AMD 800 chipset series

AMD 800 chipset series
CPU supportedfuture Opteron, Phenom,
Athlon (X2, X3, X4)
Sempron
and Turion Ultra processors
Socket supportedSocket F+, Socket G34 (server)
Socket AM3 (desktop)
Socket FS1 (mobile)
Southbridge(s)SB850, SB810, SB820M (mobile and embedded)
SP5100 (server)
Server chipsets
Uni-processor (1P)SR5580
Not knownSR5690, SR5670
Desktop / mobile chipsets
Enthusiast segment890FX
Performance segment890GX
Mainstream segment870, 880G
Miscellaneous
Release date(s)March 2, 2010 (890GX)
IGP Direct3D support10.1 (880G, 890GX)
PredecessorAMD 700 chipset series
SuccessorAMD 900 chipset series

The AMD 800 chipset series is a set of chipsets developed by AMD, released in 2009. The chipset series was revealed in its presentation slides during the AMD Financial Analyst Day 2007 held on December 13, 2007. This chipset series also marks the return of AMD to the workstation/server market after the completion of the ATI acquisition in October 2006 with the first server chipsets.

Lineup

Server

The chipset series is targeted in three markets: the workstation/server market, the desktop market and the notebook market. Current information about the chipset series is very scarce, while the officially published information about the series is the server chipsets with two variants available, the AMD 890S chipset and the AMD 870S chipset, all of them paired with the SB700S series southbridge.[1] The chipsets were supposed to support the codenamed "Montreal" processor made on 45 nm process, in Socket G3 package, supporting both unbuffered or buffered DDR3 (with Socket G3MX), HyperTransport 3.0 and IOMMU, all of them forming the codenamed "Piranha" server platform. However, as a result of shifted strategy, AMD abandoned plans for Socket G3 and G3MX completely and focused to deliver new server platforms. Also for uni-processor server platform, the combination of SR5580 (Originally codenamed "RS780") and SP5100 formed the codenamed "Catalunya" platform.

The codenamed "Fiorano" platform consists of codenamed "Istanbul" six-core processors, while "Istanbul" processors still feature Socket F+ and support dual-channel registered DDR2 memory, the platform supports HyperTransport 3.0 and IOMMU.[2]

The codenamed "Maranello" platform consists of six-core "Sao Paulo" or twelve-core "Magny-Cours" processors. These two processors support a new socket called Socket G34 with four-channel DDR3 support, with other platform features such as HyperTransport 3.0 and IOMMU support.[2]

The codenamed "Catalunya" platform consists of codenamed "Suzuka" quad-core processors, featuring Socket AM3 and support dual-channel registered DDR3 memory, the platform supports HyperTransport 3.0.[2]

The codenames of the chipsets "RD890S", "RD870S" and "SB700S" has also changed to "SR5690", "SR5670" and "SP5100".[3]

Desktop and Mobile

890FX

  • Codenamed RD890
  • Single AMD processor configuration
  • Four physical PCIe 2.0 x16 slots @ x8 electrical which can be combined to create two PCIe 2.0 x16 slots @ x16 electrical, one PCIe 2.0 x4 slot and 6 PCIe 2.0 x1 slots, the chipset provides a total of 42 PCIe 2.0 lanes and 4 PCIe 2.0 for A-Link Express III solely in the Northbridge
  • HyperTransport 3.0 and PCI Express 2.0
  • ATI CrossFireX
  • AMD OverDrive
  • IOMMU
  • Pairs with SB850 southbridge with support up to six SATA 6.0 Gbit/s ports
  • Enthusiast discrete multi-graphics segment

890GX

  • Codenamed RS880D
  • Single AMD processor configuration
  • Two physical PCIe 2.0 x16 slots (one @ x16 or two @ x8 in Crossfire mode), one PCIe 2.0 x4 slot and two PCIe 2.0 x1 slots, the chipset provides a total of 22 PCIe 2.0 lanes and 4 PCIe 2.0 for A-Link Express III solely in the Northbridge
  • Integrated graphics: Radeon HD 4290
  • Two physical PCI-E x16 slots (one 16x and one 8x electrically. In Crossfire mode, both will revert to 8x electrically)
  • HyperTransport 3.0 and PCI Express 2.0
  • ATI CrossFire
  • AMD OverDrive
  • Performance hybrid multi-graphics segment

880G

870

  • Codenamed RX880
  • Single AMD processor configuration
  • One physical PCIe 2.0 x16 slot, one PCIe 2.0 x4 slot and two PCIe 2.0 x1 slots, the chipset provides a total of 22 PCIe 2.0 lanes and 4 PCIe 2.0 for A-Link Express III solely in the Northbridge
  • HyperTransport 3.0 and PCI Express 2.0

Southbridges

While in the same internal event mentioned above, AMD gave a preview on the features of the SB8xx family of southbridges, as follows:[5]

