Advanced Micro Devices introduced its first accelerated processing units (APUs) for PCs a few years back, placing x86-based central processing cores on the same computer chips as its Radeon graphics processing units for the first time.
The value proposition was pretty straightforward. As PC computing has become more heterogeneous, with computational work traditionally done by the CPU now being offloaded to GPUs better able to handle certain types of workloads, it made sense to eliminate bottlenecks caused by having CPUs and GPUs on discrete dies on a motherboard. Wrapping central processing and graphics processing up in a single package was also a great way to free up real estate on circuit boards, enabling thinner and lighter PC designs.
The arrival of APUs is part of a trend towards consolidation of processor functionality into single packages that we've seen accelerate in recent years. Parts like memory controllers and, in the case of mobile device SoCs, baseband radio circuitry, have also been migrating into single-chip designs.
These days, AMD is several generations into its APU product line. The company has seen its bigger rival Intel also adopt the practice of matching CPUs and GPUs in single chip packages, but AMD wants us all to know that all APUs aren't created equal, in its humble opinion.
The infographic below doesn't provide us with a ton of technical details on APUs, but it's instructive insofar as it informs us where AMD thinks its APU advantages will lie going forward. The skinny is that the smaller chip maker thinks it has a better ratio of CPU-to-GPU circuitry on its APU products than Intel, which has been steadily devoting more die space to graphics processing in recent years but still doesn't match AMD on that front.