CPU

Not long ago, AMD announced that it will introduce a new feature called Curve Optimizer as part of the Precision Boost Overdrive 2. According to AMD, this feature set should only come with AGESA 1.1.8.0., but it seems that AGESA 1.1.0.0. Patch D firmware on the MSI B450 Tomahawk motherboard already has …

Intel Rocket Lake-S processors are expected to launch soon and we've seen plenty of rumours regarding specs. So far, the line-up has 4 SKUs: the i5-11400, the i5-11600K, the i7-11700K, and the i9-11900K. The expected specs of all four CPUs have now been revealed.  Twitter user @davidbepo (via Wccftech) shared the alleged specifications …

Apple just recently launched the first Apple Silicon powered Macs, all featuring the Apple M1 ARM-based SoC. The M1 is an entry-level chip for Macs, but a more powerful high-performance chip is apparently just around the corner and reportedly, it'll outperform Intel.  According to Bloomberg, a new high-performance Apple Silicon …

A cracking CPU you will want, but let us know if you can find it for sale anywhere !

Leo recently sat through an Intel briefing relating to benchmarking laptops and focusing on performance both with and without the power adapter connected. Throughout, Intel was keen to highlight the AMD drops performance by a higher percentage in their own testing. Luke and Leo discuss this briefing and wonder why Intel is so keen to publicise AMD's weaknesses rather than focusing on its own strengths.

Ryzen 5000 has launched and both Luke and Leo are impressed by the performance offered up by the chips. Some of AMD's pricing decisions seem a bit bizarre, though, and have let Intel back into the picture with some of their ageing refined 14nm processors. Let's discuss Ryzen 5000, Zen 3, Intel competition, and more availability woes.

AMD previously announced that 400-series motherboards would gain support for Smart Access Memory and Ryzen 5000 CPUs in January 2021. As it turns out, motherboard makers are eager to get the update out early, with beta versions of the BIOS already publicly available.  Motherboard vendors have started shipping a beta …

AMD's Ryzen 5000U CPUs are expected to arrive within the next few months, with a mix of Zen 2 refreshed SKUs and newer Zen 3 models. Recent leaks have started to point towards what performance we can expect from these upcoming processors.  A Geekbench 5 database entry for the Ryzen …

AMD is getting ready to launch a new version of Precision Boost Overdrive. Also known as PBO. This tool is often used to overclock Ryzen processors, but with Precision Boost Overdrive 2, undervolting will also be possible. Precision Boost Overdrive 2 behaviour will be based on three aspects: CPU temperature, socket …

We assess AMD's 8-core Zen 3 processor, the Ryzen 7 5800X

Intel has confirmed that the Ice Lake-SP 3rd Gen Xeon processors will go into mass-production in Q1 2021. Additionally, Intel has shared a few more details about the upcoming server processors, while also claiming that they are faster than the 64-core EPYC Rome processors at certain workloads. The Intel Ice Lake-SP …

Following the announcement that Nvidia is developing a Smart Access Memory alternative, AMD has released a statement sharing new information about its technology. According to the company, Smart Access Memory won't be supported on older hardware, but AMD is welcoming other hardware vendors to use it.

Intel has already started to ship its first Tiger Lake processors, but higher-end Tiger Lake processors are expected to come in early 2021. As the release of these mobile high-powered processors comes closer, the first benchmark of a Tiger Lake-H processors has been spotted. For now, Intel has only released …

Apple is promising that the 2020 MacBook Air is faster than “98 percent of PC laptops sold in the last year”, and based on new benchmark scores, there's a good chance that it will be. The Apple M1 APU is the company's first laptop processor. Powered by TSMC's 5nm process node, …

Despite claims that Ryzen 5000 processors wouldn't be supported on 300-series motherboards, screenshots of a Ryzen 9 5900X running on an A320 motherboard have been spotted on a Chinese forum. AMD has only officially announced support for Ryzen 5000 processors on 500-series and 400-series motherboards, leaving 300-series motherboard owners out …

AMD's next-gen laptop processors aren't expected until early 2021, but listings for them are already popping up in the wild.

