AMD 'Yukon' looks beyond Netbooks
Updated at 3:20 p.m. PST throughout with clarification of Yukon and Congo technologies
An AMD-based Netbook? Maybe, maybe not.
On Thursday at an analyst meeting, AMD disclosed "Yukon" and "Congo"--the names that AMD is giving to its silicon technology, due in 2009, that will target the "ultraportable" market. (The meeting was streamed live from the event.)
AMD is targeting Yukon at ultraportable designs like the Voodoo Envy 133 notebook
(Credit: Hewlett-Packard)The company is being very careful to parse this as a more full-featured ultraportable PC play not a strict Netbook play.
The ideal ultraportable form factor is a MacBook Air-style design: very thin with a 13-inch screen, according to AMD spokesman John Taylor.
In short, AMD is not offering an enthusiastic endorsement of the Netbook market. "The target is the slim form factor with a larger screen. Not a 10- or 11- or 12-inch screen," Taylor said. He quickly added that smaller Netbook-style designs may appear but repeated that this is not the emphasis.
Why? AMD's approach is to deliver "a full PC experience," Taylor said. "That's not what you can say about some of the Netbook-type products on the market today," he said. AMD will do this by tapping into the graphics chip technology from its ATI unit, according to Taylor.
"Customers are not satisfied with the experience on mini-notebooks," said Bahr Mahony, director, notebook product marketing at AMD, speaking during the analyst meeting on Thursday. AMD refers to Netbooks as mini-notebooks. Bahr said data shows that there are high return rates in Europe where many consumers have been snapping up Netbooks.
AMD's goal, therefore, is to offer a "more satisfying" experience on higher-performance laptop designs like the MacBook Air, Mahony said.
The tech specs that AMD is currently disclosing for Yukon/Congo are a sub 25-watt platform (processor and chipset) with single and dual-core options. Currently, its mainstream Turion processors operate at over 30 watts. (Correction: the "sub 25-watt" Yukon/Congo refers to both the processor and chipset.)
AMD also showed a Congo platform
AMD roadmap shows future Conesus and Geneva ultraportable chips
(Credit: AMD)
AMD Congo and Yukon ultraportable platforms
(Credit: AMD)AMD showed an ultraportable dual-core 65-nanometer chip dubbed "Conesus" on its road map. This will fall under the Congo platform umbrella. Huron will have one core and fall under the Yukon platform. After this, a 45-nanometer Geneva chip will debut in 2010. (Correction: Conesus falls under the Congo platform.)
Taylor also offered this thinking: Intel's Netbook strategy is somewhat restrictive in that designs are small, at least under 12 inches and--to date--usually under 10 inches. Without mentioning Intel by name, he said this restriction is to "protect segmentation of your business." In other words, if Intel delivers a chip that addresses larger designs it would cannibalize Intel's more profitable mainstream mobile processor lines.
Brooke Crothers has been an editor at large at CNET News, an analyst at IDC Japan, and an editor at The Asian Wall Street Journal Weekly, among other endeavors, including co-manager of an after-school math-and-reading center. He writes for the CNET Blog Network and is not a current employee of CNET. Disclosure. 
Oh sure, there will be reassurances that your data is safe and nobody has access to it, but we know better. The only way to keep your data out of other people's hands is to literally keep it out of their hands - something that can't be done from a remote location like a netbook.
The Intel Atom 1.6GHz processor and 1.5GB of RAM runs flawlessly with anything I can throw at it, Photoshop runs perfectly and very fast. All of these processor company's, Intel included want us to think that we need faster and faster more and more powerful processors when all you really need is to make the software run properly with what you have. Once you take the crap out of the operating system (which has effected nothing) everything runs right.
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- by ProDigit January 21, 2009 8:13 AM PST
- Seems to me Caspian will be a greater mini notebook processor than the conesus.
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(14 Comments)Without having any data about the processors,one can assume the 45nm processor to only use slightly more or even less than the Conesus
Let's say the Conesus uses 8W TDP; the Caspian should use max. 16W (seeing it has twice the L cache,and probably will be slightly more advanced).
Then apply the rule of three,
16W*45nm/65nm=11W; since generally a 45nm will use about 70% of the 65nm's surface area,as well as use only 70% of the other's power draw.
when lower voltages are applied due to smaller manufacturing, the 45nm CPU could even use less than 70% of the 65nm's power.