AT Mobile Kaveri CPU Performance Preview

[Arachnotronic]

EDIT: Nevermind.

 

[Maxima1]

Yet some people are still cheering because the fastest 35W model is now slower than a 1-year old 15W Haswell-ULT chip (replaced months ago - Core i7 4600U is clocked 300MHz higher) by a smaller margin CPU-wise than Richland was. Also why comparable 37W Haswell dual-core & quad-core parts were not included in this comparison? A $225 standard voltage chip like Core i5 4310M should be way faster than the Core i7 4500U. While the iGPU performance is impressive (finally GCN @ mobile APUs) I wonder how much their advantage would be reduced had they used their fastest 17W part (running 256 GCN cores @ 424MHz) instead of top dog 512 cores @ 686MHz. That's 15W Haswell-U's real competitor, not the fastest 35W SKU.

Why? If you want AMD mobile, you're probably looking into playing games. If you want an Intel system that can play games, you have little choice in the same price range. There are countless Intel systems with crappy integrated graphics all the way up to i7 systems. Lenovo seems to offer the most for Intel's standard voltage chips otherwise you're looking at paying much more than a Kaveri system. Many of the OEMs have gone with ULV's even for 17 inch laptops (Ironically Lenovo has standard chips but no 17+ inch), and the OEMs want to segment gaming performance into premium laptop models.

 

[Galatian]

Yet some people are still cheering because the fastest 35W model is now slower than a 1-year old 15W Haswell-ULT chip (replaced months ago - Core i7 4600U is clocked 300MHz higher) by a smaller margin CPU-wise than Richland was. Also why comparable 37W Haswell dual-core & quad-core parts were not included in this comparison? A $225 standard voltage chip like Core i5 4310M should be way faster than the Core i7 4500U. While the iGPU performance is impressive (finally GCN @ mobile APUs) I wonder how much their advantage would be reduced had they used their fastest 17W part (running 256 GCN cores @ 424MHz) instead of top dog 512 cores @ 686MHz. That's 15W Haswell-U's real competitor, not the fastest 35W SKU.

I agree. Anand even used the HD4400 for test and not the GT3 HD5000 that is available for 15W Haswell CPUs. Needless to say at 35W you have Iris 5100 and Iris Pro 5200.

Of course now everybody will chime in and say that the chips are differently priced and I agree. But still that makes one thing clear: the Kaveri APU is still cutting corners compared to Intel offerings and so it is getting used in notebooks that are cutting corners.

 

[Fjodor2001]

@AtenRa - u do understand that they are comparing a 35W CPU vs a 15W one right. that mean less weight, thinner chassis and possible better battery life
and that GPU is not even HD5000 let alone Iris

But the FX-7500 19W part isn't clocked much lower the FX-7600P 35 W APU. So at least the CPU performance of the 7500 ought to be close to the 7600P, but with much lower power consumption. See:

 

[Arachnotronic]

But the FX-7500 19W part isn't clocked much lower the FX-7600P 35 W APU. So at least the CPU performance of the 7500 ought to be close to the 7600P, but with much lower power consumption. See:

Or maybe it can't turbo for as long? I would be genuinely curious to see how AMD is pulling that off.

If it's actually close in performance and much lower in power consumption, then kudos.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Hey wait a minute, I thought it was all about design wins for you? You better run and tell HP that AMD's cost structure is far worse, I guess they never consulted you first! You notice they are releasing AMD EliteBooks ahead of intel's?

Side by side, AMD's Kaveri is far more appealing than whatever intel has. Kaveri is just getting rolling, and as HSA compatible software continues to roll out, AMD's mobile products make intel's look dated and much less advanced. Sure they compete on standard work loads, but fall far far behind in 3D, gaming, and when current and next gen software is utilized. Shills. They're so humorous.

I look forward to seeing how well Kaveri does in the market.

 

[TuxDave]

But the FX-7500 19W part isn't clocked much lower the FX-7600P 35 W APU. So at least the CPU performance of the 7500 ought to be close to the 7600P, but with much lower power consumption. See:

Uh oh, AMD is in a world of hurt for the FX-7500 part. When the GPU attempts to turbo it loses 200MHz by going from 756MHz to 553MHz. Seems like someone hooked up something backwards.

