AMD Barcelona = Phenom

Post by **NeilBlanchard** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 6:41 pm

Greetings,

AMD is readying their next generation CPU; the quad core Barcelona:
AnandTech article
Anand Tech has a very detailed article full of technical detail. Will it be more competitive?

J. Sparrow · Post by **J. Sparrow** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 7:59 am

There are rumors that the K10 has showed up on the SETI@Home leaderboard as an "Unknown Athlon/Opteron processor"

It might be a hoax, though.

ronrem · Post by **ronrem** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 10:20 am

I'm only superficially able to follow the described technologies-but it appears there are a dozen or so major upgrades to the architecture,the chip's strategy and priorities,to cache and memory use and speed,plus eliminating some bottlenecks,expanding to 4 cores and adding a big L3 cache. Anand implies AMD kept some of the K8's best stuff,while responding to techniques used on the Intel Core chips wherever such tweaks had a benefit. On top of all...it's 45nm. Most of what we've been dealing with are the 90nm chips,as the 65 nm Brisbanes are very new,and,I suspect,a bit rushed to market,with the followup 65nm chips apt to be somewhat better. The Barcelona,however...will be just awesome,probably far beyond my needs (not like I can move the mouse 10x faster) but it will provoke the gamer hardcore into another round of upgrades.

The real sweet part for some of us will be the trickle-down..some sort of Super Sempron that's cooler (quieter) than the 2800 Palermo,yet is a Dual core performing like a X2 4000....at a price even I can spend.

Spare Tire · Post by **Spare Tire** » Wed Mar 07, 2007 12:33 pm

Are they going to keep the same mounting bracket than the AM2? I hope so. I also wonder if peynryn will keep the same mounting bracket. I understand they sometimes need to change socket for pincount and such but there are lots of good heatsinks we'll have to be throwing out because they change the mounting bracket.
I'm thinking of switching back to AMD. Intel just plain don't have any good mATX boards.

Tzupy · Post by **Tzupy** » Sun Mar 11, 2007 9:21 am

AFAIK AMD will try to do the 45 nm transition in 2008. They may have working samples at 45 nm, but full production is different.
[quote]Barcelona is AMD's first quad-core processor, featuring four cores on a single 65 nm die.[/quote]
It's going to be fast for servers, as I said here: viewtopic.php?t=37755&sid=bd16a3753d244 ... 4f219f5a46

Redzo · Post by **Redzo** » Sun Mar 11, 2007 12:41 pm

Don't expect any availabity in 2008 though. They will have small scale production going on sure, but big OEM will swallow everything first 2-3 months. So better prediction on barcelona would be 2009

MC FLMJIG · Post by **MC FLMJIG** » Sun Mar 11, 2007 1:38 pm

AM2+ is around the corner but it should be the same "bracket".

Next year we will have ANOTHER socket change... sigh for DDR3

~El~Jefe~ · Post by **~El~Jefe~** » Sun Mar 11, 2007 11:53 pm

barcelona is the opteron and some sort of star name is the desktop one.

K10 the series is. It will be comming out this fall/winter 2007. socket am2 compatible. there will be a 1207 socket (i think i got that number right) and a pin count equal and compatible for am2. I think the 1207 has more HT lanes and would only be of use on a quad board. All of it is on 65nm. brisbane is the first attempt at mass producing before K10.

I forget what the socket is for ddr3. I am going to upgrade when it goes 1207 K10 and ddr3. I dont see the need for this ddr2 era of computing just yet.....

this thing better wax the C2D 6600 or im going to be pissed! Intel prices for their new series with their DRM infection feature will put a lot of pressure on AMD for a stronger chip....

Spare Tire · Post by **Spare Tire** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 8:05 am

Can anyone anticipate DDR3 pricing?

Redzo · Post by **Redzo** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 10:08 am

~El~Jefe~ wrote: this thing better wax the C2D 6600 or im going to be pissed! Intel prices for their new series with their DRM infection feature will put a lot of pressure on AMD for a stronger chip....

Name of their desktop chip is Altair. And i remember reading something about 20-30% performance increase compered to todays AMDs offerings. If that is true than barcelona/altair will be just hair faster then todays conroe chips.

Tzupy · Post by **Tzupy** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 3:39 am

I'm not sure if it's true, but it's plausible:
http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=38213

Post by **NeilBlanchard** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 3:49 am

Hello,

So, they are fairly high power, then.

65-120watts, depending on the speed, and on the core. Are all these 0.45 micron?

