AMD Ryzen 5 5500U vs AMD Ryzen 5 5600U

AMD Ryzen 5 5500U

The AMD Ryzen 5 5500U is a hexa-core APU of the Lucienne product family designed for use in ultra-thin, upper mid-range laptops. The processor was unveiled in H1 2021; its six CPU cores are based on the Zen 2 microarchitecture. The cores run at 2.1 GHz (base clock speed) to 4 GHz (highest Boost frequency possible) and feature the thread-doubling SMT technology for a total of 12 threads. The chip is manufactured on the modern 7 nm TSMC process.

One could be forgiven for thinking Ryzen 5 5500U is a renamed Ryzen 5 4500U - which is not the case. Ryzen 5 5500U is most similar to Ryzen 5 4600U, the most noteworthy difference between the two being the faster iGPU model of the former.

In the meantime, Ryzen 5 5600U got a little more lucky; it is based on the newer Zen 3 architecture and it also has higher clock speeds than what a 5500U can boast of.

Architecture

While Ryzen 5 5500U and Ryzen 7 5700U are Zen 2-based processors, the neighbouring Ryzen 5 5600U and Ryzen 7 5800U use AMD's brand-new Zen 3 architecture. This makes the former two a generation older than their names suggest. Still, Zen 2 is nothing to sneeze at, with its high performance-per-Watt and performance-per-MHz figures.

Ryzen 5 5500U supports dual-channel DDR4-3200 and quad-channel LPDDR4-4266 RAM and has 8 MB of Level 3 cache. Unlike desktop-grade Ryzen 5000-series processors, Ryzen 5 5500U is limited to PCI-Express 3.0 (not PCI-Express 4.0; no 7.9 GB/s NVMe SSDs here).

The processor gets soldered permanently on to the motherboard (FP6 socket interface) and is thus not user-replaceable.

Performance

Multi-thread performance is most comparable to AMD Ryzen 7 4700U and Intel Core i7-10850H, which is nothing to sneeze at. The Ryzen will have no trouble chewing through pretty much any workload, as of late 2021. Your mileage may vary depending on how high the Power Limits are and how competent the cooling solution of your laptop is.

Graphics

The Radeon RX Vega 7 iGPU has 7 CUs at its disposal (64 x 7 = 448 unified shaders) running at up to 1,800 MHz. Its real-life performance is close to what we've seen from GeForce MX250 and Iris Xe Graphics G7 (80 EUs); Mass Effect Legendary Edition (2021) runs well at 1080p resolution, low-to-medium settings, to give you an example. As the iGPU has no VRAM of its own, it is paramount that fast system RAM is used.

The graphics adapter definitely supports UHD 2160p monitors at 60 Hz. It will have no trouble HW-decoding HEVC, AVC, VP9, MPEG-2 and other popular video codecs. There is no AV1 support; AV1-encoded videos will be software-decoded, which six Zen 2 cores will handle with ease.

Power Consumption

The APU has a default TDP (also known as the long-term Power Limit) of 15 W. This can be set to anything between 10 W and 25 W by an OEM and in many cases they do go for a value higher than 15 W. Still, the 7 nm chip will happily power super-thin laptops as well as actively cooled Windows/Linux tablets, tiny mini-PCs, and gaming handhelds of various shapes and sizes. Ryzen 5 5500U can boast of very decent energy efficiency as of late 2022.

AMD Ryzen 5 5600U

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600U, not to be confused with Intel's Core i7-5600U, is a fairly fast Cezanne family processor designed for use in thinner, lighter laptops. The R5 5600U integrates six of the eight cores based on the Zen 3 microarchitecture and is the third fastest U-series processor at launch. The cores are clocked at 2.3 (guaranteed base clock) to 4.2 GHz (Turbo) and support SMT for a total of 12 threads. The chip is manufactured on the modern 7 nm TSMC process.

The new Zen 3 microarchitecture offers a significantly higher IPC (instructions per clock) compared to Zen 2. For desktop processors AMD claims 19 percent on average and in applications reviews showed around 12% gains at the same clock speed.

In addition to the six CPU cores, the APU also integrates a Radeon RX Vega 7 integrated graphics card with 7 CUs at up to 1800 MHz. The dual channel memory controller supports DDR4-3200 and energy efficient LPDDR4-4266 RAM. Furthermore, 16 MB level 3 cache (up from 8 MB at the 4800U) can be found on the chip.

Performance

The Ryzen 5 is a solid upper mid-range CPU, considerong its multi-thread benchmark scores nearly match those of Intel Core i5-11400H (the latter being a much more power-hungry hexa-core processor designed for use in gaming laptops). While not nearly as fast as 12th gen Alder Lake-P chips, this Ryzen will happily satisfy the needs of the vast majority of users.

Power consumption

This Ryzen 5 has a default TDP of 15 W, a value that laptop manufacturers are allowed to change to anything between 10 W and 25 W with clock speeds and performance changing accordingly as a result. Choosing the lowest value possible will allow for a passively cooled design. Most laptop manufacturers, however, will go for a higher value to achieve a higher performance level.

AMD Ryzen 5 5600U is built with TSMC's 7 nm process for very decent, as of mid-2022, energy efficiency.