AMD Athlon with external L2 Cache?

[hardwarecop]

Hello everyone,

I'm just wondering if any of the socket A (462) AMD Athlon processors have L2 cache outside the DIE. Because I saw this unusual processor on a video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVHctiKV-Bg

Look at 3:46.

Is this unusual?

Thanks alot in advance,

SLDWTECH

[Neon]

In my opinion, it is very unusual, since that type of part was never released.

It might indicate that AMD had a plan to use off-die L2 cache for socket A (like the slot A before) in case the plan for on-die L2 cache failed, but I speculate that this would have been an early engineering sample for internal use, to make sure K7 worked properly with the new socket design.

[hardwarecop]

Thanks, this was also my first thought.

So you think it's impossible to buy or at least to find a good photo of this part?

[Neon]

As a collector of AMD processors, I never say impossible

I also noticed in the same video at about 5:36 the socket F processor he holds up has 6 socket key indentations in the packaging, rather than the usual 4 socket keys. So that is also unusual.

[hardwarecop]

I wish I could ask him personally