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*** AMD "Zen" thread (inc AM4/APU discussion) ***

Not expecting anything at all in the performance department, just hopefully better RAM compatibility so expensive Samsung-B dies aren't necessary any more.
 
DragonQ said:
Not expecting anything at all in the performance department, just hopefully better RAM compatibility so expensive Samsung-B dies aren't necessary any more.
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Last year B-die 3866, 4000mhz ram 2x8gb was going for £136. But because the mantra "no need more than 2133" everyone was buying cheap ram to save 5-10 quid, ignoring the fact that Skylake was benefiting from high speed ram greatly.

Fast forward 12 months there is moaning why ram prices are high.....

Anyhow. Does anyone has 1800X with PGS manufacturing code? Got mine today (17th week) but haven't found any references. Usually GF was sending their stuff to China, and Samsung fab was sending them to Malaisia. Mine is GF from Saratoga made in Malaisia.
 
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What's there to be hyped about? All the new AGESA is going to do is add support for APUs. We haven't had a performance improvement since AGESA 1004.
 
AndreiD said:
What's there to be hyped about? All the new AGESA is going to do is add support for APUs. We haven't had a performance improvement since AGESA 1004.
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It supposedly includes substantial changes to RAM settings too. Whether that'll actually improve compatibility or performance though remains to be seen.
 
4K8KW10 said:
This means that one populated or physical slot will be enough to work like in dual-channel mode?

I mean is the available memory bandwidth the same? :confused:
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No it means they probably have only used one of the two slots to save money - so you need to add another DIMM to enable dual channel mode.
However,the DDR4 memory controller on Bristol Ridge is poor,so even in single channel mode Ryzen should have more memory bandwidth in single channel mode than Bristol Ridge in dual channel mode!
 
AndreiD said:
What's there to be hyped about? All the new AGESA is going to do is add support for APUs. We haven't had a performance improvement since AGESA 1004.
Click to expand...

Potential improvements in how the RAM works. Though mines reasonably tight any improvements in attainable frequency would be welcome. :)
 
CAT-THE-FIFTH said:
No it means they probably have only used one of the two slots to save money - so you need to add another DIMM to enable dual channel mode.
However,the DDR4 memory controller on Bristol Ridge is poor,so even in single channel mode Ryzen should have more memory bandwidth in single channel mode than Bristol Ridge in dual channel mode!
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2 issues immediately pop up.
First, how will you get a second identical module;
Second, even if so and bandwidth is improved, the single-channel mode in general limits the GPU and CPU performance by quite a significant margin.
I don't see any sense in them doing so :confused:
 
4K8KW10 said:
2 issues immediately pop up.
First, how will you get a second identical module;
Second, even if so and bandwidth is improved, the single-channel mode in general limits the GPU and CPU performance by quite a significant margin.
I don't see any sense in them doing so :confused:
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Plenty of Intel laptops also have shipped with a single memory slot filled - that includes the Intel versions of the HP X360. Its quite common and its done because of cost.
Laptop companies are stupid like that. Don't expect anything more than the official 2400/2667MHZ RAM though,as anything above is technically out of spec on the memory controller,and it will add to heat and power consumption too.

chroniclard said:
Potential improvements in how the RAM works. Though mines reasonably tight any improvements in attainable frequency would be welcome. :)
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Despite people saying that Ryzen has a poor memory controller it is actually quite efficient:

https://static.techspot.com/articles-info/1486/bench/Memory.png

Look at the massive difference between BR and Ryzen in dual channel mode,and even against Intel it is doing well. I think it underscores the major weakness of Ryzen(outside of clockspeeds),the low inter-CCX communication speed. I expect they did this due to power consumption and heat issues,but if that can be increased to a much higher rate,it will help a lot.
 
Its the difficulty in obtaining rated speeds and/or overclocks for your average joe that is the main issue, imo. :)

Took me a while trawling forums for info to get mine running well! (Not to mention buying another set of ram and another motherboard :p)
 
chroniclard said:
Its the difficulty in obtaining rated speeds and/or overclocks for your average joe that is the main issue, imo. :)

Took me a while trawling forums for info to get mine running well! (Not to mention buying another set of ram and another motherboard :p)
Click to expand...

The reason why higher speed RAM does help is due to the fact the inter-CCX bandwidth is 0.5X the system memory bandwidth,so if they can increase that RAM speeds should be less of an issue,as the memory controller itself is actually quite efficient. I found at least with the builds I helped out with,getting 2400MHZ/2667MHZ RAM to work,ie,the officially supported speed for RAM with Ryzen was OK,but it was trying to go past that where it needed more fiddling.

Raven Ridge for example is only a single CCX for the CPU,so I would expect unless you are aiming for top IGP performance,the CPU part might be less depedent on decent speed RAM than Ryzen IMHO OFC.
 
I don't feel like simply improving the IMC such that it can handle 4000+ MHz RAM is a good enough solution by itself, simply because finding decent 3200 MHz RAM is expensive enough and having to shell out even more for a 4000 MHz kit to increase performance by another 5% isn't a nice prospect. It'd be a good step certainly but not enough of a boost on its own, IMO.
 
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