The Kabini Deal: Can AMD Improve the Quality of Mainstream PCs with Its Latest APU?
by Anand Lal Shimpi on May 24, 2013 1:45 PM ESTGPU Performance
Looking at 3DMark’s Ice Storm test, the comparison between Intel’s 22nm HD Graphics in the Pentium 2020M and the Radeon HD 8830 in the A4-5000 is extremely close. In fact, across almost all of the 3DMark benchmarks we see the two perform very similarly. The lone exception being 3DMark 11 where the A4-5000 maintains a significant lead and even approaches Trinity in terms of performance (making it feel more like a fluke than the norm).
Turning to GFXBenchmark (formerly GL/DXBenchmark), we see performance tilt in favor of Kabini once again. The T-Rex HD test is extremely shader intensive. There’s about a 20% gap in raw shader performance between the 2-CU GCN implementation in Kabini and the 6 EU Gen7 graphics core in the Pentium 2020M, which maps almost perfectly to the performance delta we see in T-Rex HD. Now we see where the Pentium/Core i3 comparison comes from.
| GPU Performance | |||||||||||||||||
| 3DMark Ice Storm | 3DMark Cloud Gate | 3DMark Fire Strike | 3DMark 11 | 3DMark 06 | GFXBenchmark T-Rex HD | ||||||||||||
| AMD A4-5000 (Radeon HD 8330) | 23196 | 2159 | 310 | 580 | 3803 | 37 fps | |||||||||||
| Intel Pentium 2020M (HD Graphics) | 23135 | 2168 | 285 | 401 | 3542 | 30 fps | |||||||||||
All of this is fine if we’re looking at theoretical GPU benchmarks but what about actual games? In our Kabini review Jarred found the A4-5000 to be incapable of playing modern titles at reasonable frame rates, but what about titles from a few years ago? To find out, I dusted off Oblivion (with the Shivering Isles expansion) and threw it on my Kabini, Brazos and IVB Pentium systems.
I configured all three systems the same way: 1366 x 768, with medium graphics quality presets. I even used our old Oblivion SI benchmark from 2007. The results seemed to mirror what we saw in 3DMark:
| GPU Performance | ||||||||||||||||||
| Oblivion - 1366 x 768 Medium | Diablo III - 1366 x 768 Low | Oblivion - Power Consumption | ||||||||||||||||
| AMD E-350 (Radeon HD 6310) | 20.1 fps | 21.9 fps | ||||||||||||||||
| AMD A4-5000 (Radeon HD 8330) | 26.1 fps | 25.8 fps | 15.2W | |||||||||||||||
| Intel Pentium 2020M (HD Graphics) | 27.7 fps | 20.3 fps | 31.4W | |||||||||||||||
Kabini is about 30% faster than Brazos in GPU performance, and almost identical to the Pentium 2020M. Intel has a 6% performance advantage here, but I’m wondering if that’s from the CPU and not the GPU (Oblivion tends to hit both pretty hard). At lower quality settings (and/or resolution) you can definitely get Kabini above 30 fps, but even here I’d say it’s playable. More importantly, it’s performance competitive with Intel’s HD graphics.
I was also curious to see how Diablo III ran on Kabini so I fired up an early save and ran through the Cemetery of the Forsaken recording average frame rate. On a more modern title, both Kabini and Brazos actually hold a performance advantage over the Pentium 2020M.
As far as power goes, Kabini delivers relatively similar performance at roughly half the power of the Pentium 2020M.
With any of these integrated GPUs, the gaming experience even on previous generation high-end titles isn’t going to be a walk in the park.
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nunomoreira10 - Saturday, May 25, 2013 - link
try turning off turbo-boostit did wonders for mine
select 99% maxprocesserspeed on power management
ssj3gohan - Friday, May 24, 2013 - link
Where did you get that platform power consumption from? Because I've done some pretty extensive measurements on my own laptop (a not-really-ultrabook Medion, i5-3317U, UM77 chipset, 4GB RAM, Samsung 840, crappy display on eDP) and I got an idle total platform power of 3.3W. Of course that's with a 3.0W TDP UM77 chipset and not one of the 4.1W TDP non-ultramobile chipsets, but I don't think the gap should be *that* big! You're saying 8.14W for your Pentium 2020M setup, there must be some power hog or some software setting that you missed.DanNeely - Friday, May 24, 2013 - link
It's a 35W CPU in a $3xx system; unlike your not-really-an-ultrabook I doubt power consumption was a major vendor concern.repoman27 - Friday, May 24, 2013 - link
"As a more fully integrated SoC, Kabini’s IO duties are handled by an on-die North Bridge."On die northbridge is nothing new. Kabini has an on die FCH—both the north and south bridges are now integrated.
