The Brazos Performance Preview: AMD E-350 Benchmarked
by Anand Lal Shimpi on November 16, 2010 12:01 AM ESTFinal Words
The Brazos platform really poses the question of what is fast enough from a CPU standpoint. Netbook makers often argued that Atom was fast enough, and honestly they'd be right if Atom wasn't paired with such a heavyweight OS. Running Windows 7, Atom just wasn't fast enough but many made the sacrifice in order to get the form factor and battery life benefits that went along with the platform. The E-350 offers an alternative. You get faster than Atom CPU performance (particularly in single threaded tasks) and a fairly potent GPU. The only issue is that the E-350 doesn't compete against Atom. Most of the time you'll find it up against Pentium or low end Core i3 notebooks.
From a CPU performance standpoint, the E-350 can't compete with either of those CPUs clock for clock. Where AMD has the advantage is in power consumption and GPU performance. This is effectively AMD's answer to Intel's CULV platform, but with better graphics performance.
This is a huge statement from AMD, echoing what Apple has been saying for the past year: while CPU performance matters, GPU performance must scale at least as quickly, if not more to make up for lost time. The only thing we're really lacking are the killer apps (outside of 3D gaming and HD video) to support this mentality today.
The Radeon HD 6310 in the E-350 does very well, despite the memory bandwidth limitations. Its easily faster than Intel's HD Graphics, although some games (e.g. Starcraft 2) are still held back by the performance of AMD's Bobcat cores. Despite being a significant step forward for integrated graphics at this price point, I would be lying if I said I didn't wish it were faster. Ideally I would like to see > 30 fps performance across the board from the E-350.
There's also the GPU compute argument that AMD makes for Fusion, however the GPU compute tests I tried to run on Brazos didn't exactly work. Cyberlink Media Espresso would not use the GPU for encoding and the Civilization V compute shader test wouldn't run either. Both I suspect will be worked out by the time the platform actually ships.
What matters the most with Brazos is what the OEMs do with it. We'll of course get mini-ITX boards to turn into HTPCs, but on the mobile side Brazos needs to be paired with a sleek/well built chassis, good display, fast storage and a large battery to truly be attractive. I am also concerned about the performance of the Ontario based APUs. In many areas the E-350 isn't that much quicker than a dual-core Atom, which makes me wonder how the C-30 and C-50 would do.
Brazos ultimately has the same problem Atom had at its introduction. Compared to similarly priced notebooks based around 2.2GHz Pentium dual-core CPUs or Core i3s, the CPU just isn’t competitive. Unlike Atom however, in GPU bound scenarios the E-350 is actually faster than those two. The only issue, as I mentioned above, is that currently the majority of mainstream applications that are GPU bound are 3D games. Like Atom however, the Brazos platform is also destined for ultra thin formfactors - places a low end Core i3 can’t go. It’s in that comparison that AMD is most successful.
Compared to a Core i3-330UM, Brazos offers much better GPU performance and it’s even competitive in CPU dependent games like Starcraft 2. The i3-330UM is still faster CPU bound scenarios though, reinforcing the CPU speed for GPU performance tradeoff that you’re faced with when considering these two.
The E-350 delivers 50 - 60% of the multithreaded CPU performance of the Core i3-330UM, and nearly 70% of the single threaded performance. It’s a noticeable gap, but AMD attempts to make up for it by delivering up to twice the GPU performance in games.
Then there’s the issue of die size. For years AMD has had to give sell you a larger die at a lower price than Intel in order to remain competitive. The Brazos platform changes that. At 75mm^2, the Zacate die is smaller than just the CPU portion of a Core i3 and it’s less than 40% of the total die area when you include Intel’s HD Graphics. While more CPU performance would be nice to have, this is a good start.
AMD is committed to revving the Brazos platform yearly. We’ll obviously see updated graphics next year but I’m hoping for updates to the CPU cores as well. The biggest mistake Intel made with Atom was to be too conservative with its roadmap. AMD has a history of not making the same mistakes as Intel, so hopefully the Brazos roadmap looks good. Now we wait for the notebooks.
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jdonkey123 - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
What are the primary processor-related factors for consumers buying a new mobile PC?Battery Life, Price, Form Factor, & Performance (perceived)
When you look at these factors, it's pretty obvious that this platform fits into a large hole between high-end Atom based offerings and Intel's myriad ULV and non-ULV mobile parts.
