AMD announces Phenom multicore CPUs, FASN8 platform
Straight from Ars Technica: “The HD 2600 was today’s high-profile announcement from AMD, but it wasn’t the only bit of news coming from the company. The CPU and GPU maker also announced today that its new dual-core and quad-core consumer and enthusiast CPUs will be known as the Phenom. The quad-core Phenom FX and Phenom X4 will appear during the second half of 2007, while a dual-core Phenom X2 will show up after the quad-core models ship. Previously known by the code name Agena, Phenom CPUs will feature an on-die integrated DDR2 memory controller, shared L3 cache, and a HyperTransport link on-die. AMD takes a subtle dig at Intel’s quad-core CPUs, saying that its use of on-die HyperTransport removes a “bottleneck inherent in other products that are packaging two dual-core chips to form quad-core processors.”
Phenom CPUs will come in Socket AM2 and Socket AM2+ flavors, which means that they should be drop-in replacement for owners of Socket AM2 systems. In 2008, AMD will introduce Socket AM3, which will have on-die DDR3 controllers and support the company’s 45nm CPUs.”