But as you mentioned, you can probably scale the PC Mark 7 score (the one that Anand said was not OpenCL accelerated) to get a CPU comparison at ~ equal TDP.

 

[Sweepr]

35W FX-7600P is a 2.7-3.6GHz part while 19W FX-7500 runs @ 2.1-3.3GHz according to the AnandTech article.

 

[SPBHM]

performance looks good, not really 750M level for the IGP but clearly much faster than ulv HD 4400, but it would be interesting to know the power usage compared to the ULV i5/i7 + discrete graphics, and also performance compared to "M" 35W i5s

memory bandwidth?

 

[piesquared]

I look forward to seeing how well Kaveri does in the market.

I look forward to buying and using Kaveri regardless of how it does in the market. That's the difference between investors and consumers I guess.

It's an awesome product with a forward looking architecture.

 

[Galatian]

But the FX-7500 19W part isn't clocked much lower the FX-7600P 35 W APU. So at least the CPU performance of the 7500 ought to be close to the 7600P, but with much lower power consumption. See:

There are some errors in that table anyway. I thought only some parts get True Audio?

 

[AtenRa]

@AtenRa - u do understand that they are comparing a 35W CPU vs a 15W one right. that mean less weight, thinner chassis and possible better battery life
and that GPU is not even HD5000 let alone Iris

Yes, but Intel17 commended on those results

 

[Arachnotronic]

I look forward to buying and using Kaveri regardless of how it does in the market. That's the difference between investors and consumers I guess.

It's an awesome product with a forward looking architecture.

I sincerely hope you enjoy it

 

[frozentundra123456]

performance looks good, not really 750M level for the IGP but clearly much faster than ulv HD 4400, but it would be interesting to know the power usage compared to the ULV i5/i7 + discrete graphics, and also performance compared to "M" 35W i5s

memory bandwidth?

That is the problem though. Performance, even of the 35w part is still very marginal for gaming. For instance, the TH test showed BF4 unplayable at 720p in either Direct X or Mantle. Yes, you can play some games decently, but it is kind of a niche scenario to want to game, but not to be able to play the total selection of games. Even dota 2 was barely playable, while intel was much faster, so I suspect the cpu was being limiting there. Even worse is that the newer crop of games is becoming increasingly more demanding, especially of cpu, which is Kaveri's weakest point.

 

[Maxima1]

@AtenRa - u do understand that they are comparing a 35W CPU vs a 15W one right. that mean less weight, thinner chassis and possible better battery life

That doesn't necessarily mean that. It largely depends on the model itself. I just looked at Dell's 17R. It's 6.02 lbs with a Core i3-4010U. The Lenovo 17 inch everyday laptop is 6.4 lbs with a Core i3-4000MQ Processor. Even more striking, the Razor 14 inch is just 0.7 inches think and weighs only 4.47 lbs, yet it has a Core i7 4702HQ and GTX 870M.

the Kaveri APU is still cutting corners compared to Intel offerings and so it is getting used in notebooks that are cutting corners.

Besides the screen, I don't see what's really that bad. If you're buying more expensive models, you're paying for a chassis you're not going to be able to reuse and they'll rip you off if they were offering SSD's or more memory. Edit: Even with the screen, in the past, it was clearly fine to have only 768p if you were using it for gaming otherwise games would have played like crap.

 

[Idontcare]

I'm just happy to see AMD still creating competition and keeping a bit of a fire under Intel's arse in the mobile segment! Go AMD! Go!

 

[AtenRa]

I'm just happy to see AMD still creating competition and keeping a bit of a fire under Intel's arse in the mobile segment! Go AMD! Go!

Fanboy

 

[insertcarehere]

Why? If you want AMD mobile, you're probably looking into playing games. If you want an Intel system that can play games, you have little choice in the same price range. There are countless Intel systems with crappy integrated graphics all the way up to i7 systems. Lenovo seems to offer the most for Intel's standard voltage chips otherwise you're looking at paying much more than a Kaveri system. Many of the OEMs have gone with ULV's even for 17 inch laptops (Ironically Lenovo has standard chips but no 17+ inch), and the OEMs want to segment gaming performance into premium laptop models.

