Question I need help giving advice about AMD.

[preWarp]

Hello. I trying to make sure I know something before giving people advice about building a PC.

If you are building a PC for just gaming, the AMD Ryzen 5 7600 and faster processors, currently beat Intel Core I5-14600 processors. And if one buys an AMD configuration the graphics should be AMD as well. But why? Am I right about the processors? I did see benchmarks of the AMD 7800X3D beating the Intel Core I7-14700k in frame rates alone. And I don't know why but shouldn't one get an AMD Radeon RX 7000 series graphics if buying an B550/X570 chipset and AMD 7800X3D processor?

 

[bignastyid]

Using an AMD cpu does not mean you have to get an AMD gpu aswell. Nvidia cards work just fine with AMD cpus.

 

[DSzymborski]

Hello. I trying to make sure I know something before giving people advice about building a PC.

If you are building a PC for just gaming, the AMD Ryzen 5 7600 and faster processors, currently beat Intel Core I5-14600 processors. And if one buys an AMD configuration the graphics should be AMD as well. But why? Am I right about the processors? I did see benchmarks of the AMD 7800X3D beating the Intel Core I7-14700k in frame rates alone. And I don't know why but shouldn't one get an AMD Radeon RX 7000 series graphics if buying an B550/X570 chipset and AMD 7800X3D processor?

The problem is that much of your very premise is flawed. There's no reason why an AMD CPU "should" have an AMD GPU with it.

I would hope that you're not giving advice to people based on something you learned right before giving them the advice. If you don't have a good faith basis to be able to directly advise someone on a topic, the best thing a friend can do is to refer to them to someone who can.

 

[CountMike]

Hello. I trying to make sure I know something before giving people advice about building a PC.

If you are building a PC for just gaming, the AMD Ryzen 5 7600 and faster processors, currently beat Intel Core I5-14600 processors. And if one buys an AMD configuration the graphics should be AMD as well. But why? Am I right about the processors? I did see benchmarks of the AMD 7800X3D beating the Intel Core I7-14700k in frame rates alone. And I don't know why but shouldn't one get an AMD Radeon RX 7000 series graphics if buying an B550/X570 chipset and AMD 7800X3D processor?

Please do everybody a favor and don't advise them in this field. There's already enough "Advice" on Youtube. For comparison of CPUs and GPUs just Google CPU1 vs CPU2 or GPU1 vs GPU2 and find dozens of tests and benchmarks.

 

[preWarp]

The problem is that much of your very premise is flawed. There's no reason why an AMD CPU "should" have an AMD GPU with it.

I would hope that you're not giving advice to people based on something you learned right before giving them the advice. If you don't have a good faith basis to be able to directly advise someone on a topic, the best thing a friend can do is to refer to them to someone who can.

Ok. It just gets murky when you have several disparate "good faith" information and no direct answer to give. It's easy to say that there is no good reason to use an AMD RX 7000 series GPU with an AMD Zen 4 processor. The benchmarks I saw with techpowerup and Tom's hardware all use nVidia RTX 4090s in benchmarking Ryzen 5000 and 7000 series performance against Intel counterparts.

But that's not a direct answer to my questions as to weather choosing an AMD GPU is beneficial if one also uses an AMD motherboard and CPU. There could be optimizations -- why wouldn't you wonder about that?

Anyway I researched before telling you all this and it turns out that it is a bad idea after all to base your purchase of an AMD GPU on having an AMD based chipset and processor. They're actually aren't any "optimizations" coming from AMD architecture of the CPU or GPU.

I looked at infinity fabric, RDNA 3, 3D vcache...none work together in some way that would improve FPS over a non-AMD GPU. Rather these things have other benefits making the AMD Radeon RX 7000 GPUs best for gamers who desire higher FPS at the cost of turning off ray tracing.

 

[DSzymborski]

But that's not a direct answer to my questions as to weather choosing an AMD GPU is beneficial if one also uses an AMD motherboard and CPU. There could be optimizations -- why wouldn't you wonder about that?

