AMD Releases New PRO Mobile APUs: Carrizo up to A12-8800B
by Ian Cutress on October 2, 2015 7:25 PM EST
We touched upon this very briefly in our recent HP Elitebook news, but at the end of September AMD officially launched four new professional mobile APUs under the AMD PRO line. The PRO line is similar to the commercial line of APUs that end up in the hands of casual users, except they are mostly sold in machines aimed at the professional market, and might have some slightly different arrangements in configuration to ensure a long-tail support program. This typically means that features such as TrustZone (using ARM IP) embedded in the processors go through ISV (independent software vendor) certification to ensure a fully functioning product.
The four AMD PRO processors being released today all use AMD’s latest microarchitecture codenamed Carrizo, which fits comprises of one or two ‘Excavator’ class modules and Radeon Rx graphics. In a change from regular AMD A-Series nomenclature, the top processor of the stack is now an ‘A12’ class design which reaches greater parity with previous microarchitecture designs on the desktop. This means a dual module design paired with eight graphics compute units giving what AMD calls 12 compute cores in total with ‘R7’ graphics.
AMD’s Carrizo platform was built focused on the 15W TDP window, although AMD will allow its partners to boost the designs with a configurable TDP up to 35W on the A12, A10 and A8. AMD is also promising an enterprise package with partners to ensure a 36-month extended OEM warranty, 24-month product longevity, 18-month image stability and a ‘richer configuration’ package. That last point is promoted through the use of Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X5 LTE modem (Cat4) in certain HP branded professional notebook designs.
Carrizo’s raison d’être was to bring use cases that required high end laptop configurations down into the mainstream (>$800 into $500-$700), which could be considered important if a business is considering deployment of several hundred devices at once along with a support package to go along with it. The PRO APUs will also support DASH for remote desktop management as well as AMD PRO Control Center for SMBs.
AMD expects a number of partners to release information over the next few months. We are working towards obtaining a suitable Carrizo unit for testing as well.
Source: AMD
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Samus - Saturday, October 3, 2015 - link
It probably compares closer to a i3-2100.Cryio - Saturday, October 3, 2015 - link
It's really sad because a properly configured FX 8800P (FX, not Pro) in 35W and dual-channel ram at 2133 would easily compete CPU wise with Broadwell (Skylake possibly) in the i3-i5 ULV range while having at the same time easily better iGPUs and same or better battery life.The Hardcard - Saturday, October 3, 2015 - link
The regular Carrizo has the trust zone. I don't see see where anything physical is done differently with these chips beyond the label machine. But, if that gets them even one more design win, it is worth it.So far as I know, the Lenovo Y700 is the only known 35W Carrizo. Someone got their hands on some tech support docs and posted relevant pages on another forum. With discrete R9 M385, 15-inch 1080p, and 60whr battery, if anyone cares. I am tempted but unsure.
The Hardcard - Saturday, October 3, 2015 - link
Although, since I don't game much, the likely 15W Elitebook with 46Whr battery is also interesting.zodiacfml - Saturday, October 3, 2015 - link
Looks awesome but 28nm @ 15W?! It will have pretty strong competition such as the i5-5200u. I reckon it will perform similar to a Core M.phoenix_rizzen - Saturday, October 3, 2015 - link
Does this mean we might start setting AMD inside laptops that don't suck? With decent 1080p or better screens? With decent harddrives or ssds? That can be used for more than just web browsing?That would be nice!
vgray35@hotmail.com - Sunday, October 4, 2015 - link
What would nice, is if AMD forced APUs to be used only on a minimum 1080P screen. Prevent their APU from being associated with crappy screens, and I bet more people will buy AMD laptops. Force the market to move in a certain direction. If you want to make a laptop with a crappy screen go and use a cheap Intel chip. I believe this would give a realty check to the market.Gadgety - Sunday, October 4, 2015 - link
Well, yes, but are they in a position, financially to "force the market to move in a certain direction"? I think they're not.BTW I was surprised the $90 Kaveri A8-7600 does 4K with the Asrock FM2A88X-ITX+motherboard. It does light gaming, too.
medi03 - Monday, October 5, 2015 - link
Well, HDD is easily swappable. Chasis/Screen not so.Gadgety - Sunday, October 4, 2015 - link
These Carrizos look like more efficient versions of the Kaveris. Would be nice to have a performance comparison with the similarily 12 cored A10-7850k, and the A8-7600 in a future review. Or any of the 45W running FM2+ socket APUs.