Finals Words & Conclusion
Final Words & Conclusion
We've reviewed these APUs more times then can possibly even remember, hence this conclusion page really is more of the same.
This Godavari APU is a Kaveri spin with a slightly faster boost clock and GPU clock compared to the 7850. This brings in roughly 3 to 5% more performance on the CPU cores and a tiny bump in on the graphics side (IGP). As always the A10 series APUs are nice mainstream products for any internet PC or a simple game as the 512 shader processors are capable of 1080p gaming, as long as you understand the restrictions, that would be lowering image quality so that the GPU can render fast enough. The A10 7860K offers a good balance in terms of features and price as it certainly isn't expensive at 115 USD. The Achilles heel remains raw processor performance, AMD needs 4 cores for what Intel can do with two of them. Intel's processors however have become more expensive, making these APUs a more viable alternative. But people stare at numbers, and simply desire faster per core performance. GPU/IGP wise AMD remains very strong amid the competition. And if you need a little more gaming performance, use a decent dedicated graphics card, you can still play your games at Full HD quite well. Especially with Windows 10 and DirectX 12 in mind (if we actually had some proper DX12 games) these APUs will greatly benefit. Keep in mind that if you need a cheap PC that ticks alot of boxes, this product is dirt cheap for what you get, a motherboard can be purchased for 55 EURO, the APU 110 EURO / 115 USD.
The A10-7860K APU as tested today is performance wise roughly at similar performance levels as the previous generation A10 APUs, we'd doubt if you'd notice a real difference when it comes to performance in a real-world setup. The AMD 10-7800 series anno 2016 however are products that make the most sense for entry-level towards mainstream PCs. it remains an excellent solution for HTPCs though. The focus on the A10 system and the capabilities will be small form factor PCs for casual gaming, media etc and on that front it definitely excels.
Performance
Overall though our conclusion remains close to all other APU reviews we have written in the last year or so, the danger for the success of the APU on the desktop PC platform lies in the lack of raw processor power. With for normal usage and with Windows 10 it'll be more than sufficient. The integrated graphics solution that resides inside the APU is great (for its purpose) and highly programmable. OpenCL and anything compute related is exactly where this APU shines, though OpenCL is clearly becoming less popular with each year that passes. Gaming wise a migration of the architecture to GCN is a very clever step as well. With medium settings you can actually play games at 1080P, please do pair it with fast DDR3 memory though as the graphics processor is very dependent on your system memory. But you can even play games at 720P quite easily and even at 1080P if flick down image quality settings. For everyday usage like the web, photoshopping and office applications a setup like this is plenty fast.
The Platform Overall
Now in the beginning of this conclusion I wrote an entire chapter about processing performance, but the truth is also (and you do need to realize this) that a Godavari/Kaveri APU based platform will offer value for money. AMD is intensely strong with the embedded GPU and can spin-off many functions from that GPU. Combined with the series 8 chipset you will gain features like a SATA-600 and USB 3.0 support. Also a very powerful Catalyst based software suite surrounding AMDs APUs definitely brings heaps of advantages to them opposed to the competition. Remember, the A10 7860K APU offers 'OK' CPU performance at best, yet offers excellent multi-media options, a Full HD media experience and sure, even gaming albeit entry level, will work just fine.
Concluding
My conclusion, and I am sounding repetitive) will be similar to other series A8 and A10 APU reviews we did for AMD. Until the new architecture arrives (we want transistors with fins man!) the current APU will remain an average product in terms of its overall serial processing performance (raw processor performance). How important that is to you is something only you can decide, your 1080p games will run fine but with lower frame-rates once that CPU becomes important -- but you'll still play the game with proper enough performance, and that is not a bad deal for just over a 100 bucks. For the mainstream and higher demanding end-users this simply is not enough to make a big enough difference, as you guys demand something faster on the processor side of things. The flip-coin side of things is that the budget minded and limited end-users can gain heaps of features and performance in the entry-level to mainstream range of PC desktop products, within that segment the APU will impress me and will make for an excellent APU to run your average PC for browsing, photos and multi-media functionality. Also for things like a NAS or HTPC and other small form factor functionality an A10 APU is pretty sweet. Combine it with a series 68 motherboard, you'll have a processor, graphics subsystem, up-to four SATA-600 ports, USB 3.0, heaps of USB 2.0 ports, Gigabit Ethernet, HD audio and you simply get a very up-to-date PC. So for 110 EUR the A10-7860K can make a lot of sense combined with a 55 EURO motherboard. Concluding, the A10-7860K is a relatively good in price-performance APU combined with the a budget motherboard, within its range and channel positioning of course. The pricing has come down ever further making this great value for money. But I think that I can safely speak for everybody, AMD bring on the new stuff !
We want some Zen !
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