Sunnyvale (CA) – AMD announced four new “business class” Phenom processors, which essentially means that these processors are made available for a platform that won’t change for at least two years and include a 3-year warranty.
Pricing was announced, but we expect AMD to continue its business class pricing strategy, which means that these processors will be offered with a premium of close to 20% on the high-end and about 10% on the lower end when compared to non-B-series processors of the same main product family and comparable clock speeds.
It is interesting to note that AMD has changed its naming strategy of Phenom processors, which is now consistent with the rest of the Phenom product family, but inconsistent with the first batch of Phenom B CPUs. As mentioned in a previous article, AMD has chosen to designate its TLB bug-free B3 series Phenom processors with a XX50 number, which clearly indicates that these latest Phenoms (9750, 8750) are in fact B3 series and TLB-bug free processors.
In contrast, the sequence numbers of the preceding B2-series, which included the TLB bug, ended on full hundreds. The first B-series Phenoms were the 9600B and 8600B, which indicated that these are processors with the B2-series core. However, AMD told us that the 9600B and 8600B processors are actually B3-series CPUs. As if the sequence numbering system isn’t already confusing enough, AMD has now some inconsistencies of B2/B3 markers within the same product family, which does not necessarily make a purchase decision much easier, especially, if you are trying to figure out which processors have the TLB bug and which do not.
Guys, why don’t you rename the 9600B and 8600B to 9650B and 8650B, if these are TLB bug-free chips?
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