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AMD A10 and A8 Trinity APU: Virgo Desktop Experience - Hot Hardware Hands-On

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News Posted: Thu, Sep 27 2012 12:24 AM
We're taking a somewhat different two-tiered approach with our coverage of AMD’s new Trinity-based APUs for desktop systems today. AMD is lifting the veil on their new product line-up, in addition to graphics performance and power consumption, but we can’t quite give you the full monty just yet, due to a new multi-tiered launch approach AMD decided to take with these products. If you want to see how well AMD’s latest desktop APUs overclock, how their processor cores perform, or how they’re priced, you’re going to have to stop by in a few more days. For now though, we’ve got graphics performance and power consumption characteristics to talk about and have some rather interesting side-by-side comparisons in store as well.

Although they’re based on the same piece of silicon, Trinity-based APUs for desktop systems have much more power and thermal headroom to play with versus their notebook-bound cousins. As such, the chips are clocked much higher, in regard to both their CPU and GPU cores. In fact, one of the chips we’ll be showing you here today, the A10-5800K, can Turbo all the way up to 4.2GHz.


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mhenriday replied on Thu, Sep 27 2012 5:05 AM

Very much looking forward to those tests, Dave - thanks for the heads-up !...

Henri

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realneil replied on Thu, Sep 27 2012 9:35 AM

This was a good read Marco.

I have an APU A8-3850 CPU with an ASUS F1A75-V-Pro and a XFX Radeon HD-6670 in hybrid crossfire.

Gaming performance is decent with the addition of it's Hybrid Crossfire capabilities. Overall system performance is good.

These new better, faster variants are a welcome step up as I see it. I heard a rumor that the new platform's Hybrid Crossfire will be possible with faster, 7000 series Radeon cards too. This will be an improvement with meat on it's bones.

Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.

(Mark Twain)

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Marco C replied on Thu, Sep 27 2012 10:33 AM

Hybrid CrossFire is possible with faster cards now, even on your 3850, but scaling will always be limited by the slower of the two GPU. You'll never get scaling past a theoretical peak of 2x of the slower GPU, so there's less incentive to stick a faster card in there.

Marco Chiappetta
Managing Editor @ HotHardware.com

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realneil replied on Thu, Sep 27 2012 10:43 AM

My documentation stated that the HD-6670 was the fastest card that the motherboard would support in Hybrid mode. Maybe that has changed since I read it. (BIOS updates and improvements are released all of the time)

Using the Hybrid capabilities does improve performance, but it's still nothing like my GTX-570 is.

Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.

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karanm replied on Thu, Sep 27 2012 10:42 PM

Aww man I hate cliffhangers!! Gotta get the whole story before I decide between an i3 or the A10 for a buddy of mine who wants to build his first rig.

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CDeeter replied on Sat, Sep 29 2012 12:17 PM

Some nice improvements shown by AMD here, and I'm looking forward to seeing the results on the CPU side of things.

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MLovejoy replied on Fri, Nov 16 2012 1:01 PM

Can't beat the bang for the buck of AMD's APU's...just can't do it.  I think the A6-5400K would be my first choice...that or the A10-5800K. I love the APU in my laptop...I've loved APU's since!

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bikemanAMD replied on Mon, Nov 19 2012 2:24 PM

Currently have an AMD FM1 APU A6-3620 with Radeon 6530D, and have to say it outperforms my old AMD and Nvidia Video card a ton, can run a whole bunch more than I used to, in the future might go ahead and Crossfire it, if this chip supports Hybrid Crossfire, Retail Chip with HP P6-2133W Desktop PC.    Plan on getting another APU based system soon as I can afford it for my Mother's PC I think at this point

Liking the Reviews on the NEW AMD APU Trinity Line as well

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