An Interesting Discovery about AMD Athlon K7 "Pluto" Processor

Fritzchens Fritz, a renowned close-up photographer of CPU and GPU dies, recently examined an AMD Athlon K7 "Pluto" processor and made an intriguing discovery. He shared his findings on social media, along with several images for better understanding.

The images revealed that the top metal layer of the AMD Athlon K7 Pluto processor contains hidden elements such as a revolver and a map of Texas in one of the corners. Fritz's post gained significant attention from the media, with many expressing disbelief that these tiny details had remained unnoticed for almost 25 years.

The AMD Athlon K7 series, which includes models like Argon, Pluto, Thunderbird, Palomino, Thoroughbred, and Barton, was a popular mainstream processor family in the early 2000s. During that time, it competed against Intel's Pentium III CPU architecture, and AMD was often considered the winner by many reports.

Phil Park, an experienced AMD veteran currently working as a Fabric performance engineer in the memory systems department, responded to Fritz's historical observations. He revealed another interesting fact about the original Athlon naming scheme, which initially followed a car theme with names like Mustang, Thunderbird, and Spitfire. However, due to concerns about potential trademark battles, AMD decided to change the theme to horses.

Park's comment hinted that companies like Ford, Chevrolet, and BMW might have been monitoring AMD's product naming conventions. This revelation adds an intriguing layer to the story behind AMD's processor names.