The
AMD Duron was an x86-compatible
computerA computer is a machine that manipulates data according to a set of instructions.Although mechanical examples of computers have existed through much of recorded human history, the first electronic computers were developed in the mid-20th century . These were the size of a large room, consuming as...
processorThe Central Processing Unit or processor is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, and is the primary element carrying out the computer's functions. This term has been in use in the computer industry at least since the early 1960s...
manufactured by
AMDAdvanced Micro Devices, Inc. is an American multinational semiconductor company based in Sunnyvale, California, that develops computer processors and related technologies for commercial and consumer markets...
. It was released on June 19, 2000 as a low-cost alternative to AMD's own
AthlonAthlon is the brand name applied to a series of different x86 processors designed and manufactured by AMD. The original Athlon was the first seventh-generation x86 processor and, in a first, retained the initial performance lead it had over Intel's competing processors for a significant period of...
processor and the
Pentium IIIThe Pentium III brand refers to Intel's 32-bit x86 desktop and mobile microprocessors based on the sixth-generation Intel P6 microarchitecture introduced on February 26, 1999. The brand's initial processors were very similar to the earlier Pentium II-branded microprocessors...
and
CeleronThe Celeron brand has been used by Intel for several distinct ranges of x86 CPUs targeted at budget personal computers.Celeron processors can run all IA-32 computer programs, but their performance is somewhat lower when compared to similar CPUs with higher-priced Intel CPU brands...
processor lines from rival Intel. The Duron was discontinued in 2004 and succeeded by the
SempronSempron has been the marketing name used by AMD for several different budget desktop CPUs, using several different technologies and CPU socket formats. The Sempron replaced the AMD Duron processor and competes against Intel's Celeron series of processors...
.
The Duron was pin-compatible with the
Athlon and carried all of the computational resources from it, operating on the same
motherboardA motherboard is the central printed circuit board in many modern computers, and holds many of the crucial components of the system, while providing connectors for other peripherals. The motherboard is sometimes alternatively known as the main board, system board, or, on Apple computers, the logic...
s in most cases.
The
AMD Duron was an x86-compatible
computerA computer is a machine that manipulates data according to a set of instructions.Although mechanical examples of computers have existed through much of recorded human history, the first electronic computers were developed in the mid-20th century . These were the size of a large room, consuming as...
processorThe Central Processing Unit or processor is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, and is the primary element carrying out the computer's functions. This term has been in use in the computer industry at least since the early 1960s...
manufactured by
AMDAdvanced Micro Devices, Inc. is an American multinational semiconductor company based in Sunnyvale, California, that develops computer processors and related technologies for commercial and consumer markets...
. It was released on June 19, 2000 as a low-cost alternative to AMD's own
AthlonAthlon is the brand name applied to a series of different x86 processors designed and manufactured by AMD. The original Athlon was the first seventh-generation x86 processor and, in a first, retained the initial performance lead it had over Intel's competing processors for a significant period of...
processor and the
Pentium IIIThe Pentium III brand refers to Intel's 32-bit x86 desktop and mobile microprocessors based on the sixth-generation Intel P6 microarchitecture introduced on February 26, 1999. The brand's initial processors were very similar to the earlier Pentium II-branded microprocessors...
and
CeleronThe Celeron brand has been used by Intel for several distinct ranges of x86 CPUs targeted at budget personal computers.Celeron processors can run all IA-32 computer programs, but their performance is somewhat lower when compared to similar CPUs with higher-priced Intel CPU brands...
processor lines from rival Intel. The Duron was discontinued in 2004 and succeeded by the
SempronSempron has been the marketing name used by AMD for several different budget desktop CPUs, using several different technologies and CPU socket formats. The Sempron replaced the AMD Duron processor and competes against Intel's Celeron series of processors...
.
Development
The Duron was pin-compatible with the
Athlon and carried all of the computational resources from it, operating on the same
motherboardA motherboard is the central printed circuit board in many modern computers, and holds many of the crucial components of the system, while providing connectors for other peripherals. The motherboard is sometimes alternatively known as the main board, system board, or, on Apple computers, the logic...
