Intel Core i7-8650U vs AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 5650U

Intel Core i7-8650U

The Intel Core i7-8650U is a power efficient quad-core SoC for notebooks and Ultrabooks based on the Kaby Lake Refresh generation and was announced in August 2017. Contrary to its direct predecessor the Core i7-7600U, which were still dual-cores, the i7-8650U is equipped with four cores but at a lower base frequency of 1.9 GHz. The Turbo Boost can go up to 4,2 GHz and therefore also offer good short term single core speeds. The GPU is now named Intel UHD Graphics 620 but otherwise identical to the Intel HD Graphics 620. The integrated memory controller supports DDR4-2400 / LPDDR3-2133 and dual channel memory.

Architecture

Intel basically uses the same micro architecture compared to Skylake, so the per-MHz performance does not differ. The manufacturer only reworked the Speed Shift technology for faster dynamic adjustments of voltages and clocks, and the improved 14nm process allows much higher frequencies combined with better efficiency than before.

Performance

According to Intel, the new quad core models are up to 40% faster than their dual core predecessors. Due to the reduced TDP and the same 14nm+ process, the long term performance and throttling behaviour will be interesting and depending on the laptop design. Therefore, the older 35 Watt quad-core models should be faster in applications that demand longer CPU loads. The performance however is highly depending on the TDP settings and cooling solution of the laptop. Especially, longer loads will show varying results in different laptops.

Graphics

The integrated Intel UHD Graphics 620 (Intel Gen 9.5) is untouched from the 8th Gen Kaby Lake chips. With fast dual-channel memory it can reach the performance of a dedicated GeForce 920M.

Contrary to Skylake, Kaby lake now also supports H.265/HEVC Main 10 with a 10-bit color depth as well as Google's VP9 codec. The dual-core Kaby Lake processors announced in January should also support HDCP 2.2.

Power Consumption

The chip is manufactured in an improved 14nm process with FinFET transistors (14nm+), the same as the 7th Gen Kaby Lake processors. Intel still specifies the TDP with 15 Watts, which is typical for ULV chips. Depending on the usage scenario, the TDP can vary between 7.5 (cTDP Down) and 25 Watts.

AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 5650U

The AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 5650U is a processor for thin and light laptops based on the Cezanne generation. The R5 5650U 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 / Hyperthreading (12 threads). The chip is manufactured in the modern 7 nm process at TSMC.

The PRO CPUs offer additional management and security features. The 5650U is otherwise identical to the Ryzen 5 5600U.

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.

With the increased clock speed and IPC improvements thanks to Zen 3, the Ryzen 5 PRO 5650U should be clearly faster than the 200 MHz lower clocked Ryzen 5 4500U.

In addition to the six CPU cores, the APU also integrates a Radeon RX Vega 7 integrated graphics card with 7 CUs and up to 1800 MHz. The dual channel memory controller supports DDR4-3200 and energy efficient LPDDR4-4266 RAM. Furthermore, 12 MB level 3 cache (up from 8 MB at the 4800U) can be found on the chip.

The TDP of the APU is specified at 15 Watt (default) and can be configured from 10 to 25 Watt by the laptop vendor (most chips are configured higher than 15 Watt). That means the chip is intended for thin and light laptops (but with fans).