The number of cores in this generation has not changed, as promised by many leaks throughout the year. Only Yuri Bubliy spoke about 10 cores, but forgive Yuri, you were wrong. The Ryzen 5000 starting lineup includes 4 models: the six-core Ryzen 5600X, the eight-core Ryzen 5800X, the 5900X will have 12 cores, and the 5950X will replace the hit 16-core enthusiast chip. We were not shown any intermediate solutions, but in the future we will definitely see the addition of the Zen 3 family.
Many interesting innovations are related to the architecture of new processors based on Zen 3. First of all, this concerns the configuration of the cores - instead of two complexes of 4 cores, we now have single blocks of 8 cores with a shared pool of L3 cache memory of 32 MB.
Concatenation allows each core in the block to communicate directly in the cache without latency, for maximum gaming performance. Gamers will love it.
Thanks to architectural improvements, the throughput of the floating point and integer pipelines doubled, providing the first surprising fact about the new generation of Ryzen - if we were rumored about blocks of 8 cores many times, then no one expected a 19% increase in raw performance per core. Some leaks assumed 10%, optimists hoped for 15 - but here AMD decided to give its best, and this is good news.
Optimization also touched work with data - AMD has implemented the Zero Bubble technology, associated with the work of the so-called branch prediction unit. A critical microprocessor module preloads critical instructions for efficient use of blocks and pipelines. Zero Bubble caches instructions faster, avoiding downtime for parts of the pipeline, and reducing resource costs. We will be told more about the new technology later.
And what about consumption? Are the 150 watts rumors true? Again, no - AMD has been hard at work on energy efficiency, so the Ryzen 5000 adds 24% performance per watt compared to the outstanding Zen 2 processors. AMD says this progress has allowed the new processors to be nearly 3x more efficient than the 10900k, according to AMD. Epic! Total Lisa Su wins the match against rumors 2-0.
With the technology sorted out, now the most important thing. The gaming performance of Zen 2 was largely responsible for the huge popularity of the third generation Ryzen, but Intel had a trump card up its sleeve - its game processors were often faster, and the flagship 10900k outstripped the competition by a wide margin. It was ahead, but it was time for a change - at the demo we were shown the Ryzen 5900X, a processor capable of quietly becoming the most productive gaming stone on the market. Bypass 10900k in CSGO by 19%? Beat its predecessor in League of Legends by 50%? Beginners can do everything, and most importantly, even in the most difficult cases, the 5900X keeps its brand, not inferior to the best competitor's gaming processor. And all this without getting out of the 105 W thermal package! We never dreamed of more.
It's time to deal once and for all with the leaks that misled us. Contrary to gloomy forecasts, AMD did not split the releases - Lisa Su showed all 4 chips, and they will be on store shelves on November 5, less than a month after the announcement. Prices have jumped along with performance, but without the drama - the $ 50 markup does not look like a robbery against the background of the achievements of the new generation. If I wanted to believe in any rumor, then about the sacred 5 GHz! It's a pity, but here too! The senior chip received a boost frequency of 4.9 GHz, a little short of the same figure. And we hoped so! But nothing - the increase in boost frequencies of new products by an average of 100 MHz in comparison with Zen 2 processors became a consolation prize. The gain is small, but not useless.
It's time to take stock. For the first time in 15 years, AMD returns to the top of the gaming benchmarks, forcing the fight against the fastest Intel processors. If earlier we were attracted by shock-low prices and omnipotent multithreading, now games have come to the fore. The entire presentation from AMD was devoted to gaming advantages - we were shown a record single-core performance in Cinebench, and in order not to be unfounded, they brought out a lot of interesting benchmarks. Especially pleased with the presence of such a masterpiece as Far Cry: New Dawn. The half-threaded Dunya engine has always looked down on Zen 2, and the best AMD chips were outperformed here even by the solutions of previous generations, but Zen 3 proved itself at 10900k here too! That's it, the age of compromises has passed - now Intel has only one trump card: the smile of Bob Swan.
At the end of the presentation, we were shown a teaser for the long-awaited Big Navi - the fan nickname liked the company so much that it became official. The teaser came out with a surprise, because no one told us the exact model, from which we can conclude that the conditional 6800XT was shown, and not the flagship card.
Why? It's simple - many immediately ran to compare the numbers shown with the RTX 3080, and Lisa Su was definitely not going to spoil the game on October 28. As the presentation of the new Ryzen showed, the Reds got the hang of confusing cards for leak hunters, so Jensen Huang with his postponed 3070 release will surely have an unpleasant surprise.