In early
July, AMD launched the latest architecture Llano APU.
Since the launch, it
has already been two and a half months. Initially, the only CPUs that can work
with it were the relatively high-end A8-3850 and the A6-3650.
The market
prices of course were a bit higher.
For chipsets, there are two options, the
A75 and the A55, adopting the latest FM1pinout design. For now, it appears the
price difference between the two is not very wide.
The main advantage of the
A75 is its support for the new SATA3 and USB 3.0 specifications. If you have
sufficient budget, this is the better choice.
The Llano APU was
relaunched in early September together with three new CPUs, and compared with
the previous two, the prices are lower
With built-in GPUs, the
A4-3400/A6-3500 are quite expensive compared with the A6-631, which has no GPU
Currently, a total of five CPUs support the Llano APU architecture to offer
more choices for the AMD FM1 platform
To begin, windwithme has shared tests
of the previous two Llano APUs, and we know that the biggest advantage of this
platform lies in its significant 3D performance.
Now the star of the
show is the latest product from ECS, the ECS A75 motherboard
The product is
positioned as part of the Black Series, and the complete serial number is
A75F-A, including the AMD A75 chipset
The PCB is black, and the extension
card slots are a complimentary gray or white
Based on the
ATX form factor, the size is 305mm x 220mm, a little smaller than standard ATX
measurements
The A75F-A is positioned as a high level A75 product, but the
price is actually lower than many other brands
Motherboard
Lower Left
2 X PCI-E X16, supporting 2Way CrossFireX technology, bandwidth
of X16 + X4
2 X PCI-E X1
3 X PCI
Realtek RTL8111E LAN chip
Realtek ALC892 audio chip, with support for 8-channel High Definition Audio
technology
Lower Right
of Motherboard
6 X gray SATA, A75 chip included, SATA3 specification,
supporting RAID 0, RAID 1 and RAID 10
Lower area F_USB1 USB 3.0 expansion
slots for the front
Top Right of
Motherboard
4 X DIMM DDR3, supporting 1333/1600/1866/2133 (OC)
This
board can be overclocked to extra performance of DDR3 2133.
Beside this is
the 24-PIN power input.
Upper Left
of Motherboard
The A75F-A uses a 4-phase power supply supporting AMD's
latest FM1 series CPU
At the top is the 8 pin power input, and heat sinks
used with the previous AM2 + / AM3 can also be installed on the pins of the FM1
IO
1 X
PS2 keyboard / mouse
VGA / DVI / HDMI
Clr CMOS button
4 X USB 2.0
(Black / Red)
1 X eSATA / USB 2.0 both supported (red)
2 X USB 3.0
(Blue)
1 X RJ-45 network connector
Closeup of
Power Supply
While the machine is running, you can feel the temperature is
not high around the heat sink.
The heat
sink models used with the A75F-A are of a typical style with a design that
increases the cooling area
If you touch the heat sink, you’ll find the
actual surface temperature is quite low, but if you use a more attractive heat
sink, it’s certain to have a stronger selling point
Test
Platform
CPU: AMD A8-3850
MB: ECS A75F-A
DRAM: CORSAIR
CMZ8GX3M2A1866C9R
VGA: AMD Radeon HD6550D
HD: CORSAIR FORCEGT
120GB
POWER: Thermaltake TR2 450W
Cooler: Thermaltake BigTyp 14Pro
OS:
Windows7 Ultimate 64bit SP1
CPU Default
Performance Test
CPU 100.0 X 29 => 2900.4MHz
DDR3 1866.8 CL8 9-7-27
1T
Hyper PI 32M X 4 => 23m 00.134s
CPUMARK 99 => 418
Nuclearus
Multi Core => 12315
Fritz Chess Benchmark => 14.86/7131
CrystalMark
2004R3 => 200725
CINEBENCH
R11.5
CPU => 3.46 pts
CPU(Single Core) => 0.88 pts
PCMark
Vantage => 12700
Windows
Experience Index - CPU 7.3
The
A8-3850’s performance is little changed from the previous generation Phenom II,
even when the CPU cache sizes of both L2 and L3 are slightly different.
For
those who need quad-core CPU performance, AMD offers better cost to performance,
but regarding the single-thread performance of AMD CPUs, I still feel that
in the future, AMD still has a lot of room to improve
DRAM Bandwidth
DDR3 1866.8 CL8 9-7-27 1T
ADIA64 Memory Read - 9360 MB/s
Sandra Memory
Bandwidth - 15775 MB/s
MaXXMEM Memory-Copy - 10680 MB/s
This is
where the Llano APU platform has made progress. The CPU default is adjustable up
to DDR3 1866, which is a bit higher than the previous 1600 platform.
