the 7350B in the HP EliteBook 745 G2.
Anyway, for the price it makes a really great casual gaming PC, especially for people who are price sensitive and can't afford a +$100 discrete GPU (in some places this is a decent chunk of a month's salary...).
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If you absolutely need the computing power of a high-end CPU, then you probably want to figure out how to do the same calculation in a GP
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What most people don't realize is that the desktop version is basically an afterthought.
I'll believe it when I see it. AMD CPUs always run hotter and used more energy in real life tests.
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I'll believe it when I see it. AMD CPUs always run hotter and used more energy in real life tests.
Well, in idle, which is what most processors do in typical user workloads, the 7800 is comparable to intel processors. Total energy to accomplish a task obviously varies, but the 7800 uses 30-50% more energy than intel processors for the same task. However, the 7 series APUs are clearly more efficient than the 6 series Richland APUs that they replace. Peak power consumption is around 100W for a complete system with 7800, which is not a huge thermal load.
In the end, what I'm saying is that AMD improved power
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Read: "AMD is just as good as Intel when they aren't doing anything"
What a pathetic piece of shilling that is. Really scraping the bottom of the barrel to find ANY redeeming quality in AMD CPUs, eh?
Well, if "not doing anything" is what your PC does a long part of the day, idle power consumption can be of some importance. That does not necessarily redeem AMD cpus, but it is worth mentioning in my opinion. Obviously, you seem to think that all discussion should be limited to "AMD sucks". Even if true, this does not make for a very interesting read.
you know what's funny? (Score:1)