AMD 9 Series Chipset Roadmap: 880G "Reloaded"

AMD recently fell in love with the road map: First, the bulldozer architecture CPU and desktop APU, then the Socket AM3 platform processor, and now the next generation of 9-series chipsets, and seen slightly different from two months ago.

The AMD 9-series chipset will be mainly paired with Zambezi, a bulldozer-architecture processor, to form the new platform "Scorpius", in which the processor socket is changed to the new Socket AM3+, but the current Socket AM3 can continue to be used. processor.

According to the latest roadmap, AMD 9 series chipsets will be fully released in the second quarter of 2011, including four Northbridge chips and two Southbridge chips.

Although the Fusion APU integrated graphics core has become a general trend, but the first generation of bulldozer architecture products do not, so there is still an integrated chipset "980G", comes with DX10.1 level graphics core, frequency 560MHz, supports UVD 2.0 decoding Engine, HDMI output and dual display, PCI-E 2.0 bus. From the specifications point of view, it and the current 880G almost no difference, but also 21mm FCBGA package and 18W thermal design power consumption, but with the South Bridge will upgrade to the next generation SB920, and support for the new AM3 + processor. In fact, the current 880G and the previous 785G itself are no different, just a slight increase in frequency. In other words, this integrated core is preparing to span three generations.

Existing integrated models such as the 880G, 785G, 760G, and 740G will continue to exist. The new motherboards of the 880G with the SB710 South Bridge can also be used to support the AM3+ processor.

The independent models in the 9 series chipset include “990FX”, “990X”, and “970”. Among them, the 980FX specifications and the 890FX are almost the same, but the package design is unchanged while the thermal design power consumption rises to 19.6W. The bridge also upgraded to SB950.

The 990X evolved from the 790X and supports IOMMU virtualization technology. The thermal design power consumption rises to 14W, and the Southbridge should be SB950.

970 is naturally the descendant of the 870. It also supports IOMMU. The thermal design power consumption rises to 13.6W, which can be matched with SB950 and SB920.

The changes of the 990FX, 990X, and 970 are not large, mainly because IOMMU is added, and the new south bridge is used to support the new processor. However, the power consumption of the thermal design has all increased slightly, and there is no hidden secret.

By the way, the high-end stand-alone 790FX and integrated 790GX in the 7 series will be retired in the fourth quarter of this year.

Southbridge also said before, upgraded to SB950, SB920. Compared to the current SB850, the SB950 adds two PCI-E 2.0 x1 outputs and has a total of four. The SB920 removes RAID 5 and FIS-based switching technology. Both support six SATA 6Gbps interfaces, fourteen USB 2.0 and two USB 1.1 interfaces, support for the PCI 33MHz bus, integrated clock generator and Gigabit Ethernet MAC, and thermal design power consumption remains at 10W.

The SB750 South Bridge will also be retired at the end of this year with the 790FX and 790GX.