Zen 2 APUs/"Renoir" discussion thread

[Shivansps]

Memory allocation is dynamic however. The IGP gets access to what it needs, regardless of UEFI setting. That just sets the minimum reserved, not what's actually used.

Thats the thing that changed with Renoir... Picasso IGP used up to 2GB MAX, unless this has changed in a recent driver, the limit is 2GB. Renoir does not seem to have that limit, it is unknow at this point how much dynamic memory it can use.

 

[Shivansps]

RDR2 4750G 2100mhz 1080p DDR4-4133 3/4 Resolution scale Textures High

RDR2 3400G 1650mhz 1080p DDR4-3466 1:1 resolution Textures Ultra

So what happened with the "memory bandwidth limitation" here?

 

[Hitman928]

RDR2 4750G 2100mhz 1080p DDR4-4133 3/4 Resolution scale Textures High

RDR2 3400G 1650mhz 1080p DDR4-3466 1:1 resolution Textures Ultra

So what happened with the "memory bandwidth limitation" here?

The second clip is running 3/4 resolution as well, they change it from 1:1 right after it transitions to the outside scene. They also aren't running the same shadow quality or SSAO settings so it's hard to make a direct comparison.

 

[Insert_Nickname]

Thats the thing that changed with Renoir... Picasso IGP used up to 2GB MAX, unless this has changed in a recent driver, the limit is 2GB. Renoir does not seem to have that limit, it is unknow at this point how much dynamic memory it can use.

This is still only reserved (or dedicated) memory. As in exclusive to the GPU. Windows/the driver can swap with system RAM if dedicated memory runs out. Since all the IGPs memory is the same as system memory, it's kind of a moot point. Windows can use up to half of system memory for graphics BTW.

F.x. the system I'm typing on with 32GB RAM and a 4GB GTX1650 has 20GB of graphics memory available.

 

[Asterox]

Solid preview/review od 65W Ryzen 5 Pro 4350G, coming from Indonesian website.

Hands-on (p)review AMD RYZEN 3 PRO 4350G : Renoir APU Desktop • Jagat Review

APU 'Renoir' Ryzen 4000-series Mobile diperkenalkan ke tech press di bulan Maret 2020 lalu, dan APU ini menjadi senjata utama bagi AMD untuk bersaing pada

www.jagatreview.com

As expected, power efficiency area is excellent or much beeter vs R5 3400G.From this point, we can see what we can expect from 35W GE(power efficiency)version.

For reference point, R5 3400G total system power comsumption is around 35W idle and 105W at CPU load.

Translation from Indonesian website!

"One thing that seems to stand out from Renoir, is its super economical power consumption, especially in idle conditions. The Zen2 Renoir CPU that we tested can touch power consumption at idle below 25 Watt on the power meter ( This is the TOTAL system power consumption minus the monitor ).

We have almost never come across a previous generation Zenisse Matisse system where when the Idle consumes less than 25W of power.

Even when loading 4-core 8-Thread on the Cinebench R15, 4350G hasn't touched 80W

As a product, even though the APU Ryzen 3 PRO 4350G is positioned in the 'lower' class, it appears that its performance in terms of CPU or integrated GPU can compete and even beat the Ryzen 5 3400G which is the highest-gen APU 'Picasso' last-gen.

Both the multi-core and single-core performance of the 4350G CPU shows a high increase over the previous generation, and although the IGP is still slightly thinner than the Ryzen 5 3400G, the IGP 4350G's performance is still in the 94% range of the Ryzen 5 3400G, using only 54% of the total CU .

Other aspects such as power efficiency also look superior. It's no exaggeration to mention that Renoir APU has the potential to be the best performance-per-watt chip available on desktops today."

 

[Insert_Nickname]

the IGP 4350G's performance is still in the 94% range of the Ryzen 5 3400G, using only 54% of the total CU .

If that holds, it's impressive to say the least. We shall see.

 

[Shivansps]

Solid preview/review od 65W Ryzen 5 Pro 4350G, coming from Indonesian website.

Hands-on (p)review AMD RYZEN 3 PRO 4350G : Renoir APU Desktop • Jagat Review

APU 'Renoir' Ryzen 4000-series Mobile diperkenalkan ke tech press di bulan Maret 2020 lalu, dan APU ini menjadi senjata utama bagi AMD untuk bersaing pada

www.jagatreview.com

As expected, power efficiency area is excellent or much beeter vs R5 3400G.From this point, we can see what we can expect from 35W GE(power efficiency)version.

