AMD Ryzen 7000 for socket AM5 is now also available in the three 65-watt TDP variants Ryzen 9 7900, Ryzen 7 7700 and Ryzen 5 7600. Apart from the reduced power loss ex works and the resulting lower clock rates, the three CPUs correspond to the X Variants. The test clarifies how fast they are in applications and games.
Efficient Zen 4 CPUs out of the box
With the new 65-watt CPUs, AMD now supplies corresponding CPUs with 12, 8 and 6 cores. The PPT, i.e. the maximum consumption, as long as the temperature allows it, is 88 watts for all three models, they are designed for a permanent 65 watts of waste heat to be dissipated (65 watts TDP). That's a whopping 142 watts less with the Ryzen 9 7900 than with the Ryzen 9 7900X (which rarely uses 230 watts even under full load), with the other two models it's a 54 watt reduction.
Technical key data in comparison
The sometimes significant cut in the maximum power consumption goes hand in hand with lower clock rates. The clock drop is particularly evident in the base clock (700 to 1,000 MHz less), because that is the clock that the CPU should achieve "at its TDP" under full load. On the other hand, the deductions are smaller with the maximum turbo, but this is only present under load on a few cores or under partial load.
The question of whether the 65 watt CPUs can work more efficiently at their TDP level than the throttled X CPUs can be clearly answered in the negative based on the test results. With 65 watts TDP (88 watts PPT), Ryzen 9 7900, Ryzen 7 7700 and Ryzen 5 7600 each perform as well in the multi-core test course as their X sister models, which are slowed down to 88 watts PPT. With the Ryzen 7 and Ryzen 5, even the X model tends to be slightly ahead, but in this case there were also two different BIOS versions - due to time constraints, the editors did not measure the X CPUs again with BIOS F8h in the applications .
The single-core performance loss, which is not due to the TDP but to the product policy, is also minimal. At 3 (7900), 6 (7700) and 5 (7600) percent, it is slightly higher than the maximum clock rates in the specifications would suggest. The reason is that the X variants in the test course in October 2022 each achieved slightly higher than the specified clock rates, which the non-X models did not succeed in January 2023.
So the editors have decided to only compare the three X and their new non-X models in this article for the time being. More was not possible in view of the CES 2023 in the previous week and illness-related absences in the editorial department. The presented test results are absolutely comparable.
And they speak a clear language: In games on the same platform with the same BIOS version, the differences between 7900X, 7700X and 7600X on the one hand and 7900, 7700 and 7600 on the other hand are absolutely negligible: More than two to three percent difference There is no difference in the absolute CPU limit (720p, maximum details, some upsampling).
This is not at all a surprise for the two smaller models, because their X variants are also not slowed down by the TDP (or PPT) on the test system. The only exception is the Ryzen 7 7700X in Spider Man: Remastered with ray tracing. The maximum clock defined by the manufacturer makes the difference and this difference is small.
The Ryzen 9 7900X vs. Ryzen 9 7900 duel looks a little different: Here the X model exceeds the 88 watt limit in 6 out of 7 games, so the Ryzen 9 7900 is slowed down by the TDP cap. But the effect is minimal in this case, too, because the loss of power loss only results in a very small clock drop.
The Ryzen 9 7900X can clock 100 to 150 MHz higher in the course compared to the 65-watt model, with the Ryzen 7 7700X it is more like 150 MHz. The biggest difference is with the Ryzen 5 7600X, which clocks 300 MHz higher, but this is not reflected in the benchmarks in a robust way.
The comparison of the clock rates with the initial test of the Ryzen 7000X shows once again that the current BIOS of the Gigabyte X670E Aorus Master (F8h) runs slightly lower clock rates: The Ryzen 7 7700X with the current software achieves the 5,550 MHz measured across the board at the time no longer. However, the power consumption is also a bit lower, which averaged over 75 watts in October, while 6 of the 7 games are currently significantly lower.
Conclusion
The new Ryzen 7000 with 65 watts underline what was already obvious when testing the X variants in autumn 2022: In competition with Intel, AMD has operated the Zen 4 architecture in this generation in the X series well above the sweet spot , Zen 4 can do almost the same with much less consumption.
When it comes to power consumption, the Ryzen 9 7900, Ryzen 7 7700 and Ryzen 5 7600 are only slightly slower, even under full multi-core load. And in games, the performance difference is even lower because the TDP cut itself hardly resulted in lower clock rates and AMD hardly cut the maximum turbo clock rates. In the test on the same platform with the same BIOS version, Ryzen 9 and Ryzen 7 as X and non-X models clocked a maximum of 150 MHz differently, with the Ryzen 5 there was a difference of 300 MHz. The sample still exceeds the official maximum turbo of 5.1 GHz in the test with 5,150 MHz (+50 MHz), only the Ryzen 5 7600X "misses" it even more clearly with 5,450 MHz (+150 MHz). However, the distance can vary from CPU to CPU.
Now it remains to be seen how big the price difference between the X and non-X models will be in retail. In the price list, it is USD 120 (Ryzen 9) or USD 70 (Ryzen 7/5), which definitely makes the 65-watt version appear attractive if it is not about the last X percent of performance. But because the X CPUs are currently listed well below their MSRP, it remains to be seen how big the difference will actually be.