*HP dv6z AMD Llano (6XXX series) Owners Lounge*

That's been kind of the problem all along. I scour the web frequently for information about Trinity and the information seems either outdated, conflicting, incomplete, or incomparable to existing benchmarks due to configuration.

For example, it's completely unfair to compare Trinity APU alone to Intel processors and a discrete GPU, but it seems people do it all the time online, as if they expect that an on-die solution should be competitive with a discrete solution, which most mid-to-expert users realize is poppycock. Benchmarks won't be fair until both systems are configured to work their best properly, with functioning drivers. Trinity plus dGPU in CrossfireX config vs Intel plus dGPU is the only fair combination when factoring in dGPU performance...which is "real world" usage for someone looking for top mobile performance.

As far as CPU/GPU integrated competition, on-die vs on-die is only fair, but it's not indicative of real-world performance among mid-to-high-end mobile solutions, because that's not intended performance use because the dGPU was intended to be used for performance (budget, yes, performance, no) and even THAT'S incomplete if you don't factor in "bang-for-buck". If my latest-model budget AMD laptop satisfactorily performs at 2/3 of someone else's latest model budget Intel laptop, and my laptop costs 1/2 to 2/3 of theirs, then I win hands down. Why? Because I paid less and I'm happy with the performance.

 

Still not enough info (no APU+dGPU), but more than I've seen elsewhere...

AMD A10-4600M Review: Mobile Trinity Gets Tested : AMD?s Next APU: Trinity

 

"All of these IGPs are relatively wimpy graphics solutions, so you really want the best one possible. That's one of the reasons we liked Llano, and Trinity gives us no reason to change our tune. Yes, Ivy Bridge's IGP is much improved, but Trinity's is enough better to erase any questions of supremacy on that front."

What I liked about this review is that enough apples-to-apples info was given for Sandy, Ivy, Llano, and Trinity

AMD's A10-4600M 'Trinity' APU - The Tech Report - Page 1

 

Anandtech, as usual, is not likely to come out and say "Trinity is a good thing" as much as they take a "wait and see" attitude when an AMD product looks to be good.

That being said, here's a link to some more benchmarks, but you have to ignore the Intel CPU+GPU combinations which Anandtech included, and isn't fair for these kinds of tests. Just having them included makes AMD look lesser on an initial visual basis alone.

Combining these results from previous results, it does look to be that, in a very few games, Trinity doesn't score quite as well as it should, but this is likely to be caused by drivers/patches for that particular game (e.g. Arkham City), and not a superior HD4000 hardware issue, since HD4000 lags in all but a couple of games.

Also needing to be considered, in addition to drivers/patches for games, is also the fact that it is quite likely that Trinity's CPU performance will improve with the right BD/PD OS drivers for Windows 7, and the release of Windows 8 (which is supposed to already have them written in.)

AnandTech - The AMD Trinity Review (A10-4600M): A New Hope

 

Some good info, but yet another review site that seems to not understand that AMD's mission isn't to compete with Intel on all things high-end, so consequently, it's unfavorable, overall.

AMD A10-4600M Trinity For Mobile Review: Trying To Cut The Ivy | PC Perspective

 

Again, missed the point that the target audience is the low-to-mid-end mobile user, and also adds an unfair comparison against an Intel CPU+dGPU combination (that the A10 sometimes beats!)

AMD Trinity A10-4600M APU Review: Jumping the Shark? by VR-Zone.com

 

"Batman: Arkham City proved to be somewhat of a stumbling block for the Radeon HD 7660G graphics engine. When running this test in both DX9 and DX11 modes, the Radeon HD 7660G trails the competition losing out to Intel's HD 4000 series graphics and NVIDIA's discrete GeForce GT 630 mobile GPU. That said, the results here speak more to driver optimization (or like thereof perhaps) rather than GPU horsepower. Again, when you consider the performance edge Trinity has over Ivy Bridge in 3DMark 11 and our older DX10 based Far Cry 2 and Just Cause 2 benchmarks, we're left with the notion that AMD isn't done wringing performance out of Trinity's graphics engine and its supporting driver package."

Again, anomalous Arkham City results...but at least they give AMD their props in this area. "...30 - 50+% over Intel's HD 4000 integrated graphics in the Ivy Bridge Core i7 chip we pit it against."

...with Trinity beating the snot out everything else Intel, HD3000 or 4000, without dGPU.

AMD Trinity A10-4600M Processor Review - HotHardware

 

There's an edit button, you know.

As for dual graphics, the reason why there's no info on it is probably because AMD didn't ship out didn't have a discrete card. Maybe they're still working out the kinks or something.

 

probably the driver stinks, they need to settle oems that just got 7970m ne ways.

 

Yay I'm in the club. Just snatched a dv6-6135dx with upgraded 8gb ram on ebay for $400. It just got here. Gonna use it for a while then see if I want to play around with the clocking later. Super excited!

