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AMD’s CES 2025 announcements include what will probably be yet another ‘world’s fastest’ CPUMore 3D V-Cache processors, handheld gaming chips, and even two new graphics cards
More 3D V-Cache processors, handheld gaming chips, and even two new graphics cards
Image credit:AMD
Image credit:AMD
No pricing (or exact release date) on these yet, but they both up the core and thread counts over the 9800X3D while peaking at higher boost clock speeds. And, of course, they share the same 3D V-Cache design that makes the 9800X3D such a superlative CPU in the first place. If you don’t know what this is and how it helps game performance, imagine how much faster you could eat Wotsits if you had a massive bucket of them on your desk at all times, instead of having to get up and walk to the kitchen to grab individual packs. In this case the Wotsits are data, the bucket is 3D V-Cache, and the hastened ruination of your digestive system is games running faster.
I wouldn’t bet against the Ryzen 9 9950X3D nabbing the Ryzen 7 9800X3D’s crown as the king of gaming CPUs, though whether it (and the Ryzen 9 9900X3D) are actually worth buying will surely come down to price. The 9800X3D is already a super-duper-premium part, and won’t stop bossing games just because something with 24MB more cache comes along, so it could feasibly remain the one to upgrade to if you don’t do the kind of multitasking or media work that would benefit from the added threads.
AMD’s new handheld processors, also unveiled at CES, are a more diverse bunch. In addition to the Ryzen Z2 and Ryzen Z2 Extreme – direct replacements for the Z1 chips powering handhelds like the AsusROG Ally,ROG Ally X, andLenovo Legion Go– there’s also a Ryzen Z2 Go designed for cheaper portables. It’s this modest, 4 core/8 thread part that forms the brain of the $599Lenovo Legion Go Sthat also got a CES reveal yesterday.
Curiously, these are a mishmash of various generations of AMD Zen CPU and RDNA graphics tech: the Ryzen Z2 Extreme combines Zen 3 and Zen 5c cores, as well as RDNA 3.5 integrated graphics, while the standard Z2 is built around RDNA 3. The Z2 Go relies on the even older RDNA 2, much like theSteam Deck’s custom AMD APU, so it’ll be interesting to see how the three compare when actually running games. Just don’t expect that to happen on a new Deck version, as Valve engineer Pierre-Loup Griffais took toBlueskyto shut down rumours of a Z2-powered Steam Deck successor.
Image credit:Lenovo
Also curious was the lack of detail AMD gave their other ‘big’ announcement, the first RDNA 4GPUs: the Radeon RX 9070 and RX 9070 XT. No specs, price, release window, nada. They exist. That’s your lot. It took a since-deleted Asus post (well caught,PCG) to even let slip that they’d come with 16GB of VRAM.
