AMD Ryzen 7 7840U Performance Benchmarks on Linux
phoronix.com
phoronix.com
Although not Linux specific, the nice thing about Notebookcheck is they have a nice database of other CPUs/devices that you can easily compare against. ServeTheHome has been reviewing a lot of these minipcs as well, here's their review of another one w/ Linux compile times and a few other Linux benchmarks: https://www.servethehome.com/minisforum-um790-pro-review-big...
For those that don't know, the U, HS, and H chips are basically the same chip with slightly different bins and usually can have their TDP modified in BIOS, via Ryzen Master, or third party tools like RyzenAdj (Phoenix support: https://github.com/FlyGoat/RyzenAdj/pull/256) to perform pretty closely. (This generation the HX is a '7045' chip is closer to a desktop chip than a mobile APU)
I really hope they stay alive in this video review age.
I didn't know about that. Do you have citations or benchmarks?
Note, each laptop manufacturer may choose their different power limits (and like Intel, AMD's curves are largely driven by temperature, so dependent on cooling solution and other settings).
This is a good summary of some of how Ryzen Mobile's power limiting works (actually, read that whole wiki if you're interested in the topic): https://github.com/FlyGoat/RyzenAdj/wiki/Renoir-Tuning-Guide
I'd also look up "AMD PMF" (their equivalent of DPTF) which only recently made it's way to the Linux kernel (but of course, that will include loads of details anyone can look through): https://www.phoronix.com/news/AMD-PMF-CnQF-Linux-6.1
Things like good power management are not a given on competing products, I routinely see the "clones" coming in with 5-10w higher idle power (which is like, double) than the first-party product (most recently Atlas Canyon vs the third-party Tremont clones). Intel is selling to big corporate customers who care a lot about wasting 5W here and 10W there and they took the time to squeeze that.
Also (and this is a more general problem) Intel actually took the time to make the wireless work properly. I've had good bluetooth on exactly three products: intel macbooks, apple silicon macbooks, and intel NUCs. This cuts across cheap/premium, even my Dell Latitude coffee lake laptop from my last job had problems - the keyboard would disconnect, or get stuck repeating a key over and over again. Part of it is that the Intel Wireless chipsets are notoriously bad... but Intel and Apple seem to be able to make them work, so.. To be clear I did have some occasional issues on my NUC but it was way way better than the laptop or any other machine I've ever used (including motherboard wifi with external antenna placed close, dongles on usb 2.0, dongles placed close, etc). On a USFF machine like a NUC that's kind of an important thing, the odds of users using wifi or bluetooth is much higher and it needs to be reliable.
Finally, if you are ever planning to do anything custom/fancy it's potentially nice to have the standardized product. You can get things like plug an OpenUPS directly into the aux power header on the NUC (and again, Intel deserves credit for taking the time to consistently implement these things!) or put it in a HDPlex or Akasa chassis for fanless operation or upgrading it with a pcie card (which runs off the m.2 slot). There's just a ton more of those options available if you're the industry standard.
It sucks, I really want to like the AMD stuff, and maybe it'd be fine just as a desktop replacement. But Intel is one of those cases where it's potentially worth it to spend slightly more for a slightly worse product and just accept that there is an unknown (but probably nonzero) amount of time and effort being saved for that expense, because you're buying a standard, fully-baked product.
Not that it doesn't mean Asus won't change the product eventually. Again, NUC in many ways was a very polished and premium product, and usually it was relatively expensive for what you got (which in a NUC7i7 was only a 2C4T!). Skull Canyon was Crystal Well 6775R 4C8T. But you got very premium features like M.2 and Thunderbolt and dual NICs on some of the products, and the atoms were very cheap for throwaway uses. Will Asus keep doing that? I saw the cute rebrand of PN50 4800U/4600U/4400U to PN51 5700U/5500U/5300U (which are still zen2!) and it soured me on their handling of their mini-pcs.
that started me looking at the rando chinese brand alternatives, and none of those seem to be very refined.
