AMD's Godavari APU refresh is due quite soon, as early as the 28th of this month according to some sites, and it has now been revealed that the high end of the APU's market spectrum will also boast the AMD A10-7870K Black Edition. As with every other AMD Black Edition CPU or APU the A10-7870K is designed to be overclocked, adding significantly more value to an already solid mid-range proposition.

Godavari is the successor to Kaveri, AMD's 2014-15 APU lineup which was based on the Steamroller CPU architecture and GCN graphics architecture, and is the first of AMD's APUs to claim HSA 1.0 compliance. Godavari itself doesn't diverge much for the established formula, mirroring the same technologies which Karveri boasted last year, but a more mature design and manufacturing process has lead to improved GPU operating frequencies within the same 95W TDP envelope. Godavari should also add support for PCI-Express 3.0 and stock DDR3 2133MHz frequencies, whilst retaining up to 512 GCN 1.2 GPU shaders and four x86 CPU cores.

In the consumer space Godavari looks set to briefly share the 7000-series with older Kaveri models, although naturally there will be a slight up-tick in the SKU numbering. The flagship A10-7870K replaces the older A10-7850K, most notably boasting a higher GPU clock (856MHz vs 720MHz), and in other aspects the APUs are broadly similar. As a whole the Godavari platform looks likely to be a strong replacement for older Trinity and Richland systems still in use, and feature in new mainstream and affordable systems during the 'Back To School' period.



In addition to a refreshed 7000-series, AMD will be releasing 8000-series SKUs to OEMs later this month. The uptick in series number appears to be a marketing measure as both refreshed 7000-series and new 8000-series will be sharing Godavari APUs, however slightly more granularity in the range allows OEMs to tailor overall system cost more effectively. Unlocked 'K' and enterprise-class 'PRO' models are all part of the new series, topping out at an A10-8850K which looks nearly identical to the A10-7870K, whilst 'B'-class APUs are anticipated to be strictly OEM-only.

With Carrizo low-power APUs also joining the 7000-series as their premier mobility design, featuring better perf/watt in the low power netbook and tablet market, AMD are going to have their work cut out communicating the exact architectural differences to OEMs and consumers alike. Thankfully, when it comes to desktops, the picture is far clearer.

SOURCE: GURU3D.