Safe to buy FM2 motherboard for future APUs?

[Aquamech]

Hey guys, I wanna build an AMD APU system, but with the new series of APUs supposedly not that far away, I was thinking of buying an A4-5300 for the time being and later upgrading to the A10-6800K. Of course, the assumption there is that the APU will have a 100w TDP and fit into the FM2 socket. Google tells me this will indeed be the case, but AMD hasn't officially said anything yet, so how trustworthy is that information? It'd be a shame if I'd end up having to replace the motherboard as well due to the APU drawing 125w or something. Seems unlikely, but as someone who doesn't normally keep up with hardware, I'd really like your input before I make the purchase. For what it's worth, the motherboard I intend to buy is an ASRock FM2A85X Extreme4-M.

 

[lazyboy947]

I'd say that yes buying a fm2 socket is a good idea, because am3+ is lasting one more generation, and if u want to be sure i heard around june amd will announce its next line of apus officially. Also about the wattage, i dont think amd would change to 125w for the next gen apu as if it stays fm2 then it requires all new motherboards and they kept the 100w tdp through out fm1 to fm2.

I believe that after this generation ddr4 will be on the release if i remember correctly so for amd i dont rlly think a new socket will be out until then, but im not to sure

 

[ohyouknow]

Well. The next round of APU's for the FM2 socket is called Richland coming out later this year. The only problem with this is that there is speculation that it is a refined low power update to the A10 and A8 APU's with new optimizations to slightly improve performance.

Being said, the update coming later this year might not have too much of a performance difference although it has been suggested by AMD to be 20-40%. Since the physical specs are not a new architecture, the new iGPU probably won't be significantly faster. A-10 right now might be where it's at. Would love to be wrong though.

After this update, there will be no more FM2 chips. It generally performs similar to a Bulldozer 1st gen FX chip alongside a discrete gpu as well.

If you're ok with not having a discrete GPU, I'd pass on the A4 save money in the long run and just invest in the A-10 right away. Cheers.

 

[jaguarskx]

Richland will be socket FM2 and is likely slated to be released either mid-2013 or Fall 2013. As stated above, it will be a tweaked version of the Trinity APU.

Kaveri is expected to be released sometime next year. It will be based on Steamroller and the CPU architecture will be significantly different from Bulldozer that some have speculated it will be socket "FM3".

There are a lot of rumors regarding Kaveri though such as it has been totally cancelled. I really doubt Kaveri has been cancelled because I believe AMD's future depends on their APUs rather than their CPUs. However, I simply cannot give you an opinion as of now whether or not Kaveri will be socket FM2 or FM3.

 

[Aquamech]

Hmmm... if the jump between the A10-5800 and 6800 won't be that big then perhaps I'll just immediately invest in the A10-5800 like ohyouknow suggested. Is there any chance that the Richlands could Crossfire with the 7000 series, though? I wouldn't be buying one anytime soon, but it's nice having the option at least.

It's hard to decide on a proper configuration with the AM3 not having much life left in it, and FM2 most likely never having been intended to last very long. I was hoping to build something I could later do some decent gaming on, but not at this time. My budget is fairly limited right now since I'm about to move into my new apartment, but I do really want a new PC I can use for some basic computing and at the very least watch 1080p footage over HDMI. Perhaps I'll just get a really cheap mITX mobo with onboard APU and figure out how much I wanna invest in this gaming rig at a later date.

Either way, thanks for the info guys.

 

[sarinaide]

FM2 is atleast future ready for Richland which is the Trinity update mid to late 2013. Kaviri may share Socket FM2 but right now it is all speculative as to what socket it will use. AMD pride on socket stability with AMD FX Steamroller parts expected to use updated AM3+ it may hold trite that Kaviri A-Series operate of FM2 socket or a updated derivative.

 

[sarinaide]

Hey guys, I wanna build an AMD APU system, but with the new series of APUs supposedly not that far away, I was thinking of buying an A4-5300 for the time being and later upgrading to the A10-6800K. Of course, the assumption there is that the APU will have a 100w TDP and fit into the FM2 socket. Google tells me this will indeed be the case, but AMD hasn't officially said anything yet, so how trustworthy is that information? It'd be a shame if I'd end up having to replace the motherboard as well due to the APU drawing 125w or something. Seems unlikely, but as someone who doesn't normally keep up with hardware, I'd really like your input before I make the purchase. For what it's worth, the motherboard I intend to buy is an ASRock FM2A85X Extreme4-M.

Please look at the ASRock A85 Extreme 4 or the Extreme 6, the Extreme 4M is missing Lucid MVP which is a very big deal in the light of things, another alternative would be the MSI A85 GD65, unfortunately also missing Lucid but on the price/features comparibility is quite a solid build. Though my opinion is the Exteme 4 (non M) is a good step down from the Extreme 6 with only a few USB3.0's and PCI e 4x slot missing which is no big deal for around the Extreme 4M pricetag, the 4M misses out on 3 USB 3.0 slots, 3 Sata 6 GB/s ports and a PCI-e 4x slot, it also uses 4+2 instead of 8+2 phase VRM's so that is another aspect to consider for clocking.