> For those interested, "embedded 4x4" is a good search term
nice tip, didn't know this one!
aliexpress has some weird stuff. there's C3750 5x10gbe SFP (or something) soft-switches and 6x 2.5GbE (225v3 or 226) 1165g7 soft-switches (which sadly don't support ECC!) etc. I almost think sometimes they just throw together random shit they have cheaply. Here's some... C3750 and intel X510 or X520? poof it's a switch.
Sadly there is a lack of NAS chassis type stuff. You'd think cutting into Synology/QNAP's gig would be profitable. Can't even buy barebones NAS chassis for your own build in most cases, the one I've used is U-NAS 810A but there's some things I'm not fond of with it too.
Asrock Rack and Supermicro both have a lot of good shit for whitebox nerd shit though. Shoutout to HDPLEX and Akasa too (and these guys make stuff for NUCs too).
One other cool thing you can find on Aliexpress is the Asrock X300TM, which is an embedded-market-only thin-ITX board with no chipset, just running off the Ryzen SOC. And thin-ITX actually is designed to be powered off an external 19v brick if you want, and it actually uses Intel cooler pattern (which opens up compatibility with some smaller/lower-profile stuff.
It's meant for ~15W thin and light devices, not thick gaming laptops, AMD has 35W parts for those.
Notable improvements from previous generation:
* AV1 encoding
* AVX512 supportMany benchmarks for these 2 models can be seen at:
https://www.servethehome.com/minisforum-um790-pro-review-big...
TLDR: Both Ryzen 9 7940HS and Ryzen 7 7840HS laptop CPUs (which are slower than the Ryzen HX laptop CPUs) are faster than the fastest 65 W desktop Intel Alder Lake CPU, Core i9-12900 (despite the fact that the latter not only uses more power, but it has 50% more threads).
And it's comparing against the previous generation 12900 instead of the current generation 13900.
And the extra threads on the 12900 are the E-cores, which aren't that fast.
Basically the result is that current gen AMD mobile CPUs are faster than last gen Intel desktop CPUs. Which is true, and not unimpressive, but far less informative than a comparison of like with like would have been.
https://www.amd.com/en/products/cpu/amd-ryzen-9-7950x https://www.amd.com/en/products/apu/amd-ryzen-9-7945hx
I have a Lenovo with a 5800U and temps are just fine. Never goes over 70C when benchmarking Cinebench at max boost on all cores. Pretty sure you're good if you at least dust the cooler regularly and repasted it correctly at least once since you bought it.
In my opinion, this is an incredibly stupid design choice.
After being once caught by surprise, now I check carefully for a specified working temperature of at least 40 degrees Celsius, whenever I am buying any laptop or desktop computers.
This, for example, disqualifies all Gigabyte small computers. Moreover, any computer which does not specify explicitly the maximum working temperature must be automatically disqualified, because it is overwhelmingly likely that it has been designed for 35 degrees Celsius and not for any higher temperature.
Some computers are guaranteed to work normally up to 35 degrees Celsius and to work with reduced performance between 35 degrees Celsius and 40 degrees Celsius, for instance many Intel NUCs. This is perfectly OK.
Operating Environment Temperature[1] Operating: 5°C (41°F) to 35°C (95°F) Storage and transportation in original shipping package: -20°C (-4°F ) to 60°C (140°F) Storage without package: 5°C (41°F) to 43°C (109°F) Humidity Operating: 8% to 95% at wet-bulb temperature 23°C (73°F) Storage and transportation: 5% to 95% at wet-bulb temperature 27°C (81°F) Altitude Maximum altitude (without pressurization): 3048 m (10,000 ft) Notes: 1. When you charge the battery, its temperature must be no lower than 10°C (50°F).
So if you're in a really hot climate that might not be enough. Rn it's 31°C here in the shadows and idling SoC temperature is ~45°C.
A while ago my laptop started running around 10°C hotter than it should have - turns out the iGPU was going wide open throttle for no apparent reason.
What I found was that CPU-intensive tasks slowed down as well, because those 10°C make a huge difference in terms of when the CPU starts throttling.
I wasn't bothered by this too much, even though I had to disable turbo altogether, until the first heat wave of the season hit - +10°C from the iGPU combined with +10°C from the heatwave slowed the device to a crawl - it was the first time I briefly saw it hit 102°C - that is actually above the usual safety threshold.
I think people in different climates either have A/C or are used to different levels of performance.
Apple's new chips are a GODSEND for laptops. My old Intel laptops would nearly instantly thermally throttle under any trivial load without air conditioning at full blast and a fan aimed at the machine.
It routinely hits 37-40C here during the summer /and/ 80%+ humidity.
A week ago it was ambient temp 39C with a Heat Index of 45C.
I hadn't thought about the Apple Silicon being a pro in that environment but now I'm tempted to get one lol.
My laptop idles at less than 20°C above ambient, so usually in the high 40s, but the fans already speed up when it reaches 60°C - at 37°C I have just a few degrees of wiggle room until inevitably it starts cooling more aggressively.
You just need to be able to afford it, and have the ok to install from the landlord, HOA, whatever, or actually OWN the place. Imagine...
https://www.servethehome.com/minisforum-um790-pro-review-big...
Very impressive machine, and quite affordable. Bonus points for Minisforum for offering barebones versions.
The only reason I didn't return my Beelink GTR7 is there was a deal and I got it for only ~$370 (barebones).
If I am running a beefy single threaded or multi program with CPU, I want the best, not some low power device. Gaming laptop.(Or whatever we want to call it)
If I'm running consumer/enterprise software, I likely want a beefy GPU. Gaming laptop.(Or whatever we want to call it)
If I'm taking a 7 hour bus ride in a bus without a 120V outlet, I want this.
If I'm taking a 6 hour bus ride in a bus without a 120V outlet, I want a gaming laptop.(Or whatever we want to call it)
What is the use case? I got a feeling these companies are chasing Apple's insignificant metric of compute/watt, which doesn't matter as far as I understand.
Also on the bus ride. I certainly wouldn't want to unpack a 17" gaming laptop on a bus of all places. You couldn't use a external mouse anyways. There I'd want a steam deck or Nintendo switch.
I just use the word gaming laptop because you can get high quality stuff for under $1000, or you can get ultra high quality for $3000 like a 4090.
I don't actually play games. Its a shortcut word.
That's the kind of machine I'd want docked at my desk, connected to multiple displays and all other peripherals. At that power efficiency and battery life are of little concern.
I snagged an Asus the other day with a 3060 + 16gb ram for $800 and its small/light weight. I don't think I've heard the fans on it, but I have kids hahaha
If battery life is a concern, how long do you need to remain on but not plugged in? I've used it in enough 2 hr meetings and I don't think I broke 50% battery. I'm doing CAD work/GPU work.
Then you have a good reason to go for a gaming laptop, because your GPU isn't one-ssh-away.
Gaming laptop also don't mean "high qualify", they just mean "high spec". Unless you really have need for higher spec (for example, you have, because of CAD work and needs GPU attached to a screen), it's better to allocate money to build quality, battery life, lower weight or even keyboard feeling.
That doesn't mean everyone else should do. Most of the software guys need "just enough" CPU power and close to zero GPU power on their laptop. When they need more compute their beefier desktop is 1-ssh away. (Or 1 aws ec2 run-instances away for even more power)
For now I'm equally pissed off because it seems like only Apple makes proper "just enough" laptops. And Apple isn't going to stop using aluminum any time soon so their laptop will be too heavy for me to consider.
I'm sure you are coming from something well intentioned, but those are specs as well. Not that I think they are worthwhile paying for, but these are still specs.
>Most of the software guys need "just enough" CPU power and close to zero GPU power on their laptop.
But if that was the case, I have a $100 craigslist laptop that has windows 7 on it from a long time ago. Heck, its good enough my kid can play minecraft on it, I'm sure it can SSH.
Seems like people really do want something nice, or they are okay with barebones. Somehow these low power CPUs are capturing a market that is overpaying or getting lower spec/$.
Well, sure, for weight. The other three I just can't tell until I try the thing for a week, it isn't spec if you can't tell anything after reading the spec.
> I'm sure it can SSH.
"just enough" means running a web browser, an IDE with a few background indexers for the code base I'm working on. That's a little bit too much for the $100 craigslist laptop, but yeah you are right, a $200 Chromebook works totally fine, except it had poor screen, poor keyboard and poor storage options. Want to know why I buy laptops with low power CPUs? They come with premium non-CPU parts and is both lighter and cheaper than ones with better CPUs.
Like, it's easy, anything >1.2kg is trash for me (which is equally arbitrary as your "non-low-power" constraint). Can you find me a nice <= 1.2kg laptop with so-called "non-low-power" CPUs? If so I'd be glad to try it, as it means maybe I can replace my laptop after 10 years instead of 5.
There's a decent chance that ryzen models with 740m or 760m that we'll probably see in cheaper ThinkPads won't be half bad either compared to the Intel alternative.
I wouldn't even get another 1650 even though it can do the job(CAD, AI Art, etc...)
>The Steam Deck GPU is based on hardware that is difficult to compare to typical PC video cards. However, the GPU’s maximum throughput of around 1.6 teraflops makes it loosely equivalent in power to an Nvidia GTX 1050 or GTX 950.
[0] https://www.gamerevolution.com/guides/687871-steam-deck-gpu-...
No True Scotsman aside, people can game how they choose. The bottom line is that many people are running new, AAA games on this tier of GPU. Is it the best possible fidelity? No, but presumably it is enough for them to derive some enjoyment.
They also have to dissipate the heat into something, which is often the chassis, and therefore your lap. Not fun in the summertime.
The higher power chips are only significantly faster on threaded workloads, so if most of your applications are poorly threaded it's a trade off in exchange for almost nothing.
Aside from a hardware defect at the beginning (cpu cooler not correctly installed), they disabled S3 sleep in BIOS after an update and sleep is sill broken. Unless I boot with `processor.max_cstate=1` the graphics lock up ~once a day (even if you keep it idle and on AC), and resume is more miss than hit.
It seems to be a known and ignored bios problem. (Some say on windows, too. I didn't check)
Wayland/sway might be less capable than good old X on resuming from graphics lockup, but I really disliked Thinkpad BIOS this time.
Before that they had BIOS versions that under-ran the fan so it overheated, versions that overran the fan constantly, and power management and wake-from-lid-closed under Linux has in general been a nightmare all along.
Lenovo's reputation for reliability has been heavily tarnished by this, but in particular I think going Ryzen with them is a real roll of the dice.
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+Ryzen+7+7840HS&...
* multithread: 31124
* single thread: 3945
* number of samples: 15
* margin for error: medium
I have several Ryzen laptops, including a 6800H. The thing is as fast as the latest and greatest from Apple, although with a bit worse battery life. I get about 12 hours in Linux with Gnome. Very quiet. The fan turns on only during gaming, or prolonged compiling.
The mobile Ryzen 7000 line is a bit messy, though. If you want the Zen 4 stuff, you need to look for a 7x4x model, such as the 7840 from this article.
7 is the generation.
4 indicates that it's a Zen 4 part. There are many 7x3x parts on the market because they are simply rebranded Zen 3 (5000 and 6000) parts.
It can be a problem with newer models. Make sure you run the 6.2 kernel or newer. Second best option would be to build the drivers yourself, assuming they are available in the first place
I think it's impressive to not only double the performance, and still keep roughly the same power rating.
Meanwhile on the M1, even keyboard support was implemented fairly late and is not mainline yet.
"AMD also included battery life benchmarks comparing the Ryzen 7 Pro 7840U against two Core i7 models and the Apple M2 Pro, with the former both having a battery capacity of 54 Wh, while the latter had a 69.6 Wh battery. Meanwhile, the Ryzen 7 Pro 7840U system was equipped with a 51.3 Wh battery yet managed to deliver longer battery life than all three competing laptops, with the highest delta being a 70% advantage over the Core i7-1370P"
https://www.tomshardware.com/news/amd-intros-ryzen-7000-pro-...
I still find this compute per watt thing such a silly thing for any company to care about. Until Apple did it, it was not on anyone's minds. Once Apple did it, they dumped a bunch of money into marketing a metric that no one cared about; and now people pretend to care about it.
Not to mention this obsession with CPU that I just cannot grasp. Not sure what industries this is the bottleneck.
> Until Apple did it, it was not on anyone's minds.
This is too on the nose.