AMD have traditionally kept well out of the ultra mobile PC 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 ultra mobile PC 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.

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 ultra mobile PC 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 ultra mobile PC 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…)

Read the full story

Not much of interest here for ultra mobile PC 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 ultra mobile PC market. Shutter explained that the ultra mobile PC market just doesn’t have the demand to warrant AMD’s attention yet.

“Our roadmap has us going there (the ultra mobile PC 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 ultra mobile PC 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.

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.