AMD AM1 Platform Aimed at Budget Computing Under $400

By Niels Broekhuijsen
published

AMD has announced a new platform targeted at budget, everyday computing.

AMD is introducing the new AM1 platform. This platform is built to address a low-budget, sub $400 computer market segment.

The APUs that go into the AM1 systems are SoCs (System on a Chip), and the majority will come as an APU and motherboard combo. This is to be known as a "System in a Socket." On the motherboards themselves, users might read the socket name FS1b, but the Kabini APU, together with a motherboard with an FS1b socket, will be known as the AM1 platform.

The Kabini APUs carry most of the computing hardware, including up to four "Jaguar" CPU cores, the GCN cores, as well as the memory controller (which can address up to 16 GB of DDR3-1600 memory) and all the remaining chipset parts. They have support for up to two SATA3 ports, two USB 3.0 ports, eight USB 2.0 ports, DisplayPort, HDMI, and VGA ports. These chips will be marketed under the Athlon and Sempron names.

Despite that the APUs will come in motherboards, the platform will still be upgradeable. The APUs can simply be removed and replaced with another, more powerful unit that fits in the same socket.

The APU+ motherboard AM1 combinations will have starting prices of about $60. As of this writing, the company has not yet announced specific models or configurations.

Niels Broekhuijsen
Niels Broekhuijsen

Niels Broekhuijsen is a Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware US. He reviews cases, water cooling and pc builds.

25 Comments Comment from the forums
  • pcgaming98
    I'll probably get banned / warned for this but...AMD!? SERIOUSLY!? WHERE ARE YOUR ENTHUSIAST CPUs!? GET BACK IN THE GAME FFS!!!!Just angry that my beloved AMD is actually going down....
    Reply
  • Kamen_BG
    I'll probably get banned / warned for this but...AMD!? SERIOUSLY!? WHERE ARE YOUR ENTHUSIAST CPUs!? GET BACK IN THE GAME FFS!!!!Just angry that my beloved AMD is actually going down....
    Nope, you won't be banned.AMD however, abandoned the high-end CPU market as they see they can not compete.Their Streamroller archetecture, while faster than Piledriver, is still SLOWER than the old Phenom II's at the same clock speed.
    Reply
  • icemunk
    AMD is just sitting on the high-end market, keeping a slight pace with Intel; Intel has also stalled the highend market as well, with only 5-10% gains lately. Everyone is focusing on small-form factor, and low power consumption these days unfortuntely. I'd love to see Intel drop a huge increase onto the enthusist market, they certainly good, but they're just sticking to modest increases instead.
    Reply
  • pcgaming98
    12808521 said:
    I'll probably get banned / warned for this but...AMD!? SERIOUSLY!? WHERE ARE YOUR ENTHUSIAST CPUs!? GET BACK IN THE GAME FFS!!!!Just angry that my beloved AMD is actually going down....
    Nope, you won't be banned.AMD however, abandoned the high-end CPU market as they see they can not compete.Their Streamroller archetecture, while faster than Piledriver, is still SLOWER than the old Phenom II's at the same clock speed.

    I know but they gotta try man! I fully understand the financial problems and risks of making a high end CPU but to be a good competitor, you gotta stretch across all sectors of the market. If only AMD took a grand old Phenom chip, dissected it, and figured out where they went wrong.... I dont want to have to resort to Intel to get better performance, as fanboyish as that sounds, I guess I am a fanboy of AMD. I just want them back in their golden days. Intel's making these 5 percent increases because there's no competition, so they dont have to bring anything big. If AMD stepped up to the plate and brought a gigantic turkey, it'd make Intel have to cook a bigger one that has to be delicious.

    Reply
  • amk-aka-Phantom
    Ugh. I may be a hypocrite with my AMD based NAS, but I have it only because I couldn't find any other Intel-based board that did the same things. Now there are - with Haswell Celerons etc. Anyhow, I think that AMD lost on all CPU markets. Intel crushed them in enthusiast and server markets, mid-range and low-power. This is just fumbling for SOMETHING. Their most poweful laptop "APU"s can barely compete with ULV Core i3s and desktop ones are power-hungry fake-multicores (though the last part is true for laptop ones too).As a sysadmin/tech support, I am DISGUSTED by this low-end tech. People buy netbooks etc with Atoms and E350s and then want me to "make them faster". No, installing XP won't do it. Or Ubuntu. Or anything, because you can't make a bad CPU perform good with modern software, especially when paired with a laptop HDD! The only instance I got good performance out of low-power system is when I installed my NAS's OS on a SanDisk 32 GB ReadyCache SSD - the AMD E-450 in it is then suitable for all kinds of office work and watching movies. But even Skype loading 1-month message history can max out both cores and bring the system to a stall. Pathetic! Stop making this junk, AMD!
    Reply
  • pcgaming98
    12808727 said:
    Ugh. I may be a hypocrite with my AMD based NAS, but I have it only because I couldn't find any other Intel-based board that did the same things. Now there are - with Haswell Celerons etc. Anyhow, I think that AMD lost on all CPU markets. Intel crushed them in enthusiast and server markets, mid-range and low-power. This is just fumbling for SOMETHING. Their most poweful laptop "APU"s can barely compete with ULV Core i3s and desktop ones are power-hungry fake-multicores (though the last part is true for laptop ones too).As a sysadmin/tech support, I am DISGUSTED by this low-end tech. People buy netbooks etc with Atoms and E350s and then want me to "make them faster". No, installing XP won't do it. Or Ubuntu. Or anything, because you can't make a bad CPU perform good with modern software, especially when paired with a laptop HDD! The only instance I got good performance out of low-power system is when I installed my NAS's OS on a SanDisk 32 GB ReadyCache SSD - the AMD E-450 in it is then suitable for all kinds of office work and watching movies. But even Skype loading 1-month message history can max out both cores and bring the system to a stall. Pathetic! Stop making this junk, AMD!

