AMD Launches the A10-7890K and Athlon X4 880K
by Ian Cutress on March 1, 2016 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
- AMD
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- APUs
- Athlon
In what seems to be a common theme every month, AMD’s recent APU release schedule has been to introduce one or two models each news cycle. For the most part, the new elements so far this year have been increases in frequency and efficiency, either replacing previous units or expanding the product stack. This is usually due to adjustments in binning the silicon as it gets produced, or minor improvements in the back-end of production that gives efficiency benefits.
So far this year we have seen the A10-7860K and the A6-7470K, both adjustments to the stack, but using some of AMD’s new 65W/95W CPU coolers. We also saw the announcement of the Athlon X4 845 which was interesting as it stands to be the single processor from AMD that is based on Excavator for the FM2+ platform. Today AMD is announcing two new processors which sit on the top of their FM2+ stacks respectively – the A10-7890K is an APU with increased frequencies, while the Athlon X4 880K is similar without the integrated graphics.
| AMD A10 and Athlon X4 Kaveri Lineup | ||||||
| A10- 7890K |
A10- 7870K |
A10- 7860K |
X4 880K |
X4 860K |
X4 845 |
|
| Modules | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 |
| Threads | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 |
| Core Freq. (GHz) | 4.1-4.3 | 3.9-4.1 | 3.6-4.0 | 4.0-4.2 | 3.7-4.0 | 3.5-3.8 |
| Compute Units | 4+8 | 4+8 | 4+8 | 4+0 | 4+0 | 4+0 |
| Streaming Processors |
512 | 512 | 512 | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| IGP Freq. (MHz) | 866 | 866 | 754 | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| TDP | 95W | 95W | 65W | 95W | 95W | 65W |
| Cooler | Wraith | 125W NS |
125W NS |
125W NS |
95W NS |
95W NS |
| DRAM Frequency |
2133 | 2133 | 2133 | 2133 | 1866 | 2133 |
| L2 Cache | 2x2MB | 2x2MB | 2x2MB | 2x2MB | 2x2MB | 2x1MB |
The A10-7890K will use a 4.1 GHz base frequency, moving up to 4.3 GHz on turbo, with 8 graphics compute units (512 streaming processors total) at 866 MHz. This is all within the 95W thermal envelope, and the A10-7890K will be the second processor from AMD bundled with their new Wraith cooler, rated at 125W with a shroud and LEDs. The Athlon X4 880K will have similar specifications at 100 MHz less, but without the integrated graphics. It is also rated at 95W, but instead gets AMD’s new 125W ‘near-silent’ thermal solution, which is essentially the Wraith cooler without the shroud (which apparently adds a couple dB due to vibration).
Both the X4 880K and the now second highest APU, the A10-7870K, will get this new 125W ‘near-silent’ thermal solution. The other A10 and X4-800 series members will get the new 95W thermal solution, which is a modified version of the high end cooler we normally associate with AMD. AMD has stated that parts that get the new coolers will not be sold for more than their current suggested retail pricing, except the FX-8370 previously announced.
These parts are being made available to the channel and distributors today, although it may take up to a month to hit the shelves for end-users to purchase (there’s no specific date set). Pricing for all the new parts are listed as follows:
- AMD FX™ 8370 Wraith - $199.99 USD
- AMD FX™ 8370 - $189.99 USD
- AMD A10-7890K – $164.99 USD
- AMD A10-7870K – $139.99 USD
- AMD A10-7860K - $117.99 USD
- AMD A8-7670K - $105.99 USD
- AMD A8-7650K - $95.99 USD
- AMD Athlon™ X4 880K – $94.99 USD
- AMD Athlon™ X4 870K - $89.99 USD
- AMD Athlon™ X4 860K - $79.99 USD
- AMD Athlon™ X4 845 - $69.99 USD
We have samples inbound, and I have plans to revisit our APU data to update the parts with our most up-to-date benchmark suite. Keep an eye out for that in the next couple of months.
Source: AMD
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yankeeDDL - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link
You are joking, right?The A10-7870 is about 50% faster than the i3 6100 with iGPU.
Here are some benchmarks for Battlefield4, GTAV, Dirt rally:
http://www.clubedohardware.com.br/artigos/teste-do...
Skylake is not bad at all and a huge step forward compared to Haswell, but it is still no match for AMD on iGPU and gaming on a budget, in general.
plonk420 - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link
just throw in that $30 Nvidia GPU (710 was it?) and your i3 is good to goyankeeDDL - Wednesday, March 2, 2016 - link
The 710 is $41 for the 1GB model (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9S... $48 for the 2GB one.Couldn't find any benchmark but between an A10-7890K and a Core i3+NV 710 I would go for the iGPU of the 7890K any day.