repoman27 - Friday, May 24, 2013 - link
Oops, sorry DanNeely. That was supposed to be a comment, not a reply. Still getting used to the new site layout.thuejk - Friday, May 24, 2013 - link
> There are two non-negotiables in building a PC these days: the cost of Intel silicon and the cost of the Windows license.The Windows license is becoming a bit optional. With Steam on Linux, lots of indie games with Linux support, and wine emulation (Starcraft II!), running Linux is becoming possible for gamers willing to limit their game library a bit.
Calinou__ - Monday, May 27, 2013 - link
It always was optional. There were lots of games before there was Steam, too.But well, you know, that's Anandtech. If it's non-commercial then it sucks. 8)
Death666Angel - Friday, May 24, 2013 - link
100% agreed with your conclusion. While cheaper-than-Pentium Kabini laptops would be okay (and will happen), I would like to see a Kabini laptop priced the same with a slightly larger battery, better/higher-res display and maybe more RAM or a small-ish SSD at the same price than competing Intel based laptops.Gaugamela - Friday, May 24, 2013 - link
This is more like it. The previous review was just pitiful. Considering that Notebookcheck.net had a much more extensive review, Notebookreview had an awesome review with glowing conclusions to Kabini, that Tomshardware managed to make a comparison with a 35W Pentium and an i3 Ivy Bridge you guys just had to do damage control.Kabini is a great piece of hardware. Super efficient and with enough performance for the majority of users not to notice an impact in daily use. Especially if options with an SSD exist.
Considering how it competes with a 35W Pentium and how efficient it is (it puts to shame the Ivy Bridge i3) this is an awesome chip. And then there's the matter of price. Considering this is a SoC, it is much cheaper than anything that Intel has to offer.
So, yes AMD has a great product here. And you guys will have to change your tune and stop using them as punching bags.
JarredWalton - Saturday, May 25, 2013 - link
[Rolls eyes]The previous review was under a severe time crunch, and while we'd love to have performance scores from every noteworthy CPU/APU out there (hello ULV Celeron, Pentium, Core i3, Trinity...) the fact is no one ever sent us laptops with those parts, and nearly all of the laptops we've reviewed over the past two years have gone back to the manufacturers.
This follow-up isn't about damage control, it's about hoping -- praying! -- that the OEMs won't do with Kabini what they've done with every other low-cost APU out there. I'm skeptical that we can get leopard to change their spots (i.e. budget laptop manufacturers to give us decent displays and chassis to go with the Kabini/Temash SoCs), but we shall see. For the price, Kabini has something to offer, but history suggests that most OEMs will take the cost savings and cut corners everywhere else to create mediocre laptops. The best CPU/APU/SoC in the world married to a lousy design is not a compelling product.
The simple fact of the matter is that you can't handle a the reality of the price/performance equation. Kabini laptops (and Temash tablets) will need to offer either better features/quality and/or lower cost than Core i3 in order to truly impress. They'll likely sell fine regardless, just like Brazos, but speaking of Brazos I actually managed to borrow a C-50 from a friend today, and I had forgotten just how bad the experience can be. E-350 was tolerable; C-50, not so much. Compared to C-50, the A4-5000 is amazingly fast! That's the problem with living in a vacuum where you only look at the comparisons a product wins: there are a lot of options out there to consider.
If there are two laptops with the same design, features, and components at the same price, and one has Kabini A4-5000 while the other has i3-3217U, it's a tossup. We know i3-3217U will have better CPU performance, and in many cases it will have better GPU performance as well. Kabini should have a slight edge in power use. Depending on the user's needs, either laptop could be a good fit, but personally I'd take Core i3 with HD 4000 and slightly worse battery life since I rarely need 7+ hours off the mains. On the other hand, if the Kabini option has a better LCD, or an SSD, that would be enough to give it the nod. This is exactly what we said in the original review, but you keep overlooking that fact.