| Test Hardware | |
|---|---|
| Processors | AMD A10-7850K (Kaveri) 3.7 GHz, Four Cores, Socket FM2+, 4 MB Shared L2, 512 Shaders, 720 MHz GPU Clock Rate, Power-savings enabled |
| AMD A8-7600 (Kaveri) 3.3 GHz, Four Cores, Socket FM2+, 4 MB Shared L2, 384 Shaders, 720 MHz GPU Clock Rate, Power-savings enabled | |
| AMD A10-6800K (Richland) 4.1 GHz, Four Cores, Socket FM2, 4 MB Shared L2, 384 Shaders, 844 MHz GPU Clock Rate, Power-savings enabled | |
| AMD A8-6500T (Richland) 2.1 GHz, Four Cores, Socket FM2, 4 MB Shared L2, 256 Shaders, 720 MHz GPU Clock Rate, Power-savings enabled | |
| Intel Core i5-4670K (Haswell) 3.4 GHz, Four Cores, LGA 1150, 6 MB Shared L3, HD Graphics 4600, 1.2 GHz Max. GPU Clock Rate, Power-savings enabled | |
| Intel Core i3-4330 (Haswell) 3.5 GHz, Two Cores, LGA 1150, 4 MB Shared L3, Hyper-Threading enabled, HD Graphics 4600, 1.15 GHz Max. GPU Clock Rate, Power-savings enabled | |
| Motherboards | ASRock FM2A88X-ITX+ (Socket FM2+) AMD A88X Fusion Controller Hub, BIOS 1.90 |
| MSI Z87I Gaming AC (LGA 1150) Intel Z87 Platform Controller Hub, BIOS 1.0 | |
| Memory | AMD Radeon Memory (2 x 8 GB) DDR3-2133 10-11-11-30, AG316G2130U2K |
| G.Skill Ripjaws X (2 x 8 GB) DDR3-2133 9-11-10-28, F3-17000CL9Q-16GBXM | |
| Hard Drive | Samsung 840 Pro 256 GB SATA 6 Gb/s |
| Power Supply | Corsair AX860i 80 PLUS Platinum-Rated |
| System Software And Drivers | |
| Operating System | Windows 8 Professional 64-bit |
| DirectX | DirectX 11 |
| Graphics Driver | AMD Catalyst 13.30 RC2 |
| Intel 15.33.8.64.3345 | |
| Benchmark Configuration | |
|---|---|
| Gaming | |
| BioShock Infinite | Medium Quality Settings, 1920x1080, Built-in Benchmark Sequence, 75-Second playback, Fraps |
| Grid 2 | Medium Quality Preset, 2x MSAA, V-sync off, 1920x1080, Built-In Benchmark, Fraps |
| The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim | Medium Quality Preset, FXAA Disabled, 1920x1080, Custom Run-Through, 25-Second playback, Fraps |
| World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria | Good Quality Preset, DirectX 11, 1920x1080, Flight Point Recording, Fraps |
| Adobe Creative Suite | |
| Adobe After Effects CC | Version 12.0.0.404 x64: Create Video which includes three Streams, 210 Frames, Render Multiple Frames Simultaneosly |
| Adobe Photoshop CC | Version 14.0 x64: Filter 15.7 MB TIF Image: Radial Blur, Shape Blur, Median, Polar Coordinates |
| Adobe Premeire Pro CC | Version 7.0.0, 6.61 GB MXF Project to H.264 to H.264 Blu-ray, Output 1920x1080, Maximum Quality |
| Audio/Video Encoding | |
| iTunes | Version 11.0.4.4 x64: Audio CD (Terminator II SE), 53 minutes, default AAC format |
| LAME MP3 | Version 3.98.3: Audio CD "Terminator II SE", 53 min, convert WAV to MP3 audio format, Command: -b 160 --nores (160 Kb/s) |
| HandBrake CLI | Version: 0.9.9: Video from Canon EOS 7D (1920x1080, 25 FPS) 1 Minutes 22 Seconds Audio: PCM-S16, 48,000 Hz, Two-Channel, to Video: AVC1 Audio: AAC (High Profile) |
| TotalCode Studio 2.5 | Version: 2.5.0.10677: MPEG-2 to H.264, MainConcept H.264/AVC Codec, 28 sec HDTV 1920x1080 (MPEG-2), Audio: MPEG-2 (44.1 kHz, 2 Channel, 16-Bit, 224 Kb/s), Codec: H.264 Pro, Mode: PAL 50i (25 FPS), Profile: H.264 BD HDMV |
| Productivity | |
| ABBYY FineReader | Version 11.0.102.583: Read PDF save to Doc, Source: Political Economy (J. Broadhurst 1842) 111 Pages |
| Adobe Acrobat XI | Version 11.0.0: Print PDF from 115 Page PowerPoint, 128-bit RC4 Encryption |
| Autodesk 3ds Max 2012 and 2013 | Version 14.0 x64: Space Flyby Mentalray, 248 Frames, 1440x1080 |
| Blender | Version: 2.68a, Cycles Engine, Syntax blender -b thg.blend -f 1, 1920x1080, 8x Anti-Aliasing, Render THG.blend frame 1 |
| Visual Studio 2010 | Version 10.0, Compile Google Chrome, Scripted |
| Cinebench | Cinebench R15.0 CPU Component |
| File Compression | |
| WinZip | Version 18.0 Pro: THG-Workload (1.3 GB) to ZIP, command line switches "-a -ez -p -r" |
| WinRAR | Version 5.0: THG-Workload (1.3 GB) to RAR, command line switches "winrar a -r -m3" |
| 7-Zip | Version 9.30 Alpha: THG-Workload (1.3 GB) to .7z, command line switches "a -t7z -r -m0=LZMA2 -mx=5" |
| Synthetic Benchmarks and Settings | |
| 3DMark | Version: 1.2.250, Cloud Gate |
| PCMark 8 | Version: 2.0, Home (OpenCL-Accelerated), Creative (OpenCL-Accelerated), Work |
Previous
Next
Summary
- Steamroller, GCN, HSA, 28 nm: Oh My!
