AMD’s GPU architecture roadmap has once again been updated. Now we have details through 2018. First we have AMD’s “Polaris” architecture, with Polaris 10 and Polaris 11 chips. Polaris will bring with it great leaps in performance over the current generation of GPUs bringing with it 2.5-times performance/watt improvement. Polaris has actually been rumored to be used in Sony’s upcoming 4K Ultra HD PlayStation.
“Polaris” will introduce new features such as HVEC (h.265) decode and encode hardware-acceleration and new display outputs like DisplayPort 1.3 and HDMI 2.0. Both Polaris 10 and Polaris 11 will likely feature GDDR5 / GDDR5X. For those waiting for the big chip that succeeds the “Fiji” series, keep waiting, you won’t see it till 2017. That is when we will see the Vega architecture. In 2018 we will see Navi, which will bring with it an even faster memory interface than HBM2.
