Next-Gen Apple TV to Use AMD Fusion APUs
 

Following AMD's recent announcement of a tie-up with Apple over supply of ATI Radeon graphics processors to be pre-fitted on iMac and Mac Pro product lines, news is surfacing that the engagement between the two will get even deeper. The next version of Apple TV will feature AMD's Fusion APU (accelerated processing units), making it the first Apple product to use an AMD processor. An APU is technically identical to the Intel Core i3 or Core i5 dual-core processors found in the market today (that have the CPU and an IGP in the same package), except that the first Fusion APUs will have the processor cores and an ATI Radeon GPU on the same die, and more importantly, the GPU will be DirectX 11 and OpenGL 4.1 compliant, and have performance on par with the ATI Radeon HD 5500 series discrete GPUs.

For Apple TV this means that it will have a GPU that's powerful enough to run a more complex, higher resolution user interface, and make use of AMD's advanced HD video acceleration features, while literally 60% of the vital components are contained within one chip (CPU, IMC, GPU, northbridge). Apple TV is a device that plugs into HDTVs, providing interactive TV and video streaming features over the iTunes store service. It can also connect to your media collection over a wireless network.

http://www.techpowerup.com/img/10-08-11/60a_thm.jpg

Source: DigiTimes

Apple 3 key sentences:

Looks good, way overpriced, doesn't deserve your money

:rockout:

Yay pay a shed load for this little HTPC in essence and then pay Apple even more to use it (iTunes)

Honestly though, kudos to Apple cause they have created a brand, and thats all that people are buying into these days regardless of the product, they blindly buy Apple's products like rats to the pied piper, stupid consumers :banghead:

wow, i never know there are many blindly haters in here,

why don't us wait for benchmarks and review before we bash this product :rolleyes:?

its really interesting product if this thing use fusion CPU, it can be a really powerful HTPC

and i want to see how liquid metal is

The Apple TV is actually reasonably priced (~$250) considering its features, Especially when you compare it to other competitors (Popcorn Hour, etc.).

I just hope this one can be converted to run the full blown OSX like the older one could.

Once you did that to them, they made awesome little workstations. The only problem was the single USB port, but with an Apple keyboard it turns that one into two, then use one for the mouse and leave the other open for whatever you need. Plus, the 160GB one for $190 makes it extremely cheap actually, you'd have a hard time even finding a PC workstation for that price(basically nettop equivalant).

here we go again with apple seems like you guys would stop after a while with the apple threads.

You will find very very very very few apple supports here.

If you could "jailbreak" this, load up an old copy of XP, would be a perfect nettop internet browser for the parents/grandparents/kids

I knew Apple would go the way of AMD, just didn't anticipate it to happen in the Apple TV. Interesting, but definately a smart move. If Fusion does a single die then it's certainly the logical choice for Apple as it will wau a lower TDP than a Core i3.

I know there are Apple haters on TPU and I'm one of them but look at it this way: with Apple as a major client, it's more money for AMD to spend on developing their chips. Apple WILL sell lots of these and as a result AMD WILL get los of money.

+1 ^ this is very good news for AMD, future is looking good for them.

this is awesome news for people that use apple TV

It gets bashed because they don't like apple products. Even benchmarks won't change that.

Well there are a few good reasons to not buy some apple products. Like the iPad, most of us can't see a good reason to buy one and the same said with their desktops we just can't justify the price. However then there was the iphone which is incredible as with the ipod touch and pretty much all ipods.

Why an old copy of XP? Loading OSX on it would accomplish the same task, and match the hardware better. Anyone can use OSX for basic internet tasks, there is really no learing curve there, and you don't have to worry about all the malware that hits XP.

I am not an apple lover but i just see this as a win for amd and they need some more wins if we want to see some more fight out of them in the cpu market in the future

Are you sure about the price? Being an apple product I would estimate this to cost somewhere around $500-800.

EDIT: Oh, you meant the older model... that costs 270€ in here.
EDIT2: WTF? Specs say that it >requires< a PC or a Mac. How lame is that.

Htpc

Another win for AMD. More money for them which is good. Apple TV was alright, I seen it in use but was not thrilled with it. Cheap HTPC for sure, but Id rather build my own.

1./ Because we all have old spare copies of XP

2./ There is ZERO learning curve to people who already know Windows

3./ Ease of remote managing an XP device. Tried remote managing OSX or mix and matching on the same network? http://www.dameware.com/products/dmrc/

4./ Malware? Lock it down and restrict user rights.

It's TPU, that's how it is. :(

And installing XP on a modern machine instead of the bundled OS is stupid. If you can install OSX on this thing, do a WM instead.

And there is the end of the "zero learning curve" thing.

Great !

I told you before and I'll say it again.. Apple will get rid of Intel and will shift to AMD soon !

AMD have what Apple wants a full Platform (CPU+GPU+Chipset) so they can lock OSX to there system more !

When this product will be launched ?!

The refurbed ones are $190, that is what I've bought and used for a few clients that wanted internet terminals in their business for the customers to use while they waited in the waiting room.

1.) True, but a copy of OSX is $26, and my time to lock down XP outweighs the cost of a new copy of OSX. Though now that I think about it, an even better solution would probably just be a Linux distro...

2.) There really isn't a learning curve to openning Safari and typing in the address, any Windows user can figure that out.

3.) There really wouldn't be a whole lot you would need to remote manage with these.

4.) You don't have to do that with OSX, and doing it with XP takes time, more time than it is worth.

I don't care how well this performs, it's a very good win for AMD.

Apple wouldn't price it that high. Seriously, now that the Mac Mini has built-in HDMI and is a lot more capable, I couldn't see them charging more than $300 for the Apple TV.