AMD's 16-Core Ryzen 7000 CPU Hits 5.5 GHz On Several Threads In Gaming Demo

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Prominent future for Zen 4

Zen 4 CPU
Zen 4 CPU (Image credit: AMD)

In a recent live stream by PCWorld, AMD's Direct of Technical Marketing Robert Hallock discussed full details about the Ryzen 7000 (Raphael) chip that the chipmaker used in a recent Computex 2022 gaming demo. According to Hallock, the 16-core Zen 4 processor, which should be the Ryzen 9 7950X, operated at the peak boost clock speed of 5.5 GHz on several threads without any overclocking or sub-ambient coolers. The chip was running completely stock and boosting up to 5.5 GHz naturally.

To quickly recap, AMD ran a gaming demo of a prototype 16-core Ryzen 7000 CPU at the end of its Computex 2022 presentation. The chip ran Ghostwire: Toyko smoothly, a recently released title, and easily boosted to 5.5 GHz. However, at the time, AMD did not disclose any details about the test system until now.

But thankfully, we now know that 5.5 GHz will be a more realistic clock speed target for Ryzen 7000 processors. Furthermore, Hallock confirms that AMD didn't use any fancy shenanigans with the Zen 4 demo. Instead, the test bench consisted of a reference AMD AM5 motherboard and a consumer-based Asetek 280mm all-in-one liquid cooler.

Hallock reported the Ryzen 7000 prototype dated back to April and the 16-core chip 5.5 GHz with its "out-of-the-box" configuration with no overclocking involved. The processor specifically fluctuated between 5.2 GHz to 5.5 GHz in Ghostwire: Tokyo. It is excellent news for Ryzen 7000; AMD is very confident in Zen 4's capability to operate well above 5 GHz without additional overclocking intervention. The actual boost clock speed will depend on the game and application, though.

The AM5 socket is compatible with AM4 coolers. Therefore, AMD owners don't have to invest in a new cooling solution. However, with AM5, AMD has increased the socket power (PPT) to 170W, where it was previously 142W on AM4. Therefore, Zen 4 chips should max out at 125W, which would only represent a 20W increase over AMD's existing Zen 3 105W SKUs, such as the Ryzen 9 5950X or Ryzen 7 5800X.

While AMD recently lifted the curtains on Zen 4, the next-generation processors won't debut until this Fall.

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Aaron Klotz
Aaron Klotz
Contributing Writer

Aaron Klotz is a contributing writer for Tom’s Hardware, covering news related to computer hardware such as CPUs, and graphics cards.

18 Comments Comment from the forums
  • hotaru251
    According to Hallock, the 16-core Zen 4 processor, which should be the Ryzen 9 7950X, operated at the peak boost clock speed of 5.5 GHz on several threads without any overclocking or sub-ambient coolers. The chip was running completely stock and boosting up to 5.5 GHz naturally.

    actually extremely impressive given they claim a 280mm aio with as low power consumption as they claim (sub 200).

    so far (cept requiring ddr5) zen4 seems to not have downsides compared to Intel (which is bad as we dont want 1 side be entirely best as drives prices up)
    Reply
  • spongiemaster
    hotaru251 said:
    so far (cept requiring ddr5) zen4 seems to not have downsides compared to Intel (which is bad as we dont want 1 side be entirely best as drives prices up)
    Interesting take considering Intel hasn't announced anything official yet about Raptor Lake. If you know something the rest of us don't, please share. It's possible RL may launch before Zen4, so this isn't a case of sit around and wait 6 months after AMD for Intel's response.
    Reply
  • Alvar "Miles" Udell
    While all this sounds well and good, if AMD is right about Zen 4 being 15% faster than Zen 3 -per thread-, not per clock, and it can boost 10% higher than Zen 3, then actual IPC gains could be very small, nothing like the gains AMD made between each Zen generation, and much more akin to the refresh of Zen to Zen+. In this case it would be, to me, very disappointing, and combined with the high prices of DDR5 and the requirement of a new motherboard investment, could result in a recommendation from most, if not all, of the reputable review sites of waiting until next year if not skipping it completely.
    Reply
  • escksu
    Alvar Miles Udell said:
    While all this sounds well and good, if AMD is right about Zen 4 being 15% faster than Zen 3 -per thread-, not per clock, and it can boost 10% higher than Zen 3, then actual IPC gains could be very small, nothing like the gains AMD made between each Zen generation, and much more akin to the refresh of Zen to Zen+. In this case it would be, to me, very disappointing, and combined with the high prices of DDR5 and the requirement of a new motherboard investment, could result in a recommendation from most, if not all, of the reputable review sites of waiting until next year if not skipping it completely.

