AMD's upcoming AM4 motherboards for Zen & Bristol Ridge are said to be debuting in October according to chatter by motherboard partners. Rumor has it that AMD's motherboard partners will be showing off their next generation AM4 socket based motherboards in a couple of months.

Bristol Ridge APUs for the desktop are set to launch around the same time. AMD's hotly anticipated high performance Zen FX processors will be available shortly afterwards. According to President & CEO Lisa Su, desktop Zen FX processors will see wide availability in Q1 2017 and couldsee limited availability in late 2016 depending on ramp up and yield.

One thing that AMD has hinted at during its recent performance demonstration of Zen which wowed the press, is that we'll see Zen on display at CES in January of 2017. That's when desktop Zen FX CPUs are also expected to launch.

AM4, AMD's Next Generation Unified Socket For APUs & CPUs

AM4 is the very first unified socket by the company. Finally bringing all of its desktop products under one roof. The next generation AM4 socket will be compatibel with both desktop APUs and CPUs. This includes the upcoming Excavator based Bristol Ridge APUs which are set to arrive some time during the next four months. As well as the brand new Summit Ridge family of high-performance Zen CPUs.

Traditionally APUs had their own dedicated FM (FM1, FM2 & FM2+) socket series and shared no compatibility withthe CPU only AM socket series. A bifurcation that was out of necessity more than anything else. With Carrizo ( dubbed Bristol Ridge on the desktop ), both the northbridge and southbridge have been integrated directly into the chip. Making a CPU-APU cross-compatible socket possible.

All Zen FX CPUs that are part of the Summit Ridge family will include the company’s new platform security processor, PCIe 3.0 support, dual channel DDR4 memory controllers, copious amounts of L3 cache and updated storage features. Including USB3.1 and NVMe. Summit Ridge will include CPUs ranging from8 cores & 16 threadsto4 cores & 8 threads with 95-65 watts of power.

AM4's Key Features

DDR4 MemoryPCIe Gen 3USB 3.1 Gen2 10GbpsNVMeSATA Express

AMD Zen Press Release

From 7th Gen APUs to upcoming Zen-based “Summit Ridge” desktop processors, the future-ready AM4 platform features the newest I/O standards and an AMD commitment to support it into the future.

The initial “Zen” cores for “Summit Ridge”-powered desktops will utilize the AMD AM4 socket, a new unified socket infrastructure that is compatible with 7th Generation AMD A-Series desktop processors. With dedicated PCIe® lanes for cutting-edge USB, graphics, data and other I/O, the AMD AM4 platform will not steal lanes from other devices and components. This allows users to enjoy systems with improved responsiveness and the future looking technologies that the AM4 platform provides, resulting in a powerful, scalable and reliable computing solution for all their needs.

2 of 9

Next Generation AMD CPUs And APUs