An AMDpocalypse for Intel - AMD Zen 3 and Ryzen 5000 CPUs Explained!

**AMD’s Zen 3 Architecture and Ryzen 5000 Series: A Deep Dive**

The past month has been an exciting time for PC enthusiasts, marked by NVIDIA's announcement of the RTX 3000 series GPUs and AMD's recent unveiling of their Zen 3 architecture. While this isn’t a formal review, it offers an exclusive look into the new Ryzen 5000 series processors, providing insights into their specifications, pricing, release dates, architectural details, performance benchmarks, and motherboard compatibility.

**AMD’s Position in the Market**

Currently, AMD is leading in nearly every category, with Zen being a significant step forward, followed by Zen+, which further enhanced performance. Zen 2 set the bar high, and Zen 3 promises to build on that success. The last Ryzen CPU release was the XT series in July, which didn’t bring major innovations but laid the groundwork for this new generation. Each new Ryzen iteration addresses the shortcomings of its predecessor, and Zen 3 is no exception.

**Zen 3 Architecture: Enhancements and Innovations**

Zen 3 retains the same 7nm manufacturing node but underwent a substantial redesign in terms of layout and features. A key innovation is the revised core complex (CCX) design, which clusters eight cores together with direct access to a shared 32MB L3 cache. This setup is expected to improve gaming performance, single-core workloads, and reduce memory latency. Additional improvements include enhanced load/store efficiency, improved floating-point and integer operations, leading to an impressive 19% increase in instructions per clock (IPC) compared to the Ryzen 3000 series.

**Ryzen 5000 Series Lineup and Pricing**

AMD has consolidated all Zen 3 processors under the Ryzen 5000 series name, simplifying their product lineup. The series includes:

1. **Ryzen 9 5950X**: A 16-core, 32-thread processor with a 200MHz higher boost clock than its predecessor, the Ryzen 3950X. Priced at $800, it features a TDP of 105W.

2. **Ryzen 9 5900X**: A 12-core, 24-thread CPU with a 100MHz higher boost clock than the Ryzen 3900XT but a lower base frequency, priced at $550.

3. **Ryzen 7 5800X**: Replacing the Ryzen 3800XT, it offers the same boost frequency but with lower base speeds and a $50 price increase to $450.

4. **Ryzen 5 5600X**: Positioned as an excellent value for gaming, it features a 65W TDP and comes bundled with a Rave Stealth cooler. Priced at $290, it offers significant performance improvements over its predecessor.

**Performance Claims**

AMD claims that the Ryzen 5900X outperforms the Ryzen 3900X by an average of 26% in 1080p gaming. While differences may diminish at higher resolutions like 1440p, Zen 3’s single-thread performance has significantly improved, challenging Intel’s top-tier CPUs like the Core i9-10900K.

**Motherboard Compatibility and Upgrades**

Zen 3 processors are compatible with existing X570 and B550 motherboards via microcode updates. However, support for older boards like B450 and X470 will be limited to a few select models through beta BIOS updates. It’s important to verify compatibility before upgrading.

**The End of the AM4 Era**

AMD has confirmed that the Ryzen 5000 series is the last generation for the AM4 socket, with future Zen 4 processors moving to a new architecture and chipset. This marks a significant shift, as previous generations ensured backward compatibility with newer CPUs.

**Conclusion: AMD’s Competitive Edge**

With Zen 3, AMD has addressed performance gaps in IPC efficiency, core counts, and gaming, positioning itself as a formidable competitor to Intel. The release of the Ryzen 5000 series on November 5th marks a new chapter for AMD, promising exciting developments in PC hardware. Stay tuned for our detailed reviews to validate these claims and explore the potential of Zen 3 in real-world applications.

Thank you for joining us on this journey into AMD’s latest innovations. We’re excited to hear your thoughts on the Ryzen 5000 series and Zen 3 architecture. Until next time, keep an eye out for more updates from Hardware Canucks!

