AMD Value Platform Analysis Part 2: The Performance

Power Usage and Undervolting

The world is in a recession. Many people are getting laid off and having to cut back on their expenses. Some users out there might be looking to save some money on their monthly electricity bill and they will definitely be interested in the power usage of this platform. But I am also interested in reducing the voltage on the CPU to see how low it can go.

AMD’s Cool&Quiet and C1E power saving technologies were enabled.

The lowest voltage the PC was stable was at 1.125V which is normal Vcore-0.225V. The stability was tested by running Cinebench R10 xCPU bench and a game at the same time.

Here are the CPU-Z screens of undervolted idle and load states.

Here are the power usage numbers.

Note the voltages in this test:

• Overclocked (Cool&Quiet disabled) : CPU Vcore (Idle&Load) – 1.475V, RAM – 1.8V, NB – +0.75V, all other voltages normal
• Undervolted (Cool&Quiet enabled) : CPU Vcore Idle/Load – 0.768V/1.125V, RAM – 1.5V, all other voltages normal
• Normal Voltage (Cool&Quiet enabled) : CPU Vcore Idle/Load – 0.992V/1.35V, RAM – 1.5V, all other voltages normal

People thinking about using this platform for HTPC use would appreciate the low power usage in undervolted mode; especially the lower heat output which means that slow spinning/quiet fans can be used in the system.