AMD Ryzen 7 6800U vs Intel Processor N100

AMD Ryzen 7 6800U

The AMD Ryzen 7 6800U is a processor for thin and light laptops based of the Rembrandt generation. The R7 6800U integrates all eight cores based on the Zen 3+ microarchitecture. They are clocked at 2.7 (guaranteed base clock) to 4.7 GHz (Turbo) and support SMT / Hyperthreading (16 threads). The chip is manufactured on the modern 6 nm TSMC process. Compared to the similar R7 6800H, the 6800U offers a lower base clock speed and a lower TDP.

The new Zen 3+ is a refresh of the Zen 3 architecture and should not offer a lot of changes. The chip itself however, offers a lot of new features, like support for USB 4 (40 Gbps), PCI-E Gen 4, DDR5-4800MT/s or LPDDR5-6400MT/s, WiFi 6E, Bluetooth LE 5.2, DisplayPort 2, and AV1 decode.

A big novelty is the integrated GPU Radeon 680M, that is now based on the RDNA2 architecture and offers 12 CUs at up to 2.2 GHz. It should be the fastest iGPU of all at the time of announcement.

Performance

The average 6800U in our database easily shoulders its way towards the best of the best, trading blows with the Core i7-1270P, the Core i7-11850H and the Ryzen 7 PRO 6850H as far as multi-thread benchmark scores are concerned. Throw everything you can at this little guy. He'll take it all and ask for more.

Thanks to its decent cooling solution and a long-term CPU power limit of more than 20 W, the Mercury EM680 is among the fastest systems built around the 6800U that we know of. It can be at least 20% faster in CPU-bound workloads than the slowest system featuring the same chip in our database, as of August 2023.

Power consumption

This Ryzen 7 series chip has a default TDP, also known as the long-term power limit, of 15 W to 28 W, the expectation being that laptop makers will go for a higher value in exchange for higher performance. Either way, a proper cooling solution is a must.

The R7 6800U is manufactured on the 6 nm TSMC process for higher-than-average, as of mid 2023, energy efficiency.

Intel Processor N100

The Intel Processor N100 is an entry-level mobile CPU for thin and light laptops from the Alder Lake-N series. It was announced in early 2023 and offers no performance cores and 4 of the 8 efficient cores (E-cores, Gracemont architecture). The chip does not support HyperThreading and clocks with 1 to 3.4 GHz. The performance of the E-cores should be similar to old Skylake cores (compare to the Core i7-6700HQ). All cores can use up to 6 MB L3-cache.

Performance

The average N100 in our database delivers unimpressive multi-thread benchmark scores that are most similar to those of the Core i3-1115G4. The chip is fast enough for many day-to-day tasks, but not much more than that; the other thing to keep in mind is that of the two N100-toting systems tested by us as of October 2023, both have rather high CPU power limits. The chip will be noticeably slower if limited to just six or seven Watts.

Features

The Alder Lake-N chips only support single channel memory with up to DDR5-4800, DDR4-3200 or LPDDR5-4800. The chip also supports Quick Sync and AV1 decoding (most likely same engine as in Alder Lake). Furthermore, Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2 are partly integrated (but no Thunderbolt). External chips can be connected via PCIe Gen3 x9 (via the PCH).

The integrated graphics adapter is based on the Xe-architecture and offers only 24 of the 32 EUs (Execution Units) operating at only 450 - 750 MHz. Due to the single channel memory, low clock speeds, and low shader count, the gaming performance of the iGPU is very limited.

Power consumption

The N100 has a base power consumption of only 6 W and is therefore suited for fanless cooling. The CPU is built with a further improved 10nm SuperFin process at Intel (called Intel 7).