Like having 2 graphics cards? How about 4? And why not add 4 CPU cores too...

MaxPowerhouse7 — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 05:00:00 GMT

About a year ago if you asked a PC building enthusiast what processor to use, he/she would probably have pointed you toward a slick 64-bit AMD chip which at the time was some of the best performance at a sweet price, win-win right?

That all changed when the Intel Core 2 Duo chips came out with better performance and even lower price points. The Intel fanboys rejoiced as the top spot had returned to the chip making giant. To this day Intel has remained in the lead with multiple iterations of the Core 2 Duo architecture with increased speeds and even doubling the cores (Quad Core chips) thus solidifying their top dog status.

AMD, however, has not given up... not by a longshot. While we all have waited to see the results of their ATi acquisition, today I had the chance to check it out firsthand. That's right, folks, AMD has its own triple-play to show off: new true quad core 64 bit CPU--the Phenom, a new Radeon 3800 series set graphic cards, and to support it all... a fancy new chipset known as "Spider."

One of the key differences with the AMD Quad Core architecture versus the Intel is that the cores are all capable of communicating on-chip. Intel's solution requires communication through the chipset since it is actually two dual-core processors on the same die.

The Spider chipset brings some fun toys to the table like a faster hypertransport bus and more importantly, the ability to connect up to 4 graphics cards in crossfire mode. And to top it all off, these new ATi 3800 series cards support Direct X 10.1--yeah before you all say "so what?" I agree that it may not be the most useful feature today but when Vista becomes the standard gaming platform and games leverage DirectX 10.1, then you'll be happy you have it.

So how well does this new platform fare in Vista? Let's just say I have never seen so many 5.9 ratings... ever (pop in a couple of Western Digital Raptors and even the hard disk rating could join the party). Keep in mind the system rating is determined by the lowest score, in this case the hard disk.

Having used this machine for 2 days I have to say I am very impressed with what I can only call SNAPPY behavior. Opening and closing applications just feels downright smooth... even when I opened 56 instances of Windows Explorer, Expression Web, Expression Blend, 11 Internet Explorers, Windows Movie Maker (playing a movie), and notepad. Why did I have so many instances of Windows Explorer open you ask? I just think it's fun to hold down "win+e" and watch the windows fly open and cascade along my screen... and it's even more fun when the system just does it without hesitation. It's important to note that while this machine was equipped with 4 gigs of RAM, the machine entered an infinite reboot loop with 64 bit Vista (AMD claims it will be fixed by launch) so I had to resort to 32 bit which while theoretically can address up to 4 gigs, that would only happen if there were NO other memory addressing space taken up by devices like graphics cards etc.

The only hiccup I had was during video editing in Windows Movie maker, it seemed like it took longer than expected to play through tracks when I dropped them into the timeline. My guess is that movie maker isn't taking advantage of either the multiple CPU cores or it is not hardware accelerating via the 4 graphics cards. When it came down to publish my video, it handled a 1 minute 30 second video from MPEG4 to 1080p WMV in under 2 minutes.

With this new platform, AMD has also introduced a new overclocking utility called "OverDrive" that combines voltage setting, status, benchmarking, and stability tests all in one tool. My favorite part is the novice mode which allows you to "safely" (meaning overclock at your own risk with proper cooling) automatically adjust your settings for better performance. For those of you who laugh at the word "novice," there's an expert mode where you can ~~burnup~~ overdrive your processor for some nice performance gains over the standard 2.3GHz stock clock speed.

All in all, this throws a few new options into the decision making process these days for those of us building or buying a new high end PC.

So what do you think, is this AMD's big comeback?

GDC 2007 - AMD Mobile Graphics

Nic — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 09:58:00 GMT

Tina and I checked out the AMD booth at GDC 2007. On display was the new AMD Imageon mobile graphics chipset and Drew Angeloff who helped explain to us exactly what a graphics chipset is and what exciting new technologies are coming to mobile graphics from AMD in the very near future. Check out Tina's post for the video and 5 points for guessing which of us was suffering from a terrible head cold :S

AMD at GDC

Tina — Mon, 26 Mar 2007 23:41:00 GMT

Our non-stop GDC coverage takes us next onto a tour of the AMD booth. AMD is taking the xbox 360 chip, shrinking it down and putting it in phones. They're also working with developers to make some great games. Nic Fillingham our Singapore rep for channel 10 does an indepth interview to bring you the scoop. 3D graphics on Mobile phones in a few years...hey, that's what they're saying. :)

Entries tagged with amd - Channel 10

Like having 2 graphics cards? How about 4? And why not add 4 CPU cores too...

GDC 2007 - AMD Mobile Graphics

AMD at GDC