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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silverblue - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
I admit it's rather one-sided, however there's an important point to be made - most graphics sales are integrated/low-end discrete. This is why Intel has the lion's share of the market. nVidia's fallen out of favour with Intel (and not because it did something wrong, either) and are soon to get a competitor in the ULV space which may just make purchasing ION a less clear cut decision.nVidia won't sit still, and I doubt Intel will in terms of on-die graphics. There's nothing to suggest that nVidia couldn't come up with an Optimus solution for the Brazos platform (as ironic as that may sound, though do remember it's hardly a graphics monster) in order to have as many fingers in as many pies at once. nVidia have produced very good chipsets in the past for both AMD and Intel and this alone should factor in system builders' purchasing decisions, let alone OEMs.
nVidia aren't going to die, far from it. The better they're doing, the more Intel and especially AMD have to lower prices to keep competitive.
nitrousoxide - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
nVidia working on Optimus in co-op with AMD? That sounds like AMD saying to Intel: hey, use my GPUs on Sandybridge!silverblue - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
By that I meant an nVidia chipset that employs a GPU switching mechanism should the x16 slot be populated.Rayb - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
Just to make it clear, I understand the point you're making and the purpose of competition when a product is superior to a previous release. That's not the issue I'm debating, since the ION chipset is almost two years old and has managed to survive the ULV niche this long almost uncontested until now. I don't have any objections to Brazoz or Ontario if are proven even marginally better than other available alternatives.I don't restrict myself to one specific brand when making a purchase based on my requirements at that point. What I object is being marginalized to only one choice as alluded in (long rant by outsideloop) the third post above my reply. Which by the way since it's offset left and not intended for you, this one is.
According to his wisdom, there is no room for anybody else but his favorite company in that fantasy world. Obviously having having fruit-loops for breakfast, lunch and dinner is detrimental to your health.
nitrousoxide - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
Hey about the 3rd question, 50 cents for a short post, 70 cents for a medium length post and 1 buck for a long post, that's how much those people are paid in my country :)plonk420 - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
when it comes to raw CPU power, Brazos seems BARELY faster than Atom... and i feared Atom wouldn't be able to decrypt BD+ realtime with AnyDVD HD. i'm tempted to go Nano for that reason (but i sooooo want Brazos's TDP (even 25-50% more) for the Nano's computing power...nitrousoxide - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
That's true in heavy multi-threaded work loads. Daily use featuring low-single-threaded work load is significantly faster than Atom. And it can at least play 1080p HD Video smoothly while an Atom struggles for 720p video playback. It is definitely faster than Atom, but how far it can go depends on its final price margin. If it is forced to encounter Sandybridge CULVs, it will definitely be wiped out.richough3 - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
I currently have the Inspiron 1012 (Atom 450/GMA 3150) and the Inspiron 11z (SU4100 - 1.3 GHz/GMA4500MHD) and both have come close to what I've been looking for, but not quite.The 1012, Atom laptop, had awesome battery life, but it sucked at flash playback, running my TV tuner, and running multiple apps.
I got an Alienware M11x prior to the 11z. The graphics were awesome for an 11.6" subnotebook and battery life was good when on the integrated video, but the weight and hinge issue was why I returned it and got the 11z.
The 11z is good on battery life and did all the things the Atom laptop couldn't but it sucked for anything but basic running around in 3D games like Warcraft.
I had also considered the Inspiron M101z with the AMD K325, 1.3 GHz dual core proc, but it ran hotter and had less of a battery life than the 11z.
The E-350 APU appears to be able to address the desire for an acceptable, casual 3D experience and still provide decent performance for the other applications, along with good battery life and to provide all that in a lightweight subnotebook. Sure, I could get better performance with a heavier laptop, but I want lightness and a small footprint and I have a desktop for any heavy gaming or CPU intensive applications I want to run. I don't need a power hungry beast to play Plant vs Zombies, Diablo II, or to farm for mats in WoW, I just want it decent enough so it's not a total slide show.
iwodo - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
There should be a price / performance / watt graph.Personally i am not too convinced this will succeed. Or this will solely complete where Atom is currently at, cheap and as apple correctly stated, useless Netbook area.
It is no where near even the low range Pentium E, or even Celeron.
The only area where Brazos or its derivative shines, is the cheapest computer possible.
However spending $40 - $50 you would get nearly double the performance.
Aloonatic - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
I don't understand.DO you really think that Intel's product will be cheaper and improvements released more quickly without AMD as competition?
Mind boggled.