Intel Core i7-4790K vs AMD Ryzen 5 4680U

Intel Core i7-4790K

The Intel Core i7-4790K is a high end quad-core desktop processor using the Haswell architecture. It was announced in the second quarter of 2014 and was the top model of the 4000 series consumer processors. Compared to the Core i7-4770K, the 4790K offers 500 MHz more base and turbo clock speed and reaches 4.4 GHz. 

AMD Ryzen 5 4680U

The AMD Ryzen 5 4680U is a semi-custom APU of the Renoir family designed for Microsoft devices. The 4680U integrates six CPU cores based on the Zen 2 microarchitecture clocked at 2.2 GHz (base) to 4 GHz (Boost) with SMT support for a total 12 threads. The two advantages a 4680U has over the older Ryzen 5 4600U are its higher base clock speed and a faster iGPU.

Architecture

The chip is manufactured on the modern 7 nm TSMC process and in part thanks to this fact, AMD advertises a 2x performance per watt improvement over the 12 nm Ryzen 3000 mobile processors. The built-in dual-channel memory controller supports LPDDR4-4266 RAM. Furthermore, 8 MB of L3 cache can be found on the chip.

Just like the other mobile Ryzen 4000 CPUs, a 4680U supports PCI-Express 3.0. Please go to our Renoir processor hub page for additional information on the product family.

Performance

Multi-thread performance is most comparable to the Ryzen 7 4700U and the Core i5-10500H, the latter being a much more power-hungry chip. This makes the Ryzen a more than decent CPU for most tasks, as of early 2022.

Graphics

In addition to the six CPU cores, the APU also integrates a DX 12 compatible Radeon RX Vega 7 graphics adapter with 7 CUs (448 unified shaders) at up to 1,500 MHz. The Vega iGPU will have no trouble HW-decoding AVC, HEVC and VP9 videos, but the newer AV1 codec will only be decoded via software. In terms of gaming, we are looking at an MX150-level performance. Pretty much all games released in 2020 can be played on low to medium settings in 720p on this graphics adapter.

Power consumption

This Ryzen 5 series chip has a default TDP (also known as the long-term power limit) of 15 W, a value that laptop makers - Microsoft, in this case - are free to change to anything between 10 W and 25 W, with clock speeds and performance changing accordingly as a result. Indeed, we saw the CPU consume roughly 23 watts when subjected to our usual stress testing routine.

The 7 nm TSMC process this Ryzen is built with makes for very decent, as of mid 2022, energy efficiency.