AMD Ryzen 5 5500U vs AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 5850U

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 the Ryzen 7 4700U and the Core i7-10850H, which is nothing to sneeze at. The Ryzen will have no trouble chewing through pretty much any workload, as of mid 2022.

Thanks to its decent cooling solution and a long-term CPU power limit of around 27 W, the Lenovo IdeaPad Flex 5 14ALC05-82HU006NGE is among the fastest laptops built around the 5500U that we know of. It can be more than 30% faster in CPU-bound workloads than the slowest system featuring the same chip in our database, as of August 2023.

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. That can be changed to anything between 10 W and 25 W by laptop makers and in many cases they do go for a value higher than 15 W to achieve higher performance levels. On the other hand, by going for the lowest value, it will be possible to build a passively cooled system around the Ryzen 5.

The R5 5500U is manufactured using TSMC's 7 nm process for average, as of mid 2023, average efficiency.

AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 5850U

The AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 5850U is a processor for thin and light laptops based on the Cezanne generation. The R7 5850U integrates all eight cores based on the Zen 3 microarchitecture and is the fastest U-series processor at launch. They are clocked at 1.9 (guaranteed base clock) to 4.4 GHz (Turbo) and support SMT for a total of 16 processing threads. The chip is manufactured on the modern 7 nm TSMC process.

The PRO CPUs offer additional management and security features. The 5850U is otherwise identical to the Ryzen 7 5800U.

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 eight CPU cores, the APU also integrates a Radeon RX Vega 8 graphics processor with 8 CUs at up to 2000 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 average 5850U in our database matches the Ryzen 7 5700U, Ryzen 7 4800U, Ryzen 7 5800U, Intel Core i7-1260P and also the Core i7-1270P in multi-thread performance. In other words, this is a very capable U-class APU that creeps in front of many H-class processors without breaking a sweat, as of early 2022.

Your mileage may vary depending on how high the CPU power limits are and how competent the cooling solution of your system is.

Power consumption

This Ryzen 7 series chip has a default TDP (also known as the long-term power limit) of 15 W. That is a tad too high to allow for passively cooled designs. Besides, most laptop manufacturers will go for much higher values to achieve higher performance levels. Say, 23 W or 28 W.

The Ryzen 7 PRO 5850U is built with TSMC's 7 nm process for average, as of mid 2023, energy efficiency.