Is it worth paying more money to get the 5900HX over the 5800H in your next Ryzen laptop?
I’ve compared both CPUs in these laptops to show you what the differences are.
These are the differences in specs between these two processors.
Both are 8 core 16 thread chips with the same amount of cache,
however the 5900HX has slightly higher base and boost clock speeds as it’s a better binned part.
The integrated graphics are similar, though the HX has a 100Mhz higher speed.
For this testing I’m using two tongfang laptops, the XMG Neo 15 aka Eluktronics Mech-15 G3,
and the Infinity M7, aka the Eluktronics Prometheus 17. Despite both laptops not
being the same chassis, the software in both lets me control power limits, so I’ve tested
both capped to the same 45 watt TDP, and both without any limits to see what they can do.
Now according to AMD, HX processors are unlocked,
however in the three laptops I’ve seen so far that have a 5900HX, none of them have
a software utility to let you overclock, and there’s nothing available in the BIOS either.
I’m not 100% yet, but after talking to some people at different companies it seems like
AMD aren’t giving the users the option to modify clockspeed. I think HX just
means you can modify things like power limit, which doesn’t really seem that unique given I
can also modify power limit on my 5800H machine, so I can get the same functionality without HX.
Anyway, let’s get straight into the results! We’ll look at things like price difference,
thermals and power draw afterwards, or you can use the timestamps below to skip into the future.
Starting off with Cinebench R23, we can quickly get a rough idea of both single and
multicore performance differences. I’ve got the results with no power limit up the top,
and the results with both capped to a 45 watt TDP below. With the 45 watt limit in place,
the 5900HX was less than 3% ahead in multicore, and almost 5% ahead with no limits. Meanwhile
single core was 6% higher with the 5900HX at 45 watts, and a little lower without the limit.
I’ve also tested the older Cinebench R20 as a lot of people still use it,
so you can use these numbers for comparing my results with those from other content.
With the same 45 watt limit the 5900HX is scoring 6.6% higher in multicore,
as it’s just a better binned chip it can achieve more with a similar amount of power.
The Geekbench test also covers both single and multicore. The 5900HX was 4 to 5% higher
in multicore score going from capped to uncapped, while single core score was about 6% higher with
the cap and 5% higher when both aren’t capped, so again not major gains, just a little boost.
V-Ray uses the processor to render out a scene. This is a multicore test,
and the 5900HX was scoring 5% higher than the 5800H with both limited to the 45 watt TDP,
but then with no cap this increases to 7.5%. As you’ll see later,
my 5900HX machine is able to use more power which is why the gap widens without any limits.
The Corona benchmark also uses the processor to render a scene,
and the difference was almost exactly the same as V-Ray just before it when there’s
no power limit, with the 5900HX completing the task 7.4% faster,
though this lowers a little to 6% quicker when both are subject to the same 45 watt limit.
Blender was tested with the Open Data benchmark using both the BMW and Classroom tests. Again
the 5900HX was ahead in all instances, and this test was showing some of the biggest
differences between the two. With no power limit, the 5900HX was completing the BMW test 9% faster,
the biggest difference out of all workloads tested. With both capped to 45 watts though,
the HX chip was 6% faster when using a comparable amount of power.
Handbrake was used to convert a 4K h.264 video file that I shot to 1080p
h.265. The difference was similar to many of the other workloads tested so far,
with the 5900HX completing the task 6% faster with both capped to the same TDP,
and then just slightly lower at 5.5% ahead with both not limited.
7-Zip was used to test compression and decompression speeds. With both
limited to 45 watts the 5900HX was 8% faster in decompression,
the largest difference out of all workloads tested with the cap in place.
The difference in compression was much smaller though, just 2% ahead with the HX.
Speaking of small difference, I’ve measured AES encryption and decryption
and only saw extremely minor changes. Technically the 5800H was slightly ahead,
but honestly it’s within margin of error anyway and not a practical difference you’d notice.
