AMD Fusion based hardware for a HTPC?

Basically, we should buy Intel ION or AMD NEO at least until Fusion is released. Since Fusion (containing Bobcat CPU) hardware specs look really great, Linux driver support for it is the great mystery, right now. Probably Catalyst won´t support Fusion. But since AMD is opening most of their hardware specs nowadays this also looks promising... And it seems that most problems are fixed with VDPAU as backend in VAAPI; most Linux version can run although some tweaking might be needed for now. Probably, with Catalyst 10.10 and kernel 2.6.32-26 hardware acceleration and audio over HDMI should be no problem anymore. The latter is also a problem with the ION boxes and I guess those problems will be solved with XBMC Dharma Live.

So let´s see what happens early 2011 when Fusion products hit the market.

Robotica Wrote:So let´s see what happens early 2011 when Fusion products hit the market.

Agreed. I still hold out hope of Intel righting its ship too. The more the merrier.

I read the whole thread and asked myself if it would be possible to decode 1080p (and 1080i) with the CPU itself?

Maybe it is strong enough, so we dont need hardware accelerated gpu decoding!
What do you think?

sylvio2000 Wrote:I read the whole thread and asked myself if it would be possible to decode 1080p (and 1080i) with the CPU itself?

Maybe it is strong enough, so we dont need hardware accelerated gpu decoding!
What do you think?

I think it's no problem for the CPU. But we need that for other tasks so we can get most out of the APU. Besides, GPU is consuming less power for decoding tasks. But it definitely is a good backup.

OK, that sounds good

So, you think if I would use Fusion only for 1080p/i this platform would be enough?
The only question is, how high the cpu load will be when decoding FullHD (it shouldnt get too hot, i hope)


The only other task I could image would be tv (with vdr backend e.g.)

sylvio2000 Wrote:OK, that sounds good

So, you think if I would use Fusion only for 1080p/i this platform would be enough?
The only question is, how high the cpu load will be when decoding FullHD (it shouldnt get too hot, i hope)


The only other task I could image would be tv (with vdr backend e.g.)

Just wait until the products hit the market but some reviews already are very promising about the processing and GPU power of the Fusions.

Other tasks: GUI, downloading, par, vdr. It all depends on your setup and your usage. But if HW-accelaration is doing a good job, enough processing power is left to have a stable platform for some years. This is the reason why I wouldn't buy a ION right now. It is only just enough right now.

sylvio2000 Wrote:I read the whole thread and asked myself if it would be possible to decode 1080p (and 1080i) with the CPU itself?

It takes a Core2Duo 2.4 GHZ chip minimum to decode all available 1080p streams. Benchmarks will tell us if Fusion surpasses that mark.

poofyhairguy Wrote:It takes a Core2Duo 2.4 GHZ chip minimum to decode all available 1080p streams. Benchmarks will tell us if Fusion surpasses that mark.

Poofyhairguy is an ION-lover (since they are the best choice right now) but reading available info (see links in OP to i.e. Anandtech, although not that objective), where Zacate is compared with i5, I'll bet it at least outperforms any i3.

I do like the Atom, too. But it would be a shame to neglect such a fast and (hopefully) economical cpu.

Only the price could be the decisive factor.

Lets hope there are some benchmarks (and prices) at the end of the year


(hope you understand my english, there are some new words I used )

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edit:
I am a bit confused now :confused2:
Today on computerbase.de there is a benchmark of an zocate with 2x 1.6 GHz (Fusion-APU E-350).

But its only a bit faster than Atom/Celeron CPUs. Where is the anticipated cpu performance ?

Yes, you are right; it look’s like it is not the revolution AMD promised but it seems a very competitive deal compared to the ION platform and maybe at the same level as Intel-culv. I should learn to value the pre-launch marketing hype....

The Bobcat-CPU seems to be between ATOM D525 and Intel culv and the GPU seems to defeat the core i5. The platform itself is up to date with directX11, DDR3, 4*PCI-e 2.0, SATA600, very low power consumption and a small die-size.

So all together, there will be some competition in the HTPC market! Let’s wait for some prices and decent drivers. Actually, this is what Poofyhairguy already said at the start of this topic. He really is the Hardware Guru!!

Anand-tech test report: http://www.anandtech.com/show/4023/the-b...chmarked/1