AMD today announced global availability of its new 'socketed' AM1 platform featuring quad-core and dual-core variants of the AMD APU codenamed "Kabini".
The AM1 platform, branded with the AMD Athlon and AMD Sempron APU brands, brings AMD's Graphics Core Next (GCN) architecture and "Jaguar" CPU cores on motherboards from the manufacturers.
There are a total of four AM1 APUs launching today:
| APU Model |
TDP |
CPU Cores |
CPU Frequency |
Radeon Cores |
GPU Frequency |
Memory Frequency |
Total Cache |
Price
(USD) |
| AMD Athlon 5350 |
25W |
4 |
2.05 GHz |
128 |
600 MHz |
1600 MHz |
2 MB |
$59 |
| AMD Athlon 5150 |
25W |
4 |
1.6 GHz |
128 |
600 MHz |
1600 MHz |
2 MB |
$49 |
| AMD Sempron 3850 |
25W |
4 |
1.3 GHz |
128 |
450 MHz |
1600 MHz |
2 MB |
$39 |
| AMD Sempron 2650 |
25W |
2 |
1.45 GHz |
128 |
400 MHz |
1333 MHz |
1 MB |
$34 |
Each of these APUs features up to four 28nm Jaguar cores and a 128 SP implementation of AMD's GCN GPU. The most expensive AM1 APU is the $55 Athlon 5350, a quad core SoC running at 2.05 GHz with a 2 compute unit GCN GPU (128 SP) running at 600 MHz. All four models will have an official TDP rating of 25W.
AMD expects mini-ITX and micro-ATX AM1 motherboards to retail for between $25 - $35.
"AMD consistently builds on its industry leading technology by continuing to offer a diversified product stack which is proven today with the availability of the AM1 platform with 'socketed' AMD Sempron and AMD Athlon APUs designed for the mainstream market," said Bernd Lienhard, corporate vice president and general manager, Client Business Unit, AMD. "With quad-core performance and AMD Radeon graphics the AM1 platform is an affordable solution that provides great flexibility due to an infrastructure built to deliver a multitude of options to our end users and system builders."
AMD Athlon and AMD Sempron APUs deliver a quad-core solution that includes two SATA 6 Gbps ports, two USB 3.0 ports, eight USB 2.0 ports, PCIe 2.0 lanes for graphic card upgrades, and a trio of video outputs (DisplayPort, HDMI, and VGA) starting at under $40 USD:
- Single Channel 64-bit DDR3/DDR3L
- Two USB 3.0
- Eight USB 2.0
- PS/2
- Trusted Platform Module Support
- Up to four eDP/DP/HDMI video ouputs
- VGA output
- Four PCIe 2.0 lanes for a discrete GPU/PCIe device
- Two SATA 3 Gbps ports
- One PCIe 2.0 x1 lane allocated to an Ethernet controller
- Three PCIe 2.0 x1 lanes for other controllers (SATA, USB, LAN, WiFi, PCIe 2.0 x1 slots, PCIe to PCI bridges)
The audio solution is based on an ALC887 Realtek codec.
AMD is attempting to fire a shot across Intel?s Bay Trail.The company considers the Athlon 5350/5150 parts (quad core, 2.05 GHz and 1.6 GHz) in line with Intel's Pentium J2850/J2900, and the Sempron 3850 with the J1850/J1900 - all Silvermont based SoCs.
For sure, AMD is offering a quad-core chip for $36, which is less than the cheapest all-in-one desktop quad-core system from Intel. On the other hand, Intel offers several dual core options around this $40-$60 price point, and in many cases the IPC and CPU speed advantage of these cores is greater than that provided by Kabini, particularly in single threaded applications.
In addition, AMD has not clarified whether a user who buys an AM1 platform now will be able to upgrade it in the future.