For reference point, R5 3400G total system power comsumption is around 35W idle and 105W at CPU load.

Translation from Indonesian website!

"One thing that seems to stand out from Renoir, is its super economical power consumption, especially in idle conditions. The Zen2 Renoir CPU that we tested can touch power consumption at idle below 25 Watt on the power meter ( This is the TOTAL system power consumption minus the monitor ).

We have almost never come across a previous generation Zenisse Matisse system where when the Idle consumes less than 25W of power.

Even when loading 4-core 8-Thread on the Cinebench R15, 4350G hasn't touched 80W

As a product, even though the APU Ryzen 3 PRO 4350G is positioned in the 'lower' class, it appears that its performance in terms of CPU or integrated GPU can compete and even beat the Ryzen 5 3400G which is the highest-gen APU 'Picasso' last-gen.

Both the multi-core and single-core performance of the 4350G CPU shows a high increase over the previous generation, and although the IGP is still slightly thinner than the Ryzen 5 3400G, the IGP 4350G's performance is still in the 94% range of the Ryzen 5 3400G, using only 54% of the total CU .

Other aspects such as power efficiency also look superior. It's no exaggeration to mention that Renoir APU has the potential to be the best performance-per-watt chip available on desktops today."

CPU tests:
Cinebench-Firestrike

GPU tests:
Firestrike-CSGO-DOTA-VALORAN

Yeah, ill pass on that one. I trust TechEpiphany results, and from what im seeing, the 4750G can beat 3400G with a small margin, the 4350G has no chance outside very old or non shader intensive games.

The second clip is running 3/4 resolution as well, they change it from 1:1 right after it transitions to the outside scene. They also aren't running the same shadow quality or SSAO settings so it's hard to make a direct comparison.

Good catch i havent noticed that. Many people are asking him to do a comparison, if he does that would be the more accurate results we can ever get.

 

[Shivansps]

Finally, video going live in 25 minutes

4750G + DDR4-4133 vs 3400G + DDR4-3200

Best case scenario Renoir vs common use case 3400G.

 

[Shivansps]

Well, now that i watched the video, dissapointing falls short in this case. It looks like the Korean review is right, the 4300G has zero chance to match the 3400G it is replacing at $150, except for some specific game.

 

[amd6502]

Well, now that i watched the video, dissapointing falls short in this case. It looks like the Korean review is right, the 4300G has zero chance to match the 3400G it is replacing at $150, except for some specific game.

Well, who would have thought. Low end Renoir looses to top flagship Picasso. That's why they named it 4300g rather than 4400g I suppose.

$150 seems about right because 2400g launch price was $169. ( 3400g is a refinement of the 2400g plus soldered IHS.)

They really need a budget SKU like an AF version of the 2400g around the ~$120 mark. No soldered IHS and ≥ 10CU.

 

[lightmanek]

Well, who would have thought. Low end Renoir looses to top flagship Picasso. That's why they named it 4300g rather than 4400g I suppose.

$150 seems about right because 2400g launch price was $169. ( 3400g is a refinement of the 2400g plus soldered IHS.)

They really need a budget SKU like an AF version of the 2400g around the ~$120 mark. No soldered IHS and ≥ 10CU.

That SKU will come one the production ramps up or market saturates a bit.
I understand from where Shivansps is coming from, but to be honest, getting faster on all aspects of the new gen SKU and offering it at a lower price than the part from 2 years ago rarely happens in processor industry. Only company who is really playing catch up is forced to do that if they can make jumps like that.
I think AMD realized with Zen 2 APU's that GPU part for notebooks needs to be just good enough, but what matters is battery life and CPU performance. I still think AMD will launch a bigger APU in the next 2 years, but that will probably have to wait for DDR5 or use some sort of HBM memory which then would kill it's value proposition anyway.

 

[Insert_Nickname]

I think AMD realized with Zen 2 APU's that GPU part for notebooks needs to be just good enough, but what matters is battery life and CPU performance.

Am I wrong or didn't they state that up front? In my view Renoir is very much a mobile first product. Desktop versions are an afterthought.

AMD did claim a 59% lift in graphics performance per CU, so I wouldn't count anything out before official reviews arrive.

https://www.anandtech.com/show/1562...-ryzen-mobile-4000-series-7nm-apu-uncovered/2

 

[DrMrLordX]

In my view Renoir is very much a mobile first product. Desktop versions are an afterthought.

