AMD Ryzen 9 6900HS review: Game-changing performance for tiny laptops

We’ll perceive should you assumed AMD was toast when Intel unleashed its spectacularly fast 12th-gen “Alder Lake” laptop CPUs in January. AMD, nonetheless, ain’t simply giving up. In truth, its new Ryzen 6000-series CPUs and Radeon RX 6800S GPU are direct proof that the battle for laptop supremacy will proceed to be a knock-down, drag-out brawl between chip makers.

The Ryzen 6000-series laptop computer processors, announced at CES 2022, are primarily based the corporate’s Zen 3+ core (an upgraded model of the structure present in AMD’s stunning Ryzen 5000 desktop processors) and constructed on an improved 6nm TSMC course of. Inside the core, not a lot has modified all that a lot from the awesome-sauce Zen 3 from a efficiency perspective.

There’s a couple of method to pores and skin a CPU although. Instead of adjusting the design of the core, AMD principally goals to select up efficiency by significantly growing its energy effectivity. So a lot in order that the corporate claims the brand new Ryzen 6000 is “most efficient x86 CPU” on the town. And that concentrate on effectivity winds up making the skinny, gentle Ryzen 9 6800HS gaming laptop computer we’re testing at present go toe-to-toe with considerably chunkier gaming laptops in uncooked efficiency, bolstered by the equally energy-efficient Radeon RX 6800S GPU—a very spectacular spectacle certainly.

Apple followers will be aware the assertion of “most efficient x86 CPU” leaves Apple’s M1 chips out of the dialog however that’s a dialogue for an additional day. Today, AMD is concentrated solely on persevering with to peel off gross sales from Intel’s new 12th-gen CPUs. AMD success in laptops (an space Intel has lengthy dominated) has been nothing short of phenomenal recently so there’s quite a bit driving on simply how nicely Ryzen 6000 does. Do the Ryzen 6900HS and Radeon RX 6800S preserve AMD within the sport towards Intel’s wonderful Alder Lake? Spoiler alert: Yep. Let’s go.

How we examined

Our testing platform for AMD’s new Ryzen 9 6900HS and Radeon RX 6800S involves us within the type of the upgraded Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 (2022). The laptop computer choice is becoming, because the introduction of the unique ROG Zephyrus at CES 2020 actually helped put AMD’s cell Ryzen push in movement. At the time, Intel’s finest comparable CPUs ran too sizzling to squeeze into skinny and light-weight laptops, leaving the debut ROG Zephyrus G14 with its Ryzen 9 4900HS to crush all comers on the time, regardless of being practically half a pound lighter.

This new ROG Zephyrus G14 is simply as spectacular with its 3.6 pound weight, 8-core Ryzen 9 6900HS, new Radeon RX 6800S discrete graphics, 32GB of DDR5/4800, and an attention-grabbing 14-inch 16:10 2560 x 1600 decision display screen, blazing at a powerful 500 nits. The compact powerhouse laptop computer additionally contains a vapor chamber cooling design to assist share energy between the CPU and GPU, which each use liquid metallic as an alternative of normal thermal paste as nicely. The laptop computer, and the entire others we examined beneath, was operating the newest model of Windows 11. We opted, nonetheless, to depart Microsoft’s Virtual Based Security function turned off. It will increase safety however can at instances eat some efficiency. The Windows 11 OEM power/performance slider was set to the highest state available for all laptops.

All testing was performed whereas plugged in, and for gaming, discrete graphics modes have been chosen the place accessible.

Performance on battery will likely be a subject for later testing, however simply know that AMD has stated that Ryzen 6000’s efficiency on battery may be pretty much as good as whereas plugged-in. This has been an issue for AMD processors, which have tended to finish up in laptops that noticed efficiency nostril dive whereas on battery. We did run Cinebench R20 each plugged and unplugged, and located the efficiency to be an identical, however we must always be aware Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 doesn’t permit entry to its “Turbo” setting when unplugged, so we used the “Performance” preset for that experiment.