Why wonder? We know how the GPUs perform. Any significant additional benefit from pairing an AMD GPU with an AMD CPU would already reflect in the benefits. And if such benefit existed, then you'd see significantly different results in the relative performance of AMD GPUs to Nvidia GPUs when paired with AMD CPUs vs. Intel CPUs.

There's little controversy in any of this.

One should never ask a question if they're unprepared to hear answers they do not like.

 

[sonofjesse]

7800X3D is generally the best gaming CPU out to date. If you game more than anything else this is the chip to get. Always get the best card you fit in your budget to pair with it.

 

[CelicaGT]

Ok. It just gets murky when you have several disparate "good faith" information and no direct answer to give. It's easy to say that there is no good reason to use an AMD RX 7000 series GPU with an AMD Zen 4 processor. The benchmarks I saw with techpowerup and Tom's hardware all use nVidia RTX 4090s in benchmarking Ryzen 5000 and 7000 series performance against Intel counterparts.

But that's not a direct answer to my questions as to weather choosing an AMD GPU is beneficial if one also uses an AMD motherboard and CPU. There could be optimizations -- why wouldn't you wonder about that?

Anyway I researched before telling you all this and it turns out that it is a bad idea after all to base your purchase of an AMD GPU on having an AMD based chipset and processor. They're actually aren't any "optimizations" coming from AMD architecture of the CPU or GPU.

I looked at infinity fabric, RDNA 3, 3D vcache...none work together in some way that would improve FPS over a non-AMD GPU. Rather these things have other benefits making the AMD Radeon RX 7000 GPUs best for gamers who desire higher FPS at the cost of turning off ray tracing.

I believe Hardware Unboxed (YouTube) uses AMD test rigs (I could be wrong, not able to check just now). Perhaps their testing data might give you some insights.

 

[mdd1963]

But that's not a direct answer to my questions as to weather choosing an AMD GPU is beneficial if one also uses an AMD motherboard and CPU. There could be optimizations -- why wouldn't you wonder about that?

You did not really 'ask' that in your initial post, and it seemed to me you moreso 'stated it'.

Problem is, it is not true. If it were, then AMD CPUs would do fare 'less well' when compared with Nvidia GPUs. Which does not occur.

If you'd like to believe that in your own purchases, feel free.

Sorry, but I'd recommend that we not advise others in such matters of opinions not based on any facts, frankly.

 

[Avro Arrow]

Hello. I trying to make sure I know something before giving people advice about building a PC.

If you are building a PC for just gaming, the AMD Ryzen 5 7600 and faster processors, currently beat Intel Core I5-14600 processors.

No, that's not true. The i5-14600K is faster than the R5-7600:

Now, when it comes to power efficiency, it's not even close, the R5-7600 is vastly more efficient. In TPU's application suite, the i5-14600K draws 93W:

While the R5-7600 only draws 54W:

You can see that it's the same suite because the R9-5950X draws 87W in both charts.

And if one buys an AMD configuration the graphics should be AMD as well. But why?

That's completely false. Radeon and GeForce cards are both 100% compatible with both AMD and Intel CPUs. There is no advantage offered to a Radeon card by a Ryzen CPU and vice-versa. Some people have Intel with Radeon, some have Intel with GeForce, some have AMD with Radeon and some have AMD with GeForce. They all work just fine with each other.

Am I right about the processors? I did see benchmarks of the AMD 7800X3D beating the Intel Core I7-14700k in frame rates alone.

The R7-5800X3D does beat everything else in gaming, including the 19-14900K:

And I don't know why but shouldn't one get an AMD Radeon RX 7000 series graphics if buying an B550/X570 chipset and AMD 7800X3D processor?

No, you should get whatever suits your needs the most without paying any attention to the brand (unless it's an Intel ARC, I would still avoid those at this time). You won't get a performance boost by having an all-AMD gaming PC. The performance will depend on the balance between the CPU and video card regardless of their branding.

Now, having said all of that, I do believe that an all-AMD build is the best way to go but not because of performance.

In the case of CPUs like the R5-7600 and R7-7700, they're actually $20 cheaper than they appear compared to their Intel counterparts because they come with coolers and they're so power-efficient that the air coolers they come with are all that you need. With an Intel CPU, you'd have to buy a cooler for it which would be at least $20. Then there's also the fact that the AM5 platform will be very long-lived and CPU upgrades in the future would just be drop-ins without needing a new motherboard or RAM. There's significant value in that. At the high-end, sure you'll need to buy a cooler regardless (unless you already have an AM2/AM3/AM4 cooler) but the power efficiency gap between AMD and Intel is about as wide as a canyon:

Nothing makes me laugh harder than someone claiming that they have a GeForce video card because it's more power-efficient than a Radeon while rocking a 13th/14th-gen i7 or i9 CPU.😊

As for taking an Radeon video card, I recommend those simply because they're faster than GeForce cards at similar (and sometimes higher) price-points. Sure, the GeForce cards are faster when using RT but that's not something that is applicable to everyone while gaming performance IS applicable to everyone. I'll use my own RX 7900 XTX as an example:

I'll explain my logic for why the RX 7900 XTX is the best buy of the top three (RTX 4090, RX 7900 XTX and RTX 4080):

The RTX 4090 is 22% faster than the RX 7900 XTX with the same amount of VRAM (24GB). However, the RX 7900 XTX only costs $960 while the RTX 4090 costs (at least) $1844. That's a price increase of 92% and it's only for as long as the PNY version of the card is available at B&H Photo for that price because the next step up is $2095 which is more than double the price of the RX 7900 XTX. I can't think of a reality in which that would be a good choice for a gamer.

The RTX 4080 is 4% slower than the RX 7900 XTX (which essentially means they're tied)

The RTX 4080 has 16GB of VRAM and while that's nothing to sneeze at, it's less than even the much less expensive RX 7900 XT (20GB) and just looks silly compared to the 24GB of the XTX. Meanwhile, the 4080 costs at least $1160 which makes it 20% ($200) more expensive than the XTX. Why would a gamer choose a card that costs an extra $200 than the XTX despite the XTX being 4% faster and having 50% more VRAM?

Those are the reasons to go all-AMD. Mythical compatibility and performance improvements are not.

 

[DSzymborski]

Yup, as Avro Arrow notes, there *are* reasons to go all-AMD, simply because them being a very good buy, irrespective of any synergy between them. I'm running an RTX 3080 with my 5900X mainly because I got it at MSRP; if I had to pay $1200 for it or something, I'd probably be running an AMD GPU, and not because it matches the CPU.

 

[preWarp]

There's little controversy in any of this.

One should never ask a question if they're unprepared to hear answers they do not like.

I shouldn't ask questions that you don't understand or I'll likewise get an answer I can't understand.

To everyone. Sorry this venture ends here. I'll have to have more patience when asking questions that are too deep in the social sense. I think the barriers I am dealing with here are mostly about the "scene" and the people here on Tom's hardware forums.

Everybody has to deal with how others perceive their thread on a public forum. It's not just me. It's you too.

 

[preWarp]

No, that's not true. The i5-14600K is faster than the R5-7600:

Now, when it comes to power efficiency, it's not even close, the R5-7600 is vastly more efficient. In TPU's application suite, the i5-14600K draws...

Thanks for breaking down those bench marks for me. I find that I have missed details that you could see. I will now look at benchmarks in a way that I haven't before that is better.

Yes. To answer my own questions about AMD products I could see the "clues" all around that people were using mixed configurations based on which part performed best - so likewise one should buy parts to suit their needs.

But this was a guess based on patterns and I wanted to understand completely.

So I looked into architecture in use by AMD for their Radeon RX 7000 series, RDNA 3, and for the Ryzen 7000 series using Zen 4. Those architectural differences from Intel are a big reason AMD is successful with their current line up. If they have an optimized way when working in tandem would come down to engineering details I don't have and will take more time for me to locate.

 

[Avro Arrow]

Thanks for breaking down those bench marks for me. I find that I have missed details that you could see. I will now look at benchmarks in a way that I haven't before that is better.

Always remember that noone is born knowing anything except that we're afraid of falling. 😉👍

Yes. To answer my own questions about AMD products I could see the "clues" all around that people were using mixed configurations based on which part performed best - so likewise one should buy parts to suit their needs.

That's right. Remember that one of the pillars of x86's dominance (in fact, the biggest pillar) has been the concept of compatibility through standardisation. This means that ALL x86 components work with ALL x86 platforms. A platform is composed of a CPU, Motherboard and RAM and ANY component can be used with it. The only exceptions to this would be components that use outdated standards (PATA, AGP, PCI, etc) but even then, the desire for backwards compatibility often results in adapters for these items.

But this was a guess based on patterns and I wanted to understand completely.

The patterns tend to be an illusion because the vast majority of people have no idea what parts to get and depend on whatever salesperson that they're dealing with to give them advice. Each salesperson has different reasons for recommending what they recommend.

So I looked into architecture in use by AMD for their Radeon RX 7000 series, RDNA 3, and for the Ryzen 7000 series using Zen 4. Those architectural differences from Intel are a big reason AMD is successful with their current line up.

Yes, but architectural difference are always what separate one semiconductor manufacturer from another. The architectures of AMD and Intel are what makes them different and the same can be said for ATi and nVidia.

If they have an optimized way when working in tandem would come down to engineering details I don't have and will take more time for me to locate.

It would be impossible because Intel and AMD CPUs stopped using the same sockets and chipsets back in the mid-90s. IIRC, Socket 7 was the last socket/motherboard that supported both. The different architectures make using the same motherboard and/or chipset for both impossible which rules out any kind of tandem use.

 

[preWarp]

Yes, but architectural difference are always what separate one semiconductor manufacturer from another. The architectures of AMD and Intel are what makes them different and the same can be said for ATi and nVidia.

It would be impossible because Intel and AMD CPUs stopped using the same sockets and chipsets back in the mid-90s. IIRC, Socket 7 was the last socket/motherboard that supported both. The different architectures make using the same motherboard and/or chipset for both impossible which rules out any kind of tandem use.

I'm talking about architectural info one might get from Anandtech or Tom's Hardware.

That's how I got introduced to Zen 4, 3d V-cache, and RDNA 3.

I could see the writers discussing the architecture and what benefits it had.

I am certain I can locate information about the architecture of AMD products.

At least I have been able to do this with Intel comet lake, the Broadcom SoC used for the Raspberry Pi 3, and other Broadcom products. In the industry programmers need organization details of a processor and details about the instruction set (Op codes).

 

[Avro Arrow]

I'm talking about architectural info one might get from Anandtech or Tom's Hardware.

That's how I got introduced to Zen 4, 3d V-cache, and RDNA 3.

I could see the writers discussing the architecture and what benefits it had.

I am certain I can locate information about the architecture of AMD products.

At least I have been able to do this with Intel comet lake, the Broadcom SoC used for the Raspberry Pi 3, and other Broadcom products. In the industry programmers need organization details of a processor and details about the instruction set (Op codes).

Yes, these are very good sources for that kind of information. AnandTech is where I first read about Intel's use of a ringbus in their Core CPUs.

 

[USAFRet]

And if one buys an AMD configuration the graphics should be AMD as well.

Where did you glean this concept?

Because it ain't true.

I've had systems with just about any combination.
Intel-AMD
Intel-Nvidia
AMD-AMD
AMD-Nvidia

There is no magical reason an AMD CPU should be paired with an AMD GPU.

 

[preWarp]

Where did you glean this concept?

Because it ain't true.

I've had systems with just about any combination.
Intel-AMD
Intel-Nvidia
AMD-AMD
AMD-Nvidia

There is no magical reason an AMD CPU should be paired with an AMD GPU.

Yes. I questioned my own thoughts so I could have real facts instead of conjecture. Would have been helpful to know why Zen 4 and RDNA 3 put together can't beat Zen 4 and Ada Lovelace the architecture of the AD102 GPU.