AMD’s Barcelo: Zen 3 APU Refresh for 2022
by Dr. Ian Cutress on January 6, 2022 2:20 PM EST
One of the key elements to how processor portfolios will evolve moving forward involves mixing and matching current generation and previous generation parts using the benefits of (supposedly) cheaper older processors taking advantage of economies of scale. It’s been no secret, for example, that below $300, AMD recommends its previous generation hardware on the desktop. On the Notebook however, along with the launch this week of next-generation hardware, AMD also launched updates to the previous generation under the heading of ‘Barcelo’.
These new 2022 Barcelo APUs are minor updates to the 2021 Cezanne APUs. They use the same Zen 3 cores, are built on the same TSMC 7nm process, have the same PCIe 3 and DDR4/LP4X support, and use the same socket. These are just refined for voltage, frequency, and power based on customer requests.
| AMD Ryzen 5000 Mobile: U-Series | ||||||
| AnandTech | Cores Threads |
Base Freq |
Boost Freq |
GPU Core |
GPU Freq |
TDP |
| 2022 Barcelo (Zen 3 + Vega) | ||||||
| Ryzen 7 5825U | 8C / 16T | 2000 | 4500 | 8 | 1800 | 15W |
| Ryzen 5 5625U | 6C / 12T | 2300 | 4300 | 7 | 1600 | 15W |
| Ryzen 3 5425U | 4C / 8T | 2700 | 4100 | 6 | 1500 | 15W |
| 2021 Cezanne (Zen 3 + Vega) | ||||||
| Ryzen 7 5800U | 8C / 16T | 1900 | 4400 | 8 | 2000 | 15W |
| Ryzen 5 5600U | 6C / 12T | 2300 | 4200 | 7 | 1800 | 15W |
| Ryzen 3 5400U | 4C / 8T | 2600 | 4000 | 6 | 1600 | 15W |
For example, the new Ryzen 7 5825U is +100 MHz on base and turbo frequencies, but loses 200 MHz on graphics. Pretty much every processor is slightly increased on CPU, slightly regressed on GPU, and it looks like this is what AMD’s customers want.
The first laptop with a Barcelo processor that came across our inboxes is the ASUS Zenbook 14 OLED. This is updated from the 2021 version, using the Ryzen 7 5825U with 16 GB of LPDDR4X-4266, 1 TB of PCIe 3.0 SSD, a 14-inch 2880x1800 display with 90 Hz and 100% DCI-P3, and HDR500 certification. It also comes with two USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-C ports, a Type-A port, an audio combo jack, an HDMI 2.0 output, and microSD. The touchpad doubles as a number pad as well, and it comes with a 180º hinge and a 75 Wh battery. The Zenbook 14 OLED (UM3402) is due on market in Q2.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
16 Comments
View All Comments
arashi - Friday, January 7, 2022 - link
A lot of people here think they have their hands on the pulse of the market, but time and time again they miss the mark so hard. Dunning Kruger.dotjaz - Monday, January 10, 2022 - link
You option doesn't matter, you are not buying millions of chips. AMD obviously listened to their customers, and personally I don't see how this is bad since Vega is bad so most of these are actually paired with dGPU anyway.edzieba - Friday, January 7, 2022 - link
It seems pretty nuts that a "hardware refresh" has as its main defining feature a clock range rebalance that could be rolled out as a BIOS option (as turbo ranges have been updated previously).Hul8 - Friday, January 7, 2022 - link
It seems pretty nuts that you'd want them to change the performance specs of the APU without communicating that to customers in the SKU name.Keeping the numbering still in the 5000s and only adding +25 seems pretty inoffensive to me.
ET - Friday, January 7, 2022 - link
AMD's product pages currently show the same GPU clocks as for the equivalent Cezanne CPUs, so it's basically just a small CPU clock update.What's strange is that these product pages no longer mentioned LPDDR4. I wonder if that's just an oversight.
meacupla - Friday, January 7, 2022 - link
99% certainty, it's just an oversight. There's zero hardware change from before the refresh, and it wouldn't make sense that AMD would disable LPDDR4 on these chips, because this refresh is aimed at people who want to get more battery life out of their ultra portable.