Published in PC Hardware

AMD's Puma to show its claws in late May

by on02 May 2008

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To roar more in June


AMD claims more than 100 designs based on its Puma mobile platform, and Griffin packed in a notebook powered with a new IGP chipset looks like a decent notebook. The first of them will be showcased in May but the retail availability is in June or later, depending on the notebook manufacturers.

We are quite certain that Puma won't be able to outrun Centrino 2, but regardless of benchmarks, it will run faster than the majority of notebook users will ever need. It will be next to impossible to discover if the notebook has an AMD or Intel CPU, at least when they are plugged in the wall and you check your Web and mail while listening to the music.

We can't imagine that  many journos have expected that improved mobile version of K8 hidden behind a cool Puma brand can ever beat Intel's Core 2 Duo Wolfdale 45nm CPU, but many did. It was clear from the first diagram that Puma is set to be inferior, at least in CPU power, speed and battery life to Core 2 Duo; but it will bet on faster IGP graphics that will play some games.

The big issue with Puma will certainly be its battery life, and Intel is traditionally much better in this field, but then again, most notebooks on the market are 15.4-inch and they tend to be very bad with battery life, anyway. The display is the main suspect for this, but again, most notebook users tend to plug in to the power most of the time.

AMD will showcase Puma in late May and it will follow with many official announcements at Computex and the rest of the June. As you probably know, notebook refreshes usually arrives in late June and through the summer. It’s all good as long as they are ready for late July and the beginning of the back to school shopping spree.

Puma will be inferior to 45nm Centrino 2 and its new chipset with Wimax, but then again it will end up cheaper; and therefore has a rather bright future.

Last modified on 02 May 2008
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