Just shown at the AMD 2008 Financial Analyst day are a few slides and details about the new mobile computing platform known as Yukon. It’s due for release in the first half of 2009 and will use a dual-core processor called Conesus.

From the diagrams and the presentation being given as I write, I get the feeling that AMD are not aiming at the low-end of the netbook market but more at a fully-capable ultra portable notebook market. I guess we’re talking Windows-7 capable ultraportables with good graphics capabilities very much like the new Dual-Core Turion-based, Raon Everun Note I’ve got here and have just benchmarked at twice the processing power of an Intel netbook!

AMD have traditionally kept well out of the UMPC and netbook market but after recent news that they might have a value-oriented platform on the way, previous news that there was a 1Ghz part in the works and the appearance of the 1.2Ghz Turion X2 in the Raon Digital Everun Note I’m using to type this article, I’m wondering what’s really happening.

Image via CHW

It could be that AMD are simply able to offer multiple variants of existing cores for special projects. I’m sure if someone like HP knocks on the door, a lot of PowerPoint slides get produced, but maybe these are all variants of the same device with cores removed (or disabled) cache removed (or disabled) or clock multipliers locked.

I’ve measured the Turion X2 in the Everun Note as far as I can and when it’s locked at 800Mhz and with 70% cpu load, it adds about 7w of extra drain as reported by perfmon. At 1.6Ghz, 22W would seem a reasonable TDP figure to be quoting. Apparently, the new CPUs are to be paired with the 740 chipset but the 740 and 690 chipset from AMD are said to be pin compatible so is it possible that I already have one of these architectures here under my fingertips right now? For those that are interested, there’s an image from CPUID to the right here. I can certainly confirm that at 1.2Mhz, its much more powerful than an 1.6 Atom part so at 1.5Ghz, you’re almost competing with Core2Duos. (Not quite though, the Core2 architechture seems more powerful, clock-for-clock, than the X2 I have in the Note.)

Remember that Raon were the first people ever to get hold of the 600Mhz version of the AMD Geode LX, well perhaps they’ve got contacts in the right places and what we’re seeing in the Everun Note is exactly what’s coming to an AMD netbook soon.

There will be a lot of talk about this affecting Intel but I think the main problem is that this AMD CPU and Chipset is good enough for most notebook and even some desktop scenarios. Where Atom (Diamondville at 1.6Ghz) is good, it does have limits in everyday productivity use but the new AMD stuff will break that barrier and potentially, provide enough for a do-it-all cheap notebook, netbook or UMPC. That could really kill the traditional market and bring sizes and right down from 15" to 10 or 12." where people will be expecting sub $500 prices.

Are we entering a new era of mobile computing where the UMPC could be the only computer you ever need? The processing module you can take anywhere? Raon Digital are breaking into exactly that category of converged mobile devices with the new and interesting Everun Note. Here at UMPCPortal we’ve been lucky enough to get hold of one of the first samples out of the door for some long term testing but after 4 days of hard but enjoyable testing, were ready to bring you the full review.

[6 pages follow]

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Update: Full review now available.

While I continue to work on (read: enjoy!) completing the full review of the Raon Digital Everun Note, you can enjoy some of the images that I’ve dropped into the gallery.

50+ more images in the gallery.
I’ve also added a ton of testing notes in the forum along with an
FAQ which will probably answer your questions.
Full specifications in the database.

Following on from yesterdays shockingly popular (read: Almost took my site out at one point) post about the Everun Note, I’ve got some new information pertaining to availability and have a copy of the manual that exposes some good information.

The first shipments should go out on Sept 19th with resellers being able to get them to customers the following week. 4-weeks to wait if you’re interested in this one. I have only heard from one reseller so far (Mobilx) but I’m sure there will be others. [Resellers. If you're going to stock this, I'll be happy to relay the information in the official Raon Digital forum we have here.]

I’ve also got a copy of the manual which I’m not going to post just yet as I haven’t been able to check if its final but there are a few interesting items in it that I will air. The first thing that caught my eye was some information about how to use Avivo which is ATI’s hardware accelerated video engine. They include a video conversion tool which I assume just uses the hardware-accelerated decoding features of the GPU but this is something I had not considered before, its got hardware video acceleration for MPEG-2, MPEG-4 and WMV. Its good and bad news because it means that video performance will be top-notch [Raon provide details of how to enable the hardware encoding in KMPlayer] but it means that any battery life figures for video playback might not have any relevance to browsing use. Its a shame there’s no HDMI output on the Everun Note as this is going be one amazing PMP. [article continues...]

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Update: Full review now available.

“This new machine from Raon Digital is designed for power users like you, not for children.”

