Zen 5 with 3D V-Cache could remove some fo the biggest limitations of previous generations
After Computex, a report surfaced that the Zen 5 version of 3D V-Cache processors coming after the standard Ryzen 9000 models could have interesting extra features over previous generations, which was mentioned by company rep Donny Woligrosky. What exactly it will be, however, has not been said. It seems that the news could be the possibility of overclocking these CPUs, which has been missing until now due to the 3D chiplets.
In the aforementioned interview provided by PC Gamer, there was no specific mention of what the 3D V-Cache improvements on the Ryzen 9000 might consist of. Woligroski only said that AMD doesn’t want to rest on its laurels and 3D V-Cache technology should be improved in some ways for Zen 5. Which without specifics given could mean almost anything, even something trivial like maybe the CPU package making the X3D models a small bit easier to cool.
Overclocking cores with 3D V-Cache
But the WCCFtech website has now presented information that a fairly major change could indeed be in the works. The 5000X3D Ryzens had overclocking completely locked down, and even with the 7000X3D generation it was not possible to increase voltage and clock speed, although the company did make some sort of overclocking available via the Precision Boost Overdrive feature. This leaves the processor in its standard clock speed control mode, but increases the power and current limits it can utilise. The boost range is therefore unchanged, but especially under multi-threaded loads, you can see the CPU achieve better residency of higher clocks within this same range. The Curve Optimiser function has also been enabled, which works similarly, but still operates within the standard boost clock algorithms.
According to WCCFtech, however, the 9000X3D Ryzens should already have full-fledged regular overclocking enabled, which has been locked away until now. The site reportedly found this out from its sources. In addition to PBO and Curve Optimiser, according to this source, it will supposedly be possible to change the processor’s multiplier, thus increasing its maximum clock speed, and also the voltage, i.e. probably all the manual OC options.
However, overclocking, and especially voltage increases, were limited on processors with 3D V-Cache for a good reason – the 3D chiplet technology could not handle the higher voltages commonly used by enthusiasts when OCing processors. For the same reason, CPU cores with 3D V-Cache also could not reach as high boost clock speeds as CPU cores of the standard variant of processors, with maximum boosts of 4.5 GHz for the 5000X3D generation and just over 5.0 GHz for the 7000X3D generation. For these processors, it’s believed they can be damaged by voltages as low as somewhat above 1.3 V, which are conventionally considered safe for processors.
So the question is whether enabling overclocking on the 9000X3D generation means that these issues have been eliminated or reduced, and the V-Cache is capable of handling higher voltages now. This would be quite a crucial improvement, because processors with 3D V-Cache could likely also reach higher boost clock speeds in that case, and there would be no regression in single-threaded performance (due to lower maximum boosts) as a result. However, it is probably premature to infer this merely from the WCCFtech report. AMD may have another reason for unlocking overclocking may be different.
It is possible that the sensitivity to higher voltages will remain unchanged, and even with overclocking unlocked, processors will apply strict limiters to the increase in “voltages” allowed to the user. This could mean that in theory OC will be allowed, but in practice you won’t achieve much with it because on most chips it will not be possible to support the clock speeds increases with the voltage they would require to maintain stability. Also, for example, the catch could be that AMD is going to allow overclocking on dual CCX models, where OC would only be allowed on the chiplet without 3D V-Cache, while the chiplet with 3D V-Cache would remain locked.
So we don’t yet know how significant this news it is, the newly unlocked overclocking might be a big gamechanger but also might not be one. For now, this claim should of course be taken with a grain of salt anyway, it hasn’t been confirmed from other sources besides WCCFtech’s claims and there is a risk that it may just be someone’s speculation.
Release in September or next year?
According to a previous report from Club386, these processors could be out relatively soon. While it was previously assumed that AMD would release them as a bit of a refresh product generation for 2025 and they wouldn’t come out until January at CES 2025, this site reports that at Computex, board manufacturers told it off record that X3D models could come out as early as September. So maybe we won’t have to wait quite that long for the unveiling. However, this too is unconfirmed rumor, so again, it should be taken with a grain of salt for now.
Sources: PCGamer, WCCFtech, VideoCardz (1, 2)
English translation and edit by Jozef Dudáš
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