Six-core Thuban, quad-core Deneb, dual-core Calisto, quad-core Propus, three-core Rana, dual-core Regor and single-core Sargas processors are looking ahead to their last shipment in Q4 2011. You know these processors as Athlon or Phenom branded parts and quite a few of us at Fudzilla still use them.
After that time, AMD will still ship most of these 45nm based cores for at least until end of Q2 2012, but you won’t be able to place new orders after Q4 2011. They already stopped orders on some of the models with end of Q3 2011 and this week is the last to order some of these 45nm parts.
This is the end of an era, as AMD is killing off these quite well known brands and has already replaced them with FX, A series and E series where most of them have an integrated graphics with an exception of an enthusiast FX part.
Rest in peace Athlon. The iconic was brand introduced back in August 1999, more than twelve years ago, and it served AMD quite well. Obviously AMD’s marketing leaders including Nigel Desau believe that it’s time to leave these brands in the past, and continue to focus on FX, A series and E series market segmentation. It’s easier for the market just as its easier for end user to understand that core i7 is better than Core i5 and Core i3, bigger is better always works.
