That's fine but how do you recommend these to someone who want's a decent laptop? If the pricing is right then great; but if i could get a core i5 or a A8 llano in the same price bracket I would go for the core i5.Originally Posted by CAT-THE-FIFTH
I think AMD is playing the pricing game again and I was hoping that they could at least give Intel a kick in the teeth. I feel it was AMD's big chance to shine but the lackluster performance is disappointing.
TBH,if the Core i5 based laptop was using the HD3000 IGP then it is not an obvious choice. I know quite a few people who like to play some games on their laptops and they would be better served by getting the A8 based laptop.
The HD3000 is rubbish in comparison to the IGP the A8 laptops have and battery life also seems decent on the AMD laptops especially if gaming. According to the Toms Hardware review they got one hour extra battery life when taxing the IGP on the A8 when compared to the Core i5 based one.
On top of this it seems that even relatively cheap A6 and A8 based laptops also come with a discrete graphics card in addition to the 320 to 400 shader IGP.
This laptop is around £500 including 19% VAT in Germany:
http://www.notebooksnochgünstiger.de...er_aid=0693537
It has an HD6750M discrete graphics card and a 320 shader IGP too. The A6 APU will have similar CPU performance to the A8 Anandtech has tested and the HD6750M is much faster than the discrete HD6630M tested in the review. The GT540M tested in the review is only found in more expensive Core i3 and Core i5 laptops over £550 to £600. Once AMD gets the drivers for asymmetrical Crossfire sorted out the gaming performance will be quite impressive for a £500 laptop.
I don't see what is wrong with AMD focusing on higher volume parts. Zacate doubled the profits AMD made this year and has sold over 5 million units.
Last edited by CAT-THE-FIFTH; 14-06-2011 at 05:37 PM.
That's not the problem, it just value for money. That Llano laptop is a A6 for £500, so I assume an A8 would be in the £650-700 range for that you can get a i5 laptop. The CPU performance is lack luster, if i wanted a gaming laptop I wouldn't want to use the integrated GPU as the performance is poor.
This is someones opinion on overclock.net
I'm struggling to understand AMD's Vision. I think the complex Integrated GPU has cost them performance; Is the hybrid CPU/GPU a Gen or Two too early? They could of used some of that TDP to increase performance, add the L3 cache back and have higher clock speeds.
People who own laptops don't tend to game or if they do they will have 460m or something worth gaming with.
I don't know about llano, maybe a mobile bulldozer processor would of been better?
The A6 and A8 uses the same CPU section but a different IGP. The A6 in the DV6 actually has a higher base frequency than the mobile A8 used in the AMD review.The difference is the IGP(400 shaders in the A8 and 320 shaders in the A6).
However,the DV6 I mentioned also has an HD6750M graphics card in addition to the A6 IGP.
Again,once you start actually using the IGP in the Intel battery life is not good and Toms Hardware noted this.
BTW,the GT540M is much slower than the HD6750M in the HP DV6 laptop:
http://www.notebookcheck.net/AMD-Rad...M.43958.0.html
http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-...M.41715.0.html
On top of this the A8 IGP seemed to run many games at 1366x768 fine. A lot of laptops use screens with this resolution.
Do you even know anyone who has a laptop with one of the recent AMD CPUs?? I do and CPU performance seemed more than enough for word processing,image editing,web browsing and watching videos.
The main issue with the AMD laptops was poor battery life and high temperatures. It seems Llano solved these two issues.
They only don't game since usually the Intel IGP historically have been so rubbish they are useless for gaming. I have heard people moan about this all the time.
Again,you fail to realise the market these laptops are targeted at.
I remember when Zacate was released people were whinging how CULV laptops were around the same price and had a much faster CPU,the X4500 IGP was good enough for video decoding and how Zacate would fail.
Funnily,enough AMD has had no issue selling every Zacate chip they have made.
Last edited by CAT-THE-FIFTH; 14-06-2011 at 06:03 PM.
Which market are AMD are aiming these laptops at, they don't seem cost effective to be lower end? If they are entry level or mainstream the CPU performance is too low for mainstream.
