Bulldozer CPUs to possibly work with some AM3 boards?

[devguy]

Anyone seen this? Sounds pretty counter to what AMD has been saying for a while, but it wouldn't be that unreasonable. I remember my buddy running a Phenom X4 9200 on his AM2 motherboard with the old HTT, and it worked fine, but slightly crippled.

Also, MSI has been saying that their 890FX gd65 motherboard is AM3+ CPU compatible. We also saw that Asrock board that advertises AM3+ cpu support on the 890FX chipset. We'll see, but if any AM3 boards are going to be compatible with Bulldozer, I'm going to bet they'll have to be 8xx series, so us 7xx series guys will have to upgrade anyway.

 

[brandonwh64]

Im guessing it will be most motherboards by the end of it. i believe if it will work with some, they will find a way to make them work on all DDR3 boards just like they made thuban work on older chipset DDR2 boards

 

[CDdude55]

I believe AMD already said that Bulldozer CPU's will not be compatible with AM3 boards, but AM3+ boards are capable of using AM3 chips.

Though it would be awesome if i could throw a Bulldozer chip on my current AM3 mobo, it would save me a good amount of cash, so here's hoping they consider Bulldozer backwards compatibility.

 

[brandonwh64]

I think the pin layout is the same and all they would really need to do is configure the AM3/DDR3 board to recognize the cpu right?

 

[cheesy999]

I think the pin layout is the same and all they would really need to do is configure the AM3/DDR3 board to recognize the cpu right?

if thats true i hope they get around to releasing a bios update for my board- unlikely however as its a geforce 630a/7025 board

 

[yogurt_21]

see I've never understood the whole backwards slot compatibility. I mean especially when you can get a new amd board so cheap most of the time. Typically a cheap asrock of the new spec will outperform a top of the line asus of the old spec and you can sell the top of the line asus on the old spec for more than the cost of the new spec asrock.


so why continue to run the old one?

just upgrade the board. I've never understood amd users utter refusal to change boards. I mena sure it's been a while since I've been on an amd platform but with my fx-62 it was an easy change from a 939 4000 sandiego. I don't see the same thing on intel, most intel users will swapout boards at a moments notice and while this may say something about board stability it makes sense to do so when there's a new platform out and you want to upgrade.

I for 1 think they shouldn't make bulldozer backwards compatible so that everyone running bulldozer gets full bulldozer power.

 

[mstenholm]

if thats true i hope they get around to releasing a bios update for my board- unlikely however as its a geforce 630a/7025 board

About the same time as I replaced my 8086 with a Nec 30 or was it the year after

Edit: if so it only states that AMD, in terms of user friendliness has be a better choice then "the other camp".

 

[cheesy999]

just upgrade the board. I've never understood amd users utter refusal to change boards. I mena sure it's been a while since I've been on an amd platform but with my fx-62 it was an easy change from a 939 4000 sandiego. I don't see the same thing on intel, most intel users will swapout boards at a moments notice and while this may say something about board stability it makes sense to do so when there's a new platform out and you want to upgrade.

I for 1 think they shouldn't make bulldozer backwards compatible so that everyone running bulldozer gets full bulldozer power.

yeah but i still run DDR2 and For the price of a CPU+New Mobo+New Ram you can get better performance by just buying a better processor

 

[brandonwh64]

I believe if it does go backwards, it will only be for DDR3 boards

 

[cheesy999]

I believe if it does go backwards, it will only be for DDR3 boards

what about hybrids

 

[devguy]

I believe if it does go backwards, it will only be for DDR3 boards

Well that is for sure, as AMD have already stated that Bulldozer Zambezi chips will have a dual-channel DDR3 memory controller only.

 

[yogurt_21]

yeah but i still run DDR2 and For the price of a CPU+New Mobo+New Ram you can get better performance by just buying a better processor

in that case for the price of buying a new processor you can just overclock your old one and skip the expense altogether or buy a new cooler. In fact you could buy nothing, reinstall your os and get better performance.

you're not doing yourself any favors by simply changing cpu while running an old platform. You're gettign half the features and pairing it with a slower chipset abnd slower memory for a marginal boost you'd get more easily by clocking your current cpu faster.

new architecture needs a new board and memory to match it. otherwise it's like running a gtx480 with a pentium 4.

 

[erocker]

you're not doing yourself any favors by simply changing cpu while running an old platform.

You never know. It's possible that the performance benefit is there from just upgrading my CPU if possible. I honestly don't find myself needing an upgrade anyways.

 

[Hunt3r]

I do not think they would show the design of an AM3 motherboard + stupidly.

AM3 + bulldozer will be fact ..

 

[cheesy999]

@yogurt

have you actualy used a board with an older chipset - the cpu is about 5-10% slower in worst case and in most programs its unoticible as they dont use enough memory for the chipsets limitations to cause a bottleneck the only limitation thats noticible is PCi v1 and on mid range gfx card thats 1>%

sorry if post is poor quality psp has problems with tpu

edit it could be worse for buldozer though as theyve got 8 cores

 

[techtard]

They should release Bulldozer as AM4, new socket/platform. Maybe Tri or Quad channel DDR3 memory, Sata III, USB3 and PCIE-3. Market it as high end enthusiast, professional. Like i7.