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enso this last month has been really exciting for the pc master race because we started off with nvidia announcing the rtx 3000 series gpus and then today we have amd uh coming up with some zen 3 announcements now this isn't necessarily a review date per se it's just more of an exclusive look or a peek at the new 5000 series processors so basically i'm going to be talking about a bunch of new things about zen 3 and the ryzen 5000 series like the specs of the new processors their prices release dates a few new details about the architecture some performance results and motherboard compatibility so let's start things off with where amd finds themselves right now and that's leading in pretty much every category while zen was a great step forward and zen plus even more so zen 2 meanwhile really kicked things up a notch and now we're with zen 3 and it looks really promising it hasn't been all that long ago since the last ryzen cpu release which was done back in july with the xd series and those cpus didn't really bring a lot to the table but it sort of set the groundwork for this launch every new generation of ryzen cpus has been a constant evolution that addressed weaknesses of previous generation and that's exactly what zen3 is too basically amd saw what needed to be improved like gaming performance single thread performance and some other key areas and they attacked those head-on but they also didn't want to complicate their lives by completely shifting the zen architecture to a brand new layout and manufacturing process so zen3 stays on an updated seven nanometer node but the underlying design got a pretty big facelift a cornerstone of this new design is a revised layout that clusters eight cores in a single ccx module which has direct access to 32 megabytes of l3 cache supposedly that gives huge benefits in gaming single core workloads and less memory latency there's also a bunch of other updates to the overall architecture like better load store performance enhanced floating point and integer engines and more we'll cover all of those in the review but it's all supposed to result in an instructions per clock increase of about 19 over the ryzen 3000 series that is just super impressive for single generation back in the xt series video i mentioned that this launch might actually be a part of a much larger plan even though their real world performance benefits were pretty limited well those cpus allowed amd to test the seven nanometer manufacturing processes ability to run at higher frequencies we're seeing the results right now with zen 3. one of the biggest moves for this generation is amd finally consolidating all of their zen3 cpus under the same 5000 series name that's good news since things were starting to get confusing with zen 2 based cpus using the 4000 h and u series for mobile 3000 series for desktop and also 4000 g name for oem desktop apus let's just hope they stick to that and finally teach intel how to name products another thing i want to mention before i get into specs is the release date for the 5000 series cpus right now amd is set to have them launched with them available on november the 5th and from what we've been hearing they've already started production so i hope the stock situation is going to be okay but then again this is 2020 so anything could happen now the result of zen3 is a lineup of new cpus that look a lot like the current ryzen 3000 series when it comes to core counts clock speeds and tdps but those changes to the underlying architecture make those similarities pointless as a comparison at the very top is the 16 core 32 thread ryzen 9 5950x which has a 200 megahertz higher boost clock than the 3950x a price of 800 us dollars which is 50 more expensive and sticks to 105 watts that's followed by the 12 core 24 thread 5900x and this is where things get really interesting on some fronts while its boost clock is 100 megahertz higher than the 3900 xt the base frequency gets a hundred megahertz cut that 100 megahertz reduction versus the 3000 xd series is something you'll see with every 5000 series cpus and it was likely done to keep tdps as low as possible oh and the price goes up by a cool 50 here as well basically this is something you'll see with other cpus here too they cost more than the 3000 series launch tan and that's understandable provided there's an equal amount of performance uplifts also remember the maximum single core boost speeds you're seeing for these cpus are based on absolutely perfect conditions the chances you'll see them on a regular basis is slim but they still represent a pretty significant improvement versus the previous gen moving down and the ryzen 7 5800x is being launched to replace the 3800xt with exactly the same boost frequency lower base speeds and a price pump of 50 what we don't see yet is a clear 3700x replacement but i'm pretty sure amd has a few more cpus they'll roll out soon after launch so that might be one of them the ryzen 5 5600x meanwhile seems like it'll be a great bang for the bug gaming cpu not only that but its tdp is now down to 65 watts which makes it a really interesting choice for ultra small form factor builds especially with all those juicy architectural improvements and he's talking about i should also mention the 5600x is the only cpu in this new lineup that'll get an included heatsink according to amd it'll ship with a rave stealth cooler the only catch here is the price which also gets a 50 increase versus the 3600 xt on higher end processors that didn't really hurt too badly but this is a 20 premium for a product that was super affordable beforehand it also increases the cost of entry into the 5000 series because what you don't see right now are direct replacements for the non-x series and ryzen 3. amd could be waiting for a later date to launch those but they could be satisfied with what they have right now but the real news here is actually the performance because amd's claims are pretty earth-shattering or should i call it intel shattering with their focus on ipc and quicker access to onboard memory resources they made claims that the 5900x can beat the 3900x by an average of 26 in games now look that's a 1080p and we've already seen with our rtx 3080 ryzen scaling video that at 1440p the differences between cpus become close to zero even the 5950x can pretty much dominate its predecessor in gaming single thread performance was always an area where amd was a bit lacking but that's been demolished with zen 3 2 and it accounts for a lot of the reason why we're seeing such good gaming performance this all basically