AMD has offered up some official details on a pair of its new CPU cores called Bobcat and Bulldozer. The two cores are aimed at different ends of the market with the Bobcat core being a power sipping offering that is flexible and designed for energy-efficient computing. Bulldozer on the other hand is a core optimized for performance and scalability.
Bobcat is the core that AMD expects to fight the Intel Atom for the netbook and low-end PC market. AMD claims that Bobcat can deliver 90% of the performance of today's mainstream computers in about half the area. Bobcat is targeting a sub-one-watt operation capability and is optimized for low power needs. The need for less power means that any mobile device using the Bobcat core will get longer runtime.
Bulldozer on the other hand is a core aimed at the Intel Xeon series of CPUs found in servers and high-end workstations. Bulldozer is designed around a compact core with a high core count that is designed specifically for performance scaling. Bulldozer will offer support for new x86 instructions including SSE4.1, SSE4.2, AVX, and XOP including 4-operand FMAC. The core also has numerous advanced power management features and will be built on 32nm process technology. AMD is looking at 2011 for the chips to come to market, assuming it can stick to a schedule this time around.