We’re evaluating the Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 with its all-AMD loadout towards a big selection of rival laptops:

• MSI GE76 Raider with a 14-core 12th-gen Intel Core i9-12900HK, Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Laptop GPU with a 175 watt TGP, 32GB of DDR5/4800, 2TB PCIe Gen 4 SSD, 17.3-inch 1080p 360Hz panel and 280 watt energy brick. The laptop computer itself weighs 6.4 kilos.
• MSI Prestige 14 Evo with a 4-core 11th-gen Intel Core i9-1195G7, Iris Xe built-in graphics, 16GB of LPDDR4X/4266 RAM, 1TB PCIe Gen 4 SSD, 14-inch 1080p display screen and 65 watt energy brick. The laptop computer weighs 2.8 lbs.
• XPG Xenia 15KC with an 8-core 11th-gen Intel Core i7-11800H, Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop GPU with a 140 watt TGP, 32GB of DDR4/3200, 1TB PCI Gen 4 SSD, 15.6-inch, 2650×1600, 165Hz display screen and 230 watt energy brick. The laptop computer weighs 4 lbs.
• Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 GA401 with 8-core Ryzen 9 4900HS, Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 Max-Q GPU, 24GB of DDR4/3200, 1TB PCIe Gen 3 SSD, 14-inch, 1080p, 120Hz display screen and 180 watt energy brick. The laptop computer weighs 3.6 kilos. The laptop computer truly comes with 16GB of RAM, however we determined so as to add extra RAM to carry it to 24GB to present it a greater probability when operating towards a lot of the different laptops with 32GB of RAM.
• Asus ROG Flow X13 with 8-core Ryzen 9 5980HS, Nvidia GeForce RTX 1650 Max-Q GPU, 32GB of LPDDR4X/4266, 1TB PCIe Gen 3 SSD, 13.4-inch, 3480×2400 decision contact display screen and 100-watt energy brick. The laptop computer weighs 2.9 kilos.
• Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 GA402 with 8-core Ryzen 9 6900HS, AMD Radeon RX 6800S, 32GB of DDR5/4800, 1TB PCIe Gen 4 SSD, 14-inch 2560×1600 500 nit display screen with a refresh of 165Hz and 240 watt energy brick. The laptop computer weighs 3.8 kilos with its miniLED Anime Matrix lid.
• Asus ROG Strix Scar G17 with 8-core Ryzen 9 5900HX, Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Laptop GPU with a 130 watt TGP, 32GB of DDR4/3200, 2TB PCIe Gen 3 SSD, and 17.3-inch 1080p 360Hz display screen. The laptop computer weighs 6 kilos.

Before we begin, we need to remind you that taking a look at CPU and GPU efficiency in laptops isn’t the identical as in a desktop, the place you’ll be able to management the cooling and energy. Laptops are totally built-in platforms, and efficiency can certainly differ primarily based on the engineering and enterprise choices made on each laptop computer mannequin. That, nonetheless, can’t flip a extremely gradual CPU or GPU into a extremely quick one.

Still, you need to contemplate the affect that each laptop computer design has on the chips inside it. For instance, our examined laptops embody outcomes from fashions that weigh as much as 6.4 kilos and have 280 watt power-bricks and 17.3-inch screens. That’s considerably extra room for cooling the CPU and GPU than you’d get in a smaller laptop computer, similar to this new ROG Zephyrus G14. So simply bear in mind to issue within the measurement and weight of the laptop computer when wanting on the efficiency scores beneath—a key consideration since our solely 12th-gen Core “Alder Lake” specimen comes within the type of the beefy MSI GE76 Raider, with Intel’s flagship Core i9-12900HK inside (full with a mixture of high-power and high-efficiency cores).

3D rendering efficiency

We’ll kick this off the place we regularly do, in Maxon’s standard Cinebench R23 check. It’s a benchmark constructed across the identical 3D rendering engine present in Maxon’s business Cinema 4D software, which can also be built-in into such functions as Adobe’s After Effects. It’s used for 3D modeling and scales fairly nicely with core and thread depend. Basically, the CPU with probably the most cores and highest sustained clocks below load often wins.

The winner, no shock, is the beefy GE76 Raider with its 14-core Core i9-12900HK CPU in it. Intel’s Alder Lake is clearly nothing to dismiss with a hand wave.

