Quote Originally Posted by JF-AMD View Post
No, C32 is for SCM only, 8 total cores.
Well, Socket G34, where you place the Magny Cours at. This time it was my typo, sorry


Quote Originally Posted by Helmore View Post
It was known from the moment that AMD started revealing more information regarding Fusion that they would need a new socket for that. As your quote says, you need a way to get that display signal from the APU to the motherboard and that requires a new socket.
Yeah, judging by the date of the article I'm almost half a year outdated. I wasn't active on the news and speculation business at that moment, that is why I missed it.


Besides the question about how powerful Llano's GPU is, how and when AMD will be introducing Fusion based Processors and Bulldozer ones is also an important point of speculation. If Fusion with K10 comes first (That is how things seems to be), then we are going to see a new Socket with its respective Motherboards and Chipsets launching at the same time. A new Chipset makes sense because we don't know if the current ones are compatible with the new platform architecture (Due to the new GPU location and its I/O requeriments), and if anything, considering that the GPU is already in the Processor, it would be wasted silicon even if they are compatible, as mainstream AMD Chipsets comes with IGP and only the highest end ones does not, but that is not where Llano is aimed at.
Llano was supposed to receive a Socket in Notebooks that was called Socket FS1 according to slides of AMD 2007 Financal Analyst Day (And it seems that they are quite late with Llano). Socket FS1 seems to be directly succeding Socket S1 (Low profile, Notebook oriented), so we're not talking about the Desktop Socket for Fusion Processors, that is another one. With FS1 for Fusion Notebooks, the unnamed one for Fusion Desktops, and C32 and G34 at the Workstation and Server for Bulldozer (With no Fusion it seems), we are already at the four Sockets count. But we are forgeting about Bulldozer on Desktop, that is for Socket AM3. So we are going to have five sockets/platforms at the same time this round.
For me, launching Llano on a new Socket then Bulldozer on the older one makes no sense, with the exeption that all currents users will be happy knowing that they have an upgrade patch, but Fusion early adopters wouldn't be that happy. The exception would be that AMD released both Bulldozer for AM3 and the Desktop Fusion Socket at the same time, that doesn't sounds bad as an idea except for making a horrible market segment overlap.
So, the future AMD vs Intel Socket comparision will look like this...


High end Servers
Intel LGA 1567 (8-Way) for Nehalem Xeons (Beckton)
AMD Socket G34 (4-Way) for K10 Opterons MCM (Magny Cours), future Bulldozer MCM


Low end Servers/Workstations
Intel LGA 1366 (2-Way) for Nehalem Xeons (Gulftown), possibily future Sandy Bridge
AMD Socket C32 (2-Way) for K10 Opterons (Lisbon), future Bulldozer


High end Desktop/Enthusiast
Intel LGA 1366 for Nehalem Core i7 9xx (Bloomfield, Gulftown), possibily future Sandy Bridge
AMD Socket AM3 for K10 Phenom II (Deneb, Thuban), future Bulldozer

LGA 1366 is 2-Way capable, but it isn't used like that for normal Desktop users. I suppose that Socket AM3 Should be phased out not so long after Bulldozer release, because we are supposed to see a Fusion Bulldozer that makes it irrelevant. It just segments in two the AMD Desktop market, something that was like that in the Socket 754 and 939 days until Socket AM2 joined them again. However, S939 superceded S754 (Dual Channel vs Single Channel), AM3 vs Desktop Fusion doesn't supercedes because they got different features, being the either integrated GPU or early Bulldozer the main difference.


Mid end Desktop/Mainstream
Intel LGA 1156 for Nehalem Core i5, i7 (Lynnfield)
AMD unnamed Socket for Fusion K10 (Llano), possibily future Fusion Bulldozer


Low end Desktop/Budget
Intel LGA 1156 for Nehalem Core i3, i5 (Clarkdale)
AMD unnamed Socket for Fusion K10 (Llano), possibily future Fusion Bulldozer

Intel market segmentation got the issue that you have in the same Socket platform, Processors with and without GPU that may requiere different Chipsets for proper support, different features, etc. AMD usually doesn't go rampage on similar-but-different Processor and Chipsets designs, so it could be safe to say that everything on a Socket is fully supported and as similar as possible, so I suppose that all the AMD Processors for that new Socket will have the GPU.
If there is a thing where AMD is vastly superior, is that they usually choose a straightforward way for its platforms with things that supercedes the previous one, without making you having to do choices about feature tradeoffs (Look a list of features enable/disable on Xeons Processors and attempt to understand if it makes sense. You are ready to get a VIP stance on a mental asylum) but just walk a simple stair. This segmentation would break in two that stair.

This is how I see the short term future from now up to the release of Llano, that is when we are supposed to hear the most of AMD giving away info.