brings them even with or even beating intel's 10 900k in games and since that was the best gaming cpu around well that's a pretty big deal for amd they now have core counts and gaming on their side there wasn't really much shown about performance in other applications since gaming seems to be what amd wanted to focus on but they did show this for the 5950x and it does look like all of those architectural improvements also make a positive impact on multi-core heavy workloads now usually we see new cpu architectures released hand in hand with brand new motherboards but that isn't going to happen this time both x570 and b550 will be sticking around and will have full support for zen 3 via a microcode update as a matter of fact some have already added a beta version of the bios's on their product pages with a plan to have full mass production support in time for launch as usual motherboard manufacturers will start offering some refresh boards with minor changes just to take advantage of these zen 3 interest now you might remember this chart too since it showed x470 and b450 boards don't support zen 3 but amd quickly backpedaled on that now they're going to have unofficial support via beta biosis so you'll just need to update your bios before switching out cpus i also want to mention that we did talk to a few motherboard companies and uh they've been telling us that there's no official support for zen 3 on their existing b450 and x470 boards they're going to be a few select boards that will get an update from now until the end of december but you just have to pay close attention to the cpu support page before assuming that your old system will have support for zen 3. also remember that according to amd this is the last cpu on the am4 socket in the past ryzen buyers could be confident that their motherboards would be compatible with upcoming processors but this one is sort of a dead end since zenfore will be brand new from the ground up that's probably why there aren't any new chipsets launching and it's a good decision especially since b550 and x570 are already more feature packed than anything intel has right now so i guess that pretty much covers everything for now and i have to admit amd's progress looks super impressive they've been able to deliver three zen architectures in three years and have managed to beat intel in almost everything zen 3 is marching onwards while the core series is still left spinning on its wheels basically amd could now have big wins in ipc efficiency threat counts and gaming and that's a very big problem for intel especially since rocket lake s is only due for launch next year sometime in late q1 it also looks like they're confident enough to charge a bit more for their cpus as well that's good from a business perspective but only good for buyers if the price increases align with performance boosts but one thing's for sure it'll be really interesting to test these new cpus in real world use case scenarios and test amd's claims i guess we'll just have to wait until the actual review date so definitely stay tuned for our coverage and let us know what you guys think about amd's new zen 3 announcements specifically with the 5000 series cpus are you guys excited i'm curious to know i'm eber with hardware canucks thank you so much for watching and i'll talk to you guys in the next oneso this last month has been really exciting for the pc master race because we started off with nvidia announcing the rtx 3000 series gpus and then today we have amd uh coming up with some zen 3 announcements now this isn't necessarily a review date per se it's just more of an exclusive look or a peek at the new 5000 series processors so basically i'm going to be talking about a bunch of new things about zen 3 and the ryzen 5000 series like the specs of the new processors their prices release dates a few new details about the architecture some performance results and motherboard compatibility so let's start things off with where amd finds themselves right now and that's leading in pretty much every category while zen was a great step forward and zen plus even more so zen 2 meanwhile really kicked things up a notch and now we're with zen 3 and it looks really promising it hasn't been all that long ago since the last ryzen cpu release which was done back in july with the xd series and those cpus didn't really bring a lot to the table but it sort of set the groundwork for this launch every new generation of ryzen cpus has been a constant evolution that addressed weaknesses of previous generation and that's exactly what zen3 is too basically amd saw what needed to be improved like gaming performance single thread performance and some other key areas and they attacked those head-on but they also didn't want to complicate their lives by completely shifting the zen architecture to a brand new layout and manufacturing process so zen3 stays on an updated seven nanometer node but the underlying design got a pretty big facelift a cornerstone of this new design is a revised layout that clusters eight cores in a single ccx module which has direct access to 32 megabytes of l3 cache supposedly that gives huge benefits in gaming single core workloads and less memory latency there's also a bunch of other updates to the overall architecture like better load store performance enhanced floating point and integer engines and more we'll cover all of those in the review but it's all supposed to result in an instructions per clock increase of about 19 over the ryzen 3000 series that is just super impressive for single generation back in the xt series video i mentioned that this launch might actually be a part of a much larger plan even though their real world performance benefits were pretty limited well those cpus allowed amd to test the seven nanometer manufacturing processes ability to run at higher frequencies we're seeing the results right now with zen 3. one of the biggest moves for this generation is amd finally consolidating all of their zen3 cpus under the same 5000 series name that's good news since things were starting to get confusing with zen 2 based cpus using the 4000 h and u series for mobile 3000 series for desktop and also 4000 g name for oem desktop apus let's just hope they stick to that and finally teach intel how to name products another thing i want to mention before i get into specs is the release date for the 5000 series cpus right now amd is set to have them launched with them available on november the 5th and from what we've been hearing they've already started production so i hope the stock situation is going to be okay but then again this is 2020 so