AMD - Zen chitchat

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

There are loads of BR based laptops still in the channel so there is little incentive for AMD to want to price 2C/4T Ryzen too low ATM.

[scaryjim]

I think the key is product positioning. If the 2200U is positioned that close to the 2500U ($729 for a 2200U/12GB/1TV, $899 for a 2500U/16GB/2TB), where does the 2300U slot in? Current pricing makes it look like the 2200U is directly replacing the A12 9700P (e.g. an Inspiron 15 5000 with A12/12GB/1TB is currently $699 after a $100 discount) - it just seems really odd to replace the top SKUs from Bristol Ridge with the bottom SKUs of Ryzen. I'd've expected the 2300U to take that slot, and the 2200U to replace the dual core A9 etc. If the 2200U is replacing the quad core BRs, are there going to be any sub-£500 Ryzen laptops? Or are they just going to bag off that entire market? Seems like an odd decision, unless there is going to be a lower spec range of processors to fill out the bottom end (maybe that 2C/3CU single channel die is out there after all!)...

If they don't hurry up and get something in the market, though, they're going to lose my money. This old HP is very much on its way out, and if there's nothing AMD in my price range when I need to replace it....

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I think the key is product positioning. If the 2200U is positioned that close to the 2500U ($729 for a 2200U/12GB/1TV, $899 for a 2500U/16GB/2TB), where does the 2300U slot in? Current pricing makes it look like the 2200U is directly replacing the A12 9700P (e.g. an Inspiron 15 5000 with A12/12GB/1TB is currently $699 after a $100 discount) - it just seems really odd to replace the top SKUs from Bristol Ridge with the bottom SKUs of Ryzen. I'd've expected the 2300U to take that slot, and the 2200U to replace the dual core A9 etc. If the 2200U is replacing the quad core BRs, are there going to be any sub-£500 Ryzen laptops? Or are they just going to bag off that entire market? Seems like an odd decision, unless there is going to be a lower spec range of processors to fill out the bottom end (maybe that 2C/3CU single channel die is out there after all!)...

If they don't hurry up and get something in the market, though, they're going to lose my money. This old HP is very much on its way out, and if there's nothing AMD in my price range when I need to replace it....

The problem is you can get a KL 2C/4T CPU and a 940MX DDR3 for £340:

https://www.ebuyer.com/810641-asus-a...a556uq-xo1470t

Sure it only has 4GB DDR4 and a 1TB disk,but still!!

Edit!!

Model with a 1080p screen and an SSD for under £500:

https://www.ebuyer.com/805830-asus-a...a556uq-dm1319t

Second Edit!!

You can get laptops with MX150,GTX950M and GTX1050 for between £600 to £650 too. Sure they are all dual core,but Ryzen Mobile pricing does seem rather high TBH.

[scaryjim]

I'd already spotted that one CAT - it's why I'm getting frustrated with the way AMD's handling the mobile Ryzen launch. Laptops are a bigger market than desktops, they've got a great range of laptop processors, but they're trickling to market at ridiculous prices. They should have a good range of 2C/4T laptops in the market at ~ £500 with a 1080p screen.

That ASUS has a spare SODIMM slot to, so for an extra £40 you can bump it up to 8GB. Hexus very kindly compared an i5 7200U + 940MX against Ryzen 5 in gaming. Let's see how that went: http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/laptop...wift-3/?page=7

Yeah, not great for Ryzen. I'm this <-> close to just buying that ASUS now....

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I'd already spotted that one CAT - it's why I'm getting frustrated with the way AMD's handling the mobile Ryzen launch. Laptops are a bigger market than desktops, they've got a great range of laptop processors, but they're trickling to market at ridiculous prices. They should have a good range of 2C/4T laptops in the market at ~ £500 with a 1080p screen.

That ASUS has a spare SODIMM slot to, so for an extra £40 you can bump it up to 8GB. Hexus very kindly compared an i5 7200U + 940MX against Ryzen 5 in gaming. Let's see how that went: http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/laptop...wift-3/?page=7

Yeah, not great for Ryzen. I'm this <-> close to just buying that ASUS now....

