AMD Brings Its AI Engines To The Desktop With Ryzen 8000G APUs, RX 7600 XT Graphics Cards

CES AMD unveiled its first desktop processors with integrated neural processing units alongside refreshed 5000-series CPUs and a new entry-level graphics card at CES on Monday.

The 8000G-series processors are based on AMD's Zen 4 core architecture but, like past G-variants, feature integrated GPUs and are built around a monolithic die. To be clear, 7000-series Ryzen processors already support video output, however this was largely a diagnostic convenience and not the kind of thing you'd want to play games on.

The GPUs found in the 8000G-series processors include AMD's higher-end Radeon 740M, 760M, and 780M graphics usually found in notebook chips. AMD claims that 60-plus FPS gaming in a variety of AAA titles is well within the scope of these APUs — as long as you're willing to turn down the details a bit — and you turn on its FSR upscaling and frame-generation tech.

"The 8000G-series isn't intended to replace an enthusiast graphics card," Donny Woligroski, senior technical marketing manager for AMD's consumer processors, said in a press briefing. "Demanding games on the 8000G are going to require low settings, but the benefit of this is modern game engines can look really good at low settings."

However, AMD's Radeon 700M-series graphics aren't the APUs' only party-trick. The chips are also AMD's first desktop processors to ship with its XDNA-based AI engines. This NPU is designed to offload and accelerate machine-learning tasks, like background blurring and eye-gaze correction in video calls or photo and video upscaling, from the CPU and/or GPU.

The underlying tech actually dates back to the XDNA architecture developed by AMD's Xilinx FPGA business unit. These AI engines made their first appearance in consumer hardware last year in AMD's Ryzen 7040 and later in 8040-series mobile processors.

Between the CPU, NPU, and integrated GPU, the House of Zen claims its top-specced chips are able to churn out 39 TOPS of inferencing performance for on-device AI/ML functionality.

Here's a full breakdown of the Ryzen 8000G-series SKUs:

• Ryzen 7 8700G: 8 cores / 16 threads with a base clock of 4.2GHz, a boost clock of 5.1GHz, a TDP of 65W, Radeon 780M graphics, and 24MB of total cache. $329
• Ryzen 5 8600G: 6 cores / 12 threads with a base clock of 4.3GHz, a boost clock of 5.0GHz, a TDP of 65W, Radeon 760M graphics, and 22MB of total cache. $229
• Ryzen 5 8500G: 6 cores / 12 threads (2x Zen 4, 4x Zen 4c) with a base clock of 3.5GHz, a boost clock of 5.0GHz, a TDP of 65W, Radeon 740M graphics, and 22MB of total cache. $179
• Ryzen 3 8300G: 4 cores / 8 threads (1x Zen 4, 3x Zen 4c) with a base clock of 3.4GHz, a boost clock of 4.9GHz, a TDP of 65W, Radeon 740M graphics, and 12MB of total cache. OEM

AMD's Ryzen 8000G-series processors are available starting Jan. 31.

AMD Gives the Radeon RX 7600 an XT memory bump

Alongside the new APUs, AMD also gave its entry-level graphics card lineup a memory bump.

The newly announced RX 7600 XT now features 16GB of GDDR6 memory. Beyond this, the card is nearly identical to the RX 7600 non-XT we looked at back in May.

The only material difference is the base and boost frequencies have been bumped up by 220MHz and 100MHz, respectively, and the newer chip is rated for 190 watts compared to 165 watts on the non-XT variant.

According to AMD's performance claims, these higher clocks and larger frame buffer should net you a few extra frames in a wide variety of games, but we can't help but wonder whether the same gains could be achieved with a little bit of overclocking.

• AMD talks up car chips it hopes will join you for a ride some time soon
• Intel and VCs form Articul8 to push chip giant's AI kit and IP
• 2024 sure looks like an exciting year for datacenter silicon
• Why Nvidia and AMD are roasting each other over AI performance claims

The larger memory capacity will come in handy is for running generative AI workloads like Meta's Llama 2 and Stable Diffusion at higher precisions or using larger parameter versions of the models. As a general rule, without quantization, you'll need a gigabyte of video memory for every billion model parameters when using 8-bit floating point data types. So, the shift to 16GB of vRAM will allow customers to run larger models on their desktops without having to shell out for higher end graphics.

The RX 7600 XT will hit store shelves for $329 on Jan. 24 from OEMs like Acer, Asrock, Asus, Gigabyte, PowerColor, Sapphire, and XFX.

AMD keeps Ryzen 5000-series on life support

More than a year after launching its Ryzen 7000 series processors on the AM5 platform, AMD still isn't ready to abandon loyal customers stuck on older AM4 motherboards.

On top of the new APUs and GPUs, the chipmaker also announced four additions to its Ryzen 5000 family of CPUs and APUs.

The chips include a new cache-stacked processor aimed at cost-conscious gamers. Initially launched in April 2022, AMD's eight-core Ryzen 7 5800X3D, boosted its L3 cache to 64MB by stacking a 64MB SRAM tile on top of the CPU die.

The Ryzen 7 5700X3D announced at CES Monday features the same cache configuration, but with a lower base and boost clock to match its lower retail price of $249.

It's a similar story with the $175 Ryzen 7 5700. But, rather than lower clock speeds, the eight core-processor features a substantially smaller cache at 20MB compared to the 36MB of total cache found on the standard X-variant.

Finally, AMD is launching a pair of six-core APUs with the 5500GT and 5600GT priced at $125 and $140, respectively. Both come equipped with AMD's Radeon graphics processors onboard. Unfortunately, based on the marginal performance gains over the 5600G, we strongly suspect these chips are using AMD's aging Vega GPU architecture.

Here's a full rundown of the new 5000-series SKUs:

• Ryzen 7 5700X3D: 8 cores / 16 threads with a base clock of 3GHz, a boost clock of 4.1GHz, a 105W TDP, and 100MB of total cache. $249
• Ryzen 7 5700: 8 cores / 16 threads with a base clock of 3.7GHz, a boost clock of 4.6GHz, a 65W TDP, and 20MB of total cache. $175
• Ryzen 5 5600GT: 6 cores / 12 threads with a base clock of 3.6GHz, a boost clock of 4.6GHz, a TDP of 65W, Radeon Graphics, and 19MB of total cache. $140
• Ryzen 5 5500GT: 6 cores / 12 threads with a base clock of 3.6GHz, a boost clock of 4.4GHz, a TDP of 65W, Radeon Graphics, and 19MB of total cache. $125

If you happen to have a B450/550 or X470/570 motherboard and are looking to breathe some new life into it, all four chips are available January 31. ®