Tzupy · Post by **Tzupy** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 4:21 am

For a quad-core of such performance it's not bad. The dual-cores are supposed to be at least as fast clock-per-clock as C2D, which makes the 2.9 GHz Kuma interesting.
My only complaint about my C2D is the x87 performance, which is 5-10% lower than AMDs, but I'll switch as much code as possible to SSE2.
The Agena quad-cores could end upto 40% faster than Intel's (at the same clock), mainly because of the on-die communication, if your software can take advantage of 4 cores.
But why would you buy a quad-core if you don't really need 4 cores? Just for bragging rights?
New mobos would be needed, with support for HT3 and PCI-E2. Oh, and they are 65 nm. AMD needs another year to shrink those to 45 nm.

MC FLMJIG · Post by **MC FLMJIG** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 11:02 am

In less than a year from now with Vista nad new games taking advantage of dual cores it will be nice. Especially if what is being said is true. $266 for a Quad 6600 C2D!!!

Post by **NeilBlanchard** » Tue Mar 27, 2007 7:10 am

Hello,

Another article with lots of information on AMD's Barcelona:

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1 ... 644,00.asp

Tzupy · Post by **Tzupy** » Thu Mar 29, 2007 5:18 am

NEW info on Barcelona:
http://www.anandtech.com/tradeshows/sho ... i=2956&p=5

Saribro · Post by **Saribro** » Thu Mar 29, 2007 6:09 am

Besides the fountain, I fail to find any new info in that article.

~El~Jefe~ · Post by **~El~Jefe~** » Fri Mar 30, 2007 3:51 pm

Redzo wrote:Don't expect any availabity in 2008 though. They will have small scale production going on sure, but big OEM will swallow everything first 2-3 months. So better prediction on barcelona would be 2009

barcelona will be out around september or maybe this summer...

Something to note about something I have noticed:

No one is making games designed for quad core. THey arent even doing it for the ps3 where lemming parents will gleefully waste 60 dollars a game on.

I see improvements now for dual core, but a single core cranked still majorly contends with any dual core. I am all for quad cores if only we had a real operating system that could use 2 cores properly. Vista still cannot and it was developed during the years when single core was the common chip.

According to M$, the NEXT os they are making or started a while ago is the real multicore, multithreaded environment.

sad, isnt it. (left out the question mark on purpose)

spookmineer · Post by **spookmineer** » Fri Mar 30, 2007 4:28 pm

I have given up on release dates. The best guess is "when it's ready".
Loads of vaporware around that keep on postponing release dates, and hardware release dates getting pushed back as well (R600).

Very tricky to state "hardware X will be released at date Y".
Even the specs are wrong most of the time...

hvengel · Post by **hvengel** » Fri Mar 30, 2007 8:10 pm

~El~Jefe~ wrote:
Redzo wrote:Don't expect any availabity in 2008 though. They will have small scale production going on sure, but big OEM will swallow everything first 2-3 months. So better prediction on barcelona would be 2009
barcelona will be out around september or maybe this summer...

Something to note about something I have noticed:

No one is making games designed for quad core. THey arent even doing it for the ps3 where lemming parents will gleefully waste 60 dollars a game on.

I see improvements now for dual core, but a single core cranked still majorly contends with any dual core. I am all for quad cores if only we had a real operating system that could use 2 cores properly. Vista still cannot and it was developed during the years when single core was the common chip.

According to M$, the NEXT os they are making or started a while ago is the real multicore, multithreaded environment.

sad, isnt it. (left out the question mark on purpose)

Funny my OS will support up to 128 cores/CPUs. So I think we do have operating system support for multiple cores/CPUs just perhaps not from Microsoft.

JazzJackRabbit · Post by **JazzJackRabbit** » Sat Apr 07, 2007 11:00 am

hvengel wrote:Funny my OS will support up to 128 cores/CPUs. So I think we do have operating system support for multiple cores/CPUs just perhaps not from Microsoft.

I find it funny that you find it funny. If you want to take advantage of multiple cores/CPUs both OS and Application you're running must support multithreading. El-Jeffe was talking about single application supporting multithreading, not multiple applications running alongside, if that particular application does not support multithreading it's going to run in one thread only on one CPU.

austinbike · Post by **austinbike** » Sun Apr 08, 2007 6:28 pm

Barcelona will be available mid year.

Same power and thermals as existing dual cores. Same heat sinks, same sockets, same memory, and in probably 95% of the cases, same system boards.

It will fit in the existing 1207 socket (2-way, 4-way, 8-way). The 1-way will come out later and that will fi in the existing AM2 sockets.

They will be 65nm and have a shared L3 cache for all 4 cores; each individual core will have it own L2 cache as well.

They have showed benchmarks that put it about 40% faster than clovertown in some workloads.

