In the Mantle part of the article you wrote 'On the next page we'll also have a peek at Ultra quality settings with 4xAA. But yeah these are massive perf gains.' however the next page was the conclusion. Would it also be possible to see some dual graphics results by pairing the APU with a DDR3 R7 graphics card. It also be nice to see if dual graphics works with a GDDR5 R7 if possible as there seems to be some confusion about if this works or not.

7850k seems good This is an excellent review, that shows the AMD 7850K APU performance pretty well. One thing can be improved is the usage of a GTX770 instead of the much older GTX580 for the discrete GPU performance, and just mention the 1080p performance that would be a more balanced one. Still the AMD 7850k APU can be clubbed with an upper mid range GPU like GTX770 or R9280X resulting in good performance than I initially thought.

The whole power consuption page shows A8 7600 instead of A10...

Ah its showing the wrong ones, updated & thanks.

Cool, you tried OCing it boss?

And I'll be forced to go with an i5 since AMD can't cough out (and apparently is uninterested in that) a CPU at least as fast as the FX-8350 when it came out. Kaveri with HSA and all that is a nice technology, but not exactly ideal for gaming PC... as the article concludes after all.

I don't know anyone in their right mind who would go for an APU for a serious gaming rig. Ignoring the CPU issues entirely, you'd be wasting most of your money on an IGP that will go unused if you use a discrete card (at least a discrete card you don't intend to crossfire with). What many people don't seem to get is AMD needs an edge over intel, and that APUs are not specifically for gamers. GPGPU is the future of computing, and that's exactly what these APUs are good at. They're specifically not meant to be good at your generic CPU tasks; you're supposed to buy an APU for things like openCL and other GPU accelerated tasks. Intel has the crown for best CPU processing power and there's nothing AMD can do to compete with that at this point. So, people need to stop expecting it and change their views on what they need a CPU for if they want to support AMD. People complain that there's no competition with Intel but that's because aside from pricing, there's no reason to. Every CPU brand has it's purpose. Intel is good for high-end workstations and serious gaming systems. AMD is good for GPGPU solutions. ARM is good for tiny and low-power solutions. PPC platforms are designed for reliability/redundancy. SPARC is good for parallelization. There is no 1-size-fits-all and the only company that's trying to do that is Intel. The problem is intel is too caught up in their idea that raw CPU performance is above all else, and that's crippling their efforts to defeat the other markets. So in a way, there really is competition. Anyway on a side note, what AMD needs to do above all else right now is get triple or quad channel memory in their APUs. Their memory controller is actually amazingly good, but it could dominate intel's if they added another channel, and it would probably turn the "hmm not bad" gaming results into "holy crap that's good".

And I'll be forced to go with an i5 since AMD can't cough out (and apparently is uninterested in that) a CPU at least as fast as the FX-8350 when it came out. Kaveri with HSA and all that is a nice technology, but not exactly ideal for gaming PC... as the article concludes after all.

The Athlon X4K versions of these with the GPU disabled should be a good deal faster CPU wise, and be far cheaper than an i5

I don't know anyone in their right mind who would go for an APU for a serious gaming rig. Ignoring the CPU issues entirely, you'd be wasting most of your money on an IGP that will go unused if you use a discrete card (at least a discrete card you don't intend to crossfire with). What many people don't seem to get is AMD needs an edge over intel, and that APUs are not specifically for gamers. GPGPU is the future of computing, and that's exactly what these APUs are good at. They're specifically not meant to be good at your generic CPU tasks; you're supposed to buy an APU for things like openCL and other GPU accelerated tasks. Intel has the crown for best CPU processing power and there's nothing AMD can do to compete with that at this point. So, people need to stop expecting it and change their views on what they need a CPU for if they want to support AMD. People complain that there's no competition with Intel but that's because aside from pricing, there's no reason to. Every CPU brand has it's purpose. Intel is good for high-end workstations and serious gaming systems. AMD is good for GPGPU solutions. ARM is good for tiny and low-power solutions. PPC platforms are designed for reliability/redundancy. SPARC is good for parallelization. There is no 1-size-fits-all and the only company that's trying to do that is Intel. The problem is intel is too caught up in their idea that raw CPU performance is above all else, and that's crippling their efforts to defeat the other markets. So in a way, there really is competition. Anyway on a side note, what AMD needs to do above all else right now is get triple or quad channel memory in their APUs. Their memory controller is actually amazingly good, but it could dominate intel's if they added another channel, and it would probably turn the "hmm not bad" gaming results into "holy crap that's good".

