New information on the heterogeneous AMD Bristol Ridge platform

The Advanced Micro Devices company directs finishing touches at the new unified platform using the AM4 socket. In a new form factor not only powerful processors without the integrated graphics Summit Ridge, but also heterogeneous chips of the class APU code-named Bristol Ridge will be issued. The official debut of a new platform has to take place on Computex Taipei 2016. So far it isn't a lot of information on new heterogeneous AMD processors, but something slowly leaks to worldwide network.

So, the Geekbench resource has published some data on productivity and characteristics of Bristol Ridge. Something is known even of the Gardenia platform, in the table below it goes the first column. She is used by the company for testing of the built-in systems for compatibility with Android ecosystem. The new reference motherboard with the AM4 socket carries the name Myrtle. This time the company has decided to take names from botany, but some fans of Joanne Rowling can be also glad, the Crybaby Mirtl — one of important characters of the saga about Harry Potter.

There is a probability that payments for Bristol Ridge though will use the unified AM4 socket, but will get support to promptly outdate memory of DDR3 instead of the new DDR4 standard though the possibility of transition to DDR4 and isn't excluded completely. Identification codes of new processors look as "AuthenticAMD Family 21 Model 101 Stepping 1", so all of them use Carrizo kernels, but not Zen as the Carrizo identifier also gives "Family 21 Model 96 Stepping 1". Either this updating of the existing APU series, or the new Carrizo models with support of DDR4. Volumes Kesha the same so it is obviously not enough changes in new chips.

The most curious in novelties — low frequencies that is uncharacteristic for solutions of AMD. Since the moment of the announcement of architecture of Bulldozer clock frequencies of AMD chips were torn up and have reached 5 GHz, and here we see 2 GHz at best and that at binuclear model. There is also a fifth processor which is also noticed by Geekbench which is allocated with something similar to analog of the Intel Hyper-Threading technology. Most likely, it is after all not Zen as Windows sees Bulldozer modules as two physical kernels now, but not as one that has caused earlier a wave of protests among owners of AMD processors. There are no doubts as Zen assumes use of 512 Kb Kesha on a kernel that in a tetracyclic configuration looks as 4 × 512 Kb, but not 1 MB on each two modules; besides the new architecture means use Kesha of the third level.

As for productivity, "unknown AMD processors" on a payment of Myrtle show very good result in the class, being inferior in the one-line test to Intel Core i5-6200U, but in multiline it is essential him advancing. The table of productivity published by foreign colleagues gives a quite good idea of what platforms should be avoided if you wish to receive the maximum productivity at the minimum cost. Among the mobile decisions available today, the best choice on the basis of AMD FX-9800P still is. On the first of June, 2016 we learn about AMD novelties more — on Computex AMD will present not only new discrete graphics of Polaris, but also will in detail tell about solutions of Summit Ridge and Bristol Ridge.