After a one month wait, AMD has officially released the first Ryzen 5000 series processors, starting at the top with the Ryzen 9 5950X and going down to the Ryzen 5 5600X. With retailers now able to list and ship the CPUs, we take a look at UK availability and …

AMD's Ryzen 9 5900X is here - how does it stack up against the competition?

Just how good is AMD's new 16-core 5950X CPU?

In the last week of October we heard about the Acer Swift 3x laptop with Intel Iris Xe Max graphics and were at a bit of a loss as this was a new name that Intel had not yet revealed. A few days later we had a call with Intel that made things clearer and now, on 1st November, you will find a handful of laptops that use Intel Max. Leo took the opportunity to address the question 'What the Heck is Intel Iris Xe Max?'

In the latest video from Leo, he discusses Intel Rocket Lake S and the possible problems Intel might have. Leo also took the time to ask Intel a couple of questions about the upcoming launch. Leo, as always speaks his mind and asks the tough questions. Leo discusses his thoughts on the new platform, including the Rocket Lake S maximum core count of 8 (16 threads) as well as some of their claims, The Intel XE graphics, Intel Deep Learning, the new Intel 500 Series chipset and their new memory controller with official support of DDR4 3200 memory speeds. But what about the clock speeds?

Intel has detailed its upcoming Rocket Lake-S processor architecture. Scheduled for release in Q1 2021, Rocket Lake-S has appeared in multiple leaks and rumours, but it was only confirmed by Intel recently. A new presentation on Rocket Lake-S confirms some rumours and denies others. Rocket Lake-S will feature up to …

We already got a glimpse of what the Ryzen 5 5600X will be capable of, but with the new CPU-Z results, we now also have an idea of how the Ryzen 7 5800X and the Ryzen 9 5950X will perform once we have them in our hands.

An alleged roadmap of the Intel Xeon series of processors has leaked, showing when we can expect to see the release of the long-awaited Ice Lake and Sapphire Rapids server processors. During Intel's recent quarterly earnings call, CEO Bob Swan claimed that they are “targeting qualification” of the 3rd Gen Intel Xeon …

AMD has risen to the top of the PassMark single-threaded benchmark chart. The new chart puts the Ryzen 5 5600X at the very top, beating out plenty of Intel Core i9 and Core i7 SKUs along the way. The 6C/12T Ryzen 5 5600X, featuring a max boost clock of 4.6GHz, …

New benchmark entries of the upcoming Ryzen 5000 processors were spotted on the SiSoftware database. The results were put in comparison with previous generations SKUs, showing significant improvements in both arithmetic and multi-media benchmarks.

Two entries of the AMD Ryzen 9 5950X have been spotted on the Geekbench database. One of these entries shows the AMD processor was running on in an iMac Pro and it was clocked at 6.0GHz, which is quite the impressive figure.  The two entries spotted on Geekbench (1, 2) …

With the Ryzen 5000 series from AMD now officially on the way, motherboard makers are planning their BIOS updates for older motherboards. In the case of MSI, we have some good news, as the company has announced that all of its 400-series motherboards will support AMD's latest processors.

A picture of an alleged Alder Lake-S processor has surfaced. This image shows the back of the processor compared to the back of the currently available Comet Lake-S processors, giving us an estimate of its size and a look at some of the physical differences between both architectures. Intel Alder …

An AMD slide belonging to the “When Gaming Begins” presentation has leaked, detailing the memory overclocking in Ryzen 5000 desktop processors. As per this slide, “DDR4-4000 is to Ryzen 5000 series as DDR4-3800 was to AMD Ryzen 3000 series”. The slide shared by TechnoPat, details what Infinity Fabric clock (fclk), …