In the recent review about AM3 cpus, Tom's went as far as breaking pins off an AM2+ cpu to try getting it to work in the AM3 socket. As the review describes, they did this because of the higher pin count on the AM2+ cpus (940) vs the pin count on the AM3 cpus (938). But this is not the issue. The mechanical incompatibility comes from the fact that two of the key locations were moved by one pin. The AM3 cpus have two fewer pins because they extend those key locations by one pin each, which is how they are able to fit on either socket.
The interesting bit that the reviewer either did not pick up on or convey in the article is that the AM3 socket itself has 941 pins, which by count alone is more than necessary to support older cpus, so the statement that 940 is "too many" is a red herring, only the key locations affect the AM2 cpus. A better question, though, is what AMD plans to do with those pins in the future. Will the Phenom II support backwards compatibility until the end of the line, or is the current offering just there to ease the transition? Will we see newer PIIs drop the DDR2 spec? Is Fusion going to be an AM3 941-pin cpu?
I'd sure like to have some idea of where AMD is going with this.
The interesting bit that the reviewer either did not pick up on or convey in the article is that the AM3 socket itself has 941 pins, which by count alone is more than necessary to support older cpus, so the statement that 940 is "too many" is a red herring, only the key locations affect the AM2 cpus. A better question, though, is what AMD plans to do with those pins in the future. Will the Phenom II support backwards compatibility until the end of the line, or is the current offering just there to ease the transition? Will we see newer PIIs drop the DDR2 spec? Is Fusion going to be an AM3 941-pin cpu?
I'd sure like to have some idea of where AMD is going with this.
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