But the brand new Ryzen 6000 chip represents itself fairly nicely. Its rating of 14,236 outstrips the equally 8-core Core i7-11800H by far, and it walks away from the unique ROG Zephyrus G14 and Ryzen 9 4900HS by a stunning 46 p.c. It’s additionally 17 p.c quicker than the Ryzen 9 5980HS as nicely. The actual shocker needs to be the opposite Ryzen right here: The Ryzen 9 9 5900HX within the Stix SCAR G17. That was AMD’s second-best gamer-grade Ryzen 5000 HX-series providing and was an incredibly quick CPU simply final 12 months. That the tiny Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 can outpace it in a multi-core load is just superb.

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Up subsequent is Cinebench R23 once more, however set to run on a single CPU thread. This truly in all probability flies nearer to what most individuals do on a PC as few shopper functions will use all of the CPU cores accessible to them. Single-threaded efficiency can also be actually arduous to enhance upon usually. The excellent news is the Ryzen 6000 nonetheless stays forward of all AMD CPUs, besting each the Ryzen 9 5000 CPUs right here, in addition to the 11th gen Core i7-11800H (no shock.) Intel’s Alder Lake, although, once more struts throughout the sphere although with a hefty 18 p.c benefit albeit in a a lot greater laptop computer. We do assume the Ryzen 9 6900HS does pretty nicely total however Intel’s 12th-gen continues to be in entrance right here.

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Moving on from Cinebench, we additionally use Chaos Group’s V-Ray 5 to measure CPU efficiency. It’s one other 3D renderer, and one of many few functions we all know that has an Academy Award. That tells you its pedigree.

Overall, we once more see the 12th-gen Intel chip with 14-cores forward of the pack, however the hole has closed with the Ryzen 9 6900HS in that tiny Asus G14 laptop computer simply 10 p.c behind it regardless of having considerably fewer cores. Again (and extra impressively) we see the Ryzen 9 6900HS merely faculty all different AMD CPUs, clocking in at virtually 12 p.c quicker than the Ryzen 9 5900HX. It doesn’t win right here, however when you think about the context of the Ryzen 9 6900HS being in a smaller and far lighter laptop computer, it’s spectacular once more.

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If V-ray says Hollywood, MCU, and blockbuster films, the free and open-source Blender is the alternative—it’s typically used for small indie movies and by different individuals who merely want entry to a free (but very highly effective) 3D modeling and rendering software. For a check scene, we use the Barbership Interior CPU workload and the Cycles renderer. The 12th-gen Core i9-12900HK is once more the winner, however in Blender, it’s actually sweating, because it finishes rendering the scene simply 5.6 p.c quicker than the Ryzen 9 6900HS.

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Encode efficiency

Moving on from 3D modeling, our subsequent appears at video encoding utilizing the free, open, and standard Handbrake encoder. For the check we use the 1.5.1 model and convert the “open-source” 4K Tears of Steel video utilizing the H.265 MKV preset on the CPU. CPU encodes, video nerds inform us, nonetheless typically yield the best high quality encodes, however they take for much longer than GPU encodes. Handbrake typically likes extra cores, however that’s not the one factor that issues. The winner is the 12th-gen Core i9-12900HK but it surely simply barely will get its nostril over the end line earlier than the Ryzen 9 6900HS crosses it. That the Ryzen 6000 CPU can barely outpace the Ryzen 9 5900HX and breath down the neck of that 12th-gen CPU, all whereas being in a skinny and light-weight laptop computer, once more says an entire lot greater than merely profitable the general race to us.

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As we stated, CPU-based encodes are what video nerds inform us they favor, however when the CPUs have built-in {hardware} encoders, why hassle to attend? For this check, we encode the identical Tears of Steel 4K video, however use the H.265 operating on both Intel’s Quick Sync or AMD’s VCE options. Those video-enders, nonetheless, typically want software program help. For instance, Intel has lengthy been lively serving to to optimize Handbrake to make use of its QuickSync expertise and it exhibits, as all three Intel CPUs cross the end line first. 

The Ryzen 9 6900HS doesn’t impress in anyway, which makes us suspect the Ryzen 9 6900HS’s media engine might not be supported by the model of Handbrake we’re operating but. We’ll should revisit this sooner or later with up to date variations of Handbrake—and likewise look a bit more durable on the rating for the Ryzen 9 5900HX, which is simply funky. That rating, we’ll be aware, isn’t because of us operating it incorrectly, as we seen its decrease efficiency regardless of being run with the identical settings. The takeaway right here is Intel’s years of Quick Sync help in Handbrake is paying dividends however AMD’s VCE (when it’s supported, like within the Ryzen 9 5980HS) isn’t too shabby.