Depends on your idea of mainstream, for the most part it doesn't mean people who keep 10 apps open, edit 30MP photos on Photoshop while running CPUmark and encoding some H.264 in the background. I'll happily argue the CPU performance of these chips is MORE than enough for mainstream. I've yet to come across a relatively modern laptop where CPU performance has been a bottleneck so why pump all of your resources into improving something that's not exactly on the critical list?
If you want a gaming laptop, you buy a gaming laptop. No CPU for the foreseeable future, let alone a 35W mobile one, is going to give you the same performance as a high-end discrete GPU with >2 billion tranistors.
Something Anand has been saying, Llano marks the point where IGP performance is good enough - it's plenty for HD video decoding, can do proper 23.976 decoding without repeating frames, can handle casual gaming and even modern games on low settings. It's the best IGP out there, it's not meant to take the throne from Northern Islands.
Biscuit (15-06-2011),CAT-THE-FIFTH (14-06-2011)
Actually i would trade the cpu performance for the graphics performance everyday of the week. CPU performance is really a case of good enough now for most tasks in the laptop space and has been for years. Unless you do serious video and photo editing for most applications more CPU power is just a nice spec boost. Graphics in laptops don't keep up with the cpus there connected to in most instances and eat battery so having a "matched" GPU which can play basic games and do simple gpu acceleration is far more important than having the latest and greatest cpu performance. I learnt this lesson building my little brothers system a pentium 2140@2.6 tied to a 8800gts 512mb which at 1440x900 is a pretty mean gaming machine considering it was basically made out of my spare parts. When i switched the cpu to a q8200 i had lying around it made so little difference i sold it (needed the cash more than i needed a happy brother) and put the 2140 back in. Seriously guys at the current point in time most new laptops would benefit more from an ssd than a faster cpu and these new amd chips look very interesting because of that. Im a little sad that i won't ever be able to buy one as a macbook user but hey bring on bulldozer i'm going to want to replace my power hungry i7 920 soon
CAT-THE-FIFTH (14-06-2011)
You never know, Apple often pair a C2D CPU with an Nvidia GPU. C2D has been around for ages and unless Apple want to stick with Intel IGP (Licensing issue with FSB+Nvidia), this might be an attractive move for them.
Too low? If anything it's too fast because nobody in the mainstream needs cpu power for anything except gaming really, and Llano is "good enough" for everything else.
This is a very telling graph -
It shows what AMD's target was. This is about twice as fast in gaming vs HD 3000 while being half as hard on battery life. That's absolutely amazing performance.
CAT-THE-FIFTH (14-06-2011)
Why produce a CPU which is no better than your last Generation? Why produce a CPU with a great emphasis on GPU performance? Surely a 35w envelope will logically mean sacrifices will have to be made elsewhere? Yes the CPU may'be Fine TODAY but who buys a product that will last them for Today, when you buy a product you at least expect to get decent amount of usage out of it. I don't think the GPU is an excuse for THE LACK OF CPU Performance, at the end of the day as I stated before Llano is a concept which i believe is a generation too early.
An Llano A8 3500m scores 1.88 in cinebench R11.5
An Core i7 2620m scores 3.08 in Cinebench R11.5
Both CPU's are 35w?
What does that mean, may'be it's the complicated hot integrated GPU, AMD could easily of squeezed more performance out of the CPU if the GPU was scaled back a bit. How can I accept an A8 when the Intel CPU's have a lot more performance? Of course a comparison has to be made as there both new technology and the main two companies in the laptop and desktop market.
Where is KICK that intel needed, theres not much competition here is there? The only chance we the consumer have Is that AMD can price there products well, if this isn't the case Intel will continue to run there standard monopoly. Also what happens when IVYBRIDGE comes? Intel will just a more $$$ to the price because of the Lack of competition.
Don't get me wrong I love the engineering work that AMD have done with llano but to not see the CPU performance boost that we all wanted is disappointing. All I can hope is that the desktop space isn't same; I own an AMD GPU because it was great value for money, lets hope that Competition comes back to the CPU race as the consumer will be the end winner!
EDIT...
Yes the Integrated GPU is amazing but what about CPU performance? 3D mark 06 is GPU bench mark? look at Cinebench scores in my above post; I'm not buying a GPU but a CPU.Too low? If anything it's too fast because nobody in the mainstream needs cpu power for anything except gaming really, and Llano is "good enough" for everything else.
