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AMD Launches Turion Mobile Processor
justforaday writes "Earlier today, AMD launched their Turion mobile processor, which is based on the AMD64 architecture. This is set to compete directly with Intel's Centrino (Pentium-M) line of processors. Chips will initially be clocked between 1.6 and 2.0 GHz. Looks like we should be seeing some nice low-powered 64-bit notebooks in the near future."
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Expected to Launch Notebook PCs Worldwide in Coming Months
AMD today introduced AMD Turion 64 mobile technology, the latest in a succession of computing innovations based on the industry-leading AMD64 architecture. AMD Turion 64 mobile technology is uniquely optimized to bring award-winning AMD64 performance to thinner and lighter notebook PCs with longer battery life, enhanced security, and compatibility with the latest graphics and wireless solutions, both today and tomorrow.
Together with industry-leading partners, AMD enables a best-in-class ecosystem of open industry-standard technologies, helping PC manufacturers to deliver feature-rich systems that satisfy the variety of ways in which people use their notebooks.
"By embracing a broad partner community and industry standards, AMD is both providing choice and stimulating innovation," said Roger Kay, vice president of Client Computing at IDC.
"We have unleashed 64-bit mobile performance, allowing business professionals and on-the-go consumers to explore the freedom of mobile productivity with AMD Turion 64 mobile technology," said Marty Seyer, corporate vice president and general manager, Microprocessor Business Unit, Computation Products Group, AMD. "This is just the first of many innovations that we are planning to pioneer with this new product family made for mobility, choice and best-in-class notebook designs."
Leading global manufacturers, hardware vendors and software suppliers have expressed support for AMD Turion 64 mobile technology. "Fujitsu welcomes AMD Turion 64 mobile technology innovation, and we congratulate AMD on their success," said Mr. Kazuhiro Igarashi, general manager, Mobile PC Division, Personal Business Group for Fujitsu Limited.
Business professionals and consumers worldwide can expect to see notebooks based on AMD Turion 64 mobile technology starting later this month in retail stores and through commercial distribution channels. The first systems are expected from Acer worldwide and Fujitsu Siemens Computers throughout Europe.
"We have had a great deal of success with our Ferrari branded notebooks based on AMD64 technology," said Walter Deppeler, senior corporate vice president, Acer Inc. "We look forward to continued success with our forthcoming notebook designs based on AMD Turion 64 mobile technology."
"As the leading European IT provider, we offer our customers world-class computing technology," said Herbert Schonebeck, Vice President Business Unit Consumer, Fujitsu Siemens Computers. "We are introducing innovative consumer notebook PCs based on AMD Turion 64 mobile technology to provide our customers efficient platforms to connect from virtually anywhere."
In addition, ASUS, Averatec, BenQ, MSI and Packard Bell are among the leading, global computer manufacturers who have indicated they will support AMD Turion 64 mobile technology.
Availability
AMD Turion 64 mobile technology models ML-37, ML-34, ML-32, ML-30, MT-34, MT-32, and MT-30 are available immediately worldwide.
In order to help consumers and business professionals simplify their notebook purchasing decisions, AMD Turion 64 mobile technology uses a new series of model numbers designed to provide a simple designation of both relative performance and degree of mobility within the processor family. The two letters of this model number indicate processor class, with the second letter designating increasing degree of mobility, as measured by power consumption.(a) As the second letter approaches the end of the alphabet, "higher" letters indicate greater mobility. The numbers indicate relative performance within the processor class. Higher numbers indicate higher relative performance among the AMD Turion 64 mobile technology family.
Pricing
AMD Turion 64 mobile technology models ML-37, ML-34, ML-32, ML-30, MT-34, MT-32, and MT-30 are priced at $354, $263, $220, $184, $268, $225 and $189 respectively, in 1,000-unit quantities.
There are other advantages, namely the additions to the x86 ISA that fix some of its shortcomings. There are 8 more general-purpose registers and 8 more SIMD registers.
DFI and AOpen both make boards. See http://www.techreport.com/reviews/2005q1/dfi-855gm e-mgf/index.x?pg=1 and http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1558,1728546 ,00.asp for reviews of each.
Umm...the performance benefit of that 2MB L2 cashe is not that much better than 1MB. It is maybe a 3-7% increase in performance. Granted that is Intel vs. Intel not Intel vs. AMD since AMD just released this CPU. AMD CPUs have usually shown better efficiency when it has come down to computation power with 512kb and 1MB L2 cashe and Intel has had troubles even with 2MB L2 cashe due to the memory controler being on the motherboard and not on the CPU.
If AMD were to up their L2 cashe to 2MB or higher, the performance gain would probably be about the same as Intel's, 3-7% increase per 1MB increase.
We will see who the real mobile CPU winner is once we get some benchmarks to compare, but until then we are all speculating as to which CPU is better.
2 MB L2 cache doesn't do much by itself, give that Dothan core a 533 MHz FSB instead of the 400 MHz Banias was on and it starts to shine (and of course the power consumption goes up too). Speaking of which, AMD Turion 64 (and Athlon 64) have memory controller in the core not in north bridge like Intel processors, so that 25/35W CPU power envelope includes MC overhead too.
;)
BTW, most 512 kB L2 Athlon 64 CPUs run circles over P4 3.6+ GHz with 2 MB cache in gaming benches, so cache alone means squat
And it looks like it's going to be two years until Pentium M range gets 64-bit core. AMD Turion 64 already has 16/16 INT/XMM registers, SSE/SSE2/SSE3 support etc.
Incorrect. Please read the Intel docs, specifically the sections on PSE/PAE, which both have been avaiable since the Pentium Pro. The virtual addressable space will still be 4GB, however the 36-bit address bus will allow for a theoretical limit of 64GB.
Keep in mind these chips have integrated memory controllers and northbridges unlike Pentium-m's. Northbridges alone use about 5W of power so this could be subtracted from their consumption for a more accurate comparision of the two.
Things are not as they appear, nor are they otherwise