Advanced Micro Devices is launching its code-named Kaveri processors, which represent one of the biggest technical advances that the company has made in some time. If you did not know already, AMD has invested large resources to make Austin a new home for its innovation, and these new chips are just one such example.
The Kaveri chips are meant for games and other high-performance applications. The new chips show that AMD is moving in a very different direction from Intel, which at the 2014 International CES put a lot of emphasis on “perceptual computing,” or using gestures and other new kinds of interfaces to control computers. Instead of interfaces, AMD is focusing on powerful graphics capabilities.
AMD says Kaveri has 2.4 billion transistors (the basic building blocks of computer electronics), and 47 percent of them are aimed at better, high-end graphics. Although the code name is Kaveri, the new chips will officially be called the A-Series Accelerated Processing Units (APUs). Like most AMD processors, they combine both graphics and central processing unit functions on the same chip.