You are, of course, correct. And a lot of mobile Renoir implementations feature dGPUs.

 

[LightningZ71]

Of course, the H and HS version almost exclusively (with only two notable recent exceptions surfacing) have dGPUs and almost all of the U models being iGPU only. Its still a big uplift, and, for the 4500 and up, it almost completely obviates the need to have anything lower than the MX350 in a laptop, and for the 4700u+, it even makes the MX350 largely irrelevant with a proper memory setup.

On desktop, I can certainly understand Shivas' point of view: With Renoir's 4 core product, he's going to have to pay a bit more for statistically lower gpu performance as compared to the most functionally equivalent product of the previous generation. He doesn't care about the CPU performance as that's entirely irrelevant to him. For whatever reason, his entire world revolves around compute heavy gaming titles that demonstrate a drop of more than a couple of frames per second in that specific situation. I personally believe that he's arguing a corner case, and, if it's really that big of a deal to him, and he doesn't have to live in a tiny ITX case, he'd actually do much better for himself to get a 3100 and a $50 used video card for the same investment and have a much better gaming experience.

 

[JustMe21]

Well, now that i watched the video, dissapointing falls short in this case. It looks like the Korean review is right, the 4300G has zero chance to match the 3400G it is replacing at $150, except for some specific game.

I would still replace my 3400G with a 4700G because of the extra 4 cores/8 threads. We all knew with the reduced CUs that APU graphics performance wasn't going to be too much better than the previous gen. I don't expect notable 3D performance improvements with APUs until RDNA2 and DDR5. It would be nice if the 4700G is priced lower than the 3700X since the 3400G is cheaper than the comparable 2600X.

 

[Asterox]

Am I wrong or didn't they state that up front? In my view Renoir is very much a mobile first product. Desktop versions are an afterthought.

AMD did claim a 59% lift in graphics performance per CU, so I wouldn't count anything out before official reviews arrive.

https://www.anandtech.com/show/1562...-ryzen-mobile-4000-series-7nm-apu-uncovered/2

Mobile laptop market, that was last part where AMD need to push much beeter CPU performance+drastically lower power consumption.With Renoir APU Mobile, AMD did a very good Mobile product=galloping over Intel Mobile parts.

Renoir Desktop is afterthought no doubt.Renoir is Mobile APU planted on desktop, or same thing as my Athlon 3000G.

As we can see, Renoir APU Desktop(JagaTreview R5 4350G test) has excellent power efficiency.

 

[Insert_Nickname]

On desktop, I can certainly understand Shivas' point of view: With Renoir's 4 core product, he's going to have to pay a bit more for statistically lower gpu performance as compared to the most functionally equivalent product of the previous generation. He doesn't care about the CPU performance as that's entirely irrelevant to him. For whatever reason, his entire world revolves around compute heavy gaming titles that demonstrate a drop of more than a couple of frames per second in that specific situation. I personally believe that he's arguing a corner case, and, if it's really that big of a deal to him, and he doesn't have to live in a tiny ITX case, he'd actually do much better for himself to get a 3100 and a $50 used video card for the same investment and have a much better gaming experience.

I think I can understand his point. But at IGP performance levels, the performance difference between models within APU generations isn't about a title being playable or not playable. It's either or.

That said, the Vega IGP is very competent for what it is. Even the Vega3 in my Athlon has no problems with older titles.

Mobile laptop market, that was last part where AMD need to push much beeter CPU performance+drastically lower power consumption.With Renoir APU Mobile, AMD did a very good Mobile product=galloping over Intel Mobile parts.

Laptops represent a huge chunk of the PC market, so focussing there makes perfect sense.

I still can't quite fathom that within the space of 3 years from Ryzens launch we've gone from having 8 cores on a mainstream socket to now having 8 core CPUs in laptops. With a very competent IGP too. How's that for progress...?

 

[Shivansps]

Of course, the H and HS version almost exclusively (with only two notable recent exceptions surfacing) have dGPUs and almost all of the U models being iGPU only. Its still a big uplift, and, for the 4500 and up, it almost completely obviates the need to have anything lower than the MX350 in a laptop, and for the 4700u+, it even makes the MX350 largely irrelevant with a proper memory setup.

