Updated AMD Notebook Roadmap Surfaces

Details about AMD's processor roadmap update for the notebook platform have surfaced on the web. Expreview guys grabbed a couple of slides and showed off the updated mobile processor roadmap. More details about the Sabine platform have been mentioned in the slides.

Last November, AMD had unveiled their processor roadmap for the desktop and the notebook platform. AMD mentioned about the Sabine platform for notebooks, which would include the Llano CPU, now known as the Accelerated Processing Unit. The Llano APU will be a 32nm process chip with four cores, a 4MB cache, DDR3-1066MHz memory controllers, and a GPU packed on the die.

DirectX 11 and Unified Video Decoder 3 technology support will be added to the Sabine platform. So by 2011, we can hope for DirectX 11 to appear in a more mature form, supported on a wide range of hardware.

Later this year, AMD will launch the new 45nm process Tigris platform for the mainstream notebook market. The Tigris platform will have single and dual core Caspian CPUs and a 780M chipset, which will be added in the second half of 2009. For the Tigris platform, a chipset bearing a RS880M north bridge chip and SB710 south bridge will be released.

In 2010, AMD will launch the Danube platform, the Tigris successor that will feature a 45nm process Champlain CPU with up to four cores, DDR3-1066MHz support, and which will move from Socket 1 Generation 3 to Socket 1 Generation 4. For the same platform, a chipset that will have a RS880M north bridge and unnamed SB8xxM south bridge chip will be released; along with that, a discrete GPU architecture code-named Manhattan as well.

Let's hope that DirectX 11 will be in a mature state by 2011. The sad part is that till 2010 we'll see DirectX 10.1 supporting hardware, which unfortunately is yet to be launched.