ATi Mobility HD 6000 series Roadmap

What do you think? Which conclusion do you come to with 2 seconds of thinking about this? Well personally I think rebrand and the new architecture will only be available at the highest end. The HD5xxx rebranded are more than enough for any mid-level GPU.

The Zacate Fusion from AMD are not new at all. They combine old tech with old tech. Phenom II with HD5550 I believe rebranded to HD6310. The HD5xxx they chose for the Fusion atm are not very powerful. These are aimed at providing sufficient power but at great power saving for notebooks at least. That leaves little doubt in my mind that the HD6630M is likely a rebrand also, granted with some boosts to power efficiency and battery savings.

 

Official AMD roadmaps already confirm new GPU in the performance and mainstream class. They won't be Cayman level new arch but they will have similar improvements to what Barts saw to it's front end, tessellation, and SPU count.

Zacate is not based on the K8 architecture, it's uses brand new Bobcat arch for the CPU, Evergreen's VLIW5 arch for the GPU, and front end changes similar to Barts. Llano is Phenom/Evergreen based with some undisclosed improvements to both.

Bulldozer is also brand new CPU core arch.

 

Ouch, why so stingy all of a sudden?

If you look at the current naming scheme, it could be either one.
It is most likely another Madison rebrand, but a Whistler-based GPU is not out of the question.

Like Phinagle says, there will be mainstream offering based on the new architecture. So why would you rule out that this HD 6630M is based on the new Whistler chip?

 

I would tend to think it's a Whistler GPU. Since 6570 is a 5730M with GDDR5 support (making it a 5770M), there's nothing left to rebrand in the 66xx/67xx numbers imho. 5850/5870m should be rebranded as 6850/6870m. That leaves Whistler in between.

I'm really excited about the potential upcoming leap in mid-range mobile GPUs, since we saw some 6570M with GDDR5, I expect a lot from Whistler. That combined with Sandy Bridge would be awesome.

 

so just to be clear about it chances are verry slim that we wil get any kind of 4 way arch in the mobile sector

 

Yep almost zero.

 

How do you know
6570 can have GDDR5 and has a lower position in the 6000 serie??

 

Probably from the HD5830m, HD5730m, & HD5430m, though naming schemes can always be messed up...

 

That would be it. The 5650, 5730, and 5830 can't use GDDR5, but the 5470, 5750, and 5770 can.

 

I think the 5830M can use GDDR5 according to AMD's own specs, it's just that it's never been used in combination. The same held true for the 5770M which was actually just a 5730M with GDDR5, which is why we've never seen a 5770M in a laptop.

If the 6570 is to be frequently associated with fast GDDR5 then using DDR3 with Whistler chips would be stupid, resulting in possibly worse performances compared to lower chip.

 

HD5850m can use GDDR3 or GDDR5, however, the HD5830m is limited to GDDR3 only. We saw the HD5870m, so the HD5770m comparison isn't really 100% valid, IMO. But I may be missing your point

 

If 6570M comes with 128bit GDDR5 with 400 shaders (almost certain specs)
And the 6630M will be 128bit with GDDR3, than it will need a lot more shaders if it's faster than the 6570M.
I'm not sure if a 5770M GDDR5 wouldn't have been faster as a 5830M GDDR5. Maybe that's the reason why they didn't produce it.

 

Oh they produced it, just no OEM bothered equiping it. The same thing might just happen here, lol...

Reason being, the HD5830m and the HD5770m took the same amount of space on the PCB, and the GDDR5 would likely make the HD5770m more power hungry than the HD5830m, so....

 

Yea, but my 4830M (almost equal to 5830M) could have been much more faster if GDDR5 was used, talking about 40%...
I hope this time they don't make the same mistake.
GDDR3 can still be used, but not in highend..

 

I think the same. My pinkie tells me that if Whistler is indeed released, it can only be a spin-off from Turks, which is expected to be half Barts, so 480 or 560sp (half 960 or 1120). Even with the more efficient Northern Islands architecture, if crappy DDR3 is used the performance will be too similar to a 400sp 6570 using GDDR5, it'll be a waste.

 

Well, at the time, the main seperator for the HD4870--HD4850 was GDDR5 vs GDDR3, considering AMD spent a lot of their own resources working in concert with Samsung and Hyundai to get GDDR5 out the door (wonder why nVidia used a stupidly large 512bit GDDR3 bus instead of a 256bit GDDR5 bus?), and how the HD4850 was originally intended to compete vs the 8800gt....

Though this doesn't translate directly into the mobile market, the HD4870m was the highest end part with GDDR5, the HD4830m was supposed to be a lowerange part - and rightly so, considering how 8 GDDR5 chips (required for a 256bit bus) would add some 20-30W to the power draw and TDP (at the time).

 

But 4830 had already 160shaders less and had 128bit memory interface instead of 256.

 

oh... I see. It was the HD4770 core...

dang.... I guess they thought a HD4830m with GDDR5 would stomp out the HD4850m, lol...

 

HP (yes, that HP) is using GDDR5 in the 6570M on at least the dv7, so it's a very safe bet that other OEMs will follow suit.

 

AMD launches Radeon HD 6000M series, endows them with HD3D and EyeSpeed skills -- Engadget

 

The page on Radeon 6000M has been updated.

So it's confirmed, 6900M is a trimmed Barts Pro (6850), 6800M is a 5830/5850M rebrand with GDDR5 and slightly higher clock (or if you prefer, 5870M with lower clocks). 6600/6700M is a trimmed Turks with 480sp using GDDR5 or DDR3, expected to be a nice improvement in the mid-range mobile segment.

 

Can't wait to see the power requirements of this card. In another thread, someone posted a benchmark of the 6970M with a 920xm.