Quad channel DDR4 😀

I find this very impressive for AMD offering for once

I don't know anyone in their right mind who would go for an APU for a serious gaming rig. Ignoring the CPU issues entirely, you'd be wasting most of your money on an IGP that will go unused if you use a discrete card (at least a discrete card you don't intend to crossfire with). What many people don't seem to get is AMD needs an edge over intel, and that APUs are not specifically for gamers. GPGPU is the future of computing, and that's exactly what these APUs are good at. They're specifically not meant to be good at your generic CPU tasks; you're supposed to buy an APU for things like openCL and other GPU accelerated tasks. Intel has the crown for best CPU processing power and there's nothing AMD can do to compete with that at this point. So, people need to stop expecting it and change their views on what they need a CPU for if they want to support AMD. People complain that there's no competition with Intel but that's because aside from pricing, there's no reason to. Every CPU brand has it's purpose. Intel is good for high-end workstations and serious gaming systems. AMD is good for GPGPU solutions. ARM is good for tiny and low-power solutions. PPC platforms are designed for reliability/redundancy. SPARC is good for parallelization. There is no 1-size-fits-all and the only company that's trying to do that is Intel. The problem is intel is too caught up in their idea that raw CPU performance is above all else, and that's crippling their efforts to defeat the other markets. So in a way, there really is competition. Anyway on a side note, what AMD needs to do above all else right now is get triple or quad channel memory in their APUs. Their memory controller is actually amazingly good, but it could dominate intel's if they added another channel, and it would probably turn the "hmm not bad" gaming results into "holy crap that's good".

i agree, they're actually making a very smart move by staying in the competition this way. but i seriously feel like they've got the wrong segment. why isn't this pushed forward more aggressively towards laptops? why is this so prominent on desktops when laptops would benefit from this a lot more? how many amd laptops are there, compared to intel/nvidia laptops? too damn few. i feel like if amd can't do something solid to improve performance they will fall behind to much. you cannot avoid direct competition forever through low pices and some features that are barely used. let's be realistic, there is monopoly in the high-performance cpus segment and it's currently held by intel. amd barely competes with a bloody 2600k from 2 generations ago. this is a joke -.-. and for people like me who actually need cpu power it's very bad. i paid 400$ for this cpu, and right after i bought it, the prices went up another 100 bucks because no competition. i don't even want to open the topic of fx 9590 which was priced around 1000$ on a ridiculous tdp. pure money grab. amd fanboys actually expected it to overclock higher, while intel fanboys bashed the hell out of that cpu. and intel 6-cores have a ridiculous price. amd needs to wake up and focus on performance. where are the days when amd was downright top of the line along with intel, competing the hell out of each other in performance and price?

Once again, Core i7 + Nvidia GTX 8xx FTW. Sorry AMD but you just can't cut it.

*facepalm*

Best leave it you're still missing the point.

i think people are overestimating the use of apus. come on now, how many people build htpcs? because that's the main use of an apu. i cannot stress this enough, apus need to be steered hard towards laptops.

$129.99 at MicroCenter --- pretty good deal at that price imo. For the record, this is what I'm recommending to 90% of the people that ask me about building them a new PC. Sure, it's not going to cut it for the geeks (myself included) that hang out here, but for home users in most families, this is perfect and cheaper for them.

These APU's are nice for overclockers, you do gain some performance overclocking the cpu cores, gpu core, and memory.

My 2600K and motherboard were a little over $400, combined. Who ever said that the Core i7 processors were for workstations? Xeon processors are intended for workstations and servers. Who said you have to buy a Core i7? The Core i5 is better for gaming. Correction, you'll be able to play every game that comes out for the next year, at medium or low settings. Some of us will be playing those games on high or ultra settings. Your mainstream processor comes with an integrated, budget GPU. Good luck playing the latest games "for quite some time". Without dual-graphics, you'll be struggling to play new games next year at anything but low settings.....and when DX12 comes, you'll have to replace your CPU and GPU, where the rest of us only need a GPU. I have an A4 5300 in my HTPC (and an A4 4000 on the shelf), and while it does everything it was intended to do, sometimes you just have to be realistic. AMD's APUs are entry-level and mainstream processors with integrated, budget GPUs. They will have a shorter lifespan than a Core i5 or i7 processor. A current generation i7 may be overkill for most, but if you're building a "gaming rig" you will get a longer upgrade cycle for the money.

Lmao a core i7 overkill

Yeah, I found that quite funny. My poor 2600K has been sweating bullets since it was installed. If my A4 5300 was asked to do even 10% of what my 2600K has been forced to do....you'd be seeing a mushroom cloud above my house from your door step....

to me, it is over kill. I can upgrade my entire system yearly for what it would cost you and willing to pay. so your system will last 2-4 years? at 1200$+ cost. I could upgrade every 2 years for less. I just don't think its worth the price tag. what's wrong with medium settings? you still get to enjoy the game.

