AMD have announced their new Ryzen 4000 mobile CPUs for laptops, along with Radeon 5600M
and 5700M graphics, so let’s find out what this means, what improvements we can expect,
and how performance could stack up to the Intel and Nvidia competition.
The new Ryzen 4000 series CPUs are based on the Zen2 7nm architecture, so same as the
desktop 3000 series chips that came out last year.
Like in the past, AMD have broken the CPUs down into U and H series. U processors are
meant to be lower powered for thinner and lighter machines, while H series chips would
be for larger higher powered devices. If we take a look at the processor lineup, we’ve
got a couple of H series CPUs, and a bunch of U series chips. Let’s start out with
the H CPUs.
In the H series there’s the Ryzen 5 4600H with 6 cores and 12 threads, and the Ryzen
7 4800H with 8 cores and 16 threads. It’s worth noting that the max boost clock listed
will be for single core, so definitely don’t expect these speeds from multicore workloads.
There are also apparently lower powered S versions too, ASUS in particular noted the
use of the 4800HS in their new G14 gaming laptop. From my understanding, this is the
same CPU as the 4800H but with a lower 35 watt power limit, but I didn’t get too many
details.
I found it interesting that they’ve got an 8 core 16 thread part with just a 15 watt
power limit, obviously we’re expecting lower clock speeds. The 4.2GHz quoted here is the
same as the 45 watt 4800H, but it’s just single core so that could be feasible, it
will be interesting to see how it actually performs in multicore workloads.
I could still see it as being a benefit as more and more apps start to take advantage
of more cores, even if they are lower powered compared to a higher power limit 4 or 6 core
CPU for instance. AMD are claiming a big boost to multicore performance when strictly comparing
performance within that 15 watt power range.
To be fair, the base clock of the 4800U is a full 1.1GHz below the 4800H which has the
higher 45 watt power limit, but without testing we don’t know what speeds to expect, base
clock should be worst case, I can’t recall testing any gaming laptops that ran at base
clock. AMD are showing it dominating one of the best 10nm Ice Lake options from Intel
in Cinebench Multicore, as Ice Lake U series tops out at 4 cores 8 threads, however even
single core had a slight edge with Ryzen.
The Vega graphics on the Ryzen chip is also apparently beating Intel’s new Iris graphics,
and these are the AMD provided results showing the differences in different workloads. It’s
important to take all of these graphs with a grain of salt, as they’re always looking
to make them look good, we won’t know for certain until we get some of these laptops
for independent review and testing.
So far there’s no word if overclocking or undervolting will be supported, that would
be cool, but I’m not getting my hopes up, I guess we’ll see.
It’s also worth noting that the memory speed supported by the Ryzen 4000 series is DDR4-3200,
which is a significant increase over the previous Ryzen platform limitation of DDR4-2400, and
this should also assist with boosting performance over last gen.
Unlike the desktop Ryzen processors, the mobile ones are still using PCIe 3 rather than 4,
but that’s not a big deal here, but does mean no faster PCIe 4 storage for laptops.
It’s great that these AMD laptops are able to offer FreeSync for a smoother tear-free
gaming experience. I’m not one hundred percent sure how this works, but it must be the Vega
graphics within the CPU that are wired to the display, because FreeSync is still possible
in laptops with an AMD CPU but Nvidia GPU, it only seems to be Intel based laptops that
aren’t offering this feature, to use G-Sync for example the Intel integrated graphics
needs to be disabled.
So when can we expect to see Ryzen 4000 laptops? Well for now AMD have just mentioned Q1 2020,
so basically between now and the end of March, I haven’t yet been contacted regarding reviewing
any new laptops with any either.
I found it interesting that despite AMD’s claims of the Ryzen 4800H beating the Intel
i7-9750H in gaming performance that we didn’t see any 4000 series CPUs in any higher end
refreshed laptops at CES. It could just be that different companies are testing the waters
with Ryzen and taking it slow, but personally I think this is a little telling.
These guys would have had the new chips available for some time for testing to create their
new products, so the lack of higher end laptops based on Ryzen 4000 mobile chips kind of leads
me to believe they’re not quite beating Intel yet, either in terms of performance,
power draw, or cost, but that’s just my guess. If that wasn’t the case then why
are there only low to mid range laptops at CES with Ryzen 4000? The best one I saw would
be the ASUS G14 with 2060 Max-Q, I don’t think there are any with 2070 or above for
instance. I guess it could be due to the possibility of new Nvidia graphics being on the way, so
maybe they wanted to hold off, we’ll have to wait and see.
In addition to new CPUs, AMD also announced the 5600M and 5700M graphics for laptops,
however, very little information was actually provided, and no laptops featuring these graphics
were seen at CES this year, at least at the companies I visited.
So far I’ve tested the 5500M in the MSI Alpha 15, and it fell in between the Nvidia
GTX 1650 and 1660 Ti, however it was also running at 85 watts while the 1660 Ti ran
at 80 watts. Based purely on this, it makes me think despite using 7nm Navi, these AMD
options will also use more power than the Nvidia competition at the higher end. This
is important for laptops, as it means they may need better cooling and power delivery,
potentially meaning we only see them in larger laptops, but these are just my own thoughts
and speculation.
Let me know what you think about AMD’s Ryzen 4000 mobile CPUs and Radeon 5600M and 5700M
graphics down in the comments, and if you’re new to the channel get subscribed for the
rest of my CES 2020 coverage.