On desktop, I can certainly understand Shivas' point of view: With Renoir's 4 core product, he's going to have to pay a bit more for statistically lower gpu performance as compared to the most functionally equivalent product of the previous generation. He doesn't care about the CPU performance as that's entirely irrelevant to him. For whatever reason, his entire world revolves around compute heavy gaming titles that demonstrate a drop of more than a couple of frames per second in that specific situation. I personally believe that he's arguing a corner case, and, if it's really that big of a deal to him, and he doesn't have to live in a tiny ITX case, he'd actually do much better for himself to get a 3100 and a $50 used video card for the same investment and have a much better gaming experience.

Remember that im not arguing MY use case, yes, i did use Vega 8 APUs for a year for gaming when i was short of money and had to sell my RX480 and my R7 1700, and i personally belive the strong point in AMD apus is the IGP perf, that is what set them apart from Intel offerings.

You need to understand that we sell an avg of 200 PCs per week and around 150 of them are AMD APUs in a 25/40/85 split (3000G/3200G/3400G), almost all people getting the 3400G are for use in gaming because they cant affort anything else. Getting a GTX1650 or a RX570 involves a considerable jump in price.
Most of these 3400G arent even using 3200mhz ram as they are more expensive and difficult to get.

So AMD now launchs something thats slower in IGP for most games and takes advantage of fast speed ram no one will ever use outside a super niche case. Worst, considering the 3200G has no replacement they may use the Athlon 3150G at that spot.

One may say "keep using the 3400G" the reality is... the 3400G stock, is very very low. I have a hard time beliving AMD will keep making Picassos that makes the 4300G look bad.

Picasso, when launched as a simple refresh, it had better perf all around for the same price, and Ryzen 1000>2000>3000 has been like this as well, except for when they added the Ryzen 9 series.
I see no reason why Renoir cant be like all previous launches, this is not a new series like Ryzen 9, even if you factor in a price increase, there is no reason why the 4300G cant be $110 and the 4600G $160. Remember that these APU will share the lineup with the new Zen 3 CPUs!!!! Not Matisse.

And about Renoir being "mobile first", every AMD APU that ever existed was "mobile first".

 

[amd6502]

there is no reason why the 4300G cant be $110 and the 4600G $160

The reason is that 7nm is not cheap and not abundant. Read the other new thread where the 7nm supply constraint is discussed. (I guess this also unfortunately means that Navi won't come as cheap as many of us want.)

For a 156mm2 die those prices can practically be ruled out, at least for Renoir. You really are better off going the dGPU route, or going with 3200g - 3400g and related APUs (or paying a $40 premium over wishlist prices).

With its supply constraint, for every Renoir die made, AMD could have printed two Matisse dies instead. (This explains the sweet spot for the 3600 pricing.)

 

[YAYgee]

I would still replace my 3400G with a 4700G because of the extra 4 cores/8 threads. We all knew with the reduced CUs that APU graphics performance wasn't going to be too much better than the previous gen. I don't expect notable 3D performance improvements with APUs until RDNA2 and DDR5. It would be nice if the 4700G is priced lower than the 3700X since the 3400G is cheaper than the comparable 2600X.

It already was a bit of a letdown that Renoir is Vega-based. Schedules not lining up was the excuse given back then (yet Cezanne is rumoured to be Vega-based as well, whatever is scheduled it will be minor, and it will take until Rembrandt for the focus to shift to graphics). Still, with APUs it isn't exactly uncommon for 3d core related blocks to lag.

However in the past the APUs always featured the newest display and video blocks (sometimes newer than in any released discrete GPU product). On this front it's quite underwhelming. E.g. the new consoles will get full-fat HDMI 2.1 while it's "HDMI 4K60" for the desktop APUs, Xe bringing AV1 accelerated decode while AMD already needed to make other media engine improvements not to fall too far behind their competitors, ... I hear there's a Renoir talk at Hot Chips, possibly touching upon the DCN and VCN un-core portions on the APU (AMD could be less secretive but until they start catching up I doubt they will be shouting from the rooftops).

I'm somewhat disappointed. Next year's APUs to handle (full-fat) HDMI 2.1 and AV1 decoding?

 

[Insert_Nickname]

Remember that im not arguing MY use case, yes, i did use Vega 8 APUs for a year for gaming when i was short of money and had to sell my RX480 and my R7 1700, and i personally belive the strong point in AMD apus is the IGP perf, that is what set them apart from Intel offerings.