And release modified 32nm Phenom/Athlon/Sempron as AM3+. More cache, stronger IMC, stronger IPC, maybe some backwards compatibility with AM3.

That way they could have platforms to compete directly with i3, i5, i7, and Atom.

 

[Over_Lord]

Maybe Tri or Quad channel DDR3 memory,

triple channel did nothing much(except benchmarks) to prove performance gain.

look at sandy bridge v/s i980x for this

 

[techtard]

No, it didn't for gamers. But if used as a professional platform, it gives the option to use more RAM. Which is a plus for heavy duty Video/Graphics, photography and audio/music editing.

And if the games/apps/etc are actually coded from the ground up to be 64 bit native, and maybe better multi-threading, then tri and quad channel memory would be a boon.
But, programmers and the like are creatures of habit, and in many cases, lazy. So this is probably just a pipedream.

 

[nt300]

Bulldozer can't be compatible with AM3, because AM3 based motherboards are missing design elements to properly utilize the new CPUs.

Also naming the new Socket AM3+ is not a good idea, perhaps AMD should re-think it and name it AM4 or something to reduce as much confusion as possible.

Rumored new name for AMD's upcoming Bulldozer CPU's "AMD SuperaCore x4, x8 and AMD SuperaCore FX 1000, 2000, etc...

 

[techtard]

Superacore sounds kinda dumb. Maybe go with ProFX or somesuch. Shame to throw away namebrand recognition if they do get rid of the Sempron, Athlon, and Phenom designations.

AMD marketing seems like they are kind of halfway retarded recently. Rumored to be phasing out the current processor naming scheme.

Mucking about with the GPU naming scheme, and adding in tons of confusion in the process.
Maybe they caught the dumb from the driver team. LOL.

 

[pantherx12]

I don't think it will me compatible.

*

looks to me like am3+ socket is longer.

Hence mobos being backwards compatible ( smaller things fit into larger things of course) but not the other way round.



*I know this is a 890fx board to, but look at that socket also says AM3b on the thing.

 

[Athlon2K15]

I hope it's not compatible the only way amd is going to move in the right direction is to remove all the backwards compatible bs they have been running with for the last 10 years

 

[devguy]

They should release Bulldozer as AM4, new socket/platform. Maybe Tri or Quad channel DDR3 memory, Sata III, USB3 and PCIE-3. Market it as high end enthusiast, professional. Like i7.

And release modified 32nm Phenom/Athlon/Sempron as AM3+. More cache, stronger IMC, stronger IPC, maybe some backwards compatibility with AM3.

That way they could have platforms to compete directly with i3, i5, i7, and Atom.

Dear God, no! That is one of the things I despise most about Intel right now, ie there are 3 sockets on their market (with a fourth incoming; five if you count the older s775), and none of the processors for one are compatible with any other. It isn't a huge deal for a TPU'er to understand which Intel chip goes where, but try to explain it to anyone not tech savvy, and AMD's strategy quickly becomes more desirable. AMD learned from the number of people they pissed off (myself included) with the unnecessarily short-lived s939.

I'm all for Bulldozer being backwards compatible with AM3 (even with a performance penalty), just as long as they don't sacrifice any performance on the AM3+ socket. If they have to compromise performance for compatibility, I'd prefer that they did not. On the other hand, if they can just add in some extra logic for AM3 support (possibly at the expense of die area), but keep performance the same on AM3+, then by all means do so.

And Pantherx12, I think that is just a bad picture. The AM3+ socket is the same exact shape, but with a different number of pins.

I hope it's not compatible the only way amd is going to move in the right direction is to remove all the backwards compatible bs they have been running with for the last 10 years

Lol, that's how I feel about Microsoft Windows. Stupid registry (Mac OSX and Linux got it right).

 

[Athlon2K15]

Lol, that's how I feel about Microsoft Windows. Stupid registry (Mac OSX and Linux got it right).

The only thing they didnt get right was mainstream functionality,both of those OSes would be more popular if they worked for the average user

 

[nt300]

Superacore sounds kinda dumb. Maybe go with ProFX or somesuch. Shame to throw away namebrand recognition if they do get rid of the Sempron, Athlon, and Phenom designations.

AMD marketing seems like they are kind of halfway retarded recently. Rumored to be phasing out the current processor naming scheme.

Mucking about with the GPU naming scheme, and adding in tons of confusion in the process.
Maybe they caught the dumb from the driver team. LOL.

I agree, also ProFX does sound great. Though I do understand why AMD want's to re-name the Bulldozer CPU something new so they won't assosiate it with the Phenom brand. I beleive this makes a lot of sense in a way.

Let's just hope they name it something that sounds good, new and fast