 

Tinderbox: Straight repaste is fine as I recall. Some like the Arctic Silver, some prefer IC Diamond as it is non-conductive. The video RAM has no heatsinks or temp sensors so I've been nervous about upping clocks on it.

clarkkent: One of those other linked reviews had a dramatically better Skyrim result, probably due to the FXAA setting and/or a difference in tested drivers?

mambastik: At that price you should have plenty of reason to be excited! Was the Windows already reset on it? How's the hull?

 

there was a dual graphics trinity review somewhere.
but it wasn't sent out by amd

asus sent out a prototype K75D with trinity a8 + 7670m. Tests are just synthetic though. no real games.

google it

 

1. I know. I was deliberately breaking these out for those out there who post "what they heard" (or "what they make up and/or misinterpret") without links, to specifically make a point. Also, for those with short attention spans, it's easier to read and follow, especially if they're reading and following while I am posting. And for those who ask here without first looking themselves. I'm following up with timely evidence that answers at least part of these questions, with substantiated information. Sorry if it's not in the format you like.

2. I know. Building a defense for incomplete and/or apples-to-oranged comparisons wasn't my point; the point is that it is unfair and misleading to post CPU+dGPU vs APU-only results, and to point that out to people before they only glanced and assumed Trinity is inferior to the HD 3000 and 4000. (And this point is being brought up in a lot of comments to these articles, by the way.) Neither Intel nor AMD is at fault; the blame lies on the websites and specific reviewers for not being impartial and objective.

 

I think it's fair to comapre it against low end discrete cards (630/540M and 66xxM series) As long as they make sure that people know that is what they are. It's interesting to me the 7660G usually beats out the 6630M.

 

Considering the price trinity is asking, it is awesome though .

HP sleekbook
trinity : 599
SB i3 : 699
IB i? : 799

the price gap can easily buy a midrange dGPU. And for people who don't need overkill CPU power(yes i3 is serious overkill for "most" people, trinity is no brainer.

All come to how they market it. AMD/OEMs need to fire their marketing department if the sale fails.

 

AMD Kicking Asses... YEAAAAAHHHH

 

Tech Report's writeup is VERY thorough-looking to me. They only compare IGP because the reference laptop had no dGPU, they listed components and software version numbers. There were caveats for power envelope and battery capacity and screen sizes. They THOROUGHLY broke down the frame rates recorded in gaming. They showed the exact game settings used.

Certainly paints a rather nice picture. Still waiting for more hands-on especially with added dGPU and useful benchmarks.

 

Someone at Tom's Hardware is a damned moron. Page six, they were terribly confused as to why the A8-3500M could not be run at 1600 memory speed. p@-@#) IDIOTS. You'd think they hadn't the year's worth of experience to figure this out.

 

...Edit button seems not to work on my phone.

Anyway, the Tom's Hardware tests were a sort of train wreck. They got some basic facts out of place, and produced strange results in a few other places. It is easy to show the A10-4600M outpacing the A8-3500M in many tests with similar power consumption, that's rather important. Of course....the 3500M CPU component can be overclocked 40-60% with modest increase in power drain, and may even be slightly more efficient than at its stock speed...? So the clear triumph of those tests would be the near-total superiority of Northern Islands cores at the scale of the 4600M, and a few isolated jobs with a big gain from new execution features.

Still hoping for a 45W MX to hit later, with these numbers it could be close to my previous guess. Disappointed the A8 couldn't trade in a little BETTER clock for the reduced graphics but I guess they opted for linear progression. The 17W and 25W are certainly good looking on paper but that means nothing until we see samples. Greatest dark horse would be if BGA package has extra pins for GDDR5, that could be a major upset. Trinity is shaping up to be an overall improvement at all price points IF the price of new A10s is aligned to the A8s that are being replaced. If this instead created a new higher cost bracket and left the beneath as they had been, suddenly A8 becomes a needful upgrade over A6 for purely CPU related reasons. And the A4 would also be a step down?

AMD could have a big winner and nice volume sales, or this will all blow up on them. Also, why in the HELL are we not seeing any halfway-respectable all in one desktops by now?! I am sick of i3, A4, Athlon x2....Give me a slab with Llano A6/A8 or even a new Trinity. I refuse to blow a thousand bucks on a pretty slab that can't draw vectors any faster than a pocket calculator.