You need to understand that we sell an avg of 200 PCs per week and around 150 of them are AMD APUs in a 25/40/85 split (3000G/3200G/3400G), almost all people getting the 3400G are for use in gaming because they cant affort anything else. Getting a GTX1650 or a RX570 involves a considerable jump in price.
Most of these 3400G arent even using 3200mhz ram as they are more expensive and difficult to get.

So AMD now launchs something thats slower in IGP for most games and takes advantage of fast speed ram no one will ever use outside a super niche case. Worst, considering the 3200G has no replacement they may use the Athlon 3150G at that spot.

I see.

I case there is only the Athlon available, have you considered an Athlon 3150G + GT1030 (GDDR5) combo? I know a 1030 isn't exactly top of anything, but it can run anything Picassos IGP can. It should be doable at the same price as a 3400G.

I know several who use older office (ubiquitous Dell Optiplexes) with a 1030 for lighter gaming.

One may say "keep using the 3400G" the reality is... the 3400G stock, is very very low. I have a hard time beliving AMD will keep making Picassos that makes the 4300G look bad.

It can also be because the 3400G requires a top bin chip. There is a possibility there simply aren't enough dies that are able to make the cut.

 

[AtenRa]

AMD was using all the Picasso dies for mobile/OEMs, that is why we had shortages is desktop SKUs.
With Renoir now at high volume in H2 2020 they are able to move more Renoir chips to the OEMs and have spare volume for Picasso (3400G) for desktop.

And once again, they will not create a second smaller Renoir die for sub $150 SKUs, so they will continue to use the GloFo 14/12nm volume to make Picasso 3200G/3400G for the $80 to $150 segment.

 

[dacostafilipe]

... there is no reason why the 4300G cant be $110 and the 4600G $160 ...

In the contrary, there a lot of reasons, it's just that you don't agree with them ...

 

[Asterox]

AMD was using all the Picasso dies for mobile/OEMs, that is why we had shortages is desktop SKUs.
With Renoir now at high volume in H2 2020 they are able to move more Renoir chips to the OEMs and have spare volume for Picasso (3400G) for desktop.

And once again, they will not create a second smaller Renoir die for sub $150 SKUs, so they will continue to use the GloFo 14/12nm volume to make Picasso 3200G/3400G for the $80 to $150 segment.

Today only GloFo 12nm, "original GloFo 14nm" it is no longer needed .

Dont forget new 12nm Zen+ 4/4 Athlon Gold series.

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TSMC 7nm is not cheep, and it seems to me that people constantly deliberately ignore that fact.

 

[Shivansps]

TSMC 7nm is not cheep, and it seems to me that people constantly deliberately ignore that fact.

People ignore the fact that cost != price. Learn how a price is formed.

The reason is that 7nm is not cheap and not abundant. Read the other new thread where the 7nm supply constraint is discussed. (I guess this also unfortunately means that Navi won't come as cheap as many of us want.)

For a 156mm2 die those prices can practically be ruled out, at least for Renoir. You really are better off going the dGPU route, or going with 3200g - 3400g and related APUs (or paying a $40 premium over wishlist prices).

With its supply constraint, for every Renoir die made, AMD could have printed two Matisse dies instead. (This explains the sweet spot for the 3600 pricing.)

Then AMD should have NOT segmented Vega in desktop, at least not as much as making a Vega 6 SKU, simple as that. Leave the IGP defect dies for mobile and dont try to pass a SKU that performs slower than the one it is replacing at the same price, after all APU in desktop is a small market RIGHT?
Prices and segmentation are bussiness decisions, and cost is just one part of the product pricing. AMD is only able to get away with this due to having the APU monopoly.

I see.

I case there is only the Athlon available, have you considered an Athlon 3150G + GT1030 (GDDR5) combo? I know a 1030 isn't exactly top of anything, but it can run anything Picassos IGP can. It should be doable at the same price as a 3400G.

I know several who use older office (ubiquitous Dell Optiplexes) with a 1030 for lighter gaming.

Surprisely, most people looking for office use goes for the 3200G rather than the 3000G, almost half of the 3000G sales are in combos paired up with dGPUs 1030/550/570/1650. I think Ryzen popularity has something to do with that.

Still, 1030/550 combos with 3000G are not worth it to me, those GPUS arent much faster than Vega 11, 3400G is a better choice.