Considering you can still use overclocked Core 2 Quads to play just about any game (though, maybe not all games) shows that you can wait a lot longer than just 2 years. If you have at least 4GB of RAM you're all set too, though 8GB is a good safe number to have. All you really need to upgrade every couple years to play the latest games are GPUs. Personally, it makes more sense to me to get a GPU that can play as many of your favorite games at the detail level and resolution you prefer and once it starts getting obsolete, get a 2nd or 3rd one. Thats what I did and I'm still using a pair of GPUs that came out in 2009. Obviously things change when you do more than just gaming, but generally speaking, the only reason to get anything more than a quad core is to simply speed things up or if you have bad task management. Most workstation applications don't need anything better than an old quad core.

My cpu is 3 years old and still much faster than your cpu. I consider that money well spent.

Don't forget how much you payed that CPU 3 years ago. Just sayin 😀

to me, it is over kill. I can upgrade my entire system yearly for what it would cost you and willing to pay. so your system will last 2-4 years? at 1200$+ cost. I could upgrade every 2 years for less. I just don't think its worth the price tag. what's wrong with medium settings? you still get to enjoy the game.

If you upgrade your system yearly, you'll spend more over a 5 year period than I will, by about double. Skylake will be my earliest CPU upgrade. That's still a year or more away and even that will be optional. There's no justification for Core i7 users to upgrade every 2 years. We can easily skip entire sockets. That's the advantage of an i7 processor. Budget processors have shorter lifespans and higher costs in the long run because of the need to upgrade more frequently. To keep gaming, you'll have to upgrade sooner than I will. My upgrades have never cost $1200....lol $1200 would be an entirely new system, not an upgrade. An upgrade is simply replacing outdated components.

How many years till a AMD APU will equal a 2600k? Just sayin.

Probably 5-6..... Just sayin....

Something that has to be replaced frequently, is never cost efficient. My HTPC had a cost of $150 for motherboard, processor and case (I had bd-rom, ram and hdd on hand). I could build an Intel equivalent system now for about $110 and have the same performance with half the power consumption. I don't hate APUs.... If I did, my HTPC wouldn't have an A4 5300 in it and I wouldn't have an A4 4000 sitting on my desk..... Technically, most of Intel's consumer level processors are APUs as they contain both a CPU and GPU. Intel just hasn't adopted the "APU" branding....

Intel's mainstream i5 & i7 LGA115x are APUs too, guess a lot people forget this.

you folks really hate apu's. just saying.... so much did that 780ti cost ya? ...700$? my comp cost me 240$mobo+apu+dgpu)) cause I had everything else. just saying. my biggest problem with the bigger price tags on those higher end cpu's are simply a cash on hand matter. im not here for a forum rage. just making a point. apu's rock. I think its extremely cost efficient. I never compare the cpu aspect of the apu in comparison to anything intel has released.

and the pc in my sig cost me around 1100$. that was almost 3 years ago. the first game that i couldn't play on ultra was hitman absolution, i was running between 20 and 40 fps, so since i wanted around 60 fps i played it on high. the pc in your sig will never ever hold absolution on high. i will most likely not upgrade my cpu until MAYBE skylake. just because something is cheap it doesn't mean it's cost-effective in the long run. my next upgrade would be a videocard, a 760 should be about 250$. but you know what? i won't get a 760. i will simply find another gtx 560 and sli them, i should pay around 150$ for one and the performance will be about the same as a 760. buying 'overpriced' motherboards is an investment aswell. ease of upgrade. and i7s are never overkill. certain people like me also have a hobby in 3d modeling. and i assure you that an i7 is a step up in terms of raw performance compared to an i5. not to again mention the fact that i will probably not upgrade my cpu for the next maybe 3 years. that's 6 years of life time. you would probably need to switch your cpu around 3 times during this time. i paid ~300$ for mine. do the math. if i'm not mistaken, your cpu is around 120$. le: oh, i'm gonna say 1 more thing. 4.8 ghz. i don't think i need to continue. just be smart and consider the upgradability you get from a high-end pc. as sykozis said, it's extremely common to skip sockets on high-end because this segment is relatively stagnant. we're most probably not gonna have a leap in performance like the switch from pentium 4 to core 2 duo anytime soon.

No most of us realize this however intel HD graphics are in no way comparable to what AMD offers with their APU's. Plus intel has never really pushed their iGPU as a discreet GPU alternative AMD has. That being said this is still an impressive little CPU for what it is.

In another light, AMD's APUs are more GPU than CPU. Intel is the opposite. You can't technically call AMD's products GPUs because you can't boot a computer off a GPU. Intel's IGPs are simply meant to give you a working display and offload some tasks like video decoding from the CPU. Otherwise, I don't think Intel really thinks their GPUs are good enough to change their product names to APUs. APU was really just a marketing thing (one that is somewhat confusing to noobs) and Intel already has a knack for confusing even enthusiasts. Besides, at this point, all of Intel's products (to my knowledge) involve IGPs. Maybe their Xeons or hex cores don't, I'm not really sure.