AMD has just expanded its lineup of the best processors for laptops by introducing the Ryzen 8000HX series. These CPUs are set to appear in some of the best gaming laptops coming out in the next few months. The downside? There might not be much of an increase compared to the 7000HX series.
These CPUs, while new, aren’t exactly a “fresh” product line. They’re a refresh of the Dragon Range lineup, dubbed Ryzen 7000HX series, and are built on Zen 4 architecture. For reference, we already have Zen 5 chips in laptops; those belong to the Fire Range generation and are still very new, so you might not be able to find them in stores.
As far as the Ryzen 8000HX series goes, spec-wise, the new chips are almost the same as their predecessors. It’s unclear how they will be made faster than the previous generation, but AMD promises to deliver ultra-fast and smooth gameplay as well as solid performance for resource-heavy workloads.
The new chips come equipped with RDNA 2 integrated graphics, and they all use the Radeon 610M iGPU. In reality, they’re most likely going to come paired with some of the best graphics cards, including Nvidia’s RTX 50-series. These are high-end chips made for laptops that consume a fair bit of power, so we won’t find them in ultrabooks; instead, they’ll become part of laptops that are on the bigger side and consume a lot of power.
So, what’s new in terms of specifications? We’ve got four CPUs to dig into, including the Ryzen 9 8945HX, the Ryzen 9 8940HX, the Ryzen 7 8840HX, and lastly, the Ryzen 7 8745HX. These chips range from 16 cores to eight cores. The two flagship chips come with 16 cores and 32 threads as well as a maximum clock speed of 5.4GHz (8945HX) and 5.3GHz (8940HX). They sport a total of 80MB of combined cache.
Then, there’s the 12-core Ryzen 7 8840HX with a maximum clock speed of 5.1GHz and 76MB of combined cache. Lastly, AMD is launching the Ryzen 7 8745HX with eight cores, 16 threads, 5.1GHz boost frequency, and 40MB of cache. All chips have a varying TDP, ranging from 55 to 75 watts for the two 16-core variants and 45-75W for the other pair.
Without testing these CPUs, it’s hard to say what the difference is between these chips and their non-refresh counterparts. However, depending on the price, they might end up being cost-effective alternatives to the upcoming Fire Range CPUs.
