Mobile Intel Ivy Bridge vs AMD Trinity?

[Fjodor2001]

Hi,

I just wonder if any tests have been done comparing the mobile Intel Ivy Bridge vs AMD Trinity CPUs/APUs? If not, can we at least make an educated guess?

I'm considering getting a 2 core 4 thread Ivy Bridge Ultrabook, but I am also considering a similar AMD Trinity based one as well since both will be out in about the same time frame. I want one where battery life is prioritized over performance, so I'll looking at the lowest watt versions of the CPUs (i.e. 17W I think).

What I'd like to know is:

1. Approximately how much faster will the CPU performance of Ivy Bridge be compared to Trinity? 10%, 25%, 50%?
2. Approximately how much faster will the IGP performance of Trinity be compared to Ivy Bridge? 25%, 50%, 100%?
3. What can be expected in terms of battery life? Will they be similar?

Please let me know what you think.

 

[anikhtos]

Hi,

I just wonder if any tests have been done comparing the mobile Intel Ivy Bridge vs AMD Trinity CPUs/APUs? If not, can we at least make an educated guess?

I'm considering getting a 2 core 4 thread Ivy Bridge Ultrabook, but I am also considering a similar AMD Trinity based one as well since both will be out in about the same time frame. I want one where battery life is prioritized over performance, so I'll looking at the lowest watt versions of the CPUs (i.e. 17W I think).

What I'd like to know is:

1. Approximately how much faster will the CPU performance of Ivy Bridge be compared to Trinity? 10%, 25%, 50%?
2. Approximately how much faster will the IGP performance of Trinity be compared to Ivy Bridge? 25%, 50%, 100%?
3. What can be expected in terms of battery life? Will they be similar?

Please let me know what you think.

when both will be out then you can have your answer
there is no point to speculate right now which will be which

 

[Fjodor2001]

when both will be out then you can have your answer there is no point to speculate right now which will be which

Why not? Reading the other threads in this forum it seems like a lot of them deal with exactly that - speculation, estimation, making educated guesses based on what is known so far, etc. We're basically interested in what's on the horizon and what can be expected of things to come. When the tests are already out there you could argue that there is no point in discussing it on the forum since then all the details are already in the reviews.

Also, it's not like we're shooting in the dark here. There are already tests out for Ivy Bridge and a lot of details are known about AMD Trinity too, right?

So is there anyone who can make at least some sensible estimation, please?

 

[aaksheytalwar]

I guess ivy will. Be the faster CPU. Trinity may be better for graphics

 

[Fjodor2001]

Yeah, we already know that. But what I wondered was approximately how much faster the CPU in IB will be compared to Trinity, and how much faster the GPU in Trinity will be compared to IB (for the case mentioned above)? Also, is either of them expected to have better battery life than the other?

 

[f4phantom2500]

well you'd have to consider that, in order to match the performance of a hyperthreaded dual core ivy bridge chip, the trinity will likely have to be a quad core. judging by what i've seen from amd lately, this will either mean that the ivy bridge notebook would have substantially better battery life or substantially better cpu performance. but, considering that the gpu is usually the limiter at this level, and considering that amd usually offers a superior gpu and this particular generation seems no different, amd will likely offer the more well rounded multimedia experience.

either way, i think you will end up with a good cpu and your experience would be far more noticeably impacted by having a sufficient amount of ram and a fast SSD.

 

[Sable]

1. Approximately how much faster will the CPU performance of Ivy Bridge be compared to Trinity? 10%, 25%, 50%?

18.2819%

2. Approximately how much faster will the IGP performance of Trinity be compared to Ivy Bridge? 25%, 50%, 100%?

22.735%

3. What can be expected in terms of battery life? Will they be similar?

42

HTH

 

[386DX]

Hi,

I just wonder if any tests have been done comparing the mobile Intel Ivy Bridge vs AMD Trinity CPUs/APUs? If not, can we at least make an educated guess?

I'm considering getting a 2 core 4 thread Ivy Bridge Ultrabook, but I am also considering a similar AMD Trinity based one as well since both will be out in about the same time frame. I want one where battery life is prioritized over performance, so I'll looking at the lowest watt versions of the CPUs (i.e. 17W I think).

