Zen 5 Processors: AMD Brings Next-Gen Performance to Laptops and Desktop Computers

There used to be a time where we would get new Ryzen chips every year, but AMD has slowed down a bit. The company switched to a biannual release schedule, and as a result, we’ve only really seen minor revisions to what AMD released as the Ryzen 7000 series back in 2022. Now, though, we have proper successors. Zen 5 is here, and with it, AMD has introduced both the Ryzen 9000 and the Ryzen AI 300 ranges.

AMD has just launched the new Zen 5 CPU architecture , as well as the first Zen 5-powered desktop and laptop processors to go with it. The new Zen 5 architecture, compared to Zen 4, boasts improved branch prediction and double the instruction, data, and AI performance, according to AMD. The company’s own benchmarks shown during its Computex keynote show impressive gains against Intel’s Core i9-14900K, particularly in productivity tasks like Blender and Cinebench. Gaming performance also sees a notable increase, with improvements ranging from 4% to 23% in various titles. Then again, we should always take these kinds of numbers with a grain of salt, but given we’ve waited almost two years, the Zen 5 architecture is almost certain to be a massive leap anyway.

There are two lineups using the new architecture. First off, the AMD Ryzen 9000 series of chips. This new range of chips includes the 16-core 9950X, the 12-core 9900X, the 8-core 9700X, and the 6-core 9600X. These processors will be compatible with existing AM5 motherboards, as it’s usually the case with AMD, but if you do need a new motherboard, X870 and X870E motherboard chipsets will also be released, offering USB 4.0 support, PCIe 5 Gen 5 compatibility, and enhanced EXPO memory overclocking.

In the laptop department, there’s the new AMD Ryzen AI 300 series. We’re not sure why AMD is opting to skew off from Ryzen 9000 completely here branding-wise as this can be confusing to new buyers, but AI 300 series chips are also Zen 5 based, with the chips featuring RDNA 3.5 graphics and an XDNA 2-based dedicated AI engine. There’s the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 (that’s a mouthful) with 12 cores and 24 threads, and the Ryzen AI 9 365 with 10 cores and 20 threads. More chips will probably join the fray as the months go by. The chips will be used for AMD-powered Copilot+ PCs .

We don’t have pricing or availability info for the chips, but we should know soon—Ryzen 9000 chips are due to hit store shelves in July, while laptops with Ryzen AI 300 chips should arrive over the course of the coming months.

Source: AMD , The Verge

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