AMD's new desktop chips run faster, cooler and quieter than ever

AMD has garnered a reputation in the PC component world of focusing on throughput over thermals, or power over practicality. That's been true for some time, but the chipmaker is looking to turn that around with its latest desktop processors for 2016.

The company's big ticket item is more of an upgrade to one of the firm's most popular chips: the AMD FX-8370 has now been equipped with a newly-designed cooler called the Wraith. This massive black cooler replaces the chip's current stock cooler.

But looks can be deceiving as, despite its size, this cooler is said to run at a maximum of 39 decibels (dbA) – or "practically inaudible," according to AMD. And, for the show-off PC gamers out there, the cooler features its own backlit illumination.

How does it work? Mostly thanks to relatively enormous size, the Wraith Cooler has 24% more cooling fin surface area and thus 34% more airflow, generating one-tenth the noise of its predecessor. In short, bigger fans have to work less to move air.

Putting the icing on the cake, AMD says that the Wraith Cooler will come stock on new runs of the FX 8370 at no additional cost. The current chip with the older cooler will drop in price relative to the new hotness. (NewEgg pegs the current FX 8370 at $209 or about £146.)

Chips at an affordable buy-in

AMD also introduces three new chips for its new line of FM2+ socket motherboards. The high-performance, quad-core $69.99 (about £48.57, AU$99.26) Athlon X4 845 (3.5-3.8GHz, no GPU, 65W), the dual-core, not-yet-priced A6-7470K (3.7-4.0GHz , 4 GPU cores, 65W) and the quad-core $117.99 (about £81.88, AU$167.33) A10-7860K (3.6-4.0GHz, 8 GPU cores, 65W).

Both the Athlon and A10 chips in this lineup use AMD's updated thermal solution, a red, Wraith-like cooler that allows these CPUs to operate as if they had 95W of available power at 65W thermal design power ratings.

AMD is putting the brunt of its weight behind the new A10 chip, as it's said to allow for entry-level online gaming all on its own. The firm has demonstrated this in creating "platforms", or really bundles of its parts designed to power certain levels of systems.

The new A10 coupled with the AMD A68H motherboard falls into the entry-level gaming platform rated at about $150 or £104. A complete system with these parts could muster about 45 frames per second (fps) in a game like DOTA 2 or blast League of Legends at 79 fps at 1080p and mixed setting, according to AMD.

In short, AMD wants you to know that it can power a range of different PC gaming systems for less and now nearly if not just as efficiently as the competition. We're expecting a retort from the green team (Nvidia) any day now.

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