AMD A10-6800K and A10-6700 Richland APUs Tested

Name: AMD A10-6800K APU
Brand: AMD

by Marco Chiappetta — Wednesday, June 05, 2013, 12:01 AM EDT

A few months back, AMD unveiled a handful of mobile Elite A-Series APUs, formerly codenamed Richland. Those products built upon the company’s existing Trinity-based products but offered additional power and frequency optimizations designed to enhance overall performance and increase battery life. In addition to these optimizations, AMD also began offering a host of specialized software with their Richland APUs that’s leveraged their inherent strengths--namely, AMD Face Login, Gesture Control, Screen Mirror, and various video enhancement features like AMD Steady Video, Quick Stream, and Picture Perfect. The ultimate goal was to make AMD hardware and software more appealing to OEMs and consumers alike.

Today AMD is taking the same approach and launching a handful of new Richland APUs but for desktops and small form factor PCs. Though these APUs offer all of the same features and benefits as their mobile counterparts, the additional power and thermal headroom afforded by desktop form factors has allowed AMD to crank things up a few notches further on both the CPU and GPU sides. You’ll see what we mean on the pages ahead, but first let’s get some specifications out of the way and cover some related information pertinent to today’s launch...

AMD Richland / Trinity Quad-Core APU Die Shot

AMD Elite A-Series APUs For 2013

Specifications & Features

AMD A-Series APU	Description
Tech/Package	32nm, FM2 socket
TDP Configs	65W and 100W configurations
Processor Core	“Piledriver” 32nm HKMG process core (up to 4 cores), up to 128 KB L1 Cache (64 KB Instruction, 64 KB Data) Up to 4 MB L2, 2 x 128-bit FPUs / compute module
Memory	Up to DDR3 2133 @ 1.5V
Graphics Core	Up to 384 Radeon™ Cores 2.0, DirectX 11 capable, UVD3, VCE
Displays	Digital Display I/F DP0: Display Port, HDMI, DVI Digital Display I/F DP1: Display Port, HDMI, DVI Digital Display I/F DP2: Display Port, HDMI, DVI Additional digital display supported using DP 1.2 daisy-chain connection VGA on FCH
Power Management	Multiple low-power states 32-nm process for decreased power consumption System Management Mode (SMM) ACPI-compliant, including support for processor performance states (P-states), processor power states (C-states), and sleep states including S0, S3, S4, and S5 Per compute module power gating (CC6) PCIe core power gating PCIe speed power policy GPU power gating of Radeon™ Cores and video decode (UVD3) Enhanced AMD Turbo Core technology featuring Temperature Smart Turbo Core
AMD A85 FCH	Integrated DAC supporting VGA.
Tech/Package	65nm / FC BGA, 605-Ball, 23x23mm, .8mm pitch
TDP Configs	2.7W to 4.7W for typical configurations
UMI	x4 Gen 2 + DP
SATA	8 Ports, 6 Gbps
RAID	0, 1, 5, 10
USB	A85X: 4 USB 3.0 Ports, 10 USB 2.0 Ports, 2 USB 1.1 Internal Ports
PCIe GPPs	4x1 Gen2
HWM	Incorporates Fan Control, Voltage Level Sensing
Consumer IR	CIR Receiver

AMD’s A-Series APUs debuted back in 2011 with Llano and were updated in 2012 with more powerful Trinity-based products. Though Richland supplants Trinity in AMD’s APU line-up, the die shots (and specifications) above reveal that Trinity and Richland are actually based on the same silicon.

AMD's New A10-6700 and A10-6800K Richland APUs

AMD has put in some additional engineering effort and done some new things with chips, which we’ll discuss a little later, but since Trinity and Richland are fundamentally similar, a refresher on the technology and platform as a whole couldn’t hurt to help lay some foundation for what we’ll be showing you on the pages ahead.

AMD A10 and A8 Trinity APU: Virgo CPU Performance

In our AMD Trinity A10-4600M coverage, we go into detail on the Trinity architecture and the Piledriver microarchitecture on which its CPU cores are based. And in the remaining AMD A10- and A8-related articles, we cover last year’s Trinity-based desktop APUs and detail the Virgo platform as a whole, which encompasses the APUs and associated chipsets and motherboards.

Tags: AMD, Radeon, graphics, CPU, processor, Fusion, APU, FM2

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