AMD Launches Carrizo Mobile APU With Excavator CPU Cores, Integrated Southbridge

MojoKid writes: AMD previously only teased bits of detail regarding their forthcoming 6th Generation A-Series APU, code named "Carrizo," as far back as CES 2015 in January and more recently with AMD's HSA (Heterogenous System Architecture) 1.0 spec roll-out in March. However, the company has officially launched the product today and has lifted the veil on all aspects of their new highly integrated notebook APU. Carrizo has been optimized for the 15 Watt TDP envelope that comprises the bulk of the thin and light notebook market currently and it brings a couple of first to integrated notebook chip designs. AMD's Carrizo APU is the first SoC architecture to fully support the HSA 1.0 specification, allowing full memory coherency of a shared memory space for both CPU and GPU up to 32GB. It's also the first integrated chip to include full support in hardware for H.265/HEVC HD video decoding and finally, Carizzo is also the first AMD APU to have a full integrated, in silicon, Southbridge controller block. So, with its CPU, GPU, memory controller, Northbridge, Southbridge, and PCIe 3.0 links, Carrizo is truly a fully integrated System On A Chip. The company is claiming a 39% CPU performance lift (combination clock speed and IPC) and up to a 65% in graphics, versus their previous generation Kaveri APU. AMD notes laptops from major vendors will begin shipping in the next few weeks.

Comments

Does it run Linux?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, have to ask. AMD fired quite a few Linux developers over last few years, so I'm not sure if this APU is even fully supported on Linux.

I don't just mean graphics, I mean OpenCL support, peripheral support, etc. etc

Re:Dream laptop.

[CajunArson]

Everytime AMD comes out with a new mobile part we see the usual requests for products revolving around a wish for the "cheap" AMD parts to be coupled with high-quality cases/displays/RAM/storage/cases/etc./etc. to get a premium product that's super cheap.

It never happens.

Instead, the OEMs look at AMD's advertising of "cheap cheap cheap!" and run with it for the rest of the components in the system.

It's not just a conspiracy either, because while AMD parts are cheaper than (some) Intel parts, when you factor in the overall cost of a system, it could turn a $1200 notebook into a $1000 notebook (maybe) but it ain't gonna turn a $1200 notebook into a $600 notebook.