AMD has announced the availability of two new APUs (Accelerated Processing Units) in its Fusion G-Series family of embedded processors. AMD claims that these APUs, with peak power ratings of only 5.5 and 6.4 watts and a small footprint of 361mm, make them well suited for fan-less operation when embedded in devices ranging from digital signs to set-top boxes. The power consumption is about 39 percent less than AMD’s previous G-Series models.
These new models incorporate either one or two x86 cores and a discrete DirectX 11-class graphics core on the die. It can be used in the emerging Qseven standardized motherboard form factor.
AMD did not provide specific performance details on the new APUs, but for their power consumption comparison versus their older models, the new processor was a single-core running at 1GHz.
Depending on the application, These new APUs could compete against Intel’s Atom series embedded processors. The latest of these are the z650 and z670 “Lincroft” series, which run at 1.2GHz and 1.5GHz and consume 3W at peak. They are slated for availability sometime before the end of the spring.