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Adobe Creative Cloud Performance

What’s the killer app on the PC (and Mac) at present? Adobe Creative Cloud. With a secure of stars starting from Photoshop to Premiere, you mainly don’t have a competing shopper and enterprise platform should you don’t have the help of Adobe Creative Cloud. To see how nicely the laptop computer chips do right here, we use workstation vendor Puget System’s set of “PugetBench” benchmarks that run the functions by way of a script of duties to supply a rating. First up is PugetBench Premiere.

We truly run the benchmark two methods: First with every laptop computer’s discrete graphics playing cards enabled, and with them disabled. The second technique offers us a bit extra perception into how every laptop computer CPU’s built-in graphics would deal with the job. It additionally helps take away the disparity in discrete GPUs from the image too. As Intel and AMD push larger efficiency CPUs with out discrete GPUs in any respect, it’s additionally truly potential that is the efficiency you’ll see in a laptop computer you’d purchase.

The massive, enormous winner is the MSI GE76 Raider with its 12th-gen Intel CPU and GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Laptop inside. Software optimization issues and Nvidia has lengthy labored with Adobe to help GPU-encoding and GPU-based results, which typically offers it the sting.

The All-AMD Asus ROG Zephyrus G14, nonetheless, does comparatively nicely. As we stated, Adobe functions have a tendency to easily run quicker on Nvidia GPUs, however the Ryzen 9 6900HS and Radeon RX 6800S combo is pretty aggressive with the Ryzen 9 5900HX and GeForce RTX 3080 inside a 6 pound laptop computer. With the discrete GPUs disabled, the Ryzen 9 5900HX manages to muscle by the Ryzen 9 6900HS but it surely’s fairly shut.

Unfortunately, we have been unable to put in the scripts for the Ryzen 9 4900HS laptop computer. We additionally determined towards operating it on the two.8 pound MSI Prestige 14 Evo for time’s sake. PugetBench additionally recommends having a minimal of 32GB to run the benchmark so it’s in all probability for the higher.

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Huge, sprawling trendy functions like Premiere imply one set of scripts doesn’t let you know the entire story, and efficiency might differ relying on the duty you do within the software. To get a fuller image, we additionally run UL’s Procyon Video Editing check which, like PugetBench, duties Premiere with exporting video utilizing 4 completely different video codecs from a timeline with results like Lumitri Color changes added to the video. Procyon doesn’t have the steep necessities of PugetBench both. Like PugetBench, we ran Procyon Video Editing with the discrete GPUs enabled and disabled.

The winner is once more Intel’s Core i9-12900HK and GeForce RTX 3080 Ti combo however the Ryzen 9 6900HS and Radeon RX 6800S is surprisingly aggressive with the bigger Ryzen 9 5900HX and GeForce RTX 3080 Laptop mixture. With the discrete GPUs turned off, the Ryzne 9 6900HS and its RDNA2 graphics are solidly in entrance of all others besides Intel’s 12th-gen behemoth.

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If a working photographer had to decide on between Photoshop and Lightroom Classic, we guess the bulk would choose Lightroom Classic. It is, in spite of everything, the applying that makes it potential to slog by way of the 4,000 pictures they took at an occasion.

Intel etches strong wins this class once more with the 12th-gen laptop computer a strong entrance runner, however the 4 lbs. Xenia 15 KC with its 11th-gen Core i7-11800H additionally outpaces Team Red. The excellent news for the Ryzen 9 6900HS is it’s no less than in entrance of all different Ryzen CPUs, together with the bigger Ryzen 9 5900HX laptop computer.

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We simply trash-talked Photoshop a bit, however we admit, it’s the applying that launched 1,000,000 superbly photoshopped memes. For this check, we run PugetBench’s Photoshop with the discrete GPU enabled and disabled, and the Ryzen 9 and Radeon RX 6800S pull off first rate scores. Although it will probably’t overpower the large, quick GE76 Raider’s 12th-gen Core i9 and 3080 Ti combo, the diminutive ROG Zephyrus G14 runs solidly forward of the remainder of the pack. We’ll have an interest to see how the Intel and Nvidia mixture do when extra constrained by thinner and lighter laptops.

