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AMD to Adopt DDR2 Next Year
Hack Jandy writes "According to Anandtech, AMD has already developed a new processor lineup for Athlon 64 processors with DDR2. The article states that internal AMD roadmaps indicate the processors should debut early next year and will require a new 1207 pin socket."
The blurb mentions 1207, but the article only talks about M2(940). I have read mention of 1207 in relation to chips with the PCIe controller onboard. But not signs of tha in this roadmap.
This roadmap seems to suggest at least that virtualization will only come in chips with the M2 socket. I will be disappointed if that is true. I had planned to upgrade to dual core chip with virtualization, but keep my 939 board. Maybe by then I will be looking to upgrade to PCIe and won't care. I have an AGP board now.
Havoc Penington, the bane of my Linux desktop.
So on x86 when you think about upgrading that 2 year old CPU to something new
Stop blathering. On Socket-A I went "Duron 800", "Athlon 1333" and then "AthlonXP 2400+". That's three processor upgrades on one platform and the VERY SAME MOTHERBOARD.
Just recently I bought a new Socket-A MB (they're dirt cheap) and 2GB of DDR (which is similarly dirt cheap), so the last CPU has seen a MB upgrade too.
And do you know what? I play modern games on that sucker.
(I'll go S939 soon with a nice Venice and get a real use for all that memory)
Belief is the currency of delusion.
They need the extra number for the integrated PCI Express controller, integrated on the chip. Chips without that controller will have less pins.
I think they will try to keep the number of pins down: more pins is more expensive to manufacture and transport.
the pun is mightier than the sword
AMD has a lot more stability on the socket side, and the move to the new sockets is strictly due to added functionality, DDR2 in this case, PCIe and FBD on the server side, eventually.
PCIe is already on the 939 boards (ASUS A8N-SLI box sitting right next to my desk here, for example).
What happened to the good old days, when pin counts lasted years and years?
Ummm... we have socket 754 which is pretty much supports the older athlons as well as the Sempron and Athlon 64s. This is common on those sub $400 pcs that you find on the retail circuit.
It's sort of like the old super socket 7 of old. Nice the fact that AMD offered CPUS as fast as 450 and 550 IIRC, even a tad higher than 450mhz in the amd k6-3 mobile if you were lucky enough to find them. While not nessicarly the best upgrade choice they are not only an option for the budget minded but most importantly those last generation high end chips either hold their value or increase in value. The socket-7 run would have been limited to 233/266mhz had it not been for AMD.
But this is all accidemic as well... Socket-a has been around for a very long time... offering speeds as low as the 600mhz... as high as 3.2ghz AFAIA. More over they are still in production.
So what happened to the good old days when pin counts lasted for years and years? They are still here, and in fact improved thanks to AMD so long as you ignore Slot-A. While I would strongly reccomend going 939 if you can, 754/slot-a is still an option even for those who gotta have 64bit CPUs. Just like the end of the 21st century when you "could" go slot-1 or stay with (super) socket 7 a while longer, or hell even 72pin simms if you really wanted to.
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
Nice Teeth
have you tried the muliplier of 6 on that k6-3?
:)
some k6-2+ and k6-3
let you set the muliplier to 2x and
it assumes it is 6x
very handy i once had a k6-2 at 6x83 on a p1 board maxed out
it retired 2 years ago
An integrated PCI Express controller would solve the only down-side of AMD's current use of an onboard memory controller. That downside is added latency when using system memory for the graphics subset.
In AthlonXP and Pentium 4 architecture, data from the graphics card would only have to pass through the North Bridge to get to the memory. However, in current Athlon64 architecture it has to pass through both the North Bridge and the memory controller built into the CPU. This slows it down a bit.
Adding an integrated PCIe controller to the Athlon64 would get rid of this slow-down once and for all... however, this problem has not really been much of a problem because graphics cards have so much memory nowadays that they hardly ever have to access system memory anymore.
... and in the DRM, bind them.
Well, I am freshly back from the AMD tech tour event in East Brunswick last night, and this specific question came during the Q and A with "TEH EXPERT5" - The question of DDR2 support.
The actual engineer on staff at the event answered it, and stated flat out that there was no performance gain until at least DDR2-667, and that alone "was only about 5% or so faster than DDR400 running in dual channel mode". He even went so far as to say that "DDR2-533, with it's increased latency over DDR400, has a negative impact of OVER 5%", and makes no sense to jump to. This was because of the efficiency already inherent in the HyperTransport bus, according to him.
He talked for about 5 minutes on the issue, and the gist of it was that until DDR2-667 specifically started to become more affordable, the incremental speed boost didn't make any sense for anyone, including and users and AMD Proc Support.
Incidentally, he also mentioned that DDR2 would (of course) require significant redesign in the built-in memory controller of the 939 chips, unless registered memory was used. This sorta implies in a friday morning-drove-all-night-from-NJ way that the current 939's would not support DDR2 if there were to be 939 mobo's with DDR2 support.