AMD Fusion Chips Reach 3 Million Shipments in Q1

Even though Intel still held its dominance on the PC market in terms of sold CPUs, it looks like Advanced Micro Devices didn't do too badly during the first quarter either, at least as far as Fusion chips go.

By now, users will no doubt be familiar with the Fusion architecture and the processor it spawned.

Called APUs (accelerated processing units), the chips are CPUs with built-in, DirectX 11-capable Radeon HD 6000 series graphics.

The Ontario and Zacate units are the ones that sold in the highest number, so far, being at the heart of netbooks and even tablets.

That said, with the month of April almost over, a sort of tally for the first quarter of 2011 was made as far as CPU/APU sales were concerned,

Apparently, the Sunnyvale, California-based company's performance was none too shabby, having managed to ship about three million APUs during the January-March period.

This number equals half of all mobile chip sales and means that the Fusion sales were three times as good as those of the fourth quarter of 2010.

"We tripled [Fusion] unit shipments over the prior quarter. [Which represented] 50% [...] the share [of mobile chips] we had in the first quarter," said Thomas Seifert, chief financial officer and interim chief exec of AMD, in a conversation with financial analysts.

"[Fusion] was [a] fantastic success in Q1, and our OEMs are now really onboard with bringing even a better, more-compelling, higher-performance solution with Llano," added Rick Bergman, senior vice president and general manager of AMD's products group.

The CPU and GPU maker considers the number a success but did not offer any information on what one may expect to happen next.

As such, while some assumptions may or may not have more support in facts than others, just how things will progress on the laptop, desktop and tablet segments is anyone's guess.