Taking high-level wraps off Ryzen 7000 Series processors in an event held in Texas, AMD struck a confident tone on the capabilities of its Zen 4-based architecture. So much so, it reckons bottom-of-the-stack Ryzen 5 7600X is faster for gaming than an Intel Core i9-12900K. Quite the claim.
It is always prudent to take any manufacturer-made claim with the appropriate amount of caution. Nevertheless, AMD reckons that, adjusted over five games – most likely picked to provide a best-case scenario for Zen 4 – the baby Ryzen 7000 Series CPU more than holds its own against one of the finest 12th Gen Core processors available.
Perusing the footnotes of such a bold claim (RPL-007) shows a Radeon RX 6950 XT provides the graphics oomph. Both AMD and Intel systems are running the same DDR5 memory at 6,000MHz and, for the AMD platform, Smart Access Memory (SAM) is turned on. It is likely SAM is providing that last bit of performance to eke ahead of Core i9-12900K.
Of course, Intel will counter that Core i9-12900K is a fair bit faster if used on a particular gaming suite more suited to its hybrid architecture. Whatever the true ins and outs, it’s hard to ignore AMD’s gaming optimism with Zen 4.
Going by the numbers posted, the wise gamer ought to choose Ryzen 5 7600X or Ryzen 7 7700X and leave the cash left over from not installing, say, a Ryzen 9 7950X for a graphics upgrade.
Impressive as the claims are, we can’t wait to test the Ryzen 5 7600X’s gaming prowess in our own labs, and looking ahead, Intel 13th Gen will no doubt have something to say. Roll on September 27.