While
the bandwidth and their platform have made a bit more progress, compared with
rivals such as the Sandy Bridge platform, the bandwidth seems to be lagging
further behind ...
DDR3 bandwidth is where AMD needs to improve in the
future, and we hope that performance will improve with the launch of the
Bulldozer
Temperature Performance (room temperature about 26 degrees)
Standby - 18
CPU at Full
Speed - 39
LinX 0.6.4
In a test
of the AMD C&Q power-saving technology, in standby the CPU clock / voltage
drops significantly, and for this reason the temperature falls quite a bit
At
this point, the obtained data was quite good, and even at full speed it was only
39 degrees.
However, because the chips tested for temperature on each
motherboard were different, actual temperatures may have been higher for some.
But what is certain is that AMD used 32nm for the A8-3850, so there has been
some progress with the temperature performance of the AMD platform
Power
Consumption
Standby - 27W
CPU Full
Speed - 125W
LinX 0.6.4
Both the
CPU and the GPU simultaneously at full speed - 153W
With OCCT running, a
test of the power supply
In
standby mode, because of the AMD C&Q power-saving technology, power
consumption is reduced to only 27W
With the Llano APU platform, the main
power consumer is the CPU. At full speed, there is an increase of about 98W in
CPU power consumption
In addition, following our comparisons, we believe
that the ECS had more outstanding power performance,
and the A75F-A was
about 10-20W lower than the previously used A75 platform
3D Test
Internal AMD Radeon HD6550D display driver
3DMark Vantage => P4423
StreetFighter
IV Benchmark
1920 X 1080 => 57.58 FPS
FINAL
FANTASY XIV
1920 X 1080 => 947
Built-in
3D performance is the biggest advantage of this platform, and the largest factor
boosting the performance level is the DDR3 clock
When combined with top of
the line DDR3, taking the setting to 1866 will result in a significant 3D
performance boost
The above test data showed the internal 3D almost on a par
with the nVIDIA GT430, and slightly better than the AMD Radeon HD5570
Consumers who want to buy entry-level VGA should save their budget with this
expenditure
ECS brought the BIOS interface to the UEFI, and this new
specification is what most of the motherboard brands have pursued in
2011
Main Screen
Quite good
support is provided with options for multiple languages
M.I.B III
Overclocking Page
At the top are mainly the CPU multiplier, DDR3 clock and
parameter settings
In the middle are current parameters for the DRAM
Below are the CPU FSB overclocking settings. This has a very significant
impact on the Llano APU
Voltage
Range
CPU Voltage +10 - +500 mV
VDIMM
Voltage -300~+600 mV
NB Voltage +10~+360 mV
DDR3
Frequency Options
Built-in
GPU that can share main memory capacity of 64M - 2GB
Hardware
Status
Added Smart Fan speed control function
Details
about overclocking have been mentioned previously.
When the Llano APU pulls
the CPU to a higher clock, the SATA FSB will be pulled up at the same time
For an extended time under 100MHz non-overclocked conditions, the stability
of the SATA device may be uncertain
This occurs with the entire A75/A55
series under overclocking conditions, and this is an inherent physical
limitation in AMD’s design
For a wide range of users who want to overclock
the CPU, we recommend that you wait for the launch of CPUs that are not locked.
Increasing the multiplier is a better solution for overclocking
With
the AMD Llano APU, overclocking settings are a bit simpler
Just pull up the
CPU FSB and combine that with the appropriate voltage to achieve overclocking
results
Of course, you’ll need to choose the right DRAM to effectively and
simultaneously boost DDR3 and GPU performance
Above are the overclocking
settings from windwithme for the A75F-A for use as reference
Overclocking Performance Test (SATA to IDE mode)
CPU 122.0 X 29
=> 3539.4MHz
DDR3 2278.4 CL10 11-10-27 1T
Hyper PI 32M X 4 =>
19m 01.017s
CPUMARK 99 => 510
Nuclearus
Multi Core => 15036
Fritz Chess Benchmark => 18.07/8671
CrystalMark
2004R3 => 235011
CINEBENCH
R11.5
CPU => 4.18 pts
CPU(Single Core) => 1.07 pts
PCMark
Vantage => 14304
Windows
Experience Index - CPU 7.4
When the
A8-3850 overclocked from 2900MHz to 3540MHz, the CPU performance increase was
about 20%
Compared with the 32nm process CPU, overclocking added about 1.45V
to the required voltage.
This relationship between the clock and voltage did
not result in significant progress.
