AMD Shows Off New APU Powered Devices and Kaveri System With Oculus Rift Attached

by Marco Chiappetta — Thursday, September 12, 2013, 08:01 AM EDT

Although IDF13 is a decidedly Intel-centric event each year (obviously), it doesn’t stop numerous companies from camping out at nearby venues to steal away travelling tech journalists for a few moments of face time. Traditionally, AMD is one of those companies, and as you have probably guessed by now, we stopped in to see what AMD had on display.

As expected, AMD’s numerous demos all featured various APUs, which powered a number of notebooks, 2-in-1 devices, tablets, and AIO systems. Most of the rigs had been previously released, but we did catch a glimpse at an upcoming, touch-enabled MSI notebook and an MSI-built tablet as well that should be hitting the market soon.

Amongst the demos, we also got to see an HP A8 APU powered notebook attached to a Dock Port hub (formerly known at Lighting Port). The Dock Port funnels USB 3.0 and DisplayPort 1.2 out through a single cable and the hub expands the IO capabilities of the notebook and allows for multiple monitor connections. In the demo, only a single additional screen was attached, but it was good to see Dock Port in action nonetheless.

Perhaps the most interesting demo in AMD’s suite was a Kaveri-powered system connected to an Oculus Rift VR helmet. Rumors had been swirling recently, which claimed Kaveri—AMD’s next-gen, Steamroller-based APU--had been delayed until 2014. Today, however, reps from AMD said Kaveri would still ship this year, though no other details were given.

The system was running a Unigine graphics demo at a relatively low resolution (we believe it was 800x600), but just seeing Kaveri up and running and powering the Rift was interesting to say the least.

Tags: AMD, APU, Kaveri, Oculus, idf13, rift

Marco Chiappetta

Marco's interest in computing and technology dates all the way back to his early childhood. Even before being exposed to the Commodore P.E.T. and later the Commodore 64 in the early ‘80s, he was interested in electricity and electronics, and he still has the modded AFX cars and shop-worn soldering irons to prove it. Once he got his hands on his own Commodore 64, however, computing became Marco's passion. Throughout his academic and professional lives, Marco has worked with virtually every major platform from the TRS-80 and Amiga, to today's high end, multi-core servers. Over the years, he has worked in many fields related to technology and computing, including system design, assembly and sales, professional quality assurance testing, and technical writing. In addition to being the Managing Editor here at HotHardware for close to 15 years, Marco is also a freelance writer whose work has been published in a number of PC and technology related print publications and he is a regular fixture on HotHardware’s own Two and a Half Geeks webcast. - Contact: marco(at)hothardware(dot)com