AMD hinted that its Project Quantum PC may now be ready for production. It further added that the upcoming Project Quantum system will feature an AMD Zen CPU and a next-gen Vega GPU with HBM2 as its core components.
AMD first unveiled the new Project Quantum concept last year, and it was expected to feature a custom small form factor chassis along with high-end hardware specs such as an Intel Core i7-4790K "Devil's Canyon" processor and a pair of Fiji graphics processors.
However, AMD eventually concluded that its Project Quantum was not a practical concept for mass production. In other words, the company's Project Quantum PC became a "Concept PC" and had to be shelved for a couple of months.
"We built it as a concept PC, so like concept cars it's not usually practical to take it straight to market, that wouldn't make a great deal of sense," AMD's Richard Huddy told PCR back in 2015.
Huddy added that, if the company had the right kind of conversations with some OEMs, Project Quantum might become a real product after all. In that case, production would be relatively small, with only a handful of PC makers bringing it to the market.
Now, AMD seems ready to mass-produce its Project Quantum concept after determining the roadblocks that might soon be cleared away.
According to WCCF Tech, one the roadblocks that led to the postponement of Project Quantum was the internal decision to market the Radeon Duo Pro as a professional high-performance solution and not purely gaming product.
Another reason that was pointed out is the lack of a high-performance Motherboard and AMD CPU solution that could go hand-in-hand with the powerful dual GPU. The originally-announced Project Quantum uses AsRock for its motherboard.
AMD touts the new Zen architecture as being fully equipped to handle high performance loads and that it is expected to be a competitor to Intel rivals.
Moreover, its Vega GPU will reportedly be based on a 14 nm FinFET.
With Vega GPU, it allows the use of the latest DisplayPort 1.3 and HDMI 2.0, as well as full alignment capability with the growing VR market.
AMD's Project Quantum concept may take a few months before it becomes ready for retail. Once it launches, it should be an impressive ready-made system for both VR and 4K purposes. There is also a potential to use it as a reference design for upcoming form factors.