    Yes, the IPC gain will be very small this time. However, IPC isn't the only thing that will boost performance. The main problem with Ryzen for a long time is clockspeed. Zen3 made improvements but 5GHz is still impossible. Even 4.7-4.8GHz on all cores is difficulty on 5950x (requires alot of voltage as well).

    So, this time round, AMD improve the chip and together with better proces nodes allows the clocks to go much higher without the power. This itself is a huge boost and a winner.
    Reply
  • TerryLaze
    Giant salt shaker,
    all cores doesn't mean all cores at the same time, we could be talking about a 10% increase in single thread turbo clock compared to the 5Ghz max turbo of zen 3 which would be pretty much in line with what we know, also the 12900k is not overclocked either because intel changed the meaning of overclocked and AMD might have done the same here.

    Wait for final benchmarks, as always.
    Reply
  • hotaru251
    spongiemaster said:
    Interesting take considering Intel hasn't announced anything official yet about Raptor Lake.
    we've seen intel's 12th gen as their approach...pump more PWR and to heck with thermals.
    no reason to assume they changed that given how much they invested into their new cpu design (big & little cores)

    TerryLaze said:
    also the 12900k is not overclocked either because intel changed the meaning of overclocked and AMD might have done the same here.
    amd already said the test system was stock settings.
    no thermals shown, but 5.5 on a Asetek 280 aio (you know the ones that havent improved in yrs and are some of worst) is still good as u aint doing that with a 12900k hitting 5.5
    Reply
  • KyaraM
    hotaru251 said:
    we've seen intel's 12th gen as their approach...pump more PWR and to heck with thermals.
    no reason to assume they changed that given how much they invested into their new cpu design (big & little cores)


    amd already said the test system was stock settings.
    no thermals shown, but 5.5 on a Asetek 280 aio (you know the ones that havent improved in yrs and are some of worst) is still good as u aint doing that with a 12900k hitting 5.5
    With the difference being that the 12900K is overclocked in that szenario and running outside specs...
    Reply
  • TerryLaze
    hotaru251 said:
    amd already said the test system was stock settings.
    Yes, the 12900k systems are also all "stock settings"
    hotaru251 said:
    is still good as u aint doing that with a 12900k hitting 5.5
    Yeah, intel limits clocks to 5ghz because reviewers will run avx512 on zen4 and then ask themselves why they don't get 5.5Ghz , while the intel CPU will get the advertised clocks even on avx as long as you deal with heat and power.

    On a game it's very possible if you unlock the 5.2 max setting (use MCE) ,I don't know this tokyo game but it could be the lightest threads ever in the history of gaming threads so you could get high clocks with little effort.
    Intel wouldn't be able to reach that on avx or something heavy but on a light game it wouldn't be an issue but typically yes, it would be overclock.
    Reply
  • thisisaname
    Wake me up when we get some real 3rd party data about proformance, until then we do not know if AMD is sandbagging or the improvement is as disappointing as it seems.
    Reply
  • spongiemaster
    hotaru251 said:
    we've seen intel's 12th gen as their approach...pump more PWR and to heck with thermals.
    no reason to assume they changed that given how much they invested into their new cpu design (big & little cores)
    One of the new features of Raptor Lake is a digital line voltage regulator which supposedly will reduce power usage.

    Intel Raptor Lake's Digital Linear Voltage Regulator (DLVR) could reduce CPU power up to 25% - VideoCardz.com

    This is a legitimate reason to believe they did change things for the better with Raptor Lake. While Intel has announced this feature, they have not officially unveiled Raptor Lake and made any performance/efficiency claims to this point. So again, you stating AMD is better in every way compared to Intel's contender is based on nothing.
    Reply