AMD Ryzen 4000: The Next Generation of Ryzen

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you know that AMD is on a roll at the moment. Traditionally, Intel CPUs were known for being technically advanced and more expensive while AMD CPUs were the less powerful and more affordable alternatives. But not anymore. With the release of the third generation Ryzen processors in 2019, AMD has clearly established itself as the more technically advanced of the two brands. This is mostly thanks to its own Zen 2 architecture.

As we’re nearing the end of 2019, AMD looks all set to dethrone Intel as the best processors brand in the world. Come November 25, they will be releasing their flagship 16-core Ryzen 9 3950X Desktop CPU, along with two Ryzen Threadrippers, the 3960X and the 3970X. But it seems it will not be stopping here. AMD already has plans for 2020 and its next generation Ryzen. The company plans on releasing their Zen 2 based Ryzen 4000 APUs in January and then the Zen 3 based next gen Ryzen 4000 series of desktop CPUs in the summer.

The Next Generation Ryzen: Ryzen 4000      

AMD had kicked off 2019, with the release of the 14nm and Zen+ based mobile Ryzen 3000 series in January. The desktop version of Ryzen 3000, based on Zen 2 and a 7nm process was released later. And as it turns out, AMD’s plans for 2020 seems no different. They plan to kick the year off with the release of 7nm based mobile chips and later moving on to the Zen 3 based Ryzen 4000 series of desktop CPUs.

In an interview with Venturebeat.com, AMD CEO Lisa Su talked about the company’s plans for 2020, also mentioning casually, plans for the next generation of Ryzen:

“We’re also pretty excited as we go into 2020. You’ll start to see our next-generation mobile products, as well, coming in early 2020. You’ll see 7nm mobile chips that have yet to come to market. That’s a pretty strong portfolio. We’re well underway with Zen 3 as a follow-on, as well, for 2020 — lots of product activity. Even though 2019 was a big product year, I think 2020 will be an even larger product year for us.”

Summer 2020

According to reports, AMD’s plans are to launch the first batch of Ryzen 4000 desktop CPUs by the Summer of 2020. The Zen 3 microarchitecture these new CPUs will be based on has already been developed. The new CPUs will be based on TSMC’s 7nm+ manufacturing process and will maintain socket compatibility with AMD’s current platforms (SP3 for servers and AM4 for desktops). So users who already own a Ryzen system will be able to do a simple drop-in CPU upgrade come next year.

AMD also has plans to launch the Milan server family during the second half of 2020.

Zen 3: What to Expect?

Rumor has it that with the introduction of the Zen 3 microarchitecture, Ryzen 4000 CPUs will perform 8% better per clock compared to the current gen Ryzen 3000 CPUs. So what exactly is it that brings about this improvement?

While Zen 3 keeps the same 8-core per chiplet design of Zen 2, it does introduce a few important changes. There are improvements in the clock mesh, cache hierarchy and in the speeds of the infinity fabric (that holds the cores and the I/O components together), which in turn results in better performance per clock, higher frequencies and lower cache latency.

Furthermore, there have also been reports from AMD’s Chinese labs about claims that the core of the Zen 3 based Ryzen 4000 CPU will have an operational speed that is at least 200 MHz higher than the current gen of Ryzen 3000 CPUs. And rumor has it that this claim has already been verified by AMD’s early engineering samples, with the new gen Ryzen 4000 CPU producing better clock speeds than Ryzen 3000 CPUs.

Ryzen 4000: Price & Release Date

Of course, it is still too early to know anything about the pricing or the release date of next year’s Ryzen 4000 CPUs. But in the history of AMD, the company seems to go by a certain pattern that we can use to make educated guesses.

Come 2020, we will probably see the arrival of the Zen 2 and 7nm process based Ryzen 4000 APU. These will mostly include modest CPUs that will go along with budget laptops, although there will be a few high end options.

Then come July, we will see the release of the first of the Zen 3 and 7nm+ based Ryzen 4000 desktop CPU. There will be plenty of more releases in the months following, including the flagship for the year. And finally, in November 2020, we could see the arrival of the Ryzen Threadripper 4000.

As for the pricing, we can expect AMD to maintain the current range. Low end APUs will start at as little as $100, with the flagship running up to $750. Decent gaming CPUs will probably cost between $300 and $500.

And Intel?