This positioning puts AMD into a bit of a niche,

IMHO, The USP of a kaveri APU (on mobile) is useful for:

-people want to play games on a laptop, graphically demanding enough for it to justify over intel's offerings, yet do not the desire the benefits so much to justify the extra costs of a (modest) dgpu, bc of the TDP constraints (35W) of the better gaming chips, these people also need to be comfortable with larger form factor laptops.

A problem with this approach is that we are at the start of a new console generation, if prev console gens are any indicator, game devs are going to start pumping up graphical features, making games more and more demanding. Considering how kaveri fares with contemporary games now, how long will it be able to maintain 768/720p at over 30fps with decent settings? The more widespread adoption of 1080p screens on laptops (finally!) will not help its cause either.

To exacerbate this problem, the alternate uses for such a laptop (for most consumer), are being served with better performance with cheaper devices than even only 1 year ago. With Intel pushing their mobile platforms out in every low-cost tablet out there, we are very close to seeing $150-200 touchscreen windows tablets with decent performance for mobile use activities.

 

[monstercameron]

If that is poor performance then what makes the Core i5 4200U???

AMD playable, Intel not playable

AMD playable, Intel not playable

AMD playable, Intel not playable

There is a pattern emerging, no wonder Intel are trying their best to improve the iGPU performance more than the CPU all that time.



Im sure we will have power and battery life measurements of actual retail products when they will be available.

but that is a flawed comparison, the vaio has super aggressive downclocking.

 

[Vesku]

This positioning puts AMD into a bit of a niche,

IMHO, The USP of a kaveri APU (on mobile) is useful for:

-people want to play games on a laptop, graphically demanding enough for it to justify over intel's offerings, yet do not the desire the benefits so much to justify the extra costs of a (modest) dgpu, bc of the TDP constraints (35W) of the better gaming chips, these people also need to be comfortable with larger form factor laptops.

Actually the desire for more graphics power in a reasonable power envelope has been the main reason for my notebook upgrades since the introduction of mobile Intel's mobile Core 2. Not even gaming driven, just regular media and internet demands. One of the main drivers to Intel suddenly caring about graphics performance around that same time frame, according to many industry analysts, was demand from computer makers most likely passing on complaints from customers. Intel HD graphics introduced with Nehalem was a huge leap over their previous offerings and it still wasn't very good.

Keep in mind that was before Apple really got the market interested in pixel density, so the need for better graphics in a reasonable package are even greater now. I wouldn't be surprised if we see a sudden jump in 1080P+ notebooks once Broadwell arrives. Sadly I just don't think the OEMs will deliver before then even though Kaveri appears quite capable for those resolutions.

My CPU demands, notebook wise, has been satisfied since Core 2 Duo @ 2GHz. Granted if it was my main computer I'd want as much CPU and GPU that I could afford for any given notebook refresh but all the "regular" people I know are generally fine with the former CPU performance even as their main machine.

 

[Techhog]

I really hope the laptops with the FX-7600P aren't too expensive.

 

[Maxima1]

Actually the desire for more graphics power in a reasonable power envelope has been the main reason for my notebook upgrades since the introduction of mobile Intel's mobile Core 2. Not even gaming driven, just regular media and internet demands.

I wonder myself. I've seen many people who have complained that they had to use Intel integrated graphics for the games that they wanted to play because an Intel laptop is what their parents got them. Also, many people talk about mobility, but there is so many people simply using the laptop like a desktop.

 

[NostaSeronx]

I really hope the laptops with the FX-7600P aren't too expensive.

The business models are aiming for $799(HDD+16:9 WXGA) to $1299(SSD+FHD).

 

[frozentundra123456]

The business models are aiming for $799(HDD+16:9 WXGA) to $1299(SSD+FHD).

AMD better hope not. No way I would pay over 600.00 for Kaveri. At 500 dollars it is a deal, 600 maybe, but not more than that.

 

[monstercameron]

AMD better hope not. No way I would pay over 600.00 for Kaveri. At 500 dollars it is a deal, 600 maybe, but not more than that.

oh come on, ultrabooks and the like are about the package [ssd, ips fhd displays, metal chassis, high end finish] and less about absolute performance. Hell most of the time these ultrabooks throttle themselves down into oblivion because of the available cooling[or lack of...]