Test Setup And Benchmarks
Llano presents us with a number of testing challenges we generally don’t encounter when it comes time to review a new processor or graphics solution. AMD doesn’t have (or at the very least, doesn’t want to share) a tool to report actual clock speeds during operation. So, we have no easy way of telling whether or not Turbo Core is working, how often it’s working or how far it’s accelerating our sample. You’ll remember that when Intel debuted the Nehalem architecture, it distributed a Turbo Boost monitor for tracking the feature’s activity in real-time. AMD needs something similar.
To help us examine this limitation, we’re including benchmarks of a Phenom II X4 at 1.5 GHz and 2.4 GHz, the nominal and Turbo Core limits of the A8-3500M CPU we’re testing today. Not only does this show us if Turbo Core is working, but it gives us an idea how closely the new version of the Stars CPU core compares to Phenom II.
In addition, we’re pairing that Phenom II X4-based system with a Radeon HD 5570. As you now know, this graphics card has the same number of shader cores as the A8-3500M APU, and for our tests, it’s under-clocked it to 444 MHz GPU and 666 MHz DDR3 memory. This allows us to compare APU performance with a discrete graphics card using the same specifications and clocks.
Last but not least, we’re testing a system based on Intel’s mobile Core i5-2520M CPU. This should give us a good idea what similarly-priced laptops based on similarly-priced Intel products can accomplish. Or at least, similarly-priced according to AMD’s not-necessarily accurate estimations.
There are three popular notebook resolutions we’ll focus on for testing games: 1280x800, 1600x900, and 1920x1080. When a particular game struggles with 1280x800, we add 1024x600 as a lower-resolution alternative to see if it fares any better.
Since AMD Dual Graphics only works on DirectX 10 and 11 game engines, we are benchmarking some games more than once, using different code paths in order to see what difference Dual Graphics makes. These games are Metro 2033, F1 2010, and HAWX 2.
| Header Cell - Column 0 | AMD Llano A8-3500M Test System | AMD Phenom II X4Test System | Intel Core i5-2520M Test System |
|---|---|---|---|
| CPU | AMD A8-3500M (Llano)Quad-Core, 4 MB L21.5 GHz (2.4 GHz Max Turbo) | AMD Phenom II X4 (Deneb)Quad-Core, 6 MB L3@ 1.5 GHz and 2.4 GHz | Intel Core i5-2520M (Sandy Bridge)Dual-Core, Hyperthreaded, 3 MB L32.5 GHz (3.2 GHz Max Turbo) |
| Motherboard | Unknown Chipset: AMD A70 Fusion Controller HubWith USB 3.0 Support | Gigabyte 880GMA-UD2H Chipset: AMD 880G | ASRock HM65-HT Chipset: Intel HM65 |
| Networking | Onboard Gigabit LAN controller | ||
| Memory | 4 GB DDR3 1333 MHz 2 x 2 GB, timings unknown | 4 GB DDR3 1333 MHz 2 x 2 GB, CL 9-9-9-24-1TKingston 99U5471-001 | 4 GB DDR3 1333 MHz 2 x 2 GB, CL 9-9-9-24-1TASint technology C1RETSR4HGF |
| Graphics | Radeon HD 6620G (Integrated)444 MHz GPU, Shared DDR3 at 667 MHzRadeon HD 6630M444 MHz GPU, Shared DDR3 at 667 MHz(Considered Radeon HD 6690G2when in Dual Graphics mode) | Radeon HD 5570underclocked to A8-3500M specifications:444 MHz GPU, 1 GB DDR3 at 667 MHz | Intel HD Graphics 3000650 MHz GPU, Shared DDR3 at 667 MHz |
| Hard Drive | Hitachi Travelstar 250 GB 7200 RPM, 16 MB Cache, SATA 3Gb/s | Western Digital Caviar Blue 1 TB 7200 RPM, 32 MB Cache, SATA 3Gb/s | Western Digital Scorpio Black 500 GB 7200 RPM, 16MB MB Cache, SATA 3Gb/s |