Adobe Photoshop was tested with the puget systems benchmark. The Nvidia graphics were disabled,
so we’re only looking at processor differences here. Both of these are exceptionally high scores
when compared to other laptops I’ve tested, but the 5900HX was 6% ahead in both cases.
These are the differences when looking at all of the applications just tested
with both limited to a 45 watt TDP. AES tests aside, which were close anyway,
the 5900HX was anywhere from 2 to 8% faster depending on the workload,
so it’s ahead as expected, it is a better binned part with higher clockspeed,
but at the same time I don’t think it’s offering too much extra over the cheaper 5800H.
With no power limits the 5900HX pulls further in front, though best case we’re now looking at a 9%
improvement, and this is probably because it’s able to run with a higher TDP,
which I’ll show you next, but it’s important to note that this will
vary based on the laptop and its power and thermal limits.
With both laptops limited to 45 watts in the blender test,
well, as expected the TDP is capped here, but with no limit the 5900HX in the laptop I tested could
happily run blender with a 66 watt TDP, while my 5800H ran the same workload at 54 watts,
so just goes to show how this can vary based on laptop.
Here’s how total system power draw looks from the wall. With both capped to a 45 watt TDP
the 5900HX laptop was using just one more watt. Despite that small difference, keep in mind that
the 5900HX laptop was completing the classroom task almost 7% faster, so I think this is really
showing what the better binned chip can achieve. With no limits, the 5900HX system was drawing 8%
more power from the wall, despite its TDP being around 22% higher than the 5800H,
so yeah just goes to show how TDP doesn’t equal wall power.
The 5900HX was running at higher clock speeds with both at a 45 watt TDP,
which is likely due to it being a better binned part, it’s simply able to get more
done with a very similar amount of power. The gap widens with no limit though,
because as we just saw the 5900HX system is able to take more power.
As you’d expect, more power equals more heat, so the 5900HX was actually hitting
thermal throttling at 95 degrees Celsius in blender with no TDP cap in place,
so with better cooling it may be possible to further boost this a little.
At the end of the day, cooling isn’t directly comparable as I’m using two
different 15 inch and 17 inch laptops that have different cooling designs.
As for price difference, XMG offers the 5900HX as an optional upgrade for the Neo 15,
the laptop I tested the 5800H in. It’s 89 Euros more for the 5900HX,
so with my RTX 3070 configuration the CPU upgrade ends up costing about 4.5% more money.
Given we saw around a 5% boost with the 5900HX in the workloads tested, I think this sounds
pretty fair. The difference is of course more or less depending on the specific workload, but
when averaged that number sounds reasonable. Pay a bit more money if you want a bit more performance.
Unfortunately both of these laptops have different Nvidia graphics, so I can’t properly compare
gaming with the discrete GPU, but I can show the differences between the integrated graphics.
Both are Vega based and have 8 graphics cores, however the 5900HX has a 100MHz higher clockspeed.
I’ve tested Shadow of the Tomb Raider with the game’s benchmark at 720p.
There was basically no difference here, just 1 FPS higher with the 5900HX at one setting level,
margin of error stuff, so in this particular game it doesn’t seem like
the higher clock speed from the iGPU is offering an improvement.
There was a little more difference in blender though, which was tested
using OpenCL on the integrated graphics. The 5900HX was just 3% faster, which I guess
is about all you can expect from a 5% clockspeed jump to the iGPU.
Ultimately, the performance difference between the 5900HX and 5800H isn’t that large,
but we’re not really expecting that. The 5900HX is just a better binned part so it
can reach higher clockspeeds and get a bit more work done with the same power,
and this results in it getting single digit performance gains over the Ryzen 7 5800H.
I think that’s about all we can expect realistically,
you start getting diminishing returns at the top of a product stack.
If you want to see how the 5800H compares against Intel, then check out my videos over here. I’ve
compared it with the 8 core i7-10875H in both gaming and productivity workloads,
so I’ll see you over in one of those videos next. Otherwise if you’re new
to the channel then get subscribed for future laptop comparisons like this one.