AMD's looming Ryzen APUs show big 30% boost over prior-gen models — Ryzen 8000G benchmarks easily beat Ryzen 5000G
The transition from Zen 3 to Zen 4 brings 30% performance uplifts.
Three of AMD's upcoming Ryzen 8000G APUs, which will vie for a spot on the list of best CPUs, have already been tested in Passmark, and the results show that these new chips are 30% faster than their 5000G predecessors. Arriving on January 31, Ryzen 8000G APUs will be the first new high-end models for the desktop AMD has delivered since 2021's Ryzen 5000G series.
The APUs in question were the Ryzen 7 8700G, the Ryzen 5 8600G, and the Ryzen 5 8500G, the only models to come to retail as the Ryzen 3 8300G will be an OEM exclusive. This indicates that upcoming reviews for the APUs will include all three models. However, with their fast integrated graphics, the headliners will almost certainly be the higher-end Ryzen 7 8700G and Ryzen 5 8600G.
Compared to their predecessors, the Ryzen 7 8700G and Ryzen 5 8600G are both 30% faster, in line with the expected upgrade of Zen 3 to Zen 4. All three Ryzen 8000G APUs can hit up to 5 GHz, substantially higher than even the Ryzen 7 5700G's 4.6 GHz boost clock speed, and the Zen 4 architecture inside the Ryzen 8000G series also delivers a little extra performance.
| Header Cell - Column 0 | Passmark Score | Cores/Threads | Base Frequency (Zen 4c) | Boost Frequency (Zen 4c) | MSRP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ryzen 7 8700G | 32,117 | 8/16 | 4.2 GHz | 5.1 GHz | $329 |
| Ryzen 7 5700G | 24,638 | 8/12 | 3.8 GHz | 4.6 GHz | $359 |
| Ryzen 5 8600G | 25,957 | 6/12 | 4.3 GHz | 5.0 GHz | $229 |
| Ryzen 5 5600G | 19,900 | 6/12 | 3.9 GHz | 4.4 GHz | $259 |
| Ryzen 5 8500G | 21,796 | 6/12 | 4.1 GHz (3.2 GHz) | 5.0 GHz (3.7 GHz) | $179 |
The benchmarks also clearly indicate how the Phoenix 2-based Ryzen 5 8500G, with its two Zen 4 and four Zen 4c cores, compares to the Ryzen 5 8600G, which uses the regular Phoenix chip and has six regular Zen 4 cores. Despite parity in core count and boost clock speed, the Ryzen 5 8600G is 19% faster, likely down to the Ryzen 5 8500G's slower Zen 4c cores. With only a boost frequency of 3.7 GHz on these more petite Zen 4c cores, the Ryzen 5 8500G undoubtedly has a much lower average frequency than the 8600G while running a multi-threaded benchmark such as Passmark.
It's still unclear if the Ryzen 8000G series will be a worthy successor to the Ryzen 5000G series, as the performance of its integrated GPUs is arguably more important than CPU performance. The Ryzen 5 8500G isn't expected to be particularly good with its low-end Radeon 740M graphics. Still, the Radeon 760M and Radeon 780M in the Ryzen 5 8600G and Ryzen 7 8700G, respectively, are expected to deliver at least the same amount of performance we've seen in gaming handhelds utilizing the very same iGPUs. With overclocking, the Ryzen 5 8600G and Ryzen 7 8700G may be able to push the performance of its integrated graphics even further.
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Matthew Connatser is a freelancing writer for Tom's Hardware US. He writes articles about CPUs, GPUs, SSDs, and computers in general.
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Sleepy_Hollowed Even if the graphics uplift is not as much, that's pretty big all things considered.Reply
That type of uplift is unheard of for a while. -
Notton For comparison, a 7840HS does about 29k, and 7940HS does about 30.5k in passmark.Reply
So, yay? 8700G is faster than its mobile counterpart. -
domih An important feature (for non-gamer) is that both the 5700G and 8700G provide more than 8 lanes of PCIe (which was a limitation on the previous AMD APUs).Reply
AMD 5700G: Gen 3, 16 Lanes (CPU only)
AMD 8700G: Gen 4, 20 Lanes (CPU only)
Ref:
https://www.techpowerup.com/cpu-specs/ryzen-7-5700g.c2472https://www.techpowerup.com/cpu-specs/ryzen-7-8700g.c3434
Because both include an iGPU, these PCIe lanes can be used for anything other than a GPU, if for example, your goal is server usage.