anything could happen now the result of zen3 is a lineup of new cpus that look a lot like the current ryzen 3000 series when it comes to core counts clock speeds and tdps but those changes to the underlying architecture make those similarities pointless as a comparison at the very top is the 16 core 32 thread ryzen 9 5950x which has a 200 megahertz higher boost clock than the 3950x a price of 800 us dollars which is 50 more expensive and sticks to 105 watts that's followed by the 12 core 24 thread 5900x and this is where things get really interesting on some fronts while its boost clock is 100 megahertz higher than the 3900 xt the base frequency gets a hundred megahertz cut that 100 megahertz reduction versus the 3000 xd series is something you'll see with every 5000 series cpus and it was likely done to keep tdps as low as possible oh and the price goes up by a cool 50 here as well basically this is something you'll see with other cpus here too they cost more than the 3000 series launch tan and that's understandable provided there's an equal amount of performance uplifts also remember the maximum single core boost speeds you're seeing for these cpus are based on absolutely perfect conditions the chances you'll see them on a regular basis is slim but they still represent a pretty significant improvement versus the previous gen moving down and the ryzen 7 5800x is being launched to replace the 3800xt with exactly the same boost frequency lower base speeds and a price pump of 50 what we don't see yet is a clear 3700x replacement but i'm pretty sure amd has a few more cpus they'll roll out soon after launch so that might be one of them the ryzen 5 5600x meanwhile seems like it'll be a great bang for the bug gaming cpu not only that but its tdp is now down to 65 watts which makes it a really interesting choice for ultra small form factor builds especially with all those juicy architectural improvements and he's talking about i should also mention the 5600x is the only cpu in this new lineup that'll get an included heatsink according to amd it'll ship with a rave stealth cooler the only catch here is the price which also gets a 50 increase versus the 3600 xt on higher end processors that didn't really hurt too badly but this is a 20 premium for a product that was super affordable beforehand it also increases the cost of entry into the 5000 series because what you don't see right now are direct replacements for the non-x series and ryzen 3. amd could be waiting for a later date to launch those but they could be satisfied with what they have right now but the real news here is actually the performance because amd's claims are pretty earth-shattering or should i call it intel shattering with their focus on ipc and quicker access to onboard memory resources they made claims that the 5900x can beat the 3900x by an average of 26 in games now look that's a 1080p and we've already seen with our rtx 3080 ryzen scaling video that at 1440p the differences between cpus become close to zero even the 5950x can pretty much dominate its predecessor in gaming single thread performance was always an area where amd was a bit lacking but that's been demolished with zen 3 2 and it accounts for a lot of the reason why we're seeing such good gaming performance this all basically brings them even with or even beating intel's 10 900k in games and since that was the best gaming cpu around well that's a pretty big deal for amd they now have core counts and gaming on their side there wasn't really much shown about performance in other applications since gaming seems to be what amd wanted to focus on but they did show this for the 5950x and it does look like all of those architectural improvements also make a positive impact on multi-core heavy workloads now usually we see new cpu architectures released hand in hand with brand new motherboards but that isn't going to happen this time both x570 and b550 will be sticking around and will have full support for zen 3 via a microcode update as a matter of fact some have already added a beta version of the bios's on their product pages with a plan to have full mass production support in time for launch as usual motherboard manufacturers will start offering some refresh boards with minor changes just to take advantage of these zen 3 interest now you might remember this chart too since it showed x470 and b450 boards don't support zen 3 but amd quickly backpedaled on that now they're going to have unofficial support via beta biosis so you'll just need to update your bios before switching out cpus i also want to mention that we did talk to a few motherboard companies and uh they've been telling us that there's no official support for zen 3 on their existing b450 and x470 boards they're going to be a few select boards that will get an update from now until the end of december but you just have to pay close attention to the cpu support page before assuming that your old system will have support for zen 3. also remember that according to amd this is the last cpu on the am4 socket in the past ryzen buyers could be confident that their motherboards would be compatible with upcoming processors but this one is sort of a dead end since zenfore will be brand new from the ground up that's probably why there aren't any new chipsets launching and it's a good decision especially since b550 and x570 are already more feature packed than anything intel has right now so i guess that pretty much covers everything for now and i have to admit amd's progress looks super impressive they've been able to deliver three zen architectures in three years and have managed to beat intel in almost everything zen 3 is marching onwards while the core series is still left spinning on its wheels basically amd could now have big wins in ipc efficiency threat counts and gaming and that's a very big problem for intel especially since rocket lake s is only due for launch next year sometime in late q1 it also looks like they're confident enough to charge a bit more for their cpus as well that's good from a business perspective but only good for buyers if the price increases align with performance boosts but one thing's for sure it'll be really interesting to test these new cpus in real world use case scenarios and test amd's claims i guess we'll just have to wait until the actual review date so definitely stay tuned for our coverage and let us know what you guys think about amd's new zen 3 announcements specifically with the 5000 series cpus are you guys excited i'm curious to know i'm eber with hardware canucks thank you so much for watching and i'll talk to you guys in the next one\n"