Windows 8.1 laptops with AMD's new chips to support wireless display

Advanced Micro Devices hopes to regain share
in the PC processor market with its upcoming
chips based on the Jaguar core, which will
bring console-like gaming and wireless
displays to laptops with Windows 8 and its
successor, Windows Blue.
The A6, A8 and A10 chips, code-named
Richland, will be up to 12 percent faster
than the comparable previous-generation
processors code-named Trinity, which were
released last year. The chips will boast a 40
percent improvement in graphics
processing speed.
The company on Thursday also introduced
A4 and A6 chips code-named Kabini for
low-end laptops. With the chips, the
company is facilitating the introduction of
inexpensive, low-power laptops with
touchscreens and other features. Acer and
Hewlett-Packard are expected to ship
laptops based on Kabini.
The financially struggling AMD is hoping
the new chips will spark a revival in the
company's PC business. PC shipments have
been falling and AMD has been losing
market share to Intel.
An interesting feature in the Richland chips
is AMD Wireless Display, which will support
wireless beaming of images from PCs to
TVs. The feature will be supported on
Windows Blue laptops this year, AMD said.
Microsoft is releasing a preview of the
Windows 8.1 OS, code-named Blue, in June.
The OS will be available as a free upgrade
to existing Windows 8 users.
The Wireless Display feature will allow
whatever is on the display to be wirelessly
streamed to TVs. AMD's Jaguar chips and
graphics cores have already been selected
for use in Sony's PlayStation 4 and
Microsoft Xbox, so the laptops could deliver
a console-like gaming experience. Laptops
will be able to display images on up to four
external displays simultaneously.
The Richland chips are also more power
efficient than their predecessors, which
translates to more battery life on laptops.
Laptops with a 55-watt-hour battery may
be able to deliver power for up to 8.3 hours
of Web browsing. That goes down to 4.3
hours for watching a 720p video.
The chip lineup includes the dual-core
A6-5357M, which has a maximum clock
speed of 3.5GHz; the quad-core A8-5557M,
which has a maximum clock speed of
3.1GHz; and the quad-core A10-5757M,
which clocks up to 3.5GHz. The chips draw
35 watts of power and are targeted at
standard-sized laptops.
For ultrathin laptops, AMD also introduced
four A4, A6, A8 and A10 chips that draw
from 17 to 25 watts of power. The
maximum clock speeds for the chips are
from 2.6GHz to 2.9GHz.
The new low-power A4, A6 and E-series
chips in the Kabini lineup deliver up to 66
percent better performance-per-watt than
comparable chips released last year, AMD
said.
The graphics capabilities are "console-like,"
and 88 percent faster than the previous-
generation chips, AMD said. The new chips
are also up to 25 percent more power
efficient.
Laptops will be able to deliver around six
hours of battery life for watching high-
definition video, and nine hours or more
when browsing the Web, according to
internal measurements by AMD.
The chips, which are based on the Jaguar
core, will compete against Intel's Core i3
and Pentium processors, which usually go
into low-cost laptops. Intel is set to release
new fourth-generation Core i3 processors
code-named Haswell in June.
The Kabini lineup includes the A6-5200
chip, which runs at 2GHz and draws 25
watts of power, and the quad-core A4-5000,
which runs at 1.5GHz and draws 15 watts
of power. The company also announced
dual-core E1 and E2 chips, which have clock
speeds between 1GHz and 1.65GHz, and
draw between 9 and 15 watts of power.
Agam Shah covers PCs, tablets, servers,
chips and semiconductors for IDG News
Service. Follow Agam on Twitter at
@agamsh . Agam's e-mail address is
agam_shah@idg.com