What I'd like to know is:

1. Approximately how much faster will the CPU performance of Ivy Bridge be compared to Trinity? 10%, 25%, 50%?
2. Approximately how much faster will the IGP performance of Trinity be compared to Ivy Bridge? 25%, 50%, 100%?
3. What can be expected in terms of battery life? Will they be similar?

Please let me know what you think.

Nobody is going to know for certain until they are both released. However based on leaked benchmarks we can make some educated guesses.

1. Early numbers put Trinity CPU IPC performance to be able the same as Llano in integer and 20-30% faster in FPU. While IB IPC is about 5-10% improved over SB. SB is already 50-100% faster then Llano on the CPU end so IB will just continue this trend.

2. Early numbers put desktop Trinity GPU to be about 50% faster then desktop Llano GPU. Desktop IB numbers put it around desktop Llano GPU. So Trinity should be faster on the GPU end. However on the mobile side the gap is probably gonna be significantly less the reason being Intel tends to use the same GPU on there desktop and mobile chips (same number of EU, running frequency changes though) while AMD reduces shaders and frequency as you move from desktop A8 APU to mobile A8, then A6 and A4 APU's. If this trend continues then we can see a similar performance gap like that between SB and Llano where desktop Llano is faster by about 50% (not exact numbers), while mobile Llano A8 is faster then mobile i5 by about 40% and mobile A4 faster then mobile i3 by about 20%. Since you're looking at 17W CPU's I doubt Trinity graphics will be that much faster then IB.

3. Battery life I'd say IB will be more efficient. Intel has just to much of a manufacturing edge and at 17W Intel has enough CPU performance lead to reduce frequency if needed to increase battery life while AMD doesn't have that luxury as even there current 35/45W Llano CPU performance is at the low side already. The 17W IB i7-3667U is suppose to be a 2C/4T @ 2.0/2.9/3.1 GHz (Base frequency/Dual Core Turbo/Single Core Turbo). That already easily beats the fastest available 45W Llano CPU out now, I just don't see AMD being able to match that while reducing power by 2.5 times.

 

[Fjodor2001]

@386DX:

Thanks! It was exactly this kind of info I was looking for.

I'm figuring the AMD Trinity based Ultrabooks will be perhaps $200 cheaper than the Intel Ivy Bridge based ones (assuming all other hardware is identical).

I was hoping IB would only have a 25-50% CPU performance advantage, in which case I'd go with the AMD Trinity if it's $200 cheaper. However if it is approaching 100% I might have to reconsider. I'm a bit surprised though, since they say IB will only be ~5-15% faster than SB. And I thought the AMD Trinity CPU performance was supposed have improved quite a bit compared to Llano.

Regarding the battery life AMD is claiming 12 hours idle battery life (see http://www.guru3d.com/news/amd-trinity-29-percent-higher-cpu-and-56-percent-higher-gpu-performance/ ). If that is the case it'll be really impressive. Can IB really match that?

 

[pelov]

The CPU performance advantage won't be near 100%. The Trinity CPU performance should be a significant improvement over Llano. In fact, the performance delta should be decreased between Trinity > IB because IB isn't a significant improvement over SB in CPU whereas Trinity > Llano should be noticeable (25% Trinity>Llano compared to 15% SB > IB).

The IB GPU is still 20-30% off from Llano levels and Trinity is supposedly bringing 50% improvements so the gap will still be very significant.

I'm not sure about battery life but I'd assume IB to be better.

Granted, most of the above is based on speculation and leaked rumors/slides. I'm waiting for both to come out as well. I've been aching for a laptop and HTPC/desktop both to replace my desktop and SB laptop. The CPU performance should definitely go to Intel but the GPU performance will go to AMD. Price and battery life will be the deciding factors for me. Right now it's looking like AMD has the advantage due to the GPU performance and price.

They should be out soon, though -- May 15th the launch date for Trinity and the IB laptops should be springing up at any moment.

 

[ShintaiDK]

I wouldnt put any faith on AMDs numbers yet. So I will support the wait and see game.

