Intel Core i7-1065G7 vs AMD Ryzen 5 4600H vs AMD Ryzen 5 4680U

Intel Core i7-1065G7

The Intel Core i7-1065G7 is a power efficient quad-core SoC of the Ice-Lake-U product family designed for thin laptops and Ultrabooks. It was announced in May 2019 (Computex). The CPU has four Sunnycove processor cores (8 threads thanks to Hyper-Threading) clocked at 1.3 (base) - 3.9 (single core Turbo) GHz. 2 cores can reach 3.8 GHz and all four 3.5 GHz using Turbo Boost. According to Intel the Sunnycove cores achieve 18% more IPCs (Instructions per Clock)  and therefore the CPU performance should be similar to the higher clocked Whiskey-Lake predecessors (e.g. Core i5-8665U with up to 4.8 GHz). The Core i7-1065G7 is the fastest 15 W Ice Lake-U chip at the time of announcement in 2019 and only bested by the 28 W Core i7-1068G7.

The biggest improvement for Ice-Lake is the integrated Gen 11 graphics adapter called Iris Plus Graphics. The Core i7-1065G7 integrates the biggest G7 variant with 64 EUs clocked at 300 - 1100 MHz. The Iris Plus G7 should be twice as fast as the predecessors and best the AMD Vega 10 GPU from current Ryzen APUs.

Other improvements for Ice Lake are the AI hardware acceleration and the partial integration of Thunderbolt and Wi-Fi 6 in the chip. The integrated DDR4 memory controller supports modules with up to 3200 MHz (and LPDDDR4 3733).

The Core i7-1065G7 is produced on the newfirst-gen 10 nm Intel process that should offer a comparable performance to the 7 nm TSMC process. The TDP is specified at 15 Watts and therefore the CPU can be used in thin and light laptops (but usually with a fan). Intel offers a configurable TDP of 7.5 - 25 Watts for the partners resulting in significant performance differences (due to longer periods of Turbo Boost).

AMD Ryzen 5 4600H

The AMD Ryzen 5 4600H is a mobile SoC for big laptops based on the Renoir architecture. The 4600H integrates six of the eight cores based on the Zen 2 microarchitecture. They are clocked at 3 (guaranteed base clock) to 4 GHz (Turbo) and support SMT / Hyperthreading (12 threads). The chip is manufactured on the modern 7 nm TSMC process and partly thanks to it AMD advertises a 2x improved performance per Watt for the Renoir chips.

Due to the two deactivated cores and the slower Turbo clock speed, the Ryzen 5 4600H should be significantly slower than the Ryzen 7 4800H. The old top model Ryzen 7 3750H is still clearly slower due to the four Zen+ cores. Compared to the competition, the Intel Core i7-8850H (6-core Coffee Lake 2.6 - 4.3 GHz) should offer a similar performance.

In addition to the six CPU cores, the APU also integrates a Radeon RX Vega 6 integrated graphics card with 6 CUs and up to 1500 MHz. The dual channel memory controller supports DDR4-3200 and energy efficient LPDDR4-4266 RAM. Furthermore, 8 MB level 3 cache can be found on the chip. See our hub page on the Renoir Processors for more information.

The TDP of the APU is specified at 45 Watt (default) and can be configured to 35 - 54 Watt by the laptop vendor. That means the chip is intended for big and relatively heavy laptops. The similar named Ryzen 5 4600HS is the 35 Watt version of the chip with the same specifications.

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

The Ryzen 5 will lag behind the Ryzen 7 4980U in multi-threaded workloads because of the lower core count, 6 vs 8, while being way ahead of the Intel Core i7-1065G7 (4 cores, up to 3.9 GHz), the fastest 15 watt Intel Ice Lake CPU. The single core performance does not differ much between the 4680U and 1065G7, as the max Boost clock speeds are nearly identical. Therefore, Ryzen 5 4680U is a very capable 15 watt CPU and clearly faster than the older Ryzen 7 3700U.

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

While the TDP of the APU is specified at 15 watts, it consumed roughly 23 watts under prolonged load in our testing. The chip is a good fit for the thinner, lighter laptops provided an active cooling system is present.