Stefan Mileschin

AMD has finally taken the wraps off its low-power APU line-up for 2013. Of course, avid readers probably know what AMD has cooked up with its Jaguar and Piledriver based chips, which now have proper names to go by, and they sound worse than the codenames.

Temash, the world’s first 28nm x86 SoC is designed for tablets and hybrids. Its market name is 2013 AMD Elite Mobility APU and it will come in dual- and quad-core configurations, with A4 and A6 branding respectively. It is based on the Jaguar core with HD 8000 series graphics and it should take care of the sub 13-inch mobile market. AMD claims up to 172 percent more CPU performance and 2012 percent more GPU performance over its predecessor.

Kabini is now known as 2013 AMD Mainstream APU and it is also based on the Jaguar core. It will also appear in dual- and quad-core flavours. Quad-cores will end up with A-series branding, while duals will be a part of the E-series. It should deliver 88 percent better graphics performance than the competition, along with 33 percent better gaming performance and 28 percent faster file compression.

AMD’s Elite Performance APU is in fact its biggest APU, better known as Richland. While it isn’t a huge improvement over the last generation like Jaguar-based parts, it can still deliver 12 percent better productivity performance and 20 to 40 percent better visuals. However, it is much better in terms of power efficiency and AMD claims up to 51 more efficiency over previous generation Trinity chips. Richland will be marketed in the A8 and A10 segment.

While there is not much to report on the technical front, since the specs have been out for ages, AMD’s decision to reshuffle its branding sounds like good news for the company. Many weren’t expecting Jaguar-based parts to end up with A4 and A6 branding, which means they will eat into a part of the market previously held by Trinity APUs. This is in line with AMD’s own roadmaps – it seems Jaguar is simply too good to be reserved for the low-end bargain bin like its predecessors.

http://news.techeye.net/chips/amd-an...low-power-apus