AMD Athlon™ Processor Product Brief
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- Ultimate Performance for Cutting-Edge Applications
- The Most Powerful Multimedia Experience in an x86 Platform
- Tomorrow's Technology Today
- Powering the Next Generation in Computing Platforms
- The Power of a Reliable Partner
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AMD Athlon™ Processor
Overview
The AMD Athlon™ processor is among the world's most powerful engines for
PC computing, and represents the industry's first seventh-generation x86
microarchitecture. The AMD Athlon processor family is designed to power
the next generation in x86 computing platforms. It meets the computation-intensive
requirements of cutting-edge software applications running on high-end desktop
systems, workstations, and servers. All AMD Athlon processors are now produced
using 0.18-micron process technology.
Business users who work with image processing, digital content creation,
CAD/CAE, scientific applications and other computationally-demanding software
will benefit from the tremendous processing power of AMD Athlon processor-based
systems. Computing enthusiasts who want the performance and clock speeds
required to run the latest 3D gaming, entertainment, Internet, and personal
productivity software will benefit from desktop systems powered by the
AMD Athlon processor.
Ultimate Performance for Cutting-Edge Applications
The AMD Athlon processor's seventh-generation microarchitecture, including
a high-bandwidth system bus and on-die L2 cache* , enables it to attain
outstanding levels of performance. Plus, the AMD Athlon processor delivers
industry-leading integer, floating point, and 3D multimedia performance
for x86 platforms.
*While all AMD Athlon processors currently being manufactured by AMD
feature 256K of full-speed, on-die L2 cache memory, previous versions,
without on-die L2 cache, may still be commercially available in some computer
systems. Ask your computer manufacturer for details.
The AMD Athlon processor provides exceptional processing power on real-world,
mainstream Microsoft® Windows® compatible software, as well as computation-intensive
applications for high-end desktops. These high-end workstation applications
include digital photo editing, digital video, commercial 3D modeling,
image compression, soft DVD, CAD, and speech recognition .
The Most Powerful Multimedia Experience in an x86
Platform
The AMD Athlon processor's ultimate x86 performance and next-generation
features combine to give end users an outstanding computing experience,
whether running standard productivity software or the latest leading-edge
consumer and commercial applications.
Computing enthusiasts get exceptional performance for Internet applications,
digital imaging, 3D gaming, and personal creativity software. The AMD
Athlon processor's advanced multimedia architecture and 3D technology
deliver rich images, fast frame rates, and accurate theater-quality sound.
The revolutionary system bus, now running as fast as 266MHz†, allows users
to quickly and easily process Internet content from DSL/cable modems and
digital video imaging devices.
†Not all AMD Athlon processors are available with 266MHz system buses.
Business users get remarkable performance from AMD Athlon processor-based
systems. Popular programs for desktop publishing, database, accounting,
and other demanding business applications execute at fast speeds, resulting
in exceptional levels of productivity. The enormous power of the AMD Athlon
processor's visual computing capabilities allows users to unleash their
creativity and deliver high impact Web designs and other dynamic communications
to effectively reach and influence customers.
Tomorrow's Technology Today
The seventh-generation AMD Athlon processor is based on the industry's
most advanced x86 microarchitecture. The following features and capabilities
combine to give users of AMD Athlon processor-based systems an extraordinary
computing experience, as well as the confidence that their systems are
designed to meet their computing needs for years to come.
- Microarchitecture: The AMD Athlon processor features a superpipelined,
nine-issue superscalar microarchitecture optimized for high clock frequencies.
The AMD Athlon processor contains a total of nine execution pipelines:
three for address calculations, three for integer calculations, and
three for executing x87 (floating point), 3DNow!™ and MMX™ instructions.
- System Bus:The AMD Athlon processor's system bus is the first x86
platform bus running at or above 200MHz. At present, AMD Athlon processors
are available with 266MHz and 200MHz system buses. As one of the fastest
x86 processor buses currently available, the design delivers as high
as 100 percent more peak bandwidth than any x86 system bus. It is designed
for scalable multiprocessing and leverages high-performance Alpha™ EV6
bus technology to enable exceptional system performance.
- Floating Point Engine: The AMD Athlon processor includes the first
fully pipelined, superscalar floating point engine for x86 platforms.
The resulting floating point capability is the most powerful ever delivered
in an x86 processor.
- Enhanced 3DNow!™ Technology: The AMD Athlon processor's enhanced 3DNow!
technology takes 3D multimedia performance to incredible heights and
builds on the 21 instructions of AMD's original 3DNow! technology-the
first x86 instruction set to use superscalar SIMD floating point techniques.
Enhanced 3DNow! technology adds 24 instructions-19 to improve MMX integer
math calculations and enhance data movement for Internet streaming applications
and 5 DSP extensions for soft modem, soft ADSL, Dolby Digital, and MP3
applications.
- Cache Architecture: The AMD Athlon processor boasts a 384K total full-speed
on-chip system cache including 128K L1 cache--four times that of Intel's
Pentium® III processor--and 256K on-chip full-speed L2 cache. This performance-enhancing
cache design helps boost overall system performance.
- Double Data Rate (DDR) Memory: The natural evolution from PC100/PC133
SDRAM memory, DDR memory enables unrivaled x86 performance while remaining
price competitive. While other types of SDRAM memory read and write
only once per clock cycle, DDR technology allows the memory to read
and write twice per cycle. DDR memory is available from major DRAM suppliers
around the world.
Powering the Next Generation in Computing Platforms
The combination of exceptional performance, high clock frequencies, performance-enhancing
cache memory, impressive bus bandwidth, and a reliable design makes the
AMD Athlon processor family a powerful choice for high-end desktop systems,
workstations, and servers.
The AMD Athlon processor offers the peace-of-mind reliability required
by enterprise users and IT managers. The AMD Athlon processor's system
bus is also designed for scalable multiprocessing, with the number of
AMD Athlon processors in a multiprocessor system determined by chipset
implementation.
High-performance AMD Athlon processor-based platforms provide an exceptional
level of performance and data-movement bandwidth for computation-intensive
software used in such challenging applications as digital imaging, Internet
content development, enterprise computing, CAD/CAE, scientific/technical
calculations, and 3D gaming
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