Rememebr AMD calculates improvements in performance/watt. If we take Ivy Bridge. Its around 30-35% better just CPU wise in performance/watt than Sandy Bridge. And maybe something like 70-100% Graphics wise.

 

[Khato]

I'm figuring the AMD Trinity based Ultrabooks will be perhaps $200 cheaper than the Intel Ivy Bridge based ones (assuming all other hardware is identical).

It's possible if AMD continues their bargain pricing. Intel's top 17W processor has a customer recommended price of $317, while the i3 and i5's are all at $250 according to ark.intel.com, so if AMD's content with making next to nothing and selling for $50-$117 then their ultrathins could be $200 cheaper than ultrabooks without sacrificing build quality. I'm just not certain why they'd continue pricing that low if their product is in any way competitive.

 

[386DX]

@386DX:

Thanks! It was exactly this kind of info I was looking for.

I'm figuring the AMD Trinity based Ultrabooks will be perhaps $200 cheaper than the Intel Ivy Bridge based ones (assuming all other hardware is identical).

I was hoping IB would only have a 25-50% CPU performance advantage, in which case I'd go with the AMD Trinity if it's $200 cheaper. However if it is approaching 100% I might have to reconsider. I'm a bit surprised though, since they say IB will only be ~5-15% faster than SB. And I thought the AMD Trinity CPU performance was supposed have improved quite a bit compared to Llano.

Regarding the battery life AMD is claiming 12 hours idle battery life (see http://www.guru3d.com/news/amd-trinity-29-percent-higher-cpu-and-56-percent-higher-gpu-performance/ ). If that is the case it'll be really impressive. Can IB really match that?

You have to be careful with AMD's marketing slides. They sneak in words like "Notebook and Desktop" and words like "upto". Like I said before the desktop Trinity IPC is about the same as Llano (remember Trinity CPU is Bulldozer based which had significantly worst IPC then Llano) and the GPU is about 50% faster. This is pretty much exactly what the AMD slides are saying because the the top end Desktop Trinity is going to run at 3.8/4.1 GHz compared to 3.0GHz Llano, at similar IPC the approximately 1 GHz frequency advantage would give you around 30% higher CPU performance... pretty much exactly what the AMD slide says.

The similar performance gains isn't necessarily going to carry over to the mobile area because you can't just increase frequency by 1 GHz and keep power down nor can you keep the GPU frequency as high. Not to mention on the desktop side you (AMD) always have the freedom of using 2333 MHz DDR3 RAM to help GPU performance numbers, this isn't realistic on a notebook which usually comes with 1333-1600 MHz Ram.

 

[jpiniero]

The pricing is how AMD is going to get their design wins. Intel is going to spend a ton on marketing; one way to combat that is to be cheaper. I do think AMD might be able to get the Macbook Air contract, which would be huge for them. Apple will use the cost savings to include a HiDPI screen, which I imagine most 2012 ultrabooks won't have.

Well, as long as AMD can make enough of those 17W parts. That's not a given.

 

[HexiumVII]

If you are planning to play games at all, go for Trinity. GPU is more important, and the fact its a Radeon with Radeon drivers vs Intel drivers, its a not brainer. Also Trinity will have Piledriver cores, which will hopefully get them near Nehalem performance, which is awesome.

 

[Arzachel]

If you are planning to play games at all, go for Trinity. GPU is more important, and the fact its a Radeon with Radeon drivers vs Intel drivers, its a not brainer. Also Trinity will have Piledriver cores, which will hopefully get them near Nehalem performance, which is awesome.

If you're going for 15.4'' and above, Ivy + dedicated graphics is definitely superior with how much BF3 loves CPU power no reason to go Trinity here except price. But for when you're running on iGPU, there are zero advantages in going Ivy. Trinity should absolutely spank Ivy, providing ~70-80% more graphics performance, you can't feel the CPU performance difference in light usage and almost every CPU heavy task besides gaming is multithreaded so a 2 module Trinity should hold it's own against 2 core Ivy's.