s in most cases. The original Duron was limited to operating on a 100 MHz front-side bus speed (FSB 200), while the Athlon at the time could run on a bus clock of 133 MHz (FSB 266). Later Durons supported a 133 MHz bus (FSB 266) while Athlon XP ran at 166/200 MHz FSB (FSB 333/400). The original Duron, using the "Spitfire" core, was manufactured in 2000 and 2001 at speeds ranging from 600 to 950 MHz. It was based on the 180nm "Thunderbird" Athlon core. The second-generation Duron, the "Morgan" core, was sold in speed grades between 900 and 1300 MHz, and was based on the 180 nm "Palomino" Athlon XP core. As a result, it featured a few important enhancements namely full Intel SSE support, enlarged TLBs, hardware data prefetch, and an integrated thermal diode. Like the "Palomino" core, "Morgan" was also expected to reduce the core heat dissipation, however in "Morgan"'s case this did not happen due to its increased core voltage. The final generation Duron was called "Applebred", sometimes called "Appalbred", and was based on the "Appaloosa" Duron along with the 130nm "Thoroughbred" Athlon XP. "Appaloosa" was never officially announced but it did see very limited circulation.
Duron's biggest difference from Athlon was its reduction in cache size to 64
KBIn computing, a binary prefix is a set of letters that precede a unit of digital quantity to indicate multiplication by a power of two....
, in contrast to the 256 KB or even 512 KB of Athlon. This was a relatively tiny amount of L2 cache, even smaller than the 128 KB L2 on Intel's
CeleronThe Celeron brand has been used by Intel for several distinct ranges of x86 CPUs targeted at budget personal computers.Celeron processors can run all IA-32 computer programs, but their performance is somewhat lower when compared to similar CPUs with higher-priced Intel CPU brands...
. However, the K7-architecture enjoyed one of the largest L1 caches, at 128 KB (split 64+64 KB). And, with the arrival of the socketed Athlon/Duron chips, AMD switched to an exclusive cache design which did not mirror data between the L1 and L2 like the inclusive cache used on the
Slot ASlot A refers to the physical and electrical specification for a 242-lead single-edge-connector used by early versions of AMD's Athlon processor.The Slot A connector allows for a higher bus rate than Socket 7 or Super Socket 7...
K7, a critical feature in a low-cache situation. An exclusive design greatly favors L1 cache as the primary caching resource, while the slower L2 cache stores victim or copy-back cache blocks to be written back to main memory (
LRUIn computing, cache algorithms are optimizing instructions – algorithms – that a computer program or a hardware-maintained structure can follow to manage a cache of information stored on the computer...
). The L2 cache essentially acts as an overflow from the L1 cache. Because of the lack of duplication between caches, Duron can be said to have 192 KB cache onboard, whereas an inclusive chip such as Athlon Slot-A, with 512 KB L2, would only have, in practice, 512 KB total (640K-128K). Celeron was in the same boat with its inclusive cache for a total of 128 KB (160K-32K).
Consequently, the post-Slot-A K7-architecture was less sensitive to L2 cache size. This reduced reliance upon L2 cache also allowed AMD to make their L2 cache higher latency and lower bandwidth without significant performance loss, which lessened processor complexity and allowed better manufacturing yields. AMD's Duron "Spitfire" CPU was only roughly 10% slower than its big brother, Athlon "Thunderbird".
Duron was often a favorite of computer builders looking for performance while on a tight budget. Perhaps most notably, in 2003 the "Applebred" Duron was available in 1.4 GHz, 1.6 GHz and 1.8 GHz forms, all on a 133 MHz (FSB 266) bus by default. Enthusiast groups quickly discovered these Durons to be rebadged Thoroughbred A/B cores with some cache disabled (and perhaps defective). With a basic chip configuration modification, it was found that "Applebred" could be turned into "Thoroughbred B" Athlon XPs, with full 256KB cache, with a very high success rate. However, this was only possible for a period of approximately 4 weeks, as shortly after the Applebred was released, AMD changed the chip configuration method to one that was not changeable.
Spitfire (Model 3, 180 nm)
- L1-Cache: 64 + 64 KB
The kilobyte is a unit of digital information storage equal to either 1,000 bytes or 1,024 bytes , depending on context....
(Data + Instructions)
- L2-Cache: 64 KB, fullspeed
- MMX, Extended MMX, 3DNow!
3DNow! is an extension to the x86 instruction set developed by AMD. It adds SIMD instructions to the base x86 instruction set, enabling it to perform simple vector processing, which improves the performance of many graphic-intensive applications...
, Extended 3DNow!3DNow! is an extension to the x86 instruction set developed by AMD. It adds SIMD instructions to the base x86 instruction set, enabling it to perform simple vector processing, which improves the performance of many graphic-intensive applications...
