Vendors Finally Pair Ryzen CPUs and High-End GPUs In Laptops
AMD's Ryzen 4000 (Renoir) processors may be mobile powerhouses, but for reasons unknown, laptop vendors were reluctant to pair the Zen 2 chips with high-end graphics cards. Ryzen 5000 (Cezanne), on the other hand, appears to have won over manufacturers as there are already retailer postings of upcoming laptops (via Tum_Apisak) with options that span up to a GeForce RTX 3080.
[...] The Ryzen 9 5900HX broke its cover recently, but the Zen 3 chip's secret remains to be unraveled. It's plausible that the Ryzen 9 5900HX is just a faster variant of its H-series counterpart or that AMD may have finally unlocked the multiplier for enthusiasts to overclock the processor, like what Intel allows with its HK-series SKUs.
[...] No one has any idea of when AMD will release Ryzen 5000, but the sudden appearance of benchmark submissions and retailer listings point to an imminent launch. CES 2020 is coming up, and AMD President and CEO Dr. Lisa Su is scheduled to deliver the keynote speech. It would be the ideal venue to announce the mobile Zen 3 chips since the desktop counterparts are already out.
"Cezanne" is the Zen 3 version of AMD's Zen 2 "Renoir" 4000-series APUs. "Lucienne" will consist of Zen 2 APUs (a Renoir refresh) confusingly given the same 5000-series naming as Cezanne.
One of the common theories behind a lack of high-end GPU options has been that AMD's Renoir limits a discrete mobile GPU to a PCIe 3.0 x8 connection (instead of x16), which can be a slight bottleneck for higher end mobile GPUs. Others believe it's just due to OEMs cheaping out on AMD systems.
Upcoming mobile GPUs (like the mobile RTX 3080 mentioned) could bring up to 16 GB of VRAM to laptops.
Related: AMD Ryzen 4000 'Renoir' APU Runs Crysis Without Any Cooling Solution
AMD Succeeds in its 25x20 Goal: 2020 "Renoir" Over 31 Times More Efficient than 2014 "Kaveri" Chips
AMD Launches Ryzen 4000G Desktop APUs: OEM-Only at First
Related Stories
AMD Ryzen 4000 'Renoir' APU Runs Crysis Without Any Cooling Solution:
Fritzchens Fritz over at Twitter, who has provided several close-up die shots of CPUs and GPUs in the past, has managed to run a Ryzen 4000 APU without any cooling solution attached to it. Using the Ryzen 3 4300U, a four core and four-thread processor that's clocked at a base clock of 2.7 GHz base and 3.7 GHz boost clock, the chip was tested under an intense scenario where it was provided no active or even passive cooling.
[...] The CPU doesn't even feature an IHS to carry off the heat from the die which makes this little test even more brutal but the chip didn't even break a sweat. This was mostly achieved using the Renoir Mobile Tuning tool that helps set the original temperature limit down to 90C.
[...] But it's not the Cinebench R15 score that makes this little test interesting but rather a full run of the Crysis benchmark. The APU also houses five enhanced Vega compute units which equates to a total of 320 stream processors running at 1400 MHz. Like the CPU, the GPU also has to manage thermal limits by reducing clock speeds but despite no cooling solution, the chip was able to run a complete loop of the Crysis benchmark without a hiccup.
AMD claims to have improved performance by about 5x while cutting power use to about 1/6th, when comparing 2014 "Kaveri" mobile APUs to 2020 "Renoir" mobile APUs. This exceeds a goal of improving efficiency by 25x by 2020:
The base value for AMD's goal is on its Kaveri mobile processors, which by the standards of today set a very low bar. As AMD moved to Carrizo, it implemented new power monitoring features on chip that allowed the system to offer a better distribution of power and ran closer to the true voltage needed, not wasting power. After Carrizo came Bristol Ridge, still based on the older cores, but used a new DDR4 controller as well as lower powered processors that were better optimized for efficiency.
A big leap came with Raven Ridge, with AMD combining its new highly efficient Zen x86 cores and Vega integrated graphics. This heralded a vast improvement in performance due to doubling the cores and improving the graphics, all within a similar power window as Bristol Ridge. This boosted up the important 25x20 metric and keeping it well above the 'linear' gain.
