AMD Unveils Speedier CPU Lineup, Bumps Older Models Down in Price

From DailyTech: Today Advanced Micro Devices, Inc., the world's second largest microprocessor maker, unveiled six new CPUs to hold off Intel while it prepares its next-generation architecture.

First, let's get a quick primer on AMD's CPU brand strategy, which can be a bit confusing. AMD makes two major lines of CPUs -- a high end line dubbed Phenom II, and a budget lined dubbed Athlon II. Athlon IIs lack L3 cache and typically feature slightly lower clock speeds. Also, only Phenom II has a subfamily of hexa-core (6-core) CPUs, code-named "Thuban" -- Athlon II is only available in two-, three-, and four-core variants. Both processors are built on a 45 nm SOI with immersion lithography process.

The Athlon II lineup has seen 3 refreshes this year (January, May, and now September), which have bumped processor speeds on the various lines by 300 MHz. The Phenom II lineup has seen only two refreshes this year, though it also saw the launch of hexa-core models.

The latest refresh starts with the hexa-core Phenom II X6. The Phenom II lineup saw the introduction of its first hexa-core offerings (the Phenom II X6 1055T and Phenom II X6 1090T BE) in April. A third chip, the Phenom II X6 1035T, began making its way to desktops in May, though it still isn't widely available as an individual CPU. The latest model, the Phenom II X6 1075T falls precisely between the X6 1090T BE and the X6 1055T in performance, though its a bit more competitive in turbo clock than the Phenom II X6 1090T BE.

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