14 DAY TRIAL // A series of recently leaked AMD roadmaps that made their way online have confirmed some previous reports that stated the company plans to introduce new Athlon II and Phenom II processors in the near future and also come to reiterate the features of the Bulldozer and Llano chips.
The roadmaps were put together for AMD's Asian partners, and, although they don't reveal any new information, they do seem to confirm all the rumors that have been reaching us in the last few months.
Just as we previously reported, AMD's FX series desktop chips based on the Bulldozer architecture will feature up to eight processing cores, an integrated dual-channel memory controller, a maximum of 8MB of Level 3 cache and will also support the Turbo Core 2.0 technology.
Together with these CPUs, AMD is also expected to launch the 990FX and 990X chipsets that bring CrossFire and IOMMU support, 14 USB 2.0 ports, six SATA 6Gbps ports and four additional PCI Express lanes.
In late Q2 or early Q3, the Lynx platform will also come, which that is comprised out of the Llano A and E2-series APUs and the A75 and A55 fusion controller hubs (FCH).
According to the roadmap, the APU's will pack as much as four x86 processing cores based on the Husky architecture with Turbo Core 2.0 support, an integrated DDR3 memory controller and on-die DirectX 11 compatible graphics.
The more advanced FCH controller supports four USB 3.0 and six SATA 6Gbps ports as well as an integrated clock generator.
In addition to Llano and Bulldozer, AMD also plans to update its Athlon II and Phenom II processor series with six new quad-core and dual-core models that will feature higher clock speeds than their current counterparts.
These CPUs should arrive between April and August 2011 and AMD has no plans to release faster six-core Thuban parts.
