Register Hardware

Original URL: http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2007/06/25/amd_45nm_cpus/

AMD to roll out 45nm Phenoms, Semprons H2 '08?

By Tony Smith
Published Monday 25th June 2007 10:00 GMT

AMD looks set to introduce Socket AM3 processors in the second half of 2008, reports coming out of Asia suggest. Sooner, though, it will begin phasing out single-core Athlon-branded chips, the moles also allege.

AMD currently offers four 90nm, one-core Athlon 64 CPUs: the 3200+, 3500+, 3800+ and 4000+, along with "energy efficient" versions of the 3500+ and 3800+, both fabbed at 65nm. Chinese-language site HKEPC claims (http://www.hkepc.com/bbs/news.php?tid=813172) the 65nm parts are no longer being offered to customers, while the 90nm chips are in very short supply.

In their place, it's said, AMD will release a raft of 45W Semprons using the chip maker's new numbering scheme: the 1.9GHz LE-1100, the 2GHz LE-1150, the 2.1GHz LE-1200, the 2.2GHz LE-1250 and the 2.3GHz LE-1300. All but the first two have 512KB of L2 cache the LE-1100 and LE-1150 have 256KB-sized caches.

Single-core Sempron and Athlon chips are expected to become up to 15 per cent cheaper (http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2007/06/06/amd_price_cuts_coming/) early in July, AMD has already indicated.

The Sempron line's next update will apparently come in H1 2008 with the arrival of 'Spica', a single-core, 512KB L2, HyperTransport 3, Socket AM2+ generation of chips fabbed at 65nm.

During the latter half of next year, AMD will introduce 'Sargas', the reports claim, which introduces Socket AM3 and the ability to use DDR 3 memory to the Sempron series.

The Socket AM3 chips - said to be compatible with Socket AM2+ motherboards - will all be fabbed at 45nm, and we should expect versions for the dual-core Phenom X2 - 'Regor' and 'Propus' - and for the quad-core Phenom X4 and FX - 'Deneb' and 'Deneb FX', the latter incorporating Socket 1207+ backward compatibility.

The Denebs and Propus all feature shared L3 cache as per their upcoming 65nm equivlents: respectivelt, 'Agena FX', 'Agena' and 'Kuma', many of which are now expected to appear later than previously anticipated (http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2007/06/22/amd_phenom_xmas/).