[...] The jump from Picasso to Renoir has been well documented. Our first use of the CPUs, reviewed in the ASUS Zephyrus G14, left us with our mouths open, almost literally. We called it a 'Mobile Revival', showcasing AMD's transition over from Zen+ to Zen2, from GF 12nm to TSMC 7nm, along with a lot of strong design and optimization on the graphics side. The changes from the 2019 to the 2020 chip include doubling the core count, from four to eight, improving the clock-for-clock performance by 15-20%, but also improving the graphics performance and frequencies despite moving down from an silicon design that had 11 compute units down to 8. This comes in line with a number of power updates, adhering to AHCI specifications, and as we discussed with Sam Naffziger, AMD Fellow, supporting the new S0ix low power states has helped tremendously. The reduction in the fabric power, along with additional memory bandwidth, offered large gains.
AMD accomplished this while using refined "7nm" Vega GPU cores in its APUs, instead of moving to a newer architecture such as RDNA2.
AMD Launches 12 Desktop Renoir Ryzen 4000G Series APUs: But You Can't Buy Them
Today AMD is finally lifting the lid on its long-awaited desktop Zen2 based APU family. Using the same silicon as in the Ryzen Mobile 4000 family, AMD is pumping it up into 35 W and 65 models in the same AM4 platform that is in use today. There has been strong demand from PC builders to release these chips, which were on the topics of forum conversation all the way back at CES. There's only one downside to these new processors: you can't buy them on their own. AMD states that the initial release of Ryzen 4000G hardware is for OEMs like Dell and HP only for their pre-built systems.
The new processors use the same 8-core Zen2 plus 8 compute unit Vega that we saw in Ryzen Mobile 4000 at the beginning of the year, but as with previous APU launches, the frequency and power thermals have been pushed up into more manageable desktop environments. To that end, AMD will be launching hardware in the Ryzen 7, Ryzen 5, and Ryzen 3 product lines at both 65 W and 35 W, all on the AM4 platform.
[...] Just to be clear, AMD specified OEM and not system integrators (SIs). On our call, AMD clarified that the market for its APUs is skewed very heavily towards the big mass-market prebuilt customers like HP and Dell, rather than custom home builds. The numbers quoted were around 80% of all APU sales end up in these systems, and by working with OEMs only, AMD can also help manage stock levels of the Renoir silicon coming out of the fabs between desktops and notebooks.
[...] AMD says that they are planning a consumer-grade release of APUs 'soon'. It was stated in our briefing call that there will be a launch of a future Zen2 APU for the consumer market compatible with 500-series motherboards. The company specifically did not say 400-series, but did clarify that the 4000G series announced today was for 400 and 500 series.
Also at Tom's Hardware, TechRadar, Guru3D, and Ars Technica.
See also: AMD Ryzen 4000 Renoir APUs Have Started Invading AIO PCs
AMD Ryzen 7 4700G Renoir APU With Vega 8 GPU Is Almost As Fast As Entry-Level Discrete Graphics When Overclocked
AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 4750G Renoir 8 Core CPU Benchmarks Leak Out, On Par With Ryzen 7 3800X & Core i7-10700K
AMD Ryzen 7 4700G APU Overclocked To 4.8 GHz Across All 8 Cores, DDR4-4400 & 2200 MHz FCLK Achieved Too – Blows Away The Ryzen 7 3700X
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 07 2020, @02:27PM (6 children)
All Ryzen CPUs have unlocked multipliers!
As for the lack of pairing with high end GPU, it's because :
* "Intel is the best CPU for games"
* AMD APU GPUs are decent already, obviously a real GPU is better but it's kind of wasteful in a sense
It is definitely not related to PCIe performance.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 07 2020, @02:36PM (4 children)
I'm curious as to what the use case is for a laptop with a discreet GPU as well as an APU. Does battery life not matter anymore?
(Score: 4, Informative) by Booga1 on Monday December 07 2020, @02:44PM
Power efficiency is exactly where you want that combination. When you don't need the horsepower, the discrete GPU it is in a low power state that barely consumes anything at all. It only ramps up when you use a game or other program that needs it.
(Score: 3, Informative) by NateMich on Monday December 07 2020, @03:46PM
For gamers? No.
(Score: 3, Informative) by takyon on Monday December 07 2020, @08:36PM
Mobile gaming (less important during pandemic times), efficiency + high performance when wanted.
Renoir clearly has slightly stagnant integrated graphics performance because it's intended to be paired with a discrete GPU, which is in most laptops over $500 or so. Same with Cezanne, which will also come with Vega GPU cores. After Cezanne, Rembrandt APUs should finally have RDNA (2) [wccftech.com] in 2022.