It does have a 940MX/MX130 GDDR5 in the Hexus review,but the cheaper Asus has the MX130 GDDR3,so a bit slower,but still for under £500 its not too bad.

I do have some concerns about AMD driver support too - if you read through the comments thread of the review. The drivers on the Acer site are much older than the official AMD desktop RR APU drivers,but you can't download any drivers for the mobile APUs on the AMD page(!),but you can for both versions of RR,ie,desktop and laptop. Also as I mentioned one YT site forced Vega desktop drivers and it worked fine and performance went up a decent amount.

Even the desktop RR launch was not ideal with half the AMD OEMs only shipping RR ready BIOSes,the week before the reviews hit.

Plus you can get laptops with the MX150 and GTX1050 for even cheaper:

https://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/-9s7...68/version.asp
https://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/refu...ea/version.asp

Both are 4C/4T.

GTX950M DDR3 laptop for £500 with 1080p screen,SSD and HDD:

https://www.saveonlaptops.co.uk/NX.G...G_2186600.html

Similar with one RX460 GDDR5 and FX CPU:

https://www.saveonlaptops.co.uk/K550...T_2108500.html

One with 4C/4T KB CPU,MX150 GDDR5 for £590:

https://www.saveonlaptops.co.uk/9S7-...r_2197296.html

Then this really good deal for £700ish:

https://www.saveonlaptops.co.uk/ZX55...T_2145527.html

ASUS Gaming ZX553VD-DM969T

Intel Core i7-7700HQ Quad Core Processor
15.6" Full HD Screen
Microsoft Windows 10 Home 64-bit
8GB DDR4 RAM
1000GB HDD
No Optical Drive
Dedicated GeForce GTX 1050 2GB Graphics
USB3 | HDMI | Bluetooth |
Red Backlit Keyboard
ZX553VD-DM969T

Edit!!

Repeated the MSI PL62 twice.Oops!!

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I had a look on saveonlaptops,and you can get that Asus ROG laptop with a 128GB SSD an 1TB drive off the shelf for £750. Not sure if the Acer Spin 3 makes much sense at £700,especially after looking at this review of the Asus laptop:

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Asus-R....200646.0.html

The only advantages the Acer Spin 3 has are a longer warranty and potentially better battery life under heavy combined CPU and graphics load. But a GTX1050 GDDR5 is much faster than a Vega8 IGP with dual channel RAM. Even the £700 model has a spare M2 slot so you could get an SSD and install one yourself.

Edit!!

Even the HDD is a 7200RPM unit which is quicker than normal as many laptop HDDs tend to be 5400RPM to 5900RPM units.

Second Edit!!

That mobile FX and a RX460 GDDR5 is faster than a 2C/4T KL CPU and an MX150 GDDR5 in the games tested.LOL.

[scaryjim]

Laptop pricing is all over the place at the minute!

The ASUS with RX 460 is kind of tempting ... but the 1366x768 screen just might be a deal breaker, and the lack of DVD drive counts against it too. Notebookcheck's review isn't exactly glowing! Sadly it's just the wrong balance for me, for all the good priceerformance ratio.

The F15 is also kind of tempting, but I'm not sure if the i3 is a compromise too far to get the 8GB RAM and 950M over the 940MX - particularly when it's the DDR3 950M, which iirc really sucks performance out of it (there's a more recent F15 in the house already with i5 7200U and GDDR5 950M which is a lovely machine).

*sigh*

The sad thing is that I really don't need anything my existing laptop hasn't got. A 1080p screen is the only meaningful upgrade to me, but getting 8GB and 1080p with any processor seems to push you right up to £500 already, and I kind of feel that if I'm going to spend that much I ought to get at least some CPU and GPU upgrade as well....

£430 will get me an i3 7130u with 8GB/1TB/1080p. Not sure the HD620 would be an improvement graphically on my APU though. £500 gets me the Acer F15 you linked, or a Lenovo with A12 9720p (also 8GB/1TB/1080p). The F15 at least has a (small) SSD, but is £500 too much for a DDR3 GPU? ARGH! Just can't decide

How about something leftfield: https://www.amazon.co.uk/HoMei-Dedic...dp/B079H1BH6R/ - it uses the desktop Pentium Gold G4560 and has a 2GB GDDR5 MX150 (plus the standard 8GB/1TB/1080p) for £570. Or for the same price there's an MSI with an i5 HQ, and IPS display...

