Discussion Why do they even bother mentioning base speeds on Ryzen CPU?

[Colif]

I mean, none of them ever run at the base speed... its an archaic value from a time when cores didn't sleep.
None of the threads on my 5800x3d ever run at exactly 3.4ghz... unless its random.

They either below it or above it.

So why even keep mentioning it?

Boost clock is at least achievable. Given right cooling/conditions.

Is it a marketing term?

I wonder how many people would complain if Task manager ever actually managed to track a Ryzens actual operating speed... it goes by clock multiplier. Its always wrong
HWINFO can see actual values, Task manager always thinks I am running at 4ghz... not even close

Average effective is closer to reality.


If they suddenly saw their 5800x3d was actually running at 190mhz it might make them think they got ripped off.
It would mean someone would have to explain the new power states CPU run at now.
Is it easier to leave people in the dark?

 

[TerryLaze]

Base speed is the minimum all core clock you should expect under a heavy load (defined by AMD/intel themselves) under the default power draw, it's there to differentiate from the max single core speed they tell you.

 

[drea.drechsler]

Put barely adequate cooling on the CPU, or maybe even less than adequate. Something similar to the stock coolers for those that come with one. Making sure it's running full-stock settings, of course, run a maximum stress all-core AVX workload that heats up the cores: something like a video rendering or even Prime95. It should heat up to Tjmax, 90 or 95 C depending, (set that as a thermal limit in BIOS if you want). It will probably run down close to it's base speed at least some of the time with occasional boosts higher and occasional lower depending on workload and thermal headroom.

Very few of us ever use a really low-spec cooler to see the CPU pulling clocks back that far.

 

[Colif]

ok, so they the speed you get under the worst possible conditions...

explains why I never see it then. Both my Ryzen so far lived under a 240mm AIO.

 

[drea.drechsler]

ok, so they the speed you get under the worst possible conditions...
...

That's what I think. The only time I've seen it was with my 3700X when using it's stock cooler. It's now in my son's system also with a 240mm AIO on it. It's also very early silicon, well before the 7nm process matured, so I don't know how that may affect things.

I've never tried it on my 5800X system as it's always been under an AIO, so well cooled.

 

[CountMike]

ok, so they the speed you get under the worst possible conditions...

explains why I never see it then. Both my Ryzen so far lived under a 240mm AIO.

It's also a starting point for boost and reference point for power savings. All above it is boost and bellow. power saving. That's of course for each core and not for""Effective Frequency" many software reports. That's reported by some algorithm as if CPU was a single core.

 

[punkncat]

Well explained, and yet, there is something to be said for the "Ryzen" power performance plan as well. It scales far differently on that plan than if you set as balanced.

 

[hotaru.hino]

A specification provides ground truth with regards to whether or not the chip is working properly. If AMD didn't specify what clock speed the CPU is supposed to run at, then any clock speed is valid, even if it's something as low as 1GHz.

In addition, it's probably there for legal reasons with regards to customer protections and warranty. If no clock speed was specified and you happened to get a defective chip where the only flaw is it can't get to say 3.5GHz, AMD could simply go "well too bad, it's running as it's supposed to."

 

[Order 66]

I know that clock speed doesn't necessarily matter, however I bought my 7700x partially because I didn't want to have some cores at sub 4GHz and other cores at 5+, That's why I wanted the base clock of 4.5GHz that way I wouldn't have to manually overclock to get 4+ GHz all core. not to mention I wanted to try AMD since I have never had a system with an AMD CPU outside of a laptop from 2017.

 

[Colif]

base clock is used by PC if your OC is too aggressive and PC needs to restart at a safe speed.

SO that is one use I have found.

 

[hotaru.hino]

base clock is used by PC if your OC is too aggressive and PC needs to restart at a safe speed.

SO that is one use I have found.

I wouldn't call it the "safe speed", I'd call it the "sanity check speed."

If my processor can't get to or maintain base clock speeds, I know something is wrong.

 

[Colif]

its the speed it picks to start PC at... it doesn't know if CPU can do that, its just picking from some table.

AMD may have its own form of P & E cores to deal with in the next generation, but for now they all the desktop ones run same speed.