AMD "'Thuban" - 6-core CPU, SATA 6Gbps mobos due

[Billus]

Details are starting to emerge about March updates to AMDs CPU and motherboard chipsets. Arriving in Q2 (May is claimed), four 6-core CPUs are slated for launch at the standard AM3 socket, taking the name "Phenom II X6 10xxT" - where the xx designated the model number.

OC Workbench alludes that they will start at 2.8GHz with a 140W TDP, and that each contains the normal 6MB L3 cache a quad core Phenom II currently uses. Notably the HyperTransport clock has also been increased from 2.0GHz to 2.4GHz, most likely in order to relieve the data stress of adding two extra cores.

The new 'Thuban' die is still made using AMD's 45nm SOI process, although recent advancements in FAB technology at AMD, which was evident in the recent Phenom II X4 965 C3 stepping, have made its leakage more manageable.

Since these CPUs still use the AM3 socket, they should be drop-in compatible with current 790FX, 790GX and 785G AM3 motherboards, providing there's a BIOS update available.

With regards to AMD's new chipsets: the 890GX will be launching in March, with announcements at CeBit we expect. Inside there's an updated graphics, named Radeon HD 4290 - so it's still RV6xx based with DirectX 10.1, although we're still waiting for boards to arrive in Feb to tell us the exact specifications. We hope the UVD video playback is updated to 5xxx series standard to compete with Intel's latest Core i3/i5 Clarkdale CPUs, and maybe, just maybe, AMD will finally support dual digital display outputs.

Most notably though is not the integrated graphics, but the new SB850 series southbridge the 890GX will be paired with. It has SATA 6Gbps natively included, but when it comes to (the arguably more useful) USB 3.0, unfortunately we still have to pay for the additional NEC controller.

Source

[Sikh]

Interesting. If I can drop on into my

mobo after a bios update I'll get one plus a fermi

[Yusuf M. Veteran]

Looks like it's Phenom II X4 with 2 added cores, so to speak. I was hoping they'd release a newly redesigned CPU.

[Ci7]

let the age of many core comance !!!

[prue3]

wait... I'm at a lost...

(noob alert)

I have a motherboard from GIGABYTE, with AM3 socket, and the chipset is AMD770,

will I be able to put this 6 core CPU on my machine or not?

[Ci7]

wait... I'm at a lost...

(noob alert)

I have a motherboard from GIGABYTE, with AM3 socket, and the chipset is AMD770,

will I be able to put this 6 core CPU on my machine or not?

probably ,

you would need at least a bios update , for the cpu to work correctly in your motherboard.

but they could limit the six core to the new AMD 850/880 chipset you never know.

edit:

you could be out of luck

Since these CPUs still use the AM3 socket, they should be drop-in compatible with current 790FX, 790GX and 785G AM3 motherboards, providing there's a BIOS update available.

[wellofsouls]

Looks like it's Phenom II X4 with 2 added cores, so to speak. I was hoping they'd release a newly redesigned CPU.

well, what they need is not a new design, but a new manufacture process. The Phenom's architecture is quite advanced already, after all Nehalem is pretty much just following Phenom's design, with a better manufacture process and more cache.

Phenom already has scalable on-die multi-core controller, built-in memory controller, L3 cache, they just need to figure out how to make it perform better (and a better manufacture process can probably fix it a lot)

[Vice]

140 Watt TDP on an AM3 socket won't be easy to cool.

[c3ntury]

Hmmm.. i think ill be fine with my AMD Quad Core 9850 for now. Once they release a 8-Core beast i will probably upgrade though :D

[Motoko.]

I'm still waiting for Bulldozer on 32nm

USB 3.0 is a big deal to me too.

[Cold Blood]

Bah,multithreading isn't always the answer and maybe not the best solution. From a programmer's standpoint it's very hard to make multhreaded applications that take advantage of all the cores. It's harder to debug multithreaded code and you can't always multithread the entire application, only parts of it. And even then, creating a thread costs the cpu some time so you also have to be careful how you make your threads. And this is just the begining. You have to sync the threads at times, and that can also waste cpu time, some threads might wait for other to finish their job, you can have 3 threads waiting for a single one to finish and you will use only one core even if it's multithreaded. And the syncronizing mechanism also uses some system resources and so on. And this is just the begining.

Imo they should make a new arhitecture, different from the x86 one that has already shown it's limits. Only a handful of applications actually use more than 2 cores.

[Nagisan]

Bah,multithreading isn't always the answer and maybe not the best solution. From a programmer's standpoint it's very hard to make multhreaded applications that take advantage of all the cores. It's harder to debug multithreaded code and you can't always multithread the entire application, only parts of it. And even then, creating a thread costs the cpu some time so you also have to be careful how you make your threads. And this is just the begining. You have to sync the threads at times, and that can also waste cpu time, some threads might wait for other to finish their job, you can have 3 threads waiting for a single one to finish and you will use only one core even if it's multithreaded. And the syncronizing mechanism also uses some system resources and so on. And this is just the begining.

Imo they should make a new arhitecture, different from the x86 one that has already shown it's limits. Only a handful of applications actually use more than 2 cores.

Or they need to put time and money into multi-threaded development. I understand that many applications are unable to use multiple threads well, but high-resource things such as games and what not can, but typically don't. Look at Dragon Age: Origins, it benefits from up to 3 cores and runs great compared to many other games released around the same time as it. Then go back and look at some older games from before multi-core became normal (TF2 and other games from that time), they run horrible. What we need is more time spent on developing proper multi-threaded applications and less time spent on making a new architecture that will require them to learn/change many things anyway.

[ObiWanToby]

I think a multi-core design plus a focus on instructions per clock will be ok. Each core individually still needs to advance in speed though. It seems to be the future. Almost every decent modern computer has at least a dual core. Two out of the three major consoles sport a multicore design...