Although the performance of the A8-3850
CPU has been sufficient for most environments, consumers would like to see more
progress with the new architecture
DRAM Bandwidth
DDR3 2278.4 CL10
11-10-27 1T
ADIA64 Memory Read - 10826 MB/s
Sandra Memory Bandwidth -
18915 MB/s
MaXXMEM Memory-Copy - 13200 MB/s
The Llano
APU platform has made obvious progress with the DDR3 clock. In the past, the AM3
could only reach the upper limit of about 1800 to 2000 only
This is the
first time I’ve seen the AMD DDR3 overclocked to a clock of DDR3 2278, and
better compatibility with the physical properties of DDR3 is very important
Bandwidth has increased by about 16 percent, and after the DDR3 clock is
pulled up sharply, one of the key areas that AMD needs to improve in the future
is bandwidth efficiency
Temperature Performance (room temperature about
26 degrees)
Standby - 5
CPU at Full
Speed - 50
LinX 0.6.4
We have
tried three A75 motherboard brands, and data showed standby temperatures of 5-18
degrees. This should be a result of C&Q power-saving technology, low voltage
and low clock speed.
The temperature of the ECS board at full speed was more
than 10 degrees lower than that of the previous A75.
The difference in
temperature may be a result of Autumn coming on or the A75F-A temperature
monitoring chip
However, the above temperature data shows the 32nm process
has reached a necessary level, and temperature performance is fairly good
Power Consumption Test
Standby - 30W
CPU at
Full Speed - 167W
LinX 0.6.4
Full
speed simultaneously for the CPU and GPU - 210W
Test of the power supply
with OCCT
With C
& Q power-saving technology enabled and the desktop in standby and when the
CPU is operating at full speed, CPU power consumption increases by 137W or so,
which is very high data
The GPU increases by about 43W, and at such a high
performance level for the GPU, power consumption is still within an acceptable
range
Although Llano APU is now fabricated with a 32nm process, the power
performance still leaves room for improvement
3D Test
Internal AMD
Radeon HD6550D display driver
3DMark Vantage => P5451
StreetFighter
IV Benchmark
1920 X 1080 => 70.21 FPS
FINAL
FANTASY XIV
1920 X 1080 => 1171
The
Llano APU’s internal performance mainly depends on level of the DDR3 clock When
overclocking reaches DDR3 2278, there is an approximate 23 - 30% increase in 3D
performance.
In high-resolution environments, as long as the 3D game is not
too demanding and not too many 3D effects are enabled, the system should be able
to operate smoothly
In the past, the gap in performance with entry-level VGA
display was often as much as 5 to 10 times.
In this year’s battle, the Llano
APU’s 3D performance has attained almost the same level as entry-level VGA.
ECS A75F-A
Advantages
1. ECS has moved the BIOS to the UEFI
interface, and many optional languages are available
2. CPU and DDR3
overclocking ability is good, helping improve system performance
3.
PCI-E/PCI provides a sufficient and convenient number of expansions, and the A75
includes native SATA3 and USB 3.0 technology
4. Three display output
interfaces are provided that together with the A8/A6 CPU provide very dazzling
3D performance
5. Heat dissipation is well implemented, and while the power
is on heat sink and chipset temperature is not high
Shortcomings
1. The visibility of sales channels and service providers can be further
enhanced
2. When the CPU is overclocked to 107MHz or more only the IDE mode
can be used. We hope that the BIOS can be revised
Performance
ratio ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆
Material comparison ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆
Specification comparison ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆
Appearance ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆
☆ ☆
Cost-effectiveness ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆
When playing a Blu-ray
movie, using the previously mentioned 1080P video playback, CPU usage rose as
much as 10%
The Intel internal HD2000/3000 GPU is of a comparable standard,
and the new generations of the two brands can easily cope with 1080P
The
A75’s six internal SATA3 mechanisms are a significant difference compared with
the native USB 3.0 technology of the A55
Although the A75 is a bit more
expensive than the A55, it still falls within mid-range market price points
If you want a cheaper combination, of course the A55 will save some money,
but if you want outstanding specifications, we suggest you consider budgeting a
little more for the A75
ECS has
currently introduced three A75 motherboards, and this review is only for the
A75F-A Black Series product with the ATX specification
The A75F-A has a
price of about NT$2900 or less, (equivalent to a retail price of about US$84.99)
which is cheaper than some other A75 ATX brands
Combining the UEFI
interface, plenty of IO and ample PCI-E/PCI expansion slots as well as excellent
overclocking features and more.
The A75F-A’s cost to performance value is
quite good, and we hope more value-added products will be introduced for
consumers to choose from
This article is windwithme’s third overclocking
test of the A75, and each one provides detailed insight on performance, teaching
methodology and the overclocking experience
This is provided as detailed
reference for consumers who are interested in buying new platforms using the AMD
Llano APU. Thanks
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