 

It's not trimmed at all, it a full 6850 core :

* 960 Stream Processing Units
* 48 Texture Units
* 128 Z/Stencil ROP Units
* 32 Color ROP Units

This is exactly as we expected.

 

Looks like we'll see a ~20% (6970M vs 5870M) improvement based on specs. That sounds nice, but it also means that it might have a tough time against a full GF114 with a high TDP. Should still be much cheaper, though.

 

Not bad. Was hoping for a 100W GPU but I never get what I want.

Seymour looks good for an entry level but I wonder how much difference there will be between Whislter/HD6600 and Madison/HD6500.

 

Wait, is there any info on the TDP of these cards?

 

Nothing official. Lower core and memory clocks than Mob. HD5870 lead me to think that the HD6900M's TDP won't reach as high as 100W though.

 

Who would have realistically expected AMD to push out a 100W card though? That's territory only nVidia is willing to tread for now. The market for such a card would be so small and I bet Dell had no interest in building the M17x-R3 around 100W and since they're one of the largest gaming ODM's around, it wouldn't make sense for AMD. Regardless, those of us with M17x and Clevo systems will be able to push these cards right back up near Barts XT clocks as long as we can overvolt them.

 

Depends on how they clock it. At the minimal clocks (580mhz core), it'll be around 20% faster than the 5870. 680mhz core would put it at 40-50% faster. The mobility 6950 would probably be at 580mhz while the 6970 would be somewhere in between 580-680 because 680 could be nearing 100w territory.

 

If a manufacturer creates another "hi-end" laptop using DDR3 and/or an underclocked GPU, i will be mega pissed! I returned 2 Envy 14s last year due to such shenanigans.

 

I don't consider the Envy 14 high end, far from it. It's just a good looking mid-range notebook. If you want high end of that size there were plenty. Clevo and Alienware both made 15" which were as powerful as you want from a single GPU system. Slightly bigger both Asus and MSI also had something. But HP Envy 14 is not nearly as powerful or "high end" as them. The cooling system in the Envy's just don't match up to the competition. Their MacBook Pro ripoff appearance says a lot IMO of who they were aiming for.

 

It also appears that they have removed any mention of "Dynamic SG" from all of the variants of the 6000M series, for rebranded and newer architechtures. This makes me worried that AMD was unable to come up with a Switchable graphics solution for the 6000M series to compete with Optimus.

Thoughts?

 

No switchable graphics? Ouch. I hope they DO have it.

 

I guess that when i said "hi-end", i was comparing it to the Acer 4820T, and other less expensive laptops that also had the 5650 or 5730 in it, which were not hamstrung as the Envy 14 was in this sense...

 

I assume that it will have manually switchable graphics, as the 5000 series did, but im talking about self-sensing automatic switching technology, like Optimus or Apple's implementation.

 

Dynamic SG might have to wait for the new 11.0 drivers.

Update:

http://techreport.com/discussions.x/20195

 

What I meant was it's a downclocked version of the 6850. But I guess it'll be easy to overclock to the same frequencies.

 

Btw, some weird stuff about the 6600/6700M specs. Half the texture units from 6970M (or Barts-Pro), 1/4 the ROPs ? I was pretty sure it'd be similar to Turks-Pro (desktop 66xx probably) which should be half Barts, but maybe I was wrong. Guess we'll have the answer soon.

 

Looks like a great upgrade. More SPUs, more texture units, more Zstencil and color ROPs, Almost twice the memory bandwidth, almost twice the antialiasing fillrate with nearly the same clock speed. Do want!

 

Yeah, Barts proved Cypress was poorly balalnced, since 320 fewer shaders and a 5% higher clock got within 7% (spitting range) of a HD5870 at almost all times. [edit: and slower memory clocks/400M fewer transistors]

Either way, I lightly hope this to come at least close to the GTX480m, if not better

 

480M? The only thing in question is by how much does it beat the 480M.

 

Damnit AMD! Get your act together! Your solution damn well better be superior to Optimus in every conceivable way!

Any idea when the 11.0 drivers are expected?

 

January 2011, as the name suggests.

 

So AMD does not have an Optimus-like solution but can implement it via drivers later? That means that Sandy Bridge is ready for AMD's solution but just waiting on the drivers?

 

It's up to the manufacturer, not Intel or AMD or Nvidia whether a laptop has switchable graphics. You'll just have to wait until the laptop models are released with specifications revealed.

There is no point in speculating when the news of new models will be announced in just a few weeks or less.

But I do know, that Gaming notebook series from Asus WILL NOT HAVE SWITCHABLE. Regardless if it's Nvidia or ATi.
- I suspect the same for MSI, could be wrong, just guessing.
- I suspect the same from Clevo.

For these companies I speculate and agree with them, switchable graphics on such high performance notebooks is not a priority or important considering how immobile these 17" notebooks are anyways.

But for notebook like Lenovo's 13" pretty sure I read the ATi equipped notebook does have switchable graphics.

 

Eurocom Upgrades the Panther 2.0 Mobile Workstation with HD 6970M CrossFire Graphics - Softpedia


The second HD6970M is only a $456 increase. Not terrible as far as mobile GPU pricing goes.

 

If the performance of the card is what it's expected to be, then that's really good pricing (though I'm sure there will be a markup on buying the card alone). It could still be cheaper than a GTX 470M...

 

It's eurocom though, might still not be available.

 

I'm interested in an upper midrange graphics card in my next laptop - what ATI GPUs should on paper perform around the GT555m level (again this is also new - so on paper).

 

The Radeon 6770M probably gets quite similar all-around performances. You'll want the GDDR5 version in both cases if available, as it makes a substantial difference.