I'm ignoring hybrid crossfire because I haven't heard anything good about it's performance with Llano, so that's wait and see.

 

[Olikan]

If you're going for 15.4'' and above, Ivy + dedicated graphics is definitely superior with how much BF3 loves CPU power no reason to go Trinity here except price.

don't forget hibrid crossfire

 

[Zstream]

If you're going for 15.4'' and above, Ivy + dedicated graphics is definitely superior with how much BF3 loves CPU power no reason to go Trinity here except price. But for when you're running on iGPU, there are zero advantages in going Ivy. Trinity should absolutely spank Ivy, providing ~70-80% more graphics performance, you can't feel the CPU performance difference in light usage and almost every CPU heavy task besides gaming is multithreaded so a 2 module Trinity should hold it's own against 2 core Ivy's.

I'm ignoring hybrid crossfire because I haven't heard anything good about it's performance with Llano, so that's wait and see.

Are you actually suggesting that ivy bridge will beat trinity in bf3? I hope you're joking because that's a terrible viewpoint. No game will play better on intel graphics regardless of the CPU power.

 

[beginner99]

Are you actually suggesting that ivy bridge will beat trinity in bf3? I hope you're joking because that's a terrible viewpoint. No game will play better on intel graphics regardless of the CPU power.

You should read his post again...

 

[Zstream]

You should read his post again...

My bad

 

[Chiropteran]

1. Approximately how much faster will the CPU performance of Ivy Bridge be compared to Trinity? 10%, 25%, 50%?
2. Approximately how much faster will the IGP performance of Trinity be compared to Ivy Bridge? 25%, 50%, 100%?
3. What can be expected in terms of battery life? Will they be similar?

1. 398% It'll be a lot faster, but won't be noticeable except in certain benchmarks because A) Games will be GPU limited, and B) most other software will more or less start instantly and run as fast as the user can input, and is more dependent on disk or network I/O (word, excel, web browsing, etc)

2. 200% Also, it'll actually work correctly in most games and will properly show textures and colors and such, and it'll get monthly driver updates with catalyst. The IB IGP will continue to receive the same non-support as existing Intel IGPs.

3. IB will be superior, but both should have good battery life. I'd expect IB to be 20-30% better on battery life all else being equal. Wild speculation.

 

[LOL_Wut_Axel]

Well, here's some educated guesses:

First, Piledriver will bring IPC to the level or near the level of Stars. Since it's still based on a revised Bulldozer architecture, for low leakage and therefore low power consumption AMD will need to clock the standard and ultra low power versions low. Base frequency for the standard (35W) quad-core shouldn't exceed 2GHz, and the base frequency for the ULV dual-core shouldn't exceed 2.5GHz. For the quad-core version, no higher than 1.5GHz base. Overall, with the IPC and clock speed improvements, it's a good estimate that Trinity will have 10-15% higher CPU performance than Llano. AMD will be using more power efficient VLIW4 cores and use their higher efficiency to improve performance, but with the fact that they're still limited in terms of the transistor budget in a 32nm node AND that the platform is memory bandwidth limited I wouldn't expect IGP performance to jump more than 25%.

Now, we already know HD 4000 is around 35% faster than the HD 3000, and the HD 6550D/6620G are 80-90% faster than HD 3000. If AMD were to make a 20% IGP performance improvement, that would still put them at around 70-75% faster than Intel when it comes to IGP performance. On average Ivy Bridge is 10% faster than Sandy Bridge, and if AMD can make a 15% performance improvement when it comes to the CPU they'll still be around 50-75% slower than Ivy Bridge when it comes to CPU performance.

The IGP and CPU performance disparity for both is about the same in terms of percentage, but the IGP in Ivy Bridge is enough to do mainstream gaming at medium quality/settings and "hardcore" gaming at low quality/settings, which should be enough to satisfy most people that want to game sometimes.

In all honesty, if you ask me, I don't really get the point of "gaming on the go" in a laptop, but I guess some people do. If I wanted to "game on the go" I'd just buy a PlayStation Vita.