 

well, for me the dilemma is here. The 'one' worthwhile piece of info that I've seen on the dual graphics implementation was with the a10 combo pulling a 2083 or so in 3dmark11, stock. That tells me a lot. I believe the stock llano dual graphics on the a8's was in the vicinity of mid to high 1700's. Now my setup runs fine at high 2100's so..say 400points or so higher than stock. Add that to the trinity just for giggles and you are pushing 2500, which is pretty darned respectable in anyone's book. Really, if it will pull that the next step up is something like a fast i5 or low to mid i7 Sandy/Ivy with something on the order of a Nvid GTX 670m which busts out circa 3000-3100 3dmark11 points. You can buy a 15" lappie like that for around 1100-1200 bux in the US. Sooo, that leaves a lot of 'bang for buck' room in there for a high end A10 setup.

seer

 

grrr stupid machine bricked on me hen d3ing, only like 87C zzz,
cmos battery no working
trying to use usb HP_TOOLS, tried few time still not working grrrrr.

Edit:
Put HP_TOOLS on sata drive still not working grrr..... last time BF3 hit 9xC and didnt do this ~~

Edit2: If any 1 still have the HP_TOOLS part ion file, let me know, maybe mine is corrupted XD

 

Were you playing overclocked? I have always been especially leery of cranking the memory speed.

 

nah was like 760/830, I ve been using same clocks for long time.

Dun think anything fried, just the stupid bios acting weird

Edit: pull'd the board out, nothing look wrong grr. BIOS refuse to read form anything for the recovery? I did it before now it not working sign. Not sure why HP decide the bios to lock itself..

 

Here's a really good and fairly comprehensive review which doesn't pull any punches or praise:


"AMD's Dual Graphics refers to a Crossfire connection between the APU and a dedicated graphics card. Sadly, in past testing, we found too many flaws with this setup. The technology looks good on paper, but the performance is limited by many restrictions in practice. For example, micro-stutters plague performance and there can sometimes be serious driver issues. For better or worse, AMD has installed this feature in Trinity as to allow a variety of Radeon GPUs (from the Radeon HD 7450M to an HD 7670M) to work in tandem with the IGP. The technology works despite the different VLIW4 and VLIW5 architectures as each card processes on its own in accordance to the AFR method. Unfortunately, the new GCN-based 7700M, 7800M and 7900M models cannot be used in Crossfire with the IGP."

I'm bummed that the GCN discretes are incompatible with the with the IGP, but at least that means that CrossfireX with too dissimilar GPUs won't be a problem (and the mismatch is what I believe causes the micro-stuttering), since a 7700M or greater discrete card should run just fine on its own anyway. Looks like we'll have to wait for Trinity to clear the shelves before we see a GCN-based IGP, as we've already been promised. (I was really hoping for a last-minute die change to incorporate GCN with Trinity...and some misleading sites contributed to this confusion as well.)

However, the site definitely seems fair, both with verbage and testing methodology...with a clear understanding of what AMD is going for.

"The Radeon HD 7660G chip sets new standards for IGPs and leaves the brand-new Intel HD Graphics 4000 behind in the dust. In our benchmarks, the IGP was able to reach the level of a Mobility Radeon HD 5650."

And then it ends with a fair assessment that the CPU could be a bottleneck for systems with a higher-end dGPU, though the above does represent the pinnacle of no-dGPU graphics performance, which will definitely get AMD more than their share of low-to-mid notebooks...where the majority of the consumer revenue is.

...so, since I am fine with this Llano notebook, and will be for awhile, I think I will be skipping Trinity in favor of AMD's next GCN-based IGP APU. (And for the life of me...I don't understand why AMD didn't cut production costs and only offer the HD 7660G on ALL their APUs, since the A10 maxes CPU power consumption? I'm sure A6 or A8 users would have appreciated the graphics "punch" in exchange for the only-little-bit-higher electrical consumption.)

Trinity in Review: AMD A10-4600M APU - Notebookcheck.net Reviews

 

Hm, I wonder what that means for higher end gaming. Are manufacturers going to put in 28nm GPUs in Trinity even though it wont support crossfire?

 

Not sure if this has been brought up before as I h ave not read every page of this post but I am hoping I can get some help.

my problem is that when playing a game, when I close the lid and open it again I get a solid black screen and I can do nothing to fix it other than press the power button to initiate a shutdown. this snaps the monitor back to life.

I have set the power settings to do nothing when i close the lid and this only happens when a game is running, fullscreen or windowed doesnt matter. I would like to be able to close the lid while a game is running and open it again and get the game or the desktop

Computer is set to never sleep or hibernate so im not sure what is causing the screen to stay black, I can hear sounds when I open the lid just no picture.

 

I'm guessing Trinity should overclock comfortably to 2.8ghz without a lot of heat.

that would beat any OC'd llano in an 8 hour marathon, where the llano would burn up.

you got some bad luck.

you killed 2 laptops so far this year ?

 

Nah, I play at 3.0 GHz with far more than 8 hours... (See mod 3)

 

No matter where I read, Trinity is better than llano. I'm really impressed, if the processor can be changed into our older llano sockets I'm sold....

 

Change your drivers, try 12.3 and 12.4 video drivers.

