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AMD has already made a good statement with the Zen 4 Ryzen 7000 X-series. It’s launched the anticipated Ryzen 9, 7, and 5 CPUs. But AMD is hungry for more, and cheaper CPUs can help trim budgets. Here’s what we know about the more affordable non-X series for the Ryzen 7000 SKUs.
Ryzen 7000 non-X series
Everything began as a leak from the well-known leaker chi11eddog. He showed in a tweet that AMD would be releasing the Ryzen 9 7900, Ryzen 7 7700, and Ryzen 5 7600 SKUs.
Alongside this, he revealed in another tweet that the chips were supposed to be a cut-down version of their predecessors, limiting the default power from 170W right down to 65W.
Rumors were confirmed at this year’s CES though, with AMD CEO Dr. Lisa Su announcing three new CPUs, with the benefit of refinements arriving on an expected date of January 10th.
The three CPUs arrive a month ahead of the expected ‘X3D’ variant/s, and are certainly more affordable, although they will also be slightly less powerful than existing X-series CPUs. The new CPUs announced were:
- AMD Ryzen 5 7600
- AMD Ryzen 7 7700
- AMD Ryzen 9 7900
AMD Ryzen 7000 non-X series: Specs
The specification that stands out more from the others is the extreme cut in TDP with the new CPUs. This was confirmed at CES, although the stressed power draw is yet to be known. Still, while the X-series draws around 105-170W, the new Ryzen 7000 non-X series is expected to draw 65W.
This is logical if we keep in mind that these are expected to be affordable CPUs aimed to be paired with cheaper hardware as well. It seems like a good strategy to compete with Intel’s Raptor Lake processors, and also means better performance per watt, which is key to AMD’s vision.
Another cut these CPUs have is in their clock speeds. Having reduced the TDP, Team Red has reduced the frequency of base and boost clocks. Here’s the round-up of Ryzen 7000 non-X vs the relative X-series CPUs:
| CPU | Cores | Threads | Base Clock | Boost clock | TDP | Cache |
| Ryzen 9 7900X | 12 | 24 | 4.7GHz | 5.6GHz | 170W | 76MB |
| Ryzen 9 7900 | 12 | 24 | 3.7GHz | 5.4GHz | 65W | 76MB |
| Ryzen 7 7700X | 8 | 16 | 4.5GHz | 5.4GHz | 105W | 40MB |
| Ryzen 7 7700 | 8 | 16 | 3.8GHz | 5.3GHz | 65W | 40MB |
| Ryzen 5 7600X | 6 | 12 | 4.7GHz | 5.3GHz | 105W | 38MB |
| Ryzen 5 7600 | 6 | 12 | 3.8GHz | 5.1GHz | 65W | 38MB |
In terms of performance comparisons, we’ll need to wait for verified benchmarks to properly compare the X and non-X series. Geekbench does have a public benchmark result from the Ryzen 7 7700 though.
The Ryzen 7 7700 was seemingly tested in an ASRock X670E Taichi motherboard and paired with DDR5-4800 RAM. Geekbench reported that the base frequency was around 3.8 GHz, 700 MHz lower than the competitor 7700X.
But why non-X?
Ultimately, it would be a win for AMD to have similar performance with an extremely low TDP, and consumers will win too. AMD’s refining of the power profiles (and trimming of clock speeds) is at the core of non-X.
Realistically, the existence of these CPUs is impacted by an unexpected response from the public to the cost that the AM5 socket requires. Non-X CPUs will trim this cost, and if AMD (or Intel) feel they need to provide better products it’s only a good thing.
AM5, a whole new socket with years ahead of it, when compared with Intel’s new CPUs, sees Zen 4 processors support DDR5 only and without any sort of backward compatibility.
Consequently, in order for users to upgrade they need to change motherboards, and AM5 motherboards are proving to be expensive too. While AMD cannot impact that directly, CPUs that cost less can be a bonus.
The Intel factor
Intel, on the other hand, has incredible backward compatibility with Raptor Lake, therefore the price of upgrading is not that high. With this fact, we see the reasoning behind this expected release of the Ryzen 7000 non-X series.
Comparing the Ryzen 7000 non-X series with previous Ryzen generations, the performance results from these new CPUs are nothing surprising from what we know.
However, they look like a good choice to future-proof a setup with DDR5 memory and PCIe GEN5 support, before a users moved to an X or potential X3D variant.
AMD Ryzen 7000 non-X series: prices
Honestly, the only reason for these new non-X series SKUs to be even considered an option is if they show a considerable price drop. And according to AMD we should expect to see some nice cuts in pricing for MSRPs.
Here’s how the prices of the X-series launch pricing and non-X series expected pricing compares (pricing can change at launch):
| Ryzen 9 7900 | $429 (expected price) |
| Ryzen 9 7900X | $549 |
| Ryzen 7 7700 | $329 (expected price) |
| Ryzen 7 7700X | $399 |
| Ryzen 5 7600 | $229 (expected price) |
| Ryzen 5 7600X | $299 |
AMD Ryzen 7000 non-X series: Release Date
As confirmed by AMD at CES 2023, the launch of the Ryzen 7000 non-X series is expected to be January 10th, 2023. We’re prepped and ready to find the processors on the day, and look forward to seeing how the new CPUs stack up against their more power-hungry, and more expensive siblings.
- Now read Ryzen 7 7600 vs Ryzen 5 7600 X
