AMD Richland processors to launch in March

AMD currently ships second-generation desktop and mobile APUs with "Trinity" core, that combines "Piledriver" microarchitecture and Radeon HD 7000 series graphics. Next generation of accelerated units will utilize Richland core with integrated graphics, upgraded to HD 8000. Richland processors were planned to launch in the first half of this year, although their announcement may come as early as the next week. Fudzilla today revealed that NDA on Richland APUs is going to be lifted on 8am EST of March 12, as a result we will see some reviews and additional product information. Last year AMD introduced mobile Trinity processors first, and they were followed by embedded parts and later by desktop processors. Whether AMD is going to use the same launch schedule for Richland parts remains to be seen.

As already been mentioned, Trinity and Richland processors are built on the same microarchitecture. However, Richland desktop APUs will be clocked about 300 MHz higher, which should increase their CPU performance by up to 8%. We don't have complete specifications of mobile Richland chips, but we expect that they will also have 200 - 300 MHz higher clock speed.