Kaveri is finally being introduced to the mobile space, and I believe it has more potential there than on the desktop. Where the previous generation of Richland-based APUs offer greater headroom for higher clock rates, that advantage is largely neutralized when you're more worried about battery life than raw performance.
Of course, AMD's mobile APUs aren't competing against the products they replace; they're doing battle against Intel's best effort, which is manufactured using more advanced technology. In that light, the mobile flavor of Kaveri fights an uphill battle to prove its mettle, particularly when the comparison points are benchmarks of popular applications.
The same arguments crop up over and over. Will you notice a difference between platforms while you're banging out emails, working in Excel, or browsing the Web? Probably not. But that's not a good enough reason to adopt a slower or less energy efficient system. Yes, OpenCL and the HSA initiative have wonderful potential, but it's still potential. Neither effort is yet prolific, and that's what we really want to see.
How about graphics? Score one for AMD there, though in certain host processing-bound applications, Intel's x86 cores alleviate bottlenecks that Kaveri must suffer through. But let's make this clear: in the four games we tested, AMD's FX-7600P established a clear win over the Core i7-4702MQ in three. Intel's HD Graphics 4600 engine was either unplayable or it dipped below the threshold of playability, while AMD proved more likely to deliver tolerable performance numbers. If you're a mobile gamer, that's a notable distinction between low-power processors.
The final piece of the puzzle is price. We won't know the specifics until AMD gets some mobile Kaveri design wins on the shelves. At a similar cost, you'd choose a Core i7-4702MQ or FX-7600P based on your preference for intense computing tasks or graphics ability, respectively. But I'd be a little surprised if those two chips ended up in similarly-priced laptops. If you could save a significant amount of money by choosing the AMD option, the value proposition could be compelling. As always, we'll have to wait until we have commercially available laptops to test in order to do a real value analysis. But no matter how you slice it, the mobile version of Kaveri is a stronger opponent than its predecessor.


That's enough for their 8-core chips to catch up or surpass current i5s, right?
I sure hope not. North Bridges and HT Link are so 5 years ago.
That's enough for their 8-core chips to catch up or surpass current i5s, right?
I agree, though it still makes sense to keep one demanding game in the test suite to give perspective on where this hardware stands compared to dedicated graphics cards and high-end CPUs.
1080p and demanding games are not good benchmarks for this GPUs you must use less demanding games or test lower resolutions It is not the same benchmarking F1s than Nascars or electric cars
That's why we used Dota2, Grid2, and WoW... they have low system requirements, and ran fine.
Mantle only shows an advantage in Battlefield 4 in rare cases, regardless of the driver. The game also requires a ton of VRAM for Mantle to show a gain instead of a loss. I have an in-depth analysis coming soon.
Having said that, Thief shows impressive gains across the board in Mantle.
1080p and demanding games are not good benchmarks for this GPUs you must use less demanding games or test lower resolutions It is not the same benchmarking F1s than Nascars or electric cars
We *did* use 720p where the graphics processor couldn't handle it... in Battlefield 4
The FX-7600P worked fine at 1080p with Dota2, Grid2, and WoW, so why would we lower the resolution?
I take great pride in testing at real-world settings, and I often lower to 720p when 1080p is too demanding.
“That top-of-the-line FX-7600P is a completely functional Kaveri APU, with both of its Steamroller modules (four integer cores) and all 512 of its shaders enabled.”
“While AMD appears confident in the ULV Kaveri's ability to compete against Core i7-4500U, the higher TDP meant we needed to find an Intel-based platform with a comparable thermal ceiling. I tapped the 37 W Core i7-4702MQ within Acer's Aspire V3.”
37 W Core i7-4702MQ this a 380$ dollar part……….. way more than Kaveri
No Firestrike score.
I would prefer different benchmarks.
“AMD is trying to give the impression of fast, responsive performance, and our sample does seem to achieve that.”
“That top-of-the-line FX-7600P is a completely functional Kaveri APU, with both of its Steamroller modules (four integer cores) and all 512 of its shaders enabled.”
“While AMD appears confident in the ULV Kaveri's ability to compete against Core i7-4500U, the higher TDP meant we needed to find an Intel-based platform with a comparable thermal ceiling. I tapped the 37 W Core i7-4702MQ within Acer's Aspire V3.”
37 W Core i7-4702MQ this a 380$ dollar part……….. way more than Kaveri
No Firestrike score.
I would prefer different benchmarks
Hi h2323, great to see you again. I took the liberty of erasing your unproductive rhetoric to address your actual concerns:
1. You've listed the top three quotes with no comments beside them. Not sure what kind of point you're trying to make, there. Does that mean you like them?
2. AMD didn't provide pricing, so we compared a mobile Core i7 part with similar wattage AS PER AMD's DIRECTION. If you disagree with their decision, I encourage you to contact their PR team.
3. I can only assume you have no idea what Firestrike is for. As per Futuremark:
"Fire Strike is a showcase DirectX 11 benchmark designed for today's high-performance gaming PCs. It is our most ambitious and technical benchmark ever, featuring real-time graphics rendered with detail and complexity far beyond what is found in other benchmarks and games today."
Mobile integrated GPUs are not "high performance gaming PCs". Would you find it valuable to see benchmark results of a slideshow? We wouldn't.
4. You indicated that you would prefer different benchmarks, but didn't mention which ones, or why?
Have a great day!
Granted most of the tests in that review focus on gaming but AMD's not half bad in everyday tasks. Considering the price of i7-4702MQ, I feel its too expensive to be compared.