There are supposedly some new power management features that make it even more power efficient than the current generation of Opteron.

~El~Jefe~ · Post by **~El~Jefe~** » Mon Apr 09, 2007 7:34 pm

yeah, some sort of ability to clock down one core vs the others.

however, I read that intel will be doing that plus having variable voltage on each core. Still, it will help what AMD is doing as the real power usage comes from 2x speed of the core vs .3 volt difference at idle.

dragmor · Post by **dragmor** » Mon Apr 09, 2007 10:38 pm

~El~Jefe~ wrote:yeah, some sort of ability to clock down one core vs the others.

however, I read that intel will be doing that plus having variable voltage on each core. Still, it will help what AMD is doing as the real power usage comes from 2x speed of the core vs .3 volt difference at idle.

From what I've read, Barcelona has the CPUs and the north bridge (memory controller, ht links, etc) on separate power planes (this will only work if youâ€™re using an AM2+ board). This should help AMD clock the CPUs higher as allot of the problems were caused by the MC and CPU sharing the same voltage. It can also clock the cores independently.

The CPU after Barcelona will also include separate power planes for each CPU core. But this will require socket AM3.

You should be able to plug an AM3 CPU into one of todayâ€™s AM2 boards and have it work, however you would lose the power saving technology and be limited to a lower HTT speed.

austinbike · Post by **austinbike** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 4:56 am

Barcelona does not use the AM2 socket, only the 1207.

~El~Jefe~ · Post by **~El~Jefe~** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 6:16 pm

there will be a barcelona version that plugs into a am2 vanilla socket. It wont be called a barcelona, I believe it is a agena.

There is also another chip, a dual core version, that will have full barcelona power yet only 2 cores. this will be the contender to C2D and will be out in like October.

All of this will be a sickness in a can setup

I love amd boards. always 70 dollars gets you full functions, full speed, every little gimick you would want and stability. intel sux for boards and now sucks for price to performance.

has anyone seen the new cuts? now officially the same dollars you spend in AMD am2 socket you will get more gaming and general performance over C2D. It took me a bit to believe it, but its true as of this week. Plus, their boards are 120 dollars cheaper. (intel needs snazy boards and chipsets cuz it doesnt have an on die mem controller.)

austinbike · Post by **austinbike** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 6:55 pm

~El~Jefe~ wrote:there will be a barcelona version that plugs into a am2 vanilla socket. It wont be called a barcelona, I believe it is a agena.

It will be budapest, not agena: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AMD_K8L

ryboto · Post by **ryboto** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 7:14 pm

dragmor wrote: The CPU after Barcelona will also include separate power planes for each CPU core. But this will require socket AM3.

Can you post a link for this? Everything I've read only suggests that it can clock individual cores independently, but that they're all on the same power lane, so they all get the same voltage. Maybe by the time AM3 is around they'll have core revisions that do have separate lanes for power, but Barcelona, as far as I knew can only adjust individual core clock speeds.

dragmor · Post by **dragmor** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 8:07 pm

ryboto wrote:
dragmor wrote:The CPU after Barcelona will also include separate power planes for each CPU core. But this will require socket AM3.
Can you post a link for this? Everything I've read only suggests that it can clock individual cores independently, but that they're all on the same power lane, so they all get the same voltage. Maybe by the time AM3 is around they'll have core revisions that do have separate lanes for power, but Barcelona, as far as I knew can only adjust individual core clock speeds.

Yeah I meant Barcelona as the family, should have said K10. I cant find the article, but I think it was about AMDs post quad core plans or maybe their 45nm plans.

~El~Jefe~ · Post by **~El~Jefe~** » Thu Apr 12, 2007 11:02 pm

amd quad core will not have individual power planes. that is the only thing it wont have. it will have individual, halving ghz speeds on each core though. Intel's 2008 chip will have each core on its own voltage. I read all this on the inquirer a few weeks ago.

the 2nd generation of amd quad will not run on am2, so no worry about it having planes or not having planes.

I hate wikipedia. it is melting pot of crap where the majority influence a few nitwits who run the thing. It is so far away from being factual. GOogle just is paid off to make it do well, wouldnt exist if not that.

That link made me laugh just looking the link. K8L is a misnomer. K8L already existed and we bought them already. we are on the K9 with dual core AMD and I think above that currently. K10 is the barcelona series.

blech

"It was reported that the codename K8L actually referred to a low-power version of the K8 chip, later named Turion 64, and that K10 was the official internal codename for the microarchitecture.[3]"

It is reported ?????? um, thats a fact for a long time now. i hate this freakin website. useless info without a real academic review behind it.