CES 2021 | AMD announces Ryzen 5000 mobile lineup, new HX series led by the Ryzen 9 5980HX available in overclockable 45 W+ TDP

We've seen several mentions of AMD Ryzen 5000 mobile parts over the past few months, and now they are finally official. At CES 2021, AMD is unveiling the Ryzen 5000 U-series for ultra-mobile form factors and the Ryzen 5000 H, HS, and HX-series for high-performance gaming and content creator laptops.

Today's launch is all about announcing which processors are part of the Ryzen 5000 portfolio. We will get to know more in-depth information about the architecture and other related information in the days to come. Having said that, AMD is introducing a few firsts this generation.

Leading the SKU list is a new class of HX processors led by the Ryzen 9 5980HX. According to AMD, the HX series is designed to offer "elite-level" performance while the HS series continues to cater to TDP-limited gaming notebooks.

There are two HX processors in today's launch — the Ryzen 9 5980HX and the Ryzen 9 5900HX. Both these SKUs are 8C/16T parts with a TDP rated 45 W+, indicating that these processors are likely overclockable. AMD said that the flagship Ryzen 9 5980HX is about 23% and 17% faster in Cinebench R20 single and multi-core tests compared to the Ryzen 9 4900H.

There are four HS series processors with a capped TDP of 35 W while only the Ryzen 7 5800H and the Ryzen 6 5600H are 45 W parts.

AMD also spoke about the updated U-series processor line led by the Ryzen 7 5800U. Previously, we reported that the Ryzen 5000 lineup will include both Zen 2 (Lucienne) and Zen 3 (Cezanne) parts. The Zen 2 parts are actually Renoir refreshes but now feature SMT. All the H, HS, and HX-series SKUs are based exclusively on Zen 3, however.

According to AMD, the U-series led by the Ryzen 7 5800U offers 16% and 14% improved scores in single and multi-thread scores in Cinebench R20 and 3DMark Physics (it is not clear which subset of 3DMark was run here) compared to the Ryzen 7 4800U.

Also being claimed is a 17.5-hour battery runtime in "general usage" and 21 hours of movie playback on a single charge. Going by the fine print, we get to know that these claims are based on testing using MobileMark 2018 and 1080p video playback on a reference laptop with Wi-Fi enabled, Bluetooth turned off, and a 53 WHr battery.

For business users, AMD will also be introducing Ryzen Pro 5000 processors with enhanced security features at the silicon, OS, and platform levels.

AMD expects more than 150 consumer and commercial laptops from Asus, HP, and Lenovo (no mention of Dell for laptops) powered by Ryzen 5000 mobile throughout 2021, so hopefully we will get to see more options than last year.