| Software and Drivers | |||
| Operating System | Microsoft Windows 7 x64 | ||
| DirectX version | DirectX 11 | ||
| Graphics Drivers | Intel Core i5-2520M Test System:: Intel Graphics Driver 8.15.10.2361AMD Llano A8-3500M Test System: AMD Catalyst 11.6 BETAAMD Phenom II X4 Test System: AMD Catalyst 11.5 |
| Benchmark Configuration | |
|---|---|
| 3D Games | |
| Metro 2033 | Version 1.0.0.1, DirectX 9 and 11, benchmark tool, Low Detail, No AA, 4x AF, advanced physX disabled, tessellation disabled, DOF disabled |
| Crysis 2 | Version 1.5, FRAPS run High Settings, No AA, No AF |
| H.A.W.X. 2 | Version 1.0.1, DirectX 9 and 10/11, Highest Settings, tessellation Off, In-game benchmark |
| F1 2010 | Version 1.1.1.129, DirectX 11, in-game benchmark Medium Detail Preset |
| Just Cause 2 | Version 1.0.0.2, DirectX 10, Concrete Jungle Benchmark Medium Details, textures High, Object Low, 16x AFHigh res shadows, point light specular, SSAO, bokeh Filter & GPU Water Simulation off |
| StarCraft 2 | Version: 2.1.2.2105, High DetailsTom's Hardware Guide Benchmark V2 |
| Audio Benchmarks and Settings | |
| Benchmark | Details |
| iTunes | Version: 10.0.1.1, 64-bit Audio CD ("Terminator II" SE), 53 min., Convert to AAC audio 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) |
| Video Benchmarks and Settings | |
| Benchmark | Details |
| HandBrake CLI | Version: 0.94Video: Big Buck Bunny (720x480, 23.972 frames) 5 Minutes, Audio: Dolby Digital, 48000 Hz, Six-Channel, English, to Video: AVC Audio: AC3 Audio2: AAC (High Profile) |
| MainConcept Reference v2 | Version: 2.0.0.1555 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 |
| Application Benchmarks and Settings | |
| Benchmark | Details |
| WinRAR | Version 4.0 Beta 4 RAR, Syntax "winrar a -r -m3", Benchmark: 2010-THG-Workload |
| WinZip 14 | Version 14.0 Pro (8652) WinZIP Commandline Version 3, ZIPX, Syntax "-a -ez -p -r", Benchmark: 2010-THG-Workload |
| 7-Zip | Version 9.2LZMA2, Syntax "a -t7z -r -m0=LZMA2 -mx=5", Benchmark: 2010-THG-Workload |
| Autodesk 3ds Max 2010 | Version: 10 x64, Rendering Space Flyby Mentalray (SPECapc_3dsmax9)Frame: 248, Resolution: 1440 x 1080 |
| Adobe Premiere Pro CS5 | Video length 2min 21s, Export to H.264 Blu-raySource 960x720, Output 1280x720 |
| Adobe After Effects CS5 | Create Video which includes 3 StreamsFrames: 210, Render Multiple Frames Simultaneously: on |
| Cinebench | Version 11.5 Build CB25720DEMOCPU and OpenGL tests |
| Blender | Version: 2.54 beta Syntax blender -b thg.blend -f 1, Resolution: 1920x1080, Anti-Aliasing: 8x, Render: THG.blend frame 1 |
| Adobe Photoshop CS 5 (64-Bit) | Version: 11 Filtering a 16 MB TIF (15000x7266), Filters:, Radial Blur (Amount: 10, Method: zoom, Quality: good) Shape Blur (Radius: 46 px; custom shape: Trademark sysmbol) Median (Radius: 1px) Polar Coordinates (Rectangular to Polar) |
| ABBYY Finereader | Version: 10 Professional Build (10.0.102.82) Read PDF save to Doc, Source: Political Economy (J. Broadhurst 1842) 111 Pages |
| Synthetic Benchmarks and Settings | |
| Benchmark | Details |
| PCMark Vantage | Version: 1.0.2.0 Patch 1901 |
| 3DMark 11 | Version 1.0.1 |
| SiSoftware Sandra 2011 | Version: 2010.1.16.10 Processor Arithmetic, Multimedia, Cryptography, Memory Bandwith, GPGPU/GPCPU Processing |