 

[Olikan]

First, Piledriver will bring IPC to the level or near the level of Stars. Since it's still based on a revised Bulldozer architecture, for low leakage and therefore low power consumption AMD will need to clock the standard and ultra low power versions low. Base frequency for the standard (35W) quad-core shouldn't exceed 2GHz, and the base frequency for the ULV dual-core shouldn't exceed 2.5GHz. For the quad-core version, no higher than 1.5GHz base. Overall, with the IPC and clock speed improvements, it's a good estimate that Trinity will have 10-15% higher CPU performance than Llano. AMD will be using more power efficient VLIW4 cores and use their higher efficiency to improve performance, but with the fact that they're still limited in terms of the transistor budget in a 32nm node AND that the platform is memory bandwidth limited I wouldn't expect IGP performance to jump more than 25%.

...trinity mobile 35W CPU, is 2.5-3.2Ghz... so, even with bulldozer cores, the cherry-picked worst increase would be 10%

trinity gpu is more complicated to explain,
first, the bulldozer IMC is 30% better than stars, and have other tecnologies that are found in bobcat, but not in llano....
second, trinity plays at dirt 3 at high, where a llano could at medium
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WD6GaFEpfC4

 

[pelov]

In all honesty, if you ask me, I don't really get the point of "gaming on the go" in a laptop, but I guess some people do. If I wanted to "game on the go" I'd just buy a PlayStation Vita.

Price and battery life matter more than anything else, imo. Furthermore, I'm gaming on my laptop far more often than I am encoding video so a heftier GPU makes more sense. This is also true in the handheld market. Laptops that are used as desktop replacements would be a different story, but they too would have discrete GPUs and a hybrid crossfire implementation would make more sense to me still.

Intel will win the CPU performance race, but quite frankly I don't care about that. The thing that interests me in IVB lappies is the battery life advantage but it's going to come at a higher cost. The deciding factor will be just how much higher each of those two are when compared to Trinity alternatives.

I love my SB laptop. The battery life is fantastic. I can get somewhere around 6 hours on a Toshiba Satellite L775, and that's with a 1600x900 17.3" screen. The issue I have with it is that I occasionally run into hiccups on the GPU side, particularly with GPU accelerated apps or gaming, which is still dreadful. IVB improves upon those but only slightly and still not enough to warrant an upgrade unless the price is great. Trinity, on the other hand, should be cheaper and fill those two criteria. The Llano dv6 laptops were exceptional at undervolting and it contributed to the battery life. With this SB I don't have that option. Frankly, I'm a bit upset that I dove in early and bought this thing rather than the Llano alternative so I don't think I'll be making that same mistake again.

 

[LOL_Wut_Axel]

...trinity mobile 35W CPU, is 2.5-3.2Ghz... so, even with bulldozer cores, the cherry-picked worst increase would be 10%

Yeah, the dual-core version. I was talking about the quad-core, and that one won't see a base clock speed of more than 2GHz. With Turbo they can get to 2.5GHz or even higher when a program is using a single thread, but I was never talking about Turbo OR the dual-core 35W version.

You'll find performance boosts sometimes that are in the 20% range, but those will be very rare. The same happens with Ivy Bridge, where in rare scenarios it's 15% faster than Sandy Bridge yet in reality it's on average 5-10% faster. One year is not enough to make the big changes necessary to make Bulldozer have much higher IPC, so 10-15% faster is a good estimate.

Llano to Trinity is the same as Sandy Bridge to Ivy Bridge: an incremental improvement. One year isn't enough for huge changes; for those you'll need to wait for the Steamroller architecture.

trinity gpu is more complicated to explain,
first, the bulldozer IMC is 30% better than stars, and have other tecnologies that are found in bobcat, but not in llano....
second, trinity plays at dirt 3 at high, where a llano could at medium
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WD6GaFEpfC4

No, it's not. In terms of memory bandwidth in many cases it's a sidegrade from Starts, and the only thing AMD is banking on is on higher speed memory instead of making a better IMC. Look at the cache latency also for another issue.

Which would explain a ~20% performance increase, since that's all you need to go one setting higher without having lower performance than the previous version. Also, Ivy Bridge plays DiRT 3 at Medium no problems.