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Our closing Adobe Creative Cloud check makes use of UL’s Procyon Photo Editing benchmark, which mixes Photoshop and Lightroom Classic. The check is lighter responsibility than PugetBench and we see the Ryzen 9 and Radeon RX 6800S in a strong place. With the discrete GPU on, it’s basically tied with the GeForce RTX 3070-based laptop computer, and nearly 13 p.c behind the GE76 Raider. With the discrete GPU off, the Ryzen 9 6900HS is barely quicker than the Ryzen 9 5900HX and has the 12th-gen Core i9 wanting nervously in its rear view mirror. 

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Office 365 Performance

In the world we dwell in, a ton extra individuals run Microsoft Office 365 than Adobe Creative Cloud. Sure, that might not be by alternative, however should you dwell the cubicle life and discover pleasure in hitting reply-all on company-wide emails, it issues.

To gauge efficiency in Office 365, we use UL’s Procyon Office, which runs Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook by way of a set of scripted duties in the best way you may run it. That is, all 4 functions are open without delay and switched between.

Pretty a lot any pc can run Microsoft Office 365 simply superb. That doesn’t imply there isn’t a quicker one although. The winner is the 12th-gen Intel laptop computer total which shouldn’t shock anybody. The Ryzen 9 6900HS nonetheless does comparatively nicely however there are some odd outcomes. While it appears to run Word virtually as quick because the 12th-gen laptop computer, PowerPoint is bizarrely off the tempo with the ROG Zephyrus G14 truly being the slowest laptop computer right here—in PowerPoint. That’s superb although because it appears to make up for it Word and Excel.

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Office 365 might appear to be a boringly productive instrument however we will not say that about Excel. After all, it’s a legit esport now with even ESPN taking discover. To rejoice Excel’s time to shine, we requested a prime Excel esport competitor to supply us with a spreadsheet he makes use of in real-life to measure efficiency on a PC. Our full interview with Jason Moore will get into all kinds of fascinating nitty-gritty particulars in regards to the lifetime of an Excel energy consumer, however the spreadsheet is legit because it’s about as real-world as you may get.

We’re nonetheless attempting to determine what makes Excel zing and we’ve seen some actual head-scratching outcomes right here, similar to a 4-core Core i7-1195G7 with 16GB of RAM out carry out 8-core Ryzen CPUs with 32GB of RAM. And whereas that 8-core 11th-gen CPU appears first rate, we’ve additionally seen a 6-core Ninth-gen Core i7-9750H flip in about the identical rating.

Trying to determine why the outcomes are all around the map could be enjoyable, however within the real-world, that doesn’t matter. The solely factor that issues is ready to get a consequence so you’ll find out the place to take a position your cash. Time actually is cash on the earth the place Excel lives. So take that glory-seeking Photoshop.

The excellent news for Ryzen 9 6900HS is its efficiency. It finishes recalculating 38 p.c quicker than the Ryzen 9 5980HS, and 35 p.c quicker than the Ryzen 9 5900HX. It doesn’t outpace the mighty 12th-gen Core i9-12900HK, which finishes the duty in 23 p.c much less time in its a lot bigger laptop computer, however the brand new Ryzen 6000 is solidly quicker than all others. Why? Who cares, we simply need to earn money.

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Browser efficiency

Arguably the one software you can’t do with out at present is the browser. Having a handy guide a rough searching efficiency is usually how individuals decide how briskly a PC is so we tasked the laptops with operating Google Chrome 98 by way of 4 standard browser benchmarks. These checks would usually be used to gauge precise browser efficiency however since we’re operating the very same browser model on every laptop computer, the pocket book {hardware} is what’s shifting the efficiency needle round. The winner once more is the large quick GE76 Raider and its 12th-gen Core i9. The Ryzen 9 6900HS is solidly in second place, nonetheless, and principally outperforms all different CPUs not named 12th gen.

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AI efficiency

AI use on the PC is arguably nonetheless very skinny, however what we’ve seen of it tells us it’s solely going to get extra essential. AI on our telephones and within the cloud for picture recognition is proving to be invaluable, so why not do it in your PC? To dip our toe into that, we run Nero Score, which is a free AI benchmark primarily based on Intel’s OpenVino framework. Yes, Intel’s OpenVino. Intel has invested tens of millions on this space and you may contemplate this a robust house subject benefit for Intel CPUs. 