    AMD's processors may not perform as good as Intel's but "fake multi cores?" No..., the way AMD meant for it to work was, they paired two cores into a module to reduce latency between the two cores, but the latency was instead increased from one module to another. It was a mere fluke that was mis-interpretted and wrongly sought into, but it's not a fake multi core. It's still very real.

    No matter how fast Intel's cores are, there's no replacing a Quad Core with a dual core, that's out of the story for me. Even though AMD's falling over its shoe laces, I'm gonna stick with them til the end. After my Pentium T4500 died, that was it for Intel for me, that processor lasted 3 months and it caught fire somehow. On the other hand, I've been doing some light gaming on my AMD E-450 for over a year. And I'm about finished with investing in my AMD based build with an Athlon II X4 760k and R9 270.
    Reply
  • InvalidError
    12808727 said:
    I think that AMD lost on all CPU markets.
    Intel is still pretty far behind AMD on at least one front: integrated graphics. GT3e is Intel's best, chips with it cost $400-600 but their graphics performance is barely on par with ~$120 AMD APUs or 750k + bargain-bin GPU.

    AMD would likely be in a much better position if TSMC and GloFo were not so many years behind Intel with their 14-22nm process.
    Reply
  • siman0
    umm you relies if a CPU can do more calculations per clock a dual core can be faster than a quad core. Multi core is just the allowance of more threads of data processed per clock. So it can load balance between more bits of data. The problems are that we have crap loads of programs/processes and not enough threads to handle them all simultaneously. There are a few different ways to go about fixing this problem make the CPU faster so it can process more threads at a faster rate (more GHz worst idea), add more cores to (allow more threads to be processed simultaneously), or find a different type of processor that can handle more threads (AMDs idea with HSA). A GPU has shit tons of individual processors its more like an ARM processor. This would allow data to be offloaded from the CPU and onto the GPU. Then you ask why cant we just make a computer run off a GPU. well we could but the processes and calculations an ALU can do are much simpler (why they are faster, its more of a this is what this core is designed for). An X86 processor can do mind boggling complex computations compared to a simple core in a GPU so its still needed. This and we are stating to have more and more problems making CPUs smaller. So a different solution is needed to get commutations done in a timely matter the cheapest solution is to use what you already have available and GPUs sit idling most of the time so why not use them. AMD is actually being smart with their cards and everything is stating to flip to Open CL and HSA type of solutions.
    Reply
  • pcgaming98
    12809131 said:
    umm you relies if a CPU can do more calculations per clock a dual core can be faster than a quad core. Multi core is just the allowance of more threads of data processed per clock. So it can load balance between more bits of data. The problems are that we have crap loads of programs/processes and not enough threads to handle them all simultaneously. There are a few different ways to go about fixing this problem make the CPU faster so it can process more threads at a faster rate (more GHz worst idea), add more cores to (allow more threads to be processed simultaneously), or find a different type of processor that can handle more threads (AMDs idea with HSA). A GPU has shit tons of individual processors its more like an ARM processor. This would allow data to be offloaded from the CPU and onto the GPU. Then you ask why cant we just make a computer run off a GPU. well we could but the processes and calculations an ALU can do are much simpler (why they are faster, its more of a this is what this core is designed for). An X86 processor can do mind boggling complex computations compared to a simple core in a GPU so its still needed. This and we are stating to have more and more problems making CPUs smaller. So a different solution is needed to get commutations done in a timely matter the cheapest solution is to use what you already have available and GPUs sit idling most of the time so why not use them. AMD is actually being smart with their cards and everything is stating to flip to Open CL and HSA type of solutions.

    It'll be quicker per clock but it wont be able to handle as many processes. No matter how fast it is, that CPU usage will still shoot up when you open a couple of things.

    Reply
  • the1kingbob
    AMD, not including the high TDP chips, competes pretty well in all the areas they wish to compete. It is true they don't sell chips that are $500+, but who buys those? Most I have seen are used in high end computing, not gaming. The few that are used in gaming are for insane machines with multi-high resolution screens and multi monitors. AMD has been struggling, they need to focus (as they are doing) on markets that gives them a stable platform. I think they are doing great on the graphics front, with the exception of the coin market driving up prices.
    Reply