While much of that is obvious from this excellent benchmarks article, what's missing a bit is a compilation of relative power consumption (and by extension, battery life.)
The most power-hungry Atom system that this is likely to compete against in mobile can be found in the Asus Eee PC 1015PN with a DC Atom N550 + NG-ion. CNet found load power of that system to be 20.66 watts. Compare that to the E-350's 25 watts that you found under similar load (assuming gaming wasn't CNet's test case.)
In that case, the power consumption is only modestly higher for what seems like at least an equivalent boost in performance and at $429 list, AMD's system looks pretty good!
I guess I see an upgraded slate of netbooks as the most likely home for this APU and I think that as long as the pricing is there, AMD is actually in a great position to displace a ton of the higher-end Atom parts.
Ref: http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/asus-eee-pc-1015pn...
Joe Supersales - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
If you want to test one please contact Joe Jao at www.jetwaycomputer.com, Tel: 510-857-0130 Ext# 128, thanks.gudodayn - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
With all the noises Intel and AMD makes, I am surprised at the little guy's performance figures, the VIA Nano DC.I read the VIA Nano DC review and knew it took out Intel Atom D510 with ease but in the larger picture with desktop CPU numbers, I didn't expect it to do what it did!!!
I am excited about consumer products developed for the VIA Nano DC but unfortunately past experiences tell us all that in the market today, its all gobbled up by other bigger players!!!
Iketh - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
you're forgetting Nano's power consumption...this is everyone's argument proven in many of these posts, the article was written in the wrong light for Brazos... people looking at $500 notebooks either want near-desktop performance and dont care about 6 hour battery life, or they need a spreadsheet/web surfer with 6+ hours of battery... these are NOT competing markets
this is one instance where sticking to the price bracket does not work
sprockkets - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
What about the performace of this vs. the current Zotac Ion board with the Intel SU3200 dual core chip at 1.2ghz?Dark_Archonis - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
Irrelevant comparison. Intel's "i" processors offer strong performance for those who want it. For those who can't afford the performance, lower CPUs are "good enough".I'd love to hear why you think AMD settled for "good enough" in terms of Bobcat performance.
Atom will get smaller and less power hungry than Bobcat. i3 and above CPUs offer easily better performance than Bobcat. A Celeron E in many cases offer better-than-Bobcat CPU performance. Bobcat's GPU is not good enough for gaming or intensive multimedia tasks.
Bobcat ends up being stuck in no-mans land.
Clearly this discussion is about Bobcat. So tell me, what is the point of Bobcat compared to Atom? Sure it's faster than Atom, but it's still not fast enough to make a big impact in the market.
Dark_Archonis - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
Yes they have a long way to go, but Intel's upcoming Atom SoC designs dramatically reduce power consumption. Cedar Trail and Oak Trail are supposed to be very power efficient Atom platforms.So Zacate is mainly good for GPU-accelerated browsing? What about when Intel offers a strong-enough GPU integrated with Atom for hardware accelerated browsing? What then?
Dark_Archonis - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
Better get your wings ready then. Cedar Trail and Oak Trail will offer far lower Atom platform power consumption than current Atom platforms. Don't believe me? You'll see when the products are released, don't take my word for it.Really, "at the same price"? For the price that Zacate will go for, I'm pretty sure I would be able to get a Celeron E or Core 2 Duo-based Pentium for about the same price. Yes in some games they would perform worse due to the IGP in those products, but gaming on Zacate is a struggle anyways so it would be a moot point.
As for average everyday tasks, a Celeron E or Pentium would generally perform better than Bobcat.
You get what you pay for. Lower end products have lower end performance. This is a simple fact, no need to get politically correct.
Anyone who wants performance wouldn't be looking at this market anyways. Neither Atom nor Bobcat provide enough performance for enthusiast/performance users.
Dark_Archonis - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
No, I don't "speculate much", do you?Do you want me to post links to what Intel has said about the future of Atom, or should I let you look it up yourself?
Intel itself has talked about how Atom will get smaller and lower in power consumption while keeping the same performance or better.
Iketh - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
"dark_archonis", just stop... you're making a complete fool of yourselfanand need's DT's post rating scheme please