AMD Ryzen 9 8945HS vs AMD Ryzen 7 8845HS

AMD Ryzen 9 8945HS

The Ryzen 9 8945HS is a rebadged Ryzen 9 7940HS with higher clock speeds on the Ryzen AI NPU. To be more specific, this is a powerful Hawk Point family laptop chip that has eight Zen 4 cores running at 4.0 GHz to 5.2 GHz. This APU was brought to life in H2 2023 and all of its cores are SMT-enabled for a total of 16 processing threads.

The Radeon 780M serves as the integrated graphics adapter.

Architecture & Features

Hawk Point family chips are powered by the Zen 4 architecture, much like Phoenix and Dragon Range family chips are. That's not to say there is no difference between the three. With Hawk Point, AMD is betting big on generative AI; these chips are promised to deliver an up to 40% increase in generative AI performance over 7040 series APUs making apps like DaVinci Resolve and Adobe Photoshop even more powerful.

Unlike Zen 3, Zen 4 features AVX512 support and, thanks to a plethora of other improvements including larger caches/registers/buffers across the board, is slated to bring a double-digit IPC improvement over the former.

Elsewhere, the 8945HS has 16 MB of L3 cache and support for super-fast RAM (up to LPDDR5x-7500 or DDR5-5600; no ECC support). The processor is compatible with USB 4 and thus with Thunderbolt; PCIe support is limited to the 4.0 spec for a throughput of 1.97 GB/s per lane. 20 lanes are available.

OS support is limited to 64-bit editions of Windows 11 and Windows 10 and of course to Linux. Note that the chip isn't overclockable and neither is it user-replaceable as it gets soldered down for good (FP7, FP7r2, FP8 socket interfaces).

Performance

The 8945HS is an R9 7940HS in disguise, so it's realistic to expect the chip to be just slightly faster than the Core i9-12900HK and also the Ryzen 7 7840HS, as far as multi-thread performance is concerned.

Your mileage may vary depending on how high the CPU power limits are and how competent the cooling solution of your system is.

Graphics

The Radeon 780M has 12 CUs (768 shaders) running at up to 2,800 MHz. This is a very fast iGPU, as of late 2023. It will let you use up to 4 monitors with resolutions as high as SUHD 4320p, and it is also capable of HW-encoding and HW-decoding the most widely used video codecs including AVC, HEVC and AV1. More importantly, it is fast enough for proper 1080p gaming as long as one is fine with low to medium detail settings.

Your mileage may vary depending on how high the CPU power limits are, how competent the cooling solution of the system is, how fast the RAM of the system is (there is no dedicated VRAM here).

Power consumption

This Ryzen 9 series chip has a long-term power limit (default TDP) of 35 W to 54 W, giving laptop makers a choice between longer battery life and higher performance. Either way, an active cooling solution is a must for a system powered by this chip.

The 8945HS is built with TSMC's 4 nm process for high, as of late 2023, energy efficiency.

AMD Ryzen 7 8845HS

The Ryzen 7 8845HS is a powerful Hawk Point family chip that we believe to be a Ryzen 7 7840HS in disguise but with higher clock speeds on the Ryzen AI NPU. The R7 8845HS was brought to life in H2 2023; it features 8 cores (16 threads thanks to SMT support) running at up to 5.1 GHz. Last but not the least, the Radeon 780M serves as the integrated GPU.

Architecture & Features

Hawk Point family chips are powered by the Zen 4 architecture, much like Phoenix and Dragon Range family chips are. That's not to say that there is no difference between the three. With Hawk Point, AMD uncorks its 2nd generation Ryzen AI technology meaning the new processors are expected to deliver an up to 40% increase in generative AI performance over 7040 series APUs. Dozens of popular apps such as DaVinci Resolve support this technology, as of late 2023.

Unlike Zen 3, Zen 4 features AVX512 support and, thanks to a plethora of other improvements including larger caches/registers/buffers across the board, is slated to bring a double-digit IPC improvement over the former.

Elsewhere, the 8845HS has 16 MB of L3 cache and a seriously fast RAM controller (up to LPDDR5x-7500 and up to DDR5-5600, ECC-enabled memory included). PCI-Express speeds are capped at 1.97 GB/s per lane which corresponds to the 4.0 spec.

This Ryzen 7 series chip is designed to run 64-bit Windows 11, 64-bit Windows 10 or Linux; please note that it isn't overclockable and neither is it user-replaceable. It gets soldered to the motherboard for good instead (FP7, FP7r2, FP8 socket interfaces).

Performance

Since the 8845HS is a 7840HS in disguise, it's safe to expect it to be just slightly faster than the Core i9-13900H and also the Ryzen 9 7940HS, as far as multi-thread performance is concerned. This is a very fast chip, as of Q3 2023.

Your mileage may vary depending on how high the CPU power limits are and how competent the cooling solution of your system is.

Graphics

The Radeon 780M (12 CUs / 768 shaders, up to 2,700 MHz) is capable of powering 4 monitors simultaneously with resolutions as high as SUHD 4320p. It will also have little issue hardware-encoding and hardware-decoding the most widely used video codecs (AV1, HEVC, AVC). As far as gaming is concerned, the thing will let you play most games at 1080p as long as you are fine with moderate quality settings. Long story short, this is the best iGPU money can buy, as of H2 2023.

Your mileage may vary depending on how high the CPU power limits are, how competent the cooling solution of your system is, how fast the RAM of your system is (there is no dedicated VRAM here).

Power consumption

This Ryzen 7 series chip has a long-term power limit (default TDP) of 35 W to 54 W, giving system makers a choice between improving battery life and making the system they're designing insanely fast. Either way, an active cooling solution is a must for a laptop or a mini-PC built around this APU.

The R7 8845HS is built with a 4 nm TSMC process for high, as of late 2023, energy efficiency.