The Ryzen 4000 series of CPUs will be in direct competition with Intel’s 10^th generation of desktop CPUs, dubbed ‘Comet Lake-S’. Intel has decided to skip the 10nm process node for its upcoming generation, instead choosing to base it on a refined 14nm++ process node. At this point, it is pretty clear that in order to stay in the game Intel will have to drastically cut prices in its new CPUs. This could in turn affect the pricing of the new AMD CPUs.

AMD Ryzen: Over The Years

Let us now look at how the Ryzen desktop CPU has evolved over the years:

1^st Generation Ryzen (2017)

• CPU microarchitecture: Zen 1
• Process Node: 14nm
• Number of Cores/Threads: 8/16
• Maximum L2/L3 Cache: 8 MB/32 MB
• PCIe Support: PCIe 3.0
• Socket/Chipset: AM4/X370

2^nd Generation Ryzen (2018)

• CPU microarchitecture: Zen+
• Process Node: 12nm
• Number of Cores/Threads: 8/16
• Maximum L2/L3 Cache: 8 MB/32 MB
• PCIe Support: PCIe 3.0
• Socket/Chipset: AM4/X470

3^rd Generation Ryzen (Current)

• CPU microarchitecture: Zen 2
• Process Node: 7nm
• Number of Cores/Threads: 16/32
• Maximum L2/L3 Cache: 16 MB/64 MB
• PCIe Support: PCIe 4.0
• Socket/Chipset: AM4/X570

4^th Generation Ryzen (2020)

• CPU microarchitecture: Zen 3
• Process Node: 7nm+
• Number of Cores/Threads: TBA
• Maximum L2/L3 Cache: TBA
• PCIe Support: PCIe 3.0
• Socket/Chipset: AM4/TBA

The Year of AMD

2019 has truly been the year of AMD. The company reported a third quarter profit of a staggering $120 million this year. This is almost four times as much as their third quarter profit from last year, $35 million. And their Revenue for the quarter $1.8 billion is their highest since the last quarter of 2005 (during the days of the Athlon 64 X2).

And now as we’re mid-way through the last quarter of 2019, AMD has predicted this quarter to be its biggest quarter ever. With increase in sales of its Epyc server, Radeon GPUs and Ryzen processors, along with the arrival of the flagship Ryzen 9 3950X CPU and Ryzen Threadripper 3960X and 3970X, AMD estimates its revenue for the quarter to be a staggering $2.1 billion.

Last month it was also reported that AMD, for the first time in history, had outsold Intel CPUs in South Korea. The survey was conducted by the research arm of ShopDanawa, one of Korea’s largest Computer retailers. It showed that AMD CPUs made up 51.3% of all the pre-built PCs that were sold, with Intel making up 48.7%. While the difference may not seem significant on paper, it is worth noting that Intel has been the industry leader for all these years. And these changes aren’t limited to South Korea. In Europe, 12 percent of all the desktops and laptops shipped to retailers were powered by AMD CPUs. While a 12% market share may not seem high, it is a win for AMD, considering how they occupied only 7% of the market in Europe last year.

Intel’s Distress

“Over the past few quarters, Intel chip supply constraints have led to a number of vendors increasing their focus on AMD. The two main vendors with commercial AMD portfolios, HP and Lenovo, both posted strong AMD growth in Q3 2019.”

So why is AMD replacing Intel everywhere? Well, it does have something to do with Intel’s shortage of its 14nm chips production. This shortage could extend till the first quarter of 2020. And Intel’s switch to a 10nm process node has also been delayed, and is now expected to skip the next generation of CPUs (Comet Lake) altogether. And if you add the competitive positioning of AMD’s third generation Ryzen CPUs to this equation, you can genuinely feel Intel’s distress.

Ryzen 4000: Closing Thoughts

AMD has had a great year. But they’re not looking to stop anytime soon. They realize they’re on a roll and they intend to keep on rolling!

‘Ryzen 4000’ will first makes its introduction as Zen 2 based APUs that will come out in January, 2020. The Zen 3 based Ryzen 4000 desktop CPUs will most likely make their first appearance in the summer of 2020. AMD reported record sales in 2019. And with their competitor Intel struggling with shortages and delays, it wouldn’t be a surprise if they exceeded those numbers in 2020.

AMD are no longer focused on the low-end of the PC market. In fact they did report weaker sales in the low-end, but when asked about this, company CEO Lisa Su summarized the company’s position perfectly:

“It’s not a significant driver of the business.”

The path is clear for AMD at the moment. They have the better hardware and are not struggling with any shortages or delays, unlike their competitor, Intel. How do you think AMD will perform in 2020? Leave a comment below.