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Laptop pricing is all over the place at the minute!

The ASUS with RX 460 is kind of tempting ... but the 1366x768 screen just might be a deal breaker, and the lack of DVD drive counts against it too. Notebookcheck's review isn't exactly glowing! Sadly it's just the wrong balance for me, for all the good priceerformance ratio.

The F15 is also kind of tempting, but I'm not sure if the i3 is a compromise too far to get the 8GB RAM and 950M over the 940MX - particularly when it's the DDR3 950M, which iirc really sucks performance out of it (there's a more recent F15 in the house already with i5 7200U and GDDR5 950M which is a lovely machine).

*sigh*

The sad thing is that I really don't need anything my existing laptop hasn't got. A 1080p screen is the only meaningful upgrade to me, but getting 8GB and 1080p with any processor seems to push you right up to £500 already, and I kind of feel that if I'm going to spend that much I ought to get at least some CPU and GPU upgrade as well....

£430 will get me an i3 7130u with 8GB/1TB/1080p. Not sure the HD620 would be an improvement graphically on my APU though. £500 gets me the Acer F15 you linked, or a Lenovo with A12 9720p (also 8GB/1TB/1080p). The F15 at least has a (small) SSD, but is £500 too much for a DDR3 GPU? ARGH! Just can't decide

How about something leftfield: https://www.amazon.co.uk/HoMei-Dedic...dp/B079H1BH6R/ - it uses the desktop Pentium Gold G4560 and has a 2GB GDDR5 MX150 (plus the standard 8GB/1TB/1080p) for £570. Or for the same price there's an MSI with an i5 HQ, and IPS display...

The PL62 has a 4C CPU,and a GTX1050 2GB GDDR5 for £580 from Ebuyer. If you are spending the better part of £500ish,you might as well get at least a reasonable card.

Also there is a 4C version of the Asus ROG laptop:

https://www.saveonlaptops.co.uk/ZX55...T_2145526.html

It has a 7200RPM drive and a backlight keyboard for £650.

Edit!!

You can get an Atom based laptop with a 1080p display for £130:

https://forums.hexus.net/retail-ther...-129-99-a.html

So,it makes me wonder how expensive having a 1080p screen is!!

[scaryjim]

... If you are spending the better part of £500ish,you might as well get at least a reasonable card. ...

Problem is, I don't *want* to spend the better part of £500. I want to spend as close to £400 as possible, but 8GB and 1080p are non-negotiable, and "better" CPU and Graphics performance should be a given.

I've just done a bit of comparison of my Fire Strike scores to an A10 9620p (which is the same 4C/6CU configuration as my A10 4600m), and while it's not necessarily indicative of overall performance, it seems to be about 25% faster at everything. I guess that's not bad. esp with the lower TDP.

OTOH, the cheapest 8GB/1080p laptop I can find with the chip is a 17" HP at £467* - so not a great improvement on what I've already been looking at! At the same price I can get a similar 15" with an i5 8250u...

*EDIT: that's actually with a 10% off promotion on all HP laptops, on their website. Brings the Ryzen Envy 360 down to £719...

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Problem is, I don't *want* to spend the better part of £500. I want to spend as close to £400 as possible, but 8GB and 1080p are non-negotiable, and "better" CPU and Graphics performance should be a given.

I've just done a bit of comparison of my Fire Strike scores to an A10 9620p (which is the same 4C/6CU configuration as my A10 4600m), and while it's not necessarily indicative of overall performance, it seems to be about 25% faster at everything. I guess that's not bad. esp with the lower TDP.

OTOH, the cheapest 8GB/1080p laptop I can find with the chip is a 17" HP at £467* - so not a great improvement on what I've already been looking at! At the same price I can get a similar 15" with an i5 8250u...