This is a very telling graph -
It shows what AMD's target was. This is about twice as fast in gaming vs HD 3000 while being half as hard on battery life. That's absolutely amazing performance.
That's me done with this thread
Last edited by Blackmage; 14-06-2011 at 09:01 PM.
Blackimage, I think you're missing where the market is headed with regards to performance. Mobility (battery life) and the GPU (and not necessarily gaming performance) are the critical things in the next few years.
CPU performance isn't a great concern because more and more performance is going to be shifted onto the GPU.
Battery life and power efficiency is the critical factor as we increasingly move towards portable computers. As a predominately desktop user I don't like that, but that's where the money is.
Just look at Windows 8 as a clear example of where the market is heading.
CAT-THE-FIFTH (14-06-2011)
This is not a lack of cpu performance. It is more than good enough for the vast majority of the market.
That i7 2620M costs $346 when bought in 1k trays. It's not even close to being the same market.
http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=52231
One of them has what is called "processor graphics". You can probably figure out how much power that draws in comparison to 400 shaders.Both CPU's are 35w?
Compare the graphics. Compare battery life when doing something you might expect to do on a 35W notebook...and that sure isn't running Cinebench all day.What does that mean, may'be it's the complicated hot integrated GPU, AMD could easily of squeezed more performance out of the CPU if the GPU was scaled back a bit. How can I accept an A8 when the Intel CPU's have a lot more performance? Of course a comparison has to be made as there both new technology and the companies.
Llano isn't meant to be Bulldozer. Llano is aimed squarely at the mainstream user, mobile gamer, people who watch HD video that kind of thing. You simply would not buy an i7 for any of that. This is the mass market that Llano is aimed at, and it's a helluva chip in that regard.
CAT-THE-FIFTH (14-06-2011)
It is better than last generation, it's plenty fast enough for years to come (not to mention the fact a fair amount of people think their CPU is too slow after 6 months when it's just the amount of crap they have running at boot which has gathered over time, so they go and but a new laptop).
You may have noticed you are comparing one of Intel's highest-end, most expensive mobile CPUs against a mainstream AMD CPU. Of course it's going to be faster in a synthetic benchmark? TDP alone doesn't mean much - check the graphs again. If you want super-high performance, wait for Trinity. As has been said before, AMD have delayed the high-end stuff knowing the mainstream stuff will sell more quickly so has priority - I'm sure they know what they're doing, they would release the high-end chips first if there was more of a market for them. I don't know about you but if you've been following Llano, you'll know it was never about massively improving CPU performance. It's an amazing feat to fit such a CPU+GPU into a 35w TDP envelope, and look again at the graph - they're not being overly optimistic!
CAT-THE-FIFTH (14-06-2011)
What are you using your cpu for? Cinebench? It's a benchmark for people who use render farms, not for people using 35W notebooks...
All I did was compare a A8(top of the Line llano) to a top of the line Core i7, even AMD themselves say the A8 will compete with the i7. I understand what Llano is about but I would of liked to see more CPU performance, Intel have managed it; why is that?
I don't believe the GPU trade off is worth crippling CPU performance for, general laptop users were fine with the performance of integrated graphics. All AMD need to do was Integrate a low powered GPU with an updated feature set.
I can't wait to see the desktop version and how much more headroom you'll be able to get with GPU disabled. Intel CPUs gain massively with the GPU Disabled.
AMD could of had made mobile bulldozer CPU's (trinity)
I know tons of people who have replaced a desktop PC with a laptop and want good performance.
It just a comparison to see maximum computing performance that's all!
Last edited by Blackmage; 14-06-2011 at 09:36 PM.
That's like saying you compared a Llano isn't meant to be high-end, compare it with something in its price range. Intel have managed no such thing, their IGP is far inferior to Llano. Intel tried to create their own proper GPU a while back and it got cancelled. The best they have now is HD 3000.
Crippled CPU performance? Is it worth me even posting this reply? Again, you don't seem to get where this CPU is aimed.
Maximum computing performance on a synthetic benchmark isn't exactly relative to actual use. Sure, it's nice to know you can calculate get x score on x benchmark with a CPU, but that's not what most people have in mind when purchasing a computer.
Cool, so they should be interested in Llano.
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