The Official Kaveri Review Thread (A10-7850K, etc)

[Aikouka]

The 45W part looks like an interesting HTPC CPU, but that's really only half the story. I've considered AMD in the past for building a HTPC, but the biggest problem has been the lack of motherboard selection. As of right now, Newegg has 2 Mini-ITX FM2+ boards.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Looks like Never Settle single card frame pacing issues, or is it just AMD in Dota 2?

 

[Gloomy]

Looks like Never Settle single card frame pacing issues, or is it just AMD in Dota 2?

By extending frametimes by up to 700%, AMD lets you enjoy your frames up to 700% more.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

AMD fixed their seismometer driver, perhaps this driver doesn't support the 7850k as far as driver knowing it needs to apply it?

 

[blackened23]

Looks like Never Settle single card frame pacing issues, or is it just AMD in Dota 2?

If frame pacing is that bad with the APU alone, gotta wonder how bad asymetric crossfire will be. It'll probably look like a 9.0 richter scale earthquake from start to finish.

I guess one can make the argument now that intel's iGPU is smoother even if the frames are slightly lower on a HD4000. Wouldn't be surprising. I think tomshardware should do some investigative reporting on this.

 

[Gloomy]

The best part about that graph is that the author didn't say anything about it.

Like, it looks so out there that he was struck dumb while writing the review.

 

[inf64]

It's only that one game title in the review that shows the anomaly and the drivers are still not the best ones for Kaveri.

 

[Homeles]

It's only that one game title in the review that shows the anomaly and the drivers are still not the best ones for Kaveri.

Shh, stop spoiling our fun. :awe:

 

[9enesis]

anyone know is mantle out yet?

 

[mrmt]

anyone know is mantle out yet?

No, still MIA.

 

[NTMBK]

Tech Report showed very good frame latency graphs for Kaveri, the best of any it tested. If you want to talk about seismograph, look at the mess that is Haswell on BF4:

And compare it to Kaveri:

The consistency of Kaveri's frametimes was the main bright spot in its reviews, frankly. DOTA2 looks like the odd one out.

 

[Ancalagon44]

It looks like GloFo's terrible 28nm process is hamstringing this thing. I mean, maybe that is to be expected with a change to a bulk process, but still, it makes this thing completely pointless. There are cases where a Phenom II X4 beats the 7850k! That should not be happening. 28nm vs 45nm, higher clockspeeds, and increased IPC over Faildozer.

If they didnt have a clockspeed regression, this would be a decent product. As it is, I can see absolutely zero reason to wait for this thing, for those who want an HTPC.

 

[parvadomus]

SR is what BD should have been from start, a 6-core SR would have been an excellent match for a 2500K/2600K. Now I dont know, it just dissapointed, I was expecting more.
The only nice part is the 45/65watt one, it showed a nice increase in performance/watt. Dont know what happened with the 7850K, its barely any better than 6800K.
Anyways, Kaveri looks much better for laptops than previous gen.

 

[Fjodor2001]

The one thing I take for this is that desktop CPUs are now "completed". When looking at what's on the horizon they will simply not provide much more performance going forward.

Both Intel and AMD are bringing us such minuscule performance increases from one generation to the next that it is pointless to upgrade your desktop PC. We're heading towards 10 year upgrade cycles. And no, I'm not bitter...

 

[Vesku]

Only the 45/65W A8 looks interesting, perhaps mini-ITX motherboard selection will increase.

A10s are priced too close to Intel i3+dGPU or quad core + iGP, imo.

Edit: Oh, and all-in-one monitor PCs which are growing somewhat popular. 45/65W TDP Kaveri actually has a lot of potential if AMD can start convincing OEMs to make products around it. The main challenge AMD has had for ages now.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

The consistency of Kaveri's frametimes was the main bright spot in its reviews, frankly. DOTA2 looks like the odd one out.

Perhaps it affects all GCN chips, since the single card pacing is a per game fix?

Pity its, Dota 2 since that's one of the few games where an underpowered and overpriced APU might actually see some use.

 

[Phynaz]

Can I quote on you on that? :awe:

Lol, freely!

 

[el etro]

Techreport is even more fun. Only 45W/65W CPUs to show the great benefit over Richland T models. And Kaveri naturally gets faster memory.

But the improvement on the 45W TDP range is outstanding.

 

[ShintaiDK]

But the improvement on the 45W TDP range is outstanding.

Not so much when you check the actual powerconsumption.

Richland T models are 45W...

Seems AMD got creative again with the TDP numbers.

 

[Erenhardt]

Dual Graphics really work?

Colour me surprised!

Even on richland?! Looks like I've missed something.

 

[Soulkeeper]

I was hoping for more CPU performance

Nice surprise on the transistor density with 28nm ... possibly good news should they create a 4 module design.

 

[Vesku]

Not so much when you check the actual powerconsumption.

Richland T models are 45W...

Seems AMD got creative again with the TDP numbers.

The A8-7600 has much better graphics performance, imo better balanced product.

Even on that CPU driven task the A8-7600 does complete the task faster and more efficiently than the Richland T series:

http://techreport.com/review/25908/amd-a8-7600-kaveri-processor-reviewed/12

A8-7600 being actually for sale in retail is an improvement as well.

 

[SPBHM]

Not so much when you check the actual powerconsumption.

Richland T models are 45W...

Seems AMD got creative again with the TDP numbers.

the difference between 45 and 65w mode looks ok, in any case, this power numbers are not at all bad, pretty good for the performance considering it's from AMD, I think specially the gaming power numbers are nice for the performance,

I quite like the 7600, use some cheap 1600 memory + A78 $60 MB and it's a good option for a cheap/low power light gaming PC

 

[StinkyPinky]

Why would anyone buy these things? They're terrible. Yeah, so they have "good" IGP performance but at a massive sacrifice with awful CPU performance. They're 5 years behind Intel now with CPU performance.

If you're a super budget gamer you're better off getting some Pentium CPU and and a mid range dedicated video card.

Very disappointing. I really want AMD to succeed but they seem lost.

 

[AtenRa]

Not so much when you check the actual powerconsumption.

What you show is not power consumption but as the title of the graph says Peak Power Draw.
Bellow is the power consumption for the x264 Benchmark Run.

Richland T models are 45W...

Seems AMD got creative again with the TDP numbers.

The one got creative here is you misleading people quoting Peak power draw as actual Power Consumption.

45W TDP Kaveri A8-7600 uses 8% less energy than 45W Richland A10-6700T to finish the same work. :whiste: