AMD's New Laptop Chips Rely on Older Architecture

AMD has unveiled its next-generation Ryzen 8000 series processors for gaming laptops, headlined by the Ryzen 9 8945HX. While launching new chips for the mobile gaming market, these processors are based on the previous Zen 4 architecture rather than the newer Zen 5 design seen in the recent Ryzen AI 300 series.

The company introduced four new processors for high-performance gaming laptops. The flagship Ryzen 9 8945HX offers 16 cores, 32 threads, and boost speeds reaching 5.4GHz. At the more accessible end, the Ryzen 7 8745HX provides 8 cores, 16 threads, and boost clocks up to 5.1GHz. These specifications closely mirror their previous-generation counterparts – the AMD Ryzen 9 7945HX also featured 16 cores, 5.4GHz boost clocks, and 80MB of cache.

These processors are designed to pair with the most powerful mobile graphics solutions in premium gaming laptops. Earlier testing with the Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 Mobile revealed some limitations when paired with the lower-power AMD Ryzen AI HX 370 processor, despite its newer Zen 5 architecture. The Ryzen 9 8945HX, however, can be configured to operate between 55W and 75W, delivering substantially better performance – though a Zen 5 chip with similar power allocation would have offered even greater gains.

For those anticipating AMD's latest mobile processors for their next gaming laptop, these chips will begin appearing in high-end models over the coming months. Below, you'll find a detailed breakdown of the new processors' specifications.