I use for work a laptop with Core i5 with Nvidia and I can't remember having as many BSODs since Windows XP era: the drivers just suck and the switching between one and the other, at least for me, is not so seamless. That said, it remains to be seen that the core i3+NV 710 is actually faster than the 7890K.
Anato - Wednesday, March 2, 2016 - link
If you are going discrete then you should compare to Athlon X4 880K $94.99. With price difference of $70 you could get Geforce 730 or Radeon R7 250.Lolimaster - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link
Both are worse than the igpu of the A10, only the R7 250 with GDDR5 is actually faster.Alexvrb - Wednesday, March 2, 2016 - link
Yeah I'm with Anato. If you're going to talk discrete graphics, now you're bringing in the Athlons... for the cost of an i3 6100 and a $40 GPU you could get an 860K and a 2GB R7 360.I mean heck the $40 710 1GB is DDR3. You'll get massive gains going to something with 2GB of GDDR5 and more crunching power, and if you can squeeze that into the same budget by going with a different platform so be it.
Samus - Wednesday, March 2, 2016 - link
I agree. Basically in the <$100 segment, for performance/$, the only Intel CPU worth investing in over an AMD is the Pentium G3258, which as many people know, has a lot of Microcode compatibility issues with Windows 7 KB3064209, and Windows 10 can't even install on a G3258 system unless you disable a core and manually remove the Intel_MC update file. Basically a pain in the ass.AMD Athlon X4's are just incredible performance per dollar in the <$100 segment. Many easily match an i3. The problem is the aging platform (no native USB 3.0, PCIe 2.0, etc) but I still occasionally put them together for people who are on a tight budget. The difference between building an AMD Athlon X4 system opposed to an Intel i3 can be almost $100 (because AMD boards are also significantly cheaper) and that can be reinvested in a GPU or nicer monitor.
Alexvrb - Wednesday, March 2, 2016 - link
Actually you're even selling FM2+ short. FM2+ has PCIe 3.0 support. :D It's processor dependent. I think all of the FM2+ models have 3.0 support. If you drop an older FM2 chip into the FM2+ platform, you only get 2.0. But any FM2+ chipset with an FM2+ chip (such as 860K) has PCIe 3.0. Not that it makes MUCH difference until you get to fairly high-power graphics cards, and we are talking budget. But it's nice to have and might make a couple percentage points difference even on a more affordable GPU, plus or minus depending on the game.Similarly, almost all of them have some native USB 3.0 ports. How many depends on the chipset. A58 has zero native 3.0. But I'd skip that one anyway. A68H is my personal favorite for budget boards, still available SUPER cheap and it has 2 native USB 3.0 ports. A78 and A88X both have 4 native 3.0 ports. All of the above are often bolstered by third-party chips for additional ports, and even non-native USB 3.0 (Asmedia) is well supported by Win10 and substantially faster than 2.0.
Eschaton - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link
Hm, that doesn't look true to me. I'm comparing prices on PCPP right now, and it doesn't look equitable for the i3 in terms of price.The GPU on these APUs is about equivalent to an AMD R7 250 or, if you prefer, an Nvidia GT 740 that's been slightly OC'd at the factory. If you add up the i3-6100 (122 USD on Amazon for me right now) + the cheapest equivalent GPU you can find (XFX Radeon R7 250 @ 68 USD on SuperBiiz), you come up with a total of 189.99 before shipping. Obviously the AMD part will ship for less than those two things combined, and it has a generally lower cost even at the base MSRP of 165 USD. In general, FM2+ boards are less expensive than 1151, but then the RAM needed to really make this APU shine is generally more expensive than RAM you'd put in a budget gamer 1151 system, so I'll call that part of the equation even.
The APU vs the i3 + discrete GPU wins on overall power efficiency, features a better CPU cooler, and obviously will fit in a smaller build if need be, so it's not without it's perks. $165 is indeed too high for the budget gamer segment, which could usually do better with an 870K (~70 USD) + R7 250 OC edition, but it's not a ridiculous price to ask if you are trying to avoid discrete GPU.
The Intel 530 iGPU on the best 1151 i3 chips is crap compared to the GPU in these chips. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rboqyzYSgqc
Deshi - Tuesday, March 8, 2016 - link
Except Intels IGPUs are garbage for anything other than office tasks. I have so many issues with driver compatibility on my HTPC machines that run IGPUs. Glitches on Unity based graphics, Glitches with Kodi, HDMI not initializing properly requiring a reboot almost everytime I turn on my TV connected to it.... Among other iritations. None of these problems are present on my AMD integrated graphics.