After a recent appearance in an ASUS ROG Strix laptop in a Chinese marketplace, AMD’s Ryzen 8000HX series (Dragon Range Refresh) is now official, though the chipmaker hasn’t made any announcements regarding the launch. Based on the published specs, it looks like some models received a minor spec bump, while others are simply a rebrand with no changes.
Ryzen 8000HX Series
The new Ryzen 8000HX series consists of four chips: Ryzen 9 8945HX, Ryzen 9 8940HX, Ryzen 7 8840HX and Ryzen 7 8745HX. Two of the Ryzen 7000HX series models (ignoring the X3D version), the Ryzen 9 7845HX and Ryzen 5 7645HX, have no direct successors in the refreshed lineup.
However, the refresh is less of a refresh and more of a rebrand – with the sole exception of Ryzen 9 8940HX gaining a 100MHz bump in boost clock, everything else is the exact same, including clock speeds, cache sizes, TDP, and onboard graphics. With the chips functionally identical, you won’t see any performance difference short for a miniscule one in the case of the aforementioned Ryzen 9 chip.
Still, AMD did have the Ryzen 9000HX series to lead the way in the desktop-class gaming laptop segment, based on the desktop Ryzen 9000 series processors (with Zen 5 architecture). As such, the Ryzen 8000HX series most likely will serve as a more budget-friendly alternative in this segment.
Pokdepinion: That’s the least changes I’ve seen out of a chip refresh since… forever?