So say Raon Digital’s marketing people via the sales brochure I just received for their new dual-core AMD-Turion based Everun Note . There’s nothing new in the brochure apart from new images showing the underside of the device (memory, disk and PCI-express mini accessible) and a revised weight (down to 748gm)

This balance of leading-edge power, battery life and miniaturisation doesn’t come cheap but in the world of pro-mo devices, this is really on-the-mark. The recommended sales price is $879 (US, before tax.) which means its way, way cheaper than the other high-performance UMPCs, the Sony UX and the Q1 Ultra Premium and it includes a 16mm pitch keyboard and easy 3G upgrade path. With Windows XP Home (yes, I know some of you would be looking for TE or Vista) it will really fly.

They are definitely targeting the pro-mo set and what better place to be sending a product sample than to Chippy at UMPCPortal. Yes, there’s one in the post and as I said before, when it arrives, you can expect a very long live session with it!

So what do you think of the price/feature balance? End users will be paying over $900 including tax and postage so it’s not cheap. Many of you will question why someone needs anything other than an Eee PC 901, why its been given a touchscreen and why there’s no mousepad (its an optical mouse) and you’d be correct in assuming that most people won’t be able to justify the cost of this but there are a great many people that need the power and are happy to pay for a 30% weight reduction, a 50% reduction in total volume and nearly double the raw processing power.  Does it resonate with you?

All four pages of the PDF are now in the gallery and I’ve updated the database to reflect the latest information.

Note: exact availability is unknown at the moment.

Before I get all excited, I better say up front that the info here is mostly from Raon Digitals marketing group. That said…WOW! The Everun Note could be the most powerful UMPC yet.

Raon have sent over some early marketing material for the Everun Note and there’s a whole lot of interesting information in it. The most interesting is a set of Crystal Mark test results that are showing stunning processing performances figures that are way faster than anything on the UMPC and netbook market. It blows the 1.3Ghz Core-based Samsung Q1 Ultra Premium out of the water and netbooks are going to look extremely slow beside it! (more after the pic…)

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So AMD aren’t getting into the mobile or netbook game?

Raon Digital have finally confirmed what we spotted months ago. They are building an AMD-based (AMD Turion 64×2 Dual Core 1.2GHz, 1MB L2 Cache) UMPC running XP for Asian and North American markets. This is not a netbook as it’s tiny! Smaller than an SC3. The AVING news is from a launch event that I knew was happening today. We’re closely in touch with Raon Digital and have our fingers crossed for more details and an early preview of this little wonder.

Specs going into the database as you read this… Specifications now in the database.

Update: Note the SIM slot indicating a 3G option!

Source: Aving

Via Pockatables.

EeePCNews.de have a very interesting news article about a possible AMD CPU aimed at netbooks and UMPCs. Its a 64 bit, single core CPU running at 1Ghz with a TDP of 8W. Effectively half of a Turion X2 dual-core CPU.

Note that the CPU includes the memory controller (Northbridge) but no Southbridge or GPU. At 8W  TDP, it is an option for netbooks and possibly high-end UMPC like the AMD UMPC seen at Computex but unless an underclocked version appears at 5W or less, it’s probably not going to be cool or even small enough to squeeze inside an MID. For that job, only the Atom and ARM-based products fit the bill.

Source: EeePCNews

Not much of interest here for UMPC and MID fans as AMD’s Puma notebook platform is launched. MiniNote devices might be possible with a core removal and down-clocking but don’t expect netbook prices. AMD are clearly not focusing on ultra low power systems yet but are prepared to address a market in 2010. This from ZDNet.

Scott Shutter, notebook division brand manager at AMD, said the chip maker’s goal with its next generation notebook platform is to cover 80 percent of the market. That means AMD is ceding the high-speed niche of the notebook to Intel as well as the UMPC market. Shutter explained that the UMPC market just doesn’t have the demand to warrant AMD’s attention yet.

“Our roadmap has us going there (the UMPC market) in the future–the first half of 2010. We will have products that play into that space when we believe that growth warrants it,” says Shutter.

So it raises the question, why did we see an AMD-based UMPC with the Turion X2 branding on it yesterday? I can only surmise that this is a very early, underclocked prototype until we get some further clarification.

This is an image of an AMD-based device that has been shown at Computex. Its small, really small. One of the smallest I’ve seen with a full keyboard. It’s got a 7″ touchscreen and its 1024×600. Its starting to look nice. AMD’s officials are saying its running Turion and that it’s 1.5 times the processing power of an Atom and will return 2.5hrs video-playback runtime. Its looking very interesting indeed. [Continued...]

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The AMD Geode LX has been seem in mobile devices for at least two years but they haven’t had anything new since they upgraded the LX800 to the 900 last year but it now looks like they have something…

This mininote by Malata, reported by Aving [translation link] is said to be using a "saemteuron" which I assume is a bad translation of Turion or Sempron. Hard to tell. The GPU is said to be an RS690. We’re trying to work out what’s going on here. It could be a new ultra low power Griffin-based platform.

Thanks JKK.

Update: JKK found a bit more info.