How a lot of a house subject benefit? Obviously the 12th-gen Alder late laptop computer knocks it out of the park, however within the AI phototagging check, the Core i7-1195G7 is barely quicker than the Ryzen 9 5900HS. It wasn’t going to win anyway however the excellent news for the Ryzen 9 6900HS is it far outperforms the Ryzen 9 4900HS and the Ryzen 9 5980HS, beating them by 67 p.c and 38 p.c respectively. It additionally exhibits a sizeable improve over older Ryzen CPUs in Nero’s AVC decode/encode check as nicely. As the world heads towards extra AI use on the PC, that is no less than a very good step for AMD.

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Geekbench efficiency

Our subsequent benchmark is the stupidly standard Geekbench 5 benchmark. It’s a collection of quick programming loops constructed round duties similar to textual content compression, encryption, and JPG decompression. The Ryzen 9 6900HS is the strong second place finisher total and once more exhibits particularly nicely towards previous-gen Ryzen 5000-based laptops in multi-core efficiency.

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Besides testing CPU-based duties, Geekbench additionally has a mode to measure standard duties utilizing OpenCL on the GPU. For our check, we ran Geekbench on each the built-in graphics of the CPUs in addition to the discrete GPU. The Radeon RX 6800S will get paved over by the higher-wattage GeForce GPUs however there’s a very good glimmer of sunshine on the IGP check.

The Radeon RDNA 2 architecture within the Ryzen 9 6900HS defeats all, together with the 12th-gen laptop computer’s DDR5-fed graphics to the tune of 61 p.c. It’s additionally about 107 p.c quicker than the Radeon IGP within the Ryzen 9 5980HS.

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Gaming efficiency

That brings us to the gaming efficiency of the Radeon RX 6800S. Modern laptop computer GPUs are largely gated by the facility they’ll eat. The larger the wattage, the upper the efficiency typically. To us, the query right here isn’t whether or not the 110 watt Radeon RX 6800S within the tiny ROG Zephyrus G14 can outpace the 175 watt GeForce RTX 3080 Ti within the massive 12th-gen GE76 Raider. It merely can’t. The query is the way it performs towards GPUs nearer to its wattage envelope.

Overall, we’d say the Radeon RX 6800S performs fairly nicely. It can run with and generally outperform the 130 watt GeForce RTX 3080 Laptop GPU within the Scar G17 laptop computer, in addition to the 140 watt GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop GPU within the Xenia 15 KC. What makes that every one the extra spectacular is simply how compact and light-weight the all-AMD ROG Zephyrus G14 is at solely 3.7 lbs. We suspect placing a GeForce RTX 3080 right into a laptop computer as tiny because the G14 might give the benefit to the Radeon.

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To get another opinion on the place the efficiency of the Radeon RX 6800S falls, we additionally run UL’s 3DMark Time Spy benchmark, which once more tells us the GPU is within the neighborhood of a GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop or GeForce 3080 Laptop GPU with bigger energy budgets. We’ll should see the place the chips fall after we check extra skinny and light-weight laptops with these GPUs, however we’re fairly certain the facility constraints are more likely to make an fascinating contest. The Radeon RX 6800S has nice gaming chops.

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Most individuals who purchase a laptop computer with a strong discrete GPU received’t use the built-in graphics for gaming, however one of the crucial thrilling developments with Ryzen 6000 is the usage of built-in Radeon RDNA 2 graphics cores and DDR5 RAM. To get a glimpse of the place the Ryzen 6000’s built-in graphics efficiency falls, we run 3DMark Time Spy on it. The winner: The RDNA 2-based Radeon inside the Ryzen 9 6900HS which is available in a whopping 33 p.c quicker than the IGP in Intel’s 12th-gen Core i9-12900HK.

What this implies is you may get way more playable body charges at 1080p with sport settings turned all the way down to low if it’s a milder sport. For laptops with discrete GPUs it’s no massive deal, however desktop APUs primarily based on new RDNA 2 graphics cores could also be fairly spectacular for funds players after they arrive.

