14 DAY TRIAL // Earlier this week, we had the pleasure of interviewing AMD's John Swinimer, public relations manager for the Sunnyvale, California-based chip maker, who told us a couple of interesting facts about some of the company's upcoming products, including the much anticipated APUs (Accelerated Processing Units). Thanks to the details that Mr. Swinimer provided us with, we now know that AMD plans to unveil its first APUs sometime in 2011. Also, according to a number of recently leaked slides of the company's notebook platforms, the 2011 APUs will also offer users support for Microsoft's upcoming API (Application Programming Interface), DirectX 11.
According to the details that have recently been made available on the English version of Expreview, AMD's 2009, 2010 and 2011 notebook platform roadmap includes the Tigris, the Danube and the Sabine, respectively. From the three, Sabine will be the first to boast an AMD APU, codenamed “Llano.”
The “Llano” APU will sport a processing unit with up to 4 cores, an integrated graphics processing unit, as well as support for DDR3-1600MHz memory, and it will be manufactured using 32nm processing technology. The APU will be coupled with AMD's new chipset SB9xxM, which will boast support for USB 3.0, 16 USB ports, 6 SATA ports, RAID and AMD's next-generation discrete notebook GPU.
One of the main features of the upcoming Sabine platform is the support it will provide for Microsoft's DirectX 11 and UVD 3 technology. This will enable users to take advantage of the latest gaming applications, which will boast DirectX 11-support. In addition, the Llano will be the first of AMD's CPU+GPU mobile chips.
However, before we have any chance to see the new Sabine platform and AMD's first APU, we have to wait for the Danube platform, due for release next year, which will use RS880M+SB8xxM chipset and will come with 4-core processors and a DDR3-1066MHz memory controller.