I have an AMD 5700G with an AM4 motherboard offering 16x, 8x8x, 8x4x4x PCIe bifurcation. An inexpensive bifurcation PCIe card for 8x8x (with the UEFI configured accordingly) allows the integration of (for instance) a high-speed NIC and a hardware-base RAID card. This is appropriate for a "cheap" file server or Proxmox server over 10 GbE, 25 GbE or even 45 GbE with IPoIB using a 2nd hand Mellanox ConnectX3 card from eBay.
If I were to upgrade to an AMD 8700G (I'm not as of this writing), the first thing I would do is to look for an AM5 motherboard offering bifurcation of the PCIe lanes or offering two 16x slots that can be used as 8x 8x. -
usertests Reply
I think TechPowerUp got it wrong. 5700G technically supports 24 PCIe 3.0 lanes (4 reserved for chipset). Which is why you can use it with an x16 GPU and x4 SSD:domih said:An important feature (for non-gamer) is that both the 5700G and 8700G provide more than 8 lanes of PCIe (which was a limitation on the previous AMD APUs).
AMD 5700G: Gen 3, 16 Lanes (CPU only)
AMD 8700G: Gen 4, 20 Lanes (CPU only)
https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-ryzen-7-5700g-reviewRe-using the Renoir SoC design also means that AMD has stuck with the PCIe 3.0 interface found on all its current-gen APUs. As such, the chip has 20 lanes of PCIe 3.0 connectivity (16 for graphics, four for the chipset, and four for storage) compared to 24 lanes of PCIe 4.0 found on the Ryzen 5000 models for the desktop PC.
Note the confusing math in Tom's review, then see these:
https://www.anandtech.com/show/16824/amd-ryzen-7-5700g-and-ryzen-5-5600g-apu-reviewThe top part is a Ryzen 7 5700G, featuring eight cores and sixteen threads, with a base frequency of 3.8 GHz and a turbo frequency of 4.6 GHz. The Vega 8 graphics runs at 2000 MHz, and we get sixteen lanes of PCIe 3.0 for graphics, plus another four for storage and four for the chipset..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_AMD_Ryzen_processors#Cezanne_(5000_series_with_Radeon_Graphics,_Zen_3_based)Common features of Ryzen 5000 desktop APUs:
...
All the CPUs support 24 PCIe 3.0 lanes. 4 of the lanes are reserved as link to the chipset.
I *believe* the 8700G/8600G have 24 PCIe 4.0 lanes (4 reserved), with the 8500G/8300G subtracting 10 lanes (leaving 8x for graphics, 2x for SSD, 4x for chipset). Not sure. AMD's own website lists 20 total / 16 usable for the 8700G, and 14 total / 10 usable for the 8500G. Yet another spec sheet mistake? -
suryasans Reply
This reminds me with AMD Ryzen APUs based on Raven Ridge and Picasso dies that only provided 12 lanes user accessible PCIe 3.0-slot. If 16 lanes user accessible PCIe 4.0-slot is true, it means only 8 lanes-PCIe slot is avaliable for discrete graphics card since another 8 lanes will be used for nvme storagesusertests said:I think TechPowerUp got it wrong. 5700G technically supports 24 PCIe 3.0 lanes (4 reserved for chipset). Which is why you can use it with an x16 GPU and x4 SSD:
https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-ryzen-7-5700g-review
Note the confusing math in Tom's review, then see these:
https://www.anandtech.com/show/16824/amd-ryzen-7-5700g-and-ryzen-5-5600g-apu-review
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_AMD_Ryzen_processors#Cezanne_(5000_series_with_Radeon_Graphics,_Zen_3_based)
I *believe* the 8700G/8600G have 24 PCIe 4.0 lanes (4 reserved), with the 8500G/8300G subtracting 10 lanes (leaving 8x for graphics, 2x for SSD, 4x for chipset). Not sure. AMD's own website lists 20 total / 16 usable for the 8700G, and 14 total / 10 usable for the 8500G. Yet another spec sheet mistake.