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Our final 3DMark outcomes appears on the PCIe efficiency of the laptops. AMD’s earlier designs restricted the GPU to 8 lanes of PCIe Gen 3, which was apparently achieved to avoid wasting energy. Today, that’s not sufficient bandwidth to attach a high-performance RDNA 2 GPU to the CPU, so AMD has elevated it to PCIe Gen 4, which can also be the identical resolution Intel made for its new 12th-gen CPUs. As we will see from 3DMark’s PCIe function check, the CPU to GPU bandwidth is about 13GBps and a really hefty enchancment over the earlier design’s 6GBps.

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Battery life

Battery comparisons of a laptop computer are fraught with caveats as a result of so many elements impression battery life aside from CPU. The display screen decision and measurement of the battery, for instance, tangibly transfer the needle in how lengthy a laptop computer will run. Still, you need to see the outcomes for these laptop computer configurations, so we ran our commonplace battery run check, which loops the Tears of Steel 4K video in airplane mode, with earbuds plugged in at 50 p.c quantity and the display screen brightness set to a comparatively vibrant 250 to 260 nits. The chart beneath denotes the dimensions of the battery and determination of the panel for reference.

The finest efficiency needs to be of no shock: The MSI Prestige 14 Evo is a lightweight extremely moveable with out discrete graphics and turns in a run time simply over 10 hours. Most of the laptops with discrete GPUs land at simply over six hours of run time, which is truthful for this class of pocket book. Video playback, nonetheless, might be one of many best duties a laptop computer can do at present. We plan extra battery checks as time permits to see if AMD’s declare of providing “hours” of endurance benefit is actual or not. For now, simply know operating video provides you with truthful runtime, however operating the GPU or CPU arduous will significantly diminish how lengthy your laptop computer stays powered-up in the actual world.

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Conclusion

We’ll shut out our evaluate the place we started, with Cinebench, however this time utilizing the older R20 model. For this comparability we run it on a single-thread then transfer all the best way as much as the utmost variety of threads on a CPU. Below, you’ll be able to see the outcomes of the Ryzen 9 6900HS in a skinny and light-weight gaming laptop computer towards a Ryzen 9 5900HX in a thick and heavy gaming laptop computer. The darker crimson bars characterize efficiency of the Ryzen 6000, whereas the lighter crimson are the Ryzen 5000. While you may simply shrug, the important thing take away from the outcomes is a skinny and light-weight laptop computer is definitely barely outperforming one of many quicker CPUs of 2021 in a a lot thicker, a lot heavier laptop computer. That’s value celebrating.

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A extra affordable comparability could be the Ryzen 9 6900HS versus the Ryzen 9 5980HS, which is nearer to its class. To make it easier to see the rise in efficiency, we’re solely exhibiting the p.c improve per-thread from the Ryzen 5000 to the Ryzen 6000. As you’ll be able to see, the newer Ryzen 9 6900HS is pushing fairly respectable velocity improve in comparison with what was the very best Ryzen 9 HS-class CPU of final 12 months.

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You’re in all probability questioning how the Ryzen 9 6800HS compares to Intel’s 12th-gen Core i9-12900HK, which we’ll present you beneath—however not with out mentioning but once more that we’re taking a look at a really thick and heavy laptop computer versus a skinny and light-weight one. Still, it’s all blue right here as a result of there’s nothing the 12th gen Core i9-12900HK offers up towards the brand new Ryzen 9 6900HS. The laptop computer can also be virtually twice as heavy too, nonetheless.

How Intel’s 12th-gen elements examine to Ryzen 6000 actually can’t be decided till we’ve seen extra Alder Lake laptops, particularly these inside skinny and light-weight laptops. The preliminary spherical of 12th-gen laptops despatched to reviewers centered on heavy, gaming-grade H-series chips. It’s completely potential that with the tighter thermal and energy constraints of a skinny and light-weight laptop computer, Intel’s 12th-gen chips and AMD’s Ryzen 6000 cell CPUs is likely to be quite a bit nearer than we anticipate them to be. At the identical time, the Ryzen 6000 gives a hefty enchancment in graphics efficiency, and when paired with its Radeon companion, it’s more likely to shut the hole much more.

The upshot in all this it appears prefer it appears like we nonetheless have a ball sport relating to high-performance laptop computer processors, so don’t depart your seats and head for the exits simply but.

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