News - AMD sheds light on Turbo CORE technology

Quote:

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Intel-like Turbo Boost functionality coming soon to hexa-core Phenom II X6 parts.

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Read more.

Can Hexus clarify a point?

The middle slide seems to indicate the boost applies to 3 cores, ie it's a simple 3 down and 3 up arrangement. The final slide seems to indicate it can boost less than this (3 or more cores idle, remaining full load cores boosted), leading to 4 down 2 up, or 5 down and 1 up scenarios.

Which is it?

Honest answer, we don't know and we can't check until we get our hands on the processors.

But we did put the question to AMD, and here's the official answer:

Quote:

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in case of a 6-core CPU we are boosting ‘up to three’ cores

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The statement seems to indicate that 3 down 3 up, 4 down 2 up, and 5 down 1 up scenarios will all be possible.

Supposedly there is some change to the 45NM process technology used to manufacture the Phenom II X6 which will reduce leakage:

http://techreport.com/discussions.x/18731