Hardware AMD Athlon Neo: The New Ultra-thin Platform

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2009/01/06/amd-athlon-neo-the-new-ultra-thin-platform/1

AMD introduces its new Yukon platform with its latest CPU: The Athlon Neo. Squeezing between the popular and cheap netbook platform and expensive ultra portables - AMD hopes to score some "ultra thin" wins. We pick through the details to decide whether AMD has enough to make a new market.

 

So they made really low TDP cpus that have stats that wouldn't worry a celeron? What please?

 

p3n... that is pretty much what this market is about. Low TDP cpu's that offer low to medium CPU processing grunt. Look at Intel's Atom... its about as powerful as my ancient Pentium M that I bought 3.5yrs ago.

Yet it can still surf the web and be used to write documents, watch media etc.. Just like my ancient Pentium M chip.

So if those graphs are to be believed, then AMD could have a hit on its hands. Much better performance than an Atom, with low power ratings.

If you were expecting a core i7 competitor from this preview then your expectations where far out of whack!

 

Yes very true, but adoption is all about COST right now otherwise people will either settle for those 15.4" bricks sold on the cheap, or, a netbook.

 

@lewchenko TBH your ancient P3/ Pentium M is more powerful than the atom/epia thanks to out of order execution even with a lesser clock speed .
@p3n: They have similar stats to my old s939 rig and it still plays all the games i need and copes well enough with all the cpu intensive tasks i need to throw at it.

 

sorry if i missed it but when will this be availible to system builders (i.e. us )

 

It will all boil down to the TDP of the chipset now. Intel did a sterling job on the Atom but blew it by pairing it with an old, high TDP chipset. If AMD can keep theirs below 5W (unlikely, but we can but dream) it should be a serious competitor to the Atom.

 

Depends if board makers use it for mini-ITX - no confirmations yet though.

 

I'm in that market! 15.4" bricks are too big for in the train, but the Atom lacks the grunt that i want. Sadly for AMD, my need has already been fulfilled... by AMD.

I'm a bit suprised that AMD is doing this... I'm reading this article on my HP Pavilion TX2550:
- 12,1" 1280x800
- AMD Puma 2GHz
- HD3200 graphics
- All the stuff normally associated with a 15.4" brick
- 4 hour battery life on power saver profile, still able to watch HD content.
- Touchscreen!
- under 800 euros.

I dont know how this "neo" chip will stack up against that, but unless the price, weight or battery life are dramatically improved, i think they should have spent the money on pushing this existing platform with better marketing. Blow the limp Atom out of the water with performance.

Personally, i think they have their aim off, if anything AMD and Intel should be aiming under the Atom, and start developing some good platforms for PDAs and cellphones. If they don't, they'll be obsolete in 10-15 years.

 

A bundle of old stuff, that's a shame. Imagine if they had used new parts instead, as you mentioned. 780G, SB750, single 45nm Deneb core..

 

The link doesn't work for me. It says page not found.

 

Try now.

 

What we need is to take this chip, shrink the die and lower its TDP, allow a greater range of clockspeeds and pair it with the ION chipset.
Then we have everything we need for pretty much any (non-gaming/3D design) platform ranging from the cheapest nettops to desktops, workstations, HTPC, car PC, home servers etc.

 

You can forget about the Ion chipset, nVidia and AMD are not really going to join forces anytime soon

The HD3450 is a very strong graphical performer though, so i dont think you'll be left wanting in that department.

 

Don't know my last few AMD motherboards have been nForce, don't see why nVidia couldn't provide the platform and AMD provide the cpu, at least that way both companies are shipping chips versus the massive head start Intel now has on them.

 

the man has a point... aight, we'll sit tight and see what happens then

 

Thanks Tim!

It makes for an interesting read, and I really hope AMD can gain some market share over Intel.

 

I'm definitely in the market for a netbook/ultraportable and now even for an ultrathin... just have to figure out which way to go. This [AMD's] seems like a great idea in general but I doubt it'll be as successful as they hope.

Still, I'll do as Xtra said: Sit tight and see what happens.

 

I'm definitely in the market for something like this as a 10" screen isn't quite large enough yet a 15" luggable isn't what I want either. Highly portable, reasonable performance (both CPU and GPU) as well as respectable battery life put this right in the sweet spot. The price point they're aiming for is just the icing on the cake ;D

 

In your opening spiel, you essentially describe my laptop. It was £550, has a 12" screen, can run Solidworks (well enough) and can get a 5 hour battery life. Intel have already got chips in that area, its called a Core 2 duo! I only hope this works out better that it sounds.

A slight aside, but what is Intel Menlow? I can't find anything obvious, though I haven't spent ages looking.