AMD A6 and A4 for SC2 net cafe?

On June 29 2011 09:38 mav451 wrote:
Llano's are more designed for HTPC's or laptops. On the desktop, it's somewhat of an afterthought since the performance is basically equal to the Athlon II X4. Also, the i3 SB's only come with the HD 2000 IGP, not the 3000 IGP. The HD 2000 IGP's are significantly weaker b/c they only have half the EU's of the HD 3000 (6 vs. 12).

You can see a direct comparison of them from the SB article here:
+ Show Spoiler +
and compared to the Llano A8's 6550D IGP here:
+ Show Spoiler +

Another thing to note is the reviews are concentrating on the highest performing Llano's...which again, are a bit misplaced on the desktop. The A4 and A6, which vary from dual/tri/quad-cores, also differ with cache (specifically the A4's with only 1MB vs. the 3MB and 4MB models found in the A6 and A8's). The IGPs, on the lower A4 and A6 models, are similarly castrated...so be wary that performance may be significantly different than the 6550D found in the top-line A8's.
+ Show Spoiler [A4,A6,A8 models] +

The bigger issue to me, IMO, is that Llano's scales very well with performance RAM as the IGP is severely memory starved. You can see what happens with the RAM speed is increased from stock 1333Mhz to 1866Mhz.
+ Show Spoiler +*I know - it's not an SC2 benchmark. Why did AT fail to benchmark SC2 with the 1866 RAM speeds? Beats me lol.

Bottom line is that with low quality settings across the board, this reduces the Llano's IGP advantage; AMD's biggest advantage. But we need to look at cost in its totality here. Pair the SB with any non-IGP GPU and you have an infinitely longer-lasting solution.

The major difference between mobile Sandy Bridge and its desktop countpart is all mobile SB launch SKUs have two graphics cores (12 EUs), while only some desktop parts have 12 EUs (it looks like the high-end K SKUs will have it). The base GPU clock is lower but it can turbo up to 1.3GHz, higher than most desktop Sandy Bridge CPUs. Note that the GPU we tested in Friday's preview had 6 EUs, so mobile Sandy Bridge should be noticeably quicker as long as we don't run into memory bandwidth issues. Update: Our preview article may have actually used a 12 EU part, we're still trying to confirm!

On June 29 2011 09:58 jacosajh wrote:
Is the budget $300 for the PC only? Or including screen, keyboard, mouse?

On June 29 2011 13:49 cannedrice wrote:


No, just the tower itself.

I was originally thinking of doing Athlon II X3 boxes paired with Radeon 5450s. Not sure if waiting for the A6 makes sense.

On June 29 2011 14:11 Womwomwom wrote:
I'm not sure but I don't believe AMD's turbo core, which is basically Intel's turbo boost, works on the desktop processors, so its basically an Athlon II with a huge IGP component. I think Ananadtech mentioned it in their review but don't count me on it.

On August 21 2011 05:12 SirazTV wrote:
The new AMD llano architecture only really makes sense for portable computers. For a PC bang just buy a bunch of athlon II x3 or the new sandy bridge duo cores(the cheaper ones then the i3 cant remember the name) and 460s. The performance will be soooooooo much better and not cost that much more then a llano system.

Also, as a side note the I did just get a llano A6-3400m laptop and have been impressed with the sc2 performance. It plays 1v1 on medium @ native resolution 1366x768 wihtout lag. Even when @ 200/200 with muta ling my fps only drops to around 30-35.

On August 21 2011 05:20 JingleHell wrote:


Pentium G840. But without a discrete GPU adding to the price, you won't beat llano by much. Even so, a GTS 450 can be had for ~$80 on sale, making it slightly more expensive after including the overpriced llano mobo, for much better performance on the GPU side, and slightly better CPU power.

On August 21 2011 05:53 jacosajh wrote:
For real, I would take a G620 + H61 + GTS 450 any day over Llano.

Heck, for an ultra portable desktop, I'd still just get a Mini-ITX for about $65, a G620 for about $78 and a low-profile HD5570 or something like that for about $65.

Llano is a great idea, but I think it needs to offer more power in both GPU/CPU department for it to be worth it for me (and therefore, most people, in my opinion).

On August 21 2011 08:53 jacosajh wrote:
Ultra @ 1920x1080 on GTS 450?

I don't think that's right.

Even if it could, it probably won't be stable for more than 1v1s and/or medium-large battles.

Maybe some stuff on Ultra, some stuff on High. My 5770, a bit better than the GTS 450, struggles a little bit on Ultra everything @ 1920x1080.