This is not going to be very technical. So if you are expecting a lot of spec related information in this, you will not. You are better off going to tomshardware.com or something.
Now that we got that out of the way.
I have always loved AMD. When they took over ATI in 2006, I loved them even more. They went and made Radeon so much more than what it was and for this, I am truly thankful that they bought a company and improved it rather than completely devastate it.
As far as gaming is concerned, I am more of a PC gamer. I love the click-ity click of the mouse and the tap-ity tap of the keyboard when I game. It is better than the vibration feedback of a console joystick. Very soothing to my ears. Which is why I love AMD. Now, until a few years ago, my gaming was limited to something my cheap as hell laptop could provide, which included some old school Prince of Persia, NFS Underground run on low graphic setting and the Incredible Hulk running around with a certain lag that could be achieved by running the game on a machine sans GPU. Come 2011, I managed to acquire a gaming laptop that was still running legacy ATI Radeon graphics with the HD 5650 and a Phenom II X4 processor. This was my first true gaming laptop and I could finally run NFS on max settings and Hulk could now bound across buildings the way he is supposed to 😊.
But running these on a laptop was not really something that is very effective. Let’s face it; the battery and the keyboard are not exactly top notch on this Acer. As far as gaming goes, a handful of brands really understand the value of quality spec. MSi is one of these brands. AMD Middle East offered me a chance to try out their APU+GPU combination on a MSi machine - the GX60 and I jumped at the opportunity.
I took the machine home and so excited was I that I forgot to video the unboxing. I immediately booted up Windows 8, installed Battlefield 3 and waited until my Resident Devastation machine (aka my son) was asleep, so I could start my gaming 😊
Once he was snoring into the night, I booted up the machine again, logged into my Origin account and hit Play Campaign on BF3. Now EA have made this game with excellent graphics and gave me the chance to see that the machine running the AMD Radeon 7970HD with their A10 APU was really up to scratch on graphics. I had on my standard definition Stereo headset, my Razer Orochi and big bottle of water to help me through the night.
Once the game was booted up, I immediately tweaked Video to ULTRA. It was worth it. MSi’s anti glare screen made looking into Blackburn’s face less troublesome than it did on my Acer. It was at midnight with no lights on, barring the screen. Burning through the game was effortless as I was supported by the SteelSeries keyboard that was provided by MSi.
But the high point was the fact that the machine kept pace both in heart and soul. Graphics and processing were both top notch with game loads between saves and scenes were cut down phenomenally compared to the Acer. The game did not lag on ULTRA settings, in fact it was a pleasure running the laptop at full resolution and 60Hz. Gorgeous depth of colour, and no strain on my eyes trying to make out where the enemy was.
I wish I could have played Assassins Creed on it, but what the hey, I tried BF3, finished the game and enjoyed myself thoroughly! 😊
Thanks AMD.
