AMD Ryzen 7000 processors are here, and the range will soon expand to include 3D V-Cache and mobile chips. Here’s everything you need to know about Zen 4.
AMD’s Ryzen 7000 CPUs are here, and there are plenty of them to go around. AMD started out strong by introducing the best processors in the Zen 4 lineup, including the flagship Ryzen 9 7950X, and then followed up by launching even more CPUs. Now, the Ryzen 7000 family includes a whole host of desktop and mobile CPUs, and the 3D V-Cache versions of AMD’s chips are right around the corner.
We’ve already had the chance to test some of AMD’s latest and greatest, and with more to come, we’ve kept our ears to the ground to not miss any details about the upcoming CPUs. Here’s everything we know about Ryzen 7000.
AMD Ryzen 7000 CPUs came out on September 27, 2022, a bit later than some rumors had predicted. It’s probably not a coincidence that September 27 was also the day Intel announced the competing 13th-generation Raptor Lake CPUs; perhaps AMD decided a delay wasn’t just necessary, but also welcome.
The first wave of Ryzen 7000 CPUs arrived with the following recommended prices:
Not long after their release, the processors got an unofficial discount that seems to have lasted to this day. As a result, you can find the flagship Ryzen 9 7950X for around $600, and the other chips are cheaper too.
Pricing has actually improved for the eight- and 16-core models. The 7950X is cheaper than the original 16-core flagship 3950X was when it launched in 2019. The 7700X is also cheaper than the 5800X, though it would have been nice to see the 7700X match the price of the $300 5700X, but it’s not that far off. While many people expected higher prices for most of these CPUs, we can be quite relieved that prices are either flat or lower than before.
AMD followed up by launching even more Zen 4 processors. The company revealed a massive number of chips during CES 2023, and the new lineup includes both desktop and mobile options.
For desktops, AMD announced three new chips sporting the 3D V-Cache that made the Ryzen 7 5800X3D so successful. These processors are set to arrive in February 2023, and the lineup includes the Ryzen 9 7950X3D, Ryzen 9 7900X3D, and the Ryzen 7 7800X3D.
As mentioned, the Zen 4 family has also expanded to include a truckload of mobile chips that will begin popping up in some of this year’s best laptops starting in March. This range is split in two: Ryzen 7040 and Ryzen 7045. The latter are aimed at gamers, with the top chip sporting 16 cores, and the Ryzen 7040 chips are going to be found in productivity-oriented laptops that don’t consume too much power.
The Ryzen 7000 range consists of Zen 4 desktop CPUs, their 3D V-Cache counterparts, and two mobile lineups. Let’s take a look at all of their specs, starting with the desktop Ryzen 7000.
The big changes with this generation of CPUs come in the form of clock speed, cache boosts, and a higher TDP to account for it. Thanks to improvements to the Zen 4 architecture and a new, more efficient 5nm process node, AMD has been able to take its Ryzen 7000 CPUs well north of 5GHz for the first time. That does come at the cost of TDP, however. Where the last-generation Ryzen 5950X had a TDP of just 105 watts, the 7950X with the same 16 cores is now rated for a 170W TDP. It actually pulled around 200W when maxed out in our testing (more on that below).
The three processors listed above utilize AMD’s 3D V-cache technology. They come with extra cache stacked on top of the chip, and the Ryzen 9 7950X3D sports a whopping 144MB — a notable increase over the Ryzen 7 5800X3D, which has 96MB. Even the direct follow-up to the 5800X3D kicks things up a notch, with a combined cache of 104MB.
Coming up next, we have the Ryzen 7045-series laptop chips currently being released in four different models ranging from the high-end Ryzen 9 to the midrange Ryzen 5. In many ways, these chips share some specs in common with their desktop counterparts — they have the same core counts and cache sizes, but the clock speeds and the TDP are both lower. These processors will be found in gaming laptops.
Lastly, the Phoenix Range processors feature cutdown specs, but are also a lot more power-conservative. The core counts are kept fairly low, but the clock speeds are still more than decent. You’ll also notice that the cache size has been drastically reduced. The drop in specifications shouldn’t be a problem, because these are not gaming chips — you’ll find them in lightweight, productivity-oriented laptops.
The Ryzen 7000 chips are based on the new Zen 4 architecture. It continues the evolution of the chiplet design pioneered on Zen 2 and is built on TSMC’s new enhanced 5nm process node.