  • "A-Link Express 3.0" now uses four PCI Express 2.0 lanes, providing 2 GB/s bandwidth
  • Supports C6 power state, which is featured in Fusion processors
  • Incorporates a Gigabit Ethernet MAC
  • Supports an integrated clock generator as an optional feature
  • Support for AHCI 1.2 with SATA FIS–based switching support
  • Mandatory support for SATA 1.5 Gbit/s, 3.0 Gbit/s, and SATA 6.0 Gbit/s (no support for Sata 6.0 Gbit/s in SB810)
  • Two embedded 8051 controllers, and one dedicated for DASH compliance
  • Support for 14 USB 2.0 ports, 2 USB 1.1 ports, and 3 integrated EHCI controllers (no support for USB 3.0 in initial products)[6]
  • Supports 5 fan controls, 8 Vin and 4 Tempin for hardware monitoring

Features

Desktop comparison matrix

Northbridge Socket Support Processor Support Fabrication
process (nm) 		TDP HyperTransport 3.0 IOMMU CrossFireX
Enabled 		Integrated
Graphics 		IGP Frequency PCI Express 2.0 NB-SB Interface
890FX Socket AM3 Phenom II family,
Athlon II family,
Sempron 		65 nm 19.6 W 2600 MHz
bi-directional 		Yes1 Yes None — 42 lanes A-Link
Express III
890GX 55 nm 25 W No Yes Radeon HD 4290 700 MHz 22 lanes
880G 55 nm 18 W No Yes Radeon HD 4250 560 MHz 22 lanes
870 65 nm 12.5 W No No None — 22 lanes
Notes:
  1. Full IOMMU functionality requires a BIOS with an ACPI IVRS table present. Currently only some 890FX motherboards provide an IVRS table [2]:
    • ASRock 890FX Deluxe3
    • ASRock 890FX Deluxe4 [3]
    • ASUS Crosshair IV
    • ASUS M4A89TD Pro
    • ASUS M4A89TD Pro/USB3
    • Biostar TA890FXE(latest BIOS required)
    • Gigabyte GA-890FXA-UD5 (from Gigabyte Tech Support: use Bios ver F5 or higher, Board Rev 3.0 or higher)
    • Gigabyte GA-890FXA-UD7 (beta-bios available from tech-support)
    • MSI 890FXA-GD70 (from bios 1.7 and greater)

Integrated graphics

Some members of the AMD 800 chipset series, the 880G and the 890GX have integrated graphics (IGP) that support hardware video playback acceleration at different levels. The IGP features are listed below:

IGP features
Chipset/
Codename 		iGPU model
(Radeon) 		Rendering APIs Video decompression1 Multi-graphics Native video output support
Direct3D OpenGL MPEG-2 H.264 VC-1 Other video features DisplayPort
(with DPCP) 		HDMI 1.3a
(with HDCP) 		DVI
(with HDCP) 		D-Sub
890GX/RS880D HD 4290 10.1 3.3 Full Full Full Dual video stream2 ATI Hybrid CrossFireX Yes Yes Yes Yes
880G/RS880P HD 4250 Full Full Full ATI Hybrid CrossFireX Yes Yes Yes Yes
RS880M series HD 4270
HD 4250
HD 4225		 Full Full Full No Yes Yes Yes Yes
Notes:
  1. The calculation of the decompression is done fully or partially by some ASIC, which is part of the chipset. Brands for this ASICs are AVIVO and Unified Video Decoder (UVD)
  2. Dual video stream may include the following at a maximum total bitrate of 40 Mbit/s:
    • 2 HD video streams OR
    • 1 HD video stream + 1 SD video stream + 1 HD audio stream

Southbridge issues (SB8x0)

AMD does not provide any SB8x0 errata publicly. Most OSes require patches in order to work reliably.

  • Windows platform:
    • Microsoft KB982091 [4]
  • Linux platform:
    • HPET operation with MSI causes LPC DMA corruption on devices using LPC DMA (floppy, parallel port, serial port in FIR mode) because MSI requests are misinterpreted as DMA cycles by the broken LPC controller [5]
    • SATA soft reset fails when PMP is enabled and attached devices will not be detected

See also

References

  1. ^ AMD Financial Analyst Day 2007 presentation Archived February 9, 2012, at the Wayback Machine, presented by Mario Rivas, page 21 of 28. Retrieved December 14, 2007
  2. ^ a b c (in Japanese) PC Watch report, retrieved August 20, 2008
  3. ^ (in Japanese) 4gamer.net coverage, retrieved August 20, 2008
  4. ^ "AMD RS880 Databook" (PDF). 2013. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2018-10-06. Retrieved 2020-04-14.
  5. ^ ChileHardware thread Archived July 12, 2008, at the Wayback Machine, retrieved July 12, 2008
  6. ^ [1] Early boards based on the chipset used a NEC chip for USB 3.0 support