 

yeah but you're cheating with bolt-ons.

without case mods, trinity would beat without heat

anyway, june can't come soon enough. I got pscheck app loaded and ready on my thumb drive.
As soon as Bestbuy gets some trinity units, it's time to overclock and abuse those demos.

 

I had a very similar crash playing D3. I am not sure if it is heat or if it somehow makes me 800/1000 OC unstable. I kept my CPU at a cool 2.6GHz. Besides that though, the game runs as smooth as butter.

I had to pull out the cmos battery, turn the laptop on with the battery out (to ensure that the bios is fully reset) and then power it off and pop the battery back in. It worked like a charm.

 

Well it used to reset by cmos battery, not this time , will see what I can do.

 

Did you try this? It worked for me when nothing else did:

1) Remove battery and AC adapter
2) Remove back panel and CMOS battery
3) Keeping all batteries out, plug AC adapter back in and power on
4) Should power on with CMOS warning. After boot shut down and re-insert everything

Also there was something that involved reflashing an old bios (F.18), as long as you has the HP_BIOS partition functioning. I think it was Fn+B on boot????

 

Short and sweet, apples-to-apples comparison, running an intensely popular, new game, Diablo III, without dGPU:

Intel Core i7-3920XM Ivy Bridge and Intel HD Graphics 4000
vs
AMD's reference Trinity notebook running A10-4600M APU with Radeon HD 7660G graphics

Diablo III Gaming Benchmarks on Ivy Bridge & Trinity Laptops - Diablo III Laptop Benchmarking - Legit Reviews

 

Did on that list and everything that I know of

 

Currently using 12.3 Ive noticed this since i got the laptop 12 months ago and it has continued with all the driver updates. does this happen for anyone else? I will update to 12.4 and see if it makes a difference.

::EDIT::

Updated to 12.4 and now it seems worse? now I don't even hear sounds when opening the lid again and when i click the power off button the screen does not come back and the machine just shuts down, before when i pressed the power button the screen would come back and i could watch it shut down. happens when running a 3d application in fullscreen or fullscreen window. May just have to live with it.

on another note Ive noticed my temps are rising slowly. before games like BF3 or Crysis 2 would get my temps up to 70-72c now my temps are hitting 79c-80c constantly when in games and my idle temp is up to 45c when it use to be 35-38c. I think the thermal paste is drying out or is no longer making good contact. Does anyone have a pictured guide or video on taking this thing fully apart?

 

Yeah 12.4 was a lot worse and less stable for me, however it seemed to work fine for others. Apparently 12.5 is great (ZERO microstuttering), and I might test that out tonight.

 

Rapid pushes on the driver front lately

 

HP G6-2002AX - A10-4600M,Radeon 7660+7670 Dual Graphics

HP ??? G6-2002AX,????3 ???? - YouTube

 

do i see microstutter..............

 

Hard to tell if microstutter, but it sure does seem like it from what I see in my Llano dual graphics. I say dual graphics should just be ignored altogether as a performance feature until they iron out the microstutter bugs. It's horrendous. It can make 60fps feel like 15.

 

It isn't that bad but yeah, when properly configured I never saw fluidity above 30 fps (even when the game marked that there were more fps)... then disabled the xfire and saw real smoothness

 

These micro stutters are looking very bad, might can cause eye cancer. I'm glad I did not purchased laptop with dual graphics, seems useless.

 

I can confirm, I'm using 12.5 and getting no microstuttering at all.

It's just poor drivers. 12.5 drivers have resolved all microstuttering issues for me.

 

Yup, reset and everything. Although it came from a smoker-home, the thing is like brand new. Keyboard and trackpad was finger-grease free. I was scared about the heat, so while it was being shipped, I started looking into the coolers thread. However after long sessions of D3 on all high and med shadows, the thing stayed at 70C. Of course cooler is always better, so I'll probably experiment with some undervolting soon.

Just a quick question about the vents in the back - is that an intake or exhast? When the fans are at max, I can barely feeling anything in those back vents. I wanna try putting one of those USB cooler vacuums back there but I can barely find any info on them.

 

those vacuum 'coolers' are a gimmick. they can't possibly extract heat as fast as the pc blows out, unless it's running at super high speed all the time.

 

I like this review AMD A10-4600M APU Battery Life and Conclusion

 

The trick with the extraction coolers is to cut out a foam (closed cell gasket that fits tightly between the cooler and the vent so as to maximize the air pressure differential. Get the best seal you can and you'll see the temps fall. Another beneficial side effect is that with the external fan pulling hard, the internal fan will often cycle much lower than otherwise, extending life etc. Much cheaper to replace an external than to rebuild the one built into the heat sink/pipe.

seer

 

my mod 3 does exactly that... and makes my system run up to 3.0 ghz, well said sir.