AMD A10-6700 Richland APU Review

By Hank Tolman

Manufacturer: Advanced Micro Devices

Full Disclosure: The product sample used in this article has been provided by AMD.

AMD has a pattern when it comes to processor releases. They release a new processor, run it through its paces for a while, then they release more of the same die with higher clock speeds. Generally, though, the new processors release at something closer to the release price of the first series of processors. That is the one part of the equation missing from this summer’s AMD APU releases. The AMD A10-6700 is the second processor coming out in June 2013 with an MSRP of $142. In this article, Benchmark Reviews is taking a detailed look at the A10-6700, especially its differences from the unlocked A10-6800K.

There is not a lot of difference between the two, top-end APUs released today by AMD. The faster of the two is the A10-6800K. The 6800K is an unlocked processor with a core clock speed of 4.1GHz with the ability to turbo up to 4.4GHz. The AMD A10-6700 runs 200MHz slower at 3.9GHz stock and can only turbo up to 4.2GHz. The A10-6700 doesn’t have a K on the end of it, which means that it isn’t an unlocked processor, severely limiting its ability to be overclocked.

The interesting thing about the AMD A10-6700 and the A10-6800K is that they both cost the exact same amount. So what’s the deal? The AMD A10-6700 is a slower, locked processor that costs the same as the faster, unlocked A10-6800K. What it all boils down to is one simple question. How much is 35 Watts worth to you?

The AMD A10-6700 has a thermal design power of 65W, 35W why of the 100W TDP of the unlocked A10-6800K. Other than that, 200MHz, and a K at the end of its name, the two APUs are identical. In fact, if the A10-6800K were to be used exclusively at stock speeds, it wouldn’t use any more power than the A10-6700. All you’d have to do is turn off the Turbo ability.

You see, the thermal design power isn’t actually indicative of how much power the processor uses. The TPD is actually the maximum amount of power that would theoretically need to be dissipated by the system under load. That means that a processor with a TDP of 65W might actually use more power than that. It also means that a processor with a TDP of 100W might actually use less power than that.

But power is a big deal these days. The shining feature of Haswell that’s drawing the most attention is its potential to use such low amounts of power that it could revolutionize the mobile arena with desktop level performance with extra-long battery life. Lower power consumption seems to be the main selling point these days. So is 35W worth 200MHz. Let’s take a look at the numbers and see.