- Socket A
Socket A is the CPU socket used for AMD processors ranging from the Athlon Thunderbird to the Athlon XP/MP 3200+, and AMD budget processors including the Duron and Sempron. Socket A also supports the recent AMD Geode NX embedded processors...
(EV6)
- Front side bus
In personal computers, the front side bus is the bus that carries data between the CPU and the northbridge.Depending on the processor used, some computers may also have a back-side bus that connects the CPU to the cache...
: 100 MHz (200 MT/s)
- VCore: 1.50 V - 1.60 V
- First release: June 19 2000
- Clockrate
The clock rate is the fundamental rate in cycles per second for the frequency of the clock in any synchronous circuit. For example, a crystal oscillator frequency reference typically is synonymous with a fixed sinusoidal waveform, a clock rate is that frequency reference translated by electronic...
: 600 MHz - 950 MHz
Morgan (Model 7, 180 nm)
- L1-Cache: 64 + 64 KB
The kilobyte is a unit of digital information storage equal to either 1,000 bytes or 1,024 bytes , depending on context....
(Data + Instructions)
- L2-Cache: 64 KB, fullspeed
- MMX, Extended MMX, 3DNow!
3DNow! is an extension to the x86 instruction set developed by AMD. It adds SIMD instructions to the base x86 instruction set, enabling it to perform simple vector processing, which improves the performance of many graphic-intensive applications...
, Extended 3DNow!3DNow! is an extension to the x86 instruction set developed by AMD. It adds SIMD instructions to the base x86 instruction set, enabling it to perform simple vector processing, which improves the performance of many graphic-intensive applications...
, SSEIn computing, Streaming SIMD Extensions is a SIMD instruction set extension to the x86 architecture, designed by Intel and introduced in 1999 in their Pentium III series processors as a reply to AMD's 3DNow!...
- Socket A
Socket A is the CPU socket used for AMD processors ranging from the Athlon Thunderbird to the Athlon XP/MP 3200+, and AMD budget processors including the Duron and Sempron. Socket A also supports the recent AMD Geode NX embedded processors...
(EV6)
- Front side bus
In personal computers, the front side bus is the bus that carries data between the CPU and the northbridge.Depending on the processor used, some computers may also have a back-side bus that connects the CPU to the cache...
: 100 MHz (200 MT/s)
- VCore: 1.75 V
- First release: August 20 2001
- Clockrate
The clock rate is the fundamental rate in cycles per second for the frequency of the clock in any synchronous circuit. For example, a crystal oscillator frequency reference typically is synonymous with a fixed sinusoidal waveform, a clock rate is that frequency reference translated by electronic...
: 900 MHz - 1300 MHz
Applebred (Model 8, 130 nm)
- L1-Cache: 64 + 64 KB
The kilobyte is a unit of digital information storage equal to either 1,000 bytes or 1,024 bytes , depending on context....
(Data + Instructions)
- L2-Cache: 64 KB, fullspeed
- MMX, Extended MMX, 3DNow!
3DNow! is an extension to the x86 instruction set developed by AMD. It adds SIMD instructions to the base x86 instruction set, enabling it to perform simple vector processing, which improves the performance of many graphic-intensive applications...
, Extended 3DNow!3DNow! is an extension to the x86 instruction set developed by AMD. It adds SIMD instructions to the base x86 instruction set, enabling it to perform simple vector processing, which improves the performance of many graphic-intensive applications...
, SSEIn computing, Streaming SIMD Extensions is a SIMD instruction set extension to the x86 architecture, designed by Intel and introduced in 1999 in their Pentium III series processors as a reply to AMD's 3DNow!...
- Socket A
Socket A is the CPU socket used for AMD processors ranging from the Athlon Thunderbird to the Athlon XP/MP 3200+, and AMD budget processors including the Duron and Sempron. Socket A also supports the recent AMD Geode NX embedded processors...
(EV6)
- Front side bus
In personal computers, the front side bus is the bus that carries data between the CPU and the northbridge.Depending on the processor used, some computers may also have a back-side bus that connects the CPU to the cache...
: 133 MHz (266 MT/s)
- VCore: 1.50 V
- First release: August 21 2003
- Clockrate
The clock rate is the fundamental rate in cycles per second for the frequency of the clock in any synchronous circuit. For example, a crystal oscillator frequency reference typically is synonymous with a fixed sinusoidal waveform, a clock rate is that frequency reference translated by electronic...
: 1400, 1600, 1800 MHz
External links