It looks like AMD will launch lower powered APUs with improved integrated graphics: Van Gogh [wccftech.com] (Zen 2 + RDNA 2) in 2021, Dragon Crest in 2022. ~9 Watt average TDP instead of 15 Watt, 4 cores instead of the 8 cores maximum in Renoir/Cezanne, probably a better iGPU than Renoir/Cezanne, some sort of "computer vision and machine learning" features. Grab one of those for great battery life.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by shortscreen on Tuesday December 08 2020, @03:16AM
There is no use case but Intel got away with making everyone pay for their integrated GPU that's always a decade out of date whether they wanted it or not. So the market has accepted that anyone who wants something better than that has to pay for a second GPU. And every game message board is full of posts saying "my labtop haz a JeeForse Eleventy-thouzand but teh gaym only runs to 1 fps!?!?" because someone couldn't figure out how to toggle the integrated one off.
Nobody going for a "high-end GPU" in a laptop cares about battery life though. Something like an RTX 3080 would run for all of 10 minutes if it didn't burst into flames first.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Monday December 07 2020, @08:39PM
Intel integrated graphics is catching up with AMD now. Expect to see a tug-of-war as each company launches with the better iGPU performance, or Intel might even come out on top consistently if AMD sticks to a strategy of de-emphasizing iGPU performance in high-end APUs (see the difference between Renoir/Cezanne and Van Gogh/Dragon Crest in other comment).
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 07 2020, @05:10PM (4 children)
Especially when I run distributed computing (DC) projects!
Now when it comes to laptops, why is it when I run 100% DC loads the fans rev up like a jet ready to take off and I fear for my own and my laptop's safety?
Are there any LAPTOPS which can do 100% DC loads 24/7 without any danger and runaway fans?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 07 2020, @06:30PM (2 children)
That is not what laptops are for.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 07 2020, @07:36PM (1 child)
> That is not what laptops are for.
Why not? Anyone up to actually answering my question?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 07 2020, @09:01PM
Laptops aren't intended for running at maximum performance over extended periods of time. They're for conserving power and being lightweight while providing short bursts of performance so the user can have fast interactive response. It's just the wrong tool for the job, same reason why a sports car is lousy at towing a boat even if it has enough horsepower; that's what trucks are for. You need a desktop.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Monday December 07 2020, @08:16PM
I say it's not directly AMD's fault. Renoir is very efficient, but laptop OEMs can ruin any chip with a bad chassis, internal cooling, etc. The pursuit of thinness (too thin for SO-DIMM modules and USB Type-A) has counteracted cooling gains. You might have to look deeply into laptop reviews to expose potential problems, and in some cases it might not be obvious what's wrong with a specific laptop model for years.
Intel has had more money to throw at the problem with stuff like the Ultrabook initiative and now Project Athena [techreport.com], where OEMs meet specific standards to get certification. While Intel is falling behind in desktop power efficiency (though they will make moves there like Alder Lake with big and small cores), they have done better in the laptop market and finally moved to "10nm".
Running distributed computing on your desk-dwelling laptop or smartphone is probably a bad idea, because as far as I can tell (there are mixed messages), lithium-ion battery devices are not made to be plugged in constantly. Although maybe you can pull the battery out entirely and just keep the laptop plugged in without one.
For these reasons and more, I'm souring on the idea of getting a new laptop that isn't a ~$100 tier fanless one. I'd rather go with small form factor PCs and use them remotely if needed. You can do distributed computing on a machine actually intended to run at 100% 24/7.
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(Score: 2) by EEMac on Monday December 07 2020, @05:43PM (1 child)
Laptop makers have been pairing Ryzen CPUs with crappy screens for years now, especially in the 17.3" size. (1600x900 at 17.3"?!) I ended up buying an Intel laptop just to get a decent screen. Not happy about that.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Monday December 07 2020, @08:22PM
I think 17.3" is a niche laptop size and you'll probably see saner options at 14/15.6" (and the screens have gotten a little larger at each size as bezels have gotten thinner).
Looking at this list [techradar.com], I found a 1600x900, the HP ZBook 17 G5. A lot of 1080p models, not much 4K, not much AMD. AMD tends to have worse options in general, as Intel dominates the laptop market.
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 07 2020, @10:01PM (1 child)
I guess "high end" means Nvidia to these Windows-using morons. If i buy a machine with an AMD processor and i want a discrete GPU i expect it to be AMD as well. Of course, Windows-using gamers probably won't care about this, because they are dumb whores, but i am a grown up man who wears pants, so i don't buy Nvidia chips.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 07 2020, @10:04PM
When I wake up in the morning, I put my pants on just like everybody else: One leg at time. But once those pants are on, I make golden records.