Lengthen / AMD’s Ryzen 7 5800X3D.
Andrew Cunningham
AMD’s AM4 socket has had a prolonged and successful fling on the desktop, ushering within the Ryzen processor lineup and serving to AMD compete with and outperform Intel’s chips for the first time since the mid-2000s.
The aging socket’s time is coming to a finish later this three hundred and sixty five days when the Ryzen 7000-series chips are launched, nonetheless AMD is sending it off with one final high-performance processor: the Ryzen 7 5800X3D, which launches on April 20th for $449.
AMD uses a obvious packaging technology known as “3D V-Cache” to triple the quantity of L3 cache on the processor, from 32MB for the frequent Ryzen 5800X to a whopping 96MB. This unique tech feels cherish an experiment in some strategies. Unlike other Ryzen CPUs, the 5800X3D would no longer offer overclocking or energy consumption controls, and its clock speeds are a limited bit decrease than the frequent 5800X. But AMD says that the extra cache enables the 5800X3D to outrun Intel’s quickest CPUs in terms of gaming.
We now beget fling some assessments on the 5800X3D to search out its strengths and weaknesses and to derive a strategy of if you are going to glimpse the influence of the extra cache. Here’s the truth is an inviting processor, nonetheless its pricing and extraordinarily particular performance advantages will limit it to a arena of interest of a arena of interest.
3D V-Cache, in transient
Lengthen / A visualization of AMD’s 3D V-Cache.
AMD
Architecturally, nothing about the Zen 3 cores that energy the 5800X3D has modified when put next to the vanilla 5800X. We’re serene talking about an 8-core, 16-thread core advanced die (CCD) constructed on TSMC’s 7 nm process, with its 32MB of L3 cache intact. Correct as Apple bulit interconnect enhance into the M1 Max to enhance the M1 Ultra, AMD created Zen 3 to enhance 3D V-Cache technology on every occasion it used to be ready to ship.
The major trade is that AMD and TSMC beget reduced the bodily top of the CCD die so that a CPU kit with 3D V-Cache won’t want to be physically taller than a CPU kit with out it. This adjustment preserves compatibility with existing CPU coolers.
The 64MB of extra L3 cache, also constructed on TSMC’s 7 nm process, is physically stacked on the Zen 3 CCD and connected with yelp copper-to-copper bonding. The is something that the system sees as one gigantic pool of L3 cache that might presumably all be treated the identical—the 64MB of stacked cache isn’t an L4 cache, and the 32MB of L3 cache constructed into the CCD doesn’t beget any performance profit when put next to the cache stacked on top.
Lengthen / Copper-to-copper bonding is old to fuse the CCD and the extra cache collectively.
AMD
One aspect extinguish of this packaging technology is that the 5800X3D runs at a noticeably slower clock wander than the 5800X, and AMD doesn’t officially allow any overclocking or energy adjustments when utilizing the 5800X3D. AMD is pushing the 5800X3D mainly as a gaming processor, and that’s because video games profit extra repeatedly from having a higher pool of cache to play with. For workloads that care less about cache and extra about clock wander—as we’ll glimpse when we launch up benchmarking—the 5800X3D will also be slower than the regular 5800X, which AMD freely admits.
| AMD’s 8-core Zen 3 CPUs | Boulevard stamp | Clocks (Unfriendly/Boost) | L3 cache | TDP | PCIe enhance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ryzen 7 5700G | $280-300 | 3.8/4.6 | 16MB | 65W | 3.0 |
| Ryzen 7 5700X | $299 | 3.4/4.6 | 32MB | 65W | 4.0 |
| Ryzen 7 5800X | $340-360 | 3.8/4.7 | 32MB | 105W | 4.0 |
| Ryzen 7 5800X3D | $449 | 3.4/4.5 | 96MB | 105W | 4.0 |
AMD played coy about whether we would count on future Zen 3 CPUs with 3D V-Cache enabled, nonetheless reading between the traces, it appears to be like unlikely. 3D V-Cache will be one amongst the instruments in AMD’s toolbox in terms of boosting performance for Zen 4 and the first Socket AM5 platforms—along with a 5nm TSMC process, DDR5 enhance, and other architectural improvements—nonetheless I don’t derive the sense that the 5800X3D will be adopted up with an expanded lineup of Zen 3-basically based mostly mostly X3D chips.
AMD says that motherboards will want a BIOS replace to glimpse and spend the extra 64MB of cache—glimpse AGESA model 1.2.0.6b or increased within the release notes. Motherboards that enhance other Ryzen 5000 CPUs will work with the 5800X3D, nonetheless they won’t be ready to derive admission to the extra cache, defeating the reason for spending extra money on the CPU within the first save.
