AMD Ryzen 9 might be coming to ultra light laptops
It looks like AMD may be preparing to add a new flagship APU to its recently launched Ryzen 4000 U-series lineup in a bid to better challenge Intel’s 10th-generation Comet Lake-U parts.
When AMD debuted the Ryzen 4000U lineup in January, the Ryzen 7 4800U was the highest-spec model, with no sign of a Ryzen 9 chip. However, it looks like that will soon change as leaker @TUM_APISAK has spotted the so-called Ryzen 9 4900U sitting pretty on UserBenchmark.
AMD Ryzen 9 4900U Graphics 🤔FP6, 1 CPU, 8 cores, 16 threadsBase clock 1.8 GHz, turbo 2.35 GHzAMD Ted3-RNhttps://t.co/Z7AYDtNip9 pic.twitter.com/Y9cvmSkF9NApril 5, 2020
The rumored flagship APU, which will be destined for thin and light laptops, will be based on AMD’s 7nm Zen 2 architecture. Specs-wise it looks to sport a similar setup to the Ryzen 7 4800U with 8 cores, 16-threads, 8MB of L3 cache and a 15W TDP.
Oddly, UserBenchmark lists the Ryzen 9 4900U as having a 1.8 GHz base clock frequency and a 2.35GHz average boost clock, though it’s likely this information is inaccurate. As noted by Tom’s Hardware, given the Ryzen 7 4800U has a 4.2GHz boost clock, it’s likely the Ryzen 9 4900U will come with a higher boost clock of 4.3GHz or more.
In terms of benchmark results, it’s a similar story, as the UserBenchmark listing suggests the Ryzen 9 APU is very much an engineering sample – it falls short of the Ryzen 7 4800 in every test, although its 1-core and 2-core scores of 136 points and 198 points, respectively, show some promise.
This non-final performance is confirmed by UserBenchmark, which notes: “Relative power n.a. – insufficient samples” next to the Ryzen 9 4900U’s results.
It’s unclear when AMD’s Ryzen 9 4900U will make its official debut, though Lenovo has prematurely confirmed that the APU will power its next-generation Yoga Slim laptops, which are expected to launch later this month.