Image Source: AMD
AMD has unveiled the Ryzen AI 300 series mobile processors at Computex 2024, its own AI CPU that will go head-to-head with Intel’s upcoming Lunar Lake and Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X. The standout feature of these new System on Chips (SoCs) is their NPU (Neural Processing Unit), which surpasses the capabilities of the AMD Ryzen 8000-series processors introduced at this year’s CES.
For starters, AMD has announced two models: the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 and the AMD Ryzen AI 9 365. The Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 boasts a 12-core and 24-thread configuration, Radeon 890M graphics, and a sizeable 36MB cache. Meanwhile, the Ryzen AI 9 365 offers 10 cores and 20 threads, and a 34MB cache.
Image Source: AMD
AMD says these new processors are set to debut in notebooks from July 2024, with the company working closely with Microsoft to meet the new Copilot+ standards. Both processors are equipped with a 50 TOPS NPU – far above Microsoft’s Copilot+ requirement.
2024 is an interesting year as we see not the usual two but three mobile processors from Intel, AMD and Qualcomm vying for the bigger piece of the AI CPU market share. Qualcomm may have fired the first salvo, with the first Snapdragon X-powered notebook available from this month. But AMD’s move is also key, pushing them ahead of Intel (Lunar Lake-powered notebooks are only due in Q3 this year), and unlike the Arm-based Snapdragon X, the x86 architecture of AMD (and Intel) processors benefits from native Windows support.
Image Source: AMD
Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X will need native Arm apps or rely on emulation, akin to Apple’s Rosetta for its M-series chips. However, native experiences typically offer superior performance, giving AMD an edge as its Ryzen AI 300 processors will ‘just work’ with Windows and existing applications right out of the box.
For now, and for the first time in a long while, AMD has the opportunity to gain a lead over Intel, which still dominates the mobile processor space.
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