Tag: Kabini

AMD updates roadmap, reveals new delays

Posted on August 27, 2013 by - News, Products

AMD, SunnyvaleAMD has a new roadmap which sheds more light on upcoming Volcanic Islands GPUs, as well as Kaveri and Kabini based product releases, and delays.

New GPUs are coming soon. AMD will hold a launch event in roughly a month and it is widely expected to launch the new Hawaii card at the event, which will be held – in Hawaii. AMD has already announced that Kaveri products will hit the channel in mid-February 2014. They will be joined by new Kabini SKUs later on, reports Digitimes.

The new Kabini chips will enter mass production in February and they will be announced in March. It appears that this batch will be focused on desktops and big notebooks, as most of them will be quad cores with a 25W TDP. The first desktop Kabini parts were supposed to launch in the second half of 2013, but now it appears they have been pushed back to March. Last week we reported that Kabini is struggling with limited availability and the delay explains it, at least on the desktop front.

Kabini’s successor, Beema, has also been delayed. It was supposed to launch in March 2014, but now it seems it will launch in the second half of 2014 or maybe even in early 2015, which is very bad news indeed.

According to the roadmap, AMD’s FM1 and AM3 sockets will be phased out by the end of the year. In 2014 AM3+ will account for 30 percent of AMD’s desktop processor shipments, while FM2/FM2+ will account for the remaining 70 percent. Kabini will use ST3 and FS1B sockets.

Looking ahead to 2015, AMD should release Carrizo APUs based on the new Excavator architecture and Nolan should replace Beema in the low end. However, delays are possible and when it comes to AMD they are the norm, not an exception.

AMD Jaguar products still thin on ground

Posted on August 23, 2013 by - News, Products

jaguar-peltIn late May AMD officially launched its first Jaguar-based APUs. Kabini was supposed to end up in all sorts of products, from cheap and cheerful notebooks, to AIOs and traditional desktops.

Temash is an even more frugal version of the chip, so it was intended for ultraportables, hybrids and similar form factors. Both chips arrived with much fanfare and got a lot of praise from the tech press. They are the most interesting consumer products to come out of AMD in 2013.

However, it’s been exactly three months since the launch and there really aren’t that many actual products to buy. There are some Jaguar-based notebooks and desktops in EMEA and US, but even they are available in a handful of shops, in rather limited numbers. The Acer Aspire V5, HP Pavilion Sleekbook TouchSmart 11, Samsung ATIV Book 9 Lite are Temash powered ultraportables and they are readily available in most European markets, albeit in a limited number of shops. So far they appear to be the only Temash notebooks in stock in Europe.

It is even worse with Kabini. There’s the Lenovo Thinkpad E145 in two SKUs, Toshiba Satellite C70/C75 and a huge Packard Bell 17-incher, which is practically the only Kabini notebook available on the continent, at least the only one to be found in price search engines. It’s only available in two Austrian shops, which is still better than the Lenovo and Toshiba, as nobody appears to have them in stock at the moment.

Then there’s a couple of Acer SFF desktops and a Packard Bell all-in-one, and that’s about it. There’s also not a single mini-ITX board yet, which is bad news for HTPC enthusiasts and tinkerers. It also may indicate that the first batches of Kabini chips are destined solely for OEMs, but we can only speculate.

In any case three months into the launch AMD’s most promising chip of the year is very hard to come by. This is very bad news for AMD. Kabini had the potential to wipe the floor with Intel’s obsolete 32nm Atoms and it should have enjoyed a few months on the market before Intel rolls out new 22nm Bay Trail parts. Now it seems this won’t be the case. The Bay Trail launch is just a few weeks away and it is becoming apparent that AMD failed to capitalize on its lead.

AMD informed us that is has product in stock in the US and EMEA. However, volumes and the number of actual design wins remain a concern. Jaguar is an excellent product with lots of potential, but with the PC market in shambles, it might struggle to gain traction and get plenty of design wins, as vendors and disties are still sitting on heaps of unsold Cedarview and Brazos products.

Channel cautious on Ivy Bridge notebooks

Posted on August 6, 2013 by - News

Intel-logoSome channel retailers are expected to switch away from Ivy Bridge based notebooks and back to the classic desktop, on the back of weak industry demand.

Plenty of channel retailers, according to Digitimes, are struggling getting rid of their Ivy Bridge notebook interviews and are taking a cautious approach to placing new orders for the classic back to school period of September and October. This is traditionally serves as a boost for notebook sales, but the economic outlook is having varied depressive effects on the industry in general.

Intel Haswell desktops could account for as much as 30 percent of all desktop shipments for the third quarter, above the 10-20 percent in notebooks, so Digitimes believes channel retailers are pinning their hopes on the former.

Ivy Bridge inventories, still reportedly high, will be the main focus for the channel – so Haswell models with touchscreen features may not be promoted until the beginning of 2014.

If correct, a way to read this is Ivy Bridge PC prices could be knocked down for the back to school period, and almost certainly will become cheaper when efforts are concentrated on Haswell next year.

Cash strapped consumers and cautious businesses may not want to upgrade to the highest end gear either, save enthusiast communities. As a result, there will be an effort to popularise low end gear, with cheaper kit coming out like Atoms in Q3 and more affordable Kabini laptops.