- Meet The Compute Core
- A More Capable GPU: GCN Surfaces In Kaveri
- Enabling HSA On The Kaveri APU
- Test Hardware And Software
- Gaming: BioShock Infinite And Grid 2
- Gaming: The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim And World Of Warcraft
- Dual Graphics: Does Kaveri Fix CrossFire's Problems?
- Results: Synthetics
- Results: Content Creation
- Results: Adobe CC
- Results: Productivity
- Results: Compression Apps
- Results: Media Encoding
- Results: Power Consumption And Efficiency
- Hoping The Best Is Yet To Come
Ask a Category Expert
Of course, the other part of this story will be the adoption of HSA and Mantle. In this regard, I think AMD is playing its cards right. If you want to provide incentive for game developers to invest in developing for Mantle, that economic incentive is not going to come from providing a high-end part that tries to compete with high-end discrete GPUs. That economic incentive, and I believe it's huge, is in lowering the cost of entry to play your game.
With the A8-7600, I believe AMD is providing a tremendous market opportunity and incentive if, with the combination of Kaveri plus embedded technologies (Mantle & True Audio), you can provide a playable gaming environment for the mass market. Admittedly, it may not be a "playable gaming environment" from an enthusiast standpoint, but as an entry point, it is quite good enough. It will be important for AMD to show that the release of Mantle for BF4 impacts performance for the Kaveri APUs in particular. More specifically, they will need to show that Mantle makes BF4 playable on a 7600. If they are successful in that regard, then I think they may really have something exciting here.
I'm hoping AMD is successful in this, because it's obvious that the desktop CPU performance race has reached a point of diminishing returns. Kudus for AMD for potentially changing the game in the industry.
All that said, they screwed up the pricing for the high-end. It needs to be $30 cheaper, and what is even the point of the 7700K? The 7850K at ~$145 and the 7600 where it is would have made much more sense if they want to incent adoption of this technology. The other point is they need to get motherboard manufacturers on-board with bringing more ITX FM2+ motherboards to market at different price points.
I got the opposite impression. Which graph are you looking at?
Given that AM3+ looks like it's done, it would have been nice to see a 6-core chip. Still, one of these may end up in my next laptop.
I got the opposite impression. Which graph are you looking at?
I really like where AMD is going (HSA, GCN and TrueAudio).Too bad the manufacturing process of GlobalFoundries just can't match Intel's.
Also, it would be interesting to see the new Bay Trail Pentium or Celeron CPUs (whichever is closer in performance) in the Efficiency graphs.
28nm SHP from GlobalFoundries. AMD bought over $1 billion worth of wafers from them in december...
I guess you have been reading the articles from a year ago about AMD still using TSMC despite promises of GlobalFoundries' new 28nm SHP process.
Of course, the other part of this story will be the adoption of HSA and Mantle. In this regard, I think AMD is playing its cards right. If you want to provide incentive for game developers to invest in developing for Mantle, that economic incentive is not going to come from providing a high-end part that tries to compete with high-end discrete GPUs. That economic incentive, and I believe it's huge, is in lowering the cost of entry to play your game.
With the A8-7600, I believe AMD is providing a tremendous market opportunity and incentive if, with the combination of Kaveri plus embedded technologies (Mantle & True Audio), you can provide a playable gaming environment for the mass market. Admittedly, it may not be a "playable gaming environment" from an enthusiast standpoint, but as an entry point, it is quite good enough. It will be important for AMD to show that the release of Mantle for BF4 impacts performance for the Kaveri APUs in particular. More specifically, they will need to show that Mantle makes BF4 playable on a 7600. If they are successful in that regard, then I think they may really have something exciting here.
I'm hoping AMD is successful in this, because it's obvious that the desktop CPU performance race has reached a point of diminishing returns. Kudus for AMD for potentially changing the game in the industry.
All that said, they screwed up the pricing for the high-end. It needs to be $30 cheaper, and what is even the point of the 7700K? The 7850K at ~$145 and the 7600 where it is would have made much more sense if they want to incent adoption of this technology. The other point is they need to get motherboard manufacturers on-board with bringing more ITX FM2+ motherboards to market at different price points.
Yesterday there was an HD7770 so low that you could get that and an FX 6300 for like $5 more than what newegg is asking for the 7850k. You can get an HD 7750 in that general price range with an FX 6300 now. In desktop, APU's still hold no appeal to me at all. Mobile, they have promise for sure.