*EDIT: that's actually with a 10% off promotion on all HP laptops, on their website. Brings the Ryzen Envy 360 down to £719...

Its not a bad price for a Core i5 8250u based laptop - but shows you how massively overpriced the Ryzen 5 2500U is.

The issue with a £700 Ryzen laptop is you can get an Asus ROG laptop with a Core i7 7700HQ and a GTX1050 and a backlit keyboard for £700ish. At this point Ryzen is just not really competitive currently. I would rather have the Asus laptop as it just seems a better device than the HP Envy which has a rather average screen apparently,and the CPU and GPU will blow the Ryzen 5 2500U out of the water,and the laptop is probably just built better and with a better screen. Remember,its reduced down to that price by £150 to £200 IIRC.

Edit!!

TBF,you can get low clocked Core i3 laptops with a 1080p screen for as low as £350,but the low clockspeed means even that AMD FX-9830P based laptop will have better performance,and it has a 1080p screen(not a 768p one).

Second Edit!!

No it doesn't,oh well!

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Loads of deals on the Dell refurb store:

http://outlet.euro.dell.com/Online/I...WiUHjTxyv70%3d

1080p displays and the Core i5 8250U for £350ish. Core i5 8250U,SSD,HDD and a 940MX GDDR5 with a 1080p display for around £500ish.

Edit!!

Another laptop but from Argos but with a GTX1050:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Medion-P6...UAAOSwehVaknWr

[DanceswithUnix]

They should have a good range of 2C/4T laptops in the market at ~ £500 with a 1080p screen.

I have to wonder if AMD are holding back on the 2C stuff to try and get out of the "bargain bucket and a bit rubbish" image that they generally have from some of the poor systems their chips have been dumped in in the past.

[kompukare]

I have to wonder if AMD are holding back on the 2C stuff to try and get out of the "bargain bucket and a bit rubbish" image that they generally have from some of the poor systems their chips have been dumped in in the past.

Problem is they sort of tried that with their graphic cards (unilaterally raising the price - in the end nobody cares how technical clever HBM1 was in the Fury), and it didn't really work.

[scaryjim]

I have to wonder if AMD are holding back on the 2C stuff to try and get out of the "bargain bucket and a bit rubbish" image ...

If that was the case Dell wouldn't be offering the 2C 2200U in a $679 laptop - they'd be offering the 4C/4T 2300U instead. That Dell could potentially be a massive own-goal for AMD - people will buy it because they've heard mobile Ryzen is gaming-capable, and suddenly they've spent almost $700 on a dual-core, 192-shader laptop that isn't much better than Intel HD graphics in games. It's the space the 2300U should be in, with the 2200U in the low end parts. Otherwise the 2300U is basically pointless...

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Whats the point of mobile Ryzen 5 if Core i5 8250U laptops can be had cheaper and laptops with a Core i7 7700HQ and a GTX1050 can be had for similar money?? Its all a bit pointless then. There is no excuse when the AMD is a single chip solution and the competing ones use two to three chips and needs a more complex cooling solution too!!

[scaryjim]

I suspect that we're seeing a bit of an early adopter tax still, and some of the cheaper Intel laptops are heavily discounted, which simply won't happen with "new" Raven Ridge designs, so I don't think we're seeing a clear picture of the landscape currently. At RRP most of the Ryzen 5 laptops look to be about the same cost as the equivalent 8th gen i5, which tbh is what I'd expect given the comparative performance.

What I find most odd about the laptop pricing is that the desktop pricing has been totally on point. It could be that the Dell 2200U is an anomaly and that most OEMs will be pricing their 2200U laptops more sensibly, but it's such a jumble I really don't know what to do atm.

I've been doing a bit of cross comparison (to my A10 4600m, and to the leaked 3DM11 scores), and it looks likes - graphically - HD620 is a bit faster than my A10, and a bit slower than a 2200U. Does make me think that I might as well just get something cheap and Intelish. I'm quite liking the look of the 13.3" Lenovo 510s, and I can get it for < £400 with a 1080p screen and 4GB. I've dug the service manual out and while upgrading the RAM (and possibly the SSD) isn't entirely straightforward it's well within my capabilities...