This is more proof that AMD's manufacturing process is doing really good.
AMD's is continuing to refine their 90nm process, I'll give them that but that is not the primary reason for those Energy-Efficient processors. All you have to do is look at the recent FX-60 and soon to be released FX-62 to confirm that. The reason why the FX-60 fits into the power envelop of the X2 4800+ was that AMD lowered the voltage in order to constrain the thermal levels. This is simply binning a chip with a higher clcok speed to run at slower speeds to save power and is the same practice that is used to have low voltages in the Opteron line. For instance chips that may run stably at 2.8GHz at stock voltage of the X2s would be run at 2.6GHz in stable operation at lower voltages to reduce power consumption creating the FX-62. If the process was significantly removed AMD wouldn't have to result to those measures.
Similarly, if the process was so much improved there wouldn't be a reason to increase the TDP of the FX-62 to 125W. I'm sure people would argue that AMD is simply leaving extra room for higher-clock speeds. However, this argument is inheirently flawed. The next speed bump for the FX line will be the FX-64 which is a 65nm chip to launch in Q1 2007. Transitioning to 65nm for the next FX should lower the TDP, which means the increase is not for higher clock speeds but simply because the 90nm FX-62 genuinely needs it. This can hardly be proof of the 90nm process "doing really good".
http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2006/02/17/amd_energy_efficient_cpus/
The more likely reason that Energy-Efficient processors are possible is the one mentioned in the article. Specifically, the redesigned Sleep, Power, and Suspend states. It will be important to see if these processors are Energy-Efficient at the expense of some performance because of their more aggressive power-saving measures, which probably mean they downclocking more and deeper for a given system load.
It's also interesting that this article mentions nothing about actual AM2 clock speeds. This is especially important because of the controversy over whether AMD will keep the current PR naming structure for given clock speeds or increase it by 400MHz for AM2. The latter would of course mean that a X2 3800+ actually runs at 1.8GHz and the current 2GHz X2 3800+ becomes the X2 4200+. This would certainly explain how the X2 3800+ can be available at 35W using the 90nm process. The drastic cut from 89W to 35W truly seems "incredible" otherwise. Of course, this last paragraph is completely speculation on my part so you can discount it, but it seems reasonable considering that the AM2 processors were originally announced with the 2GHz model being the X2 4200+.
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=28367
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