27 September, 2024
Owners of AMD Ryzen 9000 CPUs can look forward to new free performance improvements thanks to the BIOS update and the new AGESA code. Although this improvement will not affect the performance of the Ryzen 7000 series, Ryzen 9000 processor owners get a significant reduction in latency in the communication between the cores and CCD chiplets.
The new update with version AGESA 1.2.0.2 is already available for certain Asus motherboards and will soon be available for other manufacturers as well. The focus of this improvement is to reduce inter-core latency, which in initial tests at the launch of the Ryzen 9000 series was significantly higher compared to the previous generation. Forum member Overclock.net reported data showing that latency has dropped from around 180 ns to just 75 ns thanks to the new BIOS.
Although the reduction in latency is positive, it is also important to consider its impact on actual performance. Measurement results in Cinebench R23 show an improvement of 400 to 600 points, which is about one percent better in practice.
The launch of the new Ryzen 9000 series was not without its challenges. First it was delayed due to heat sink issues, then performance issues related to Windows 11 appeared. These issues were addressed by the Windows 11 24H2 update, which was initially only available to Windows Insiders. An update was then quickly released for the currently current version 23H2, in the form of Windows 11 KB5041587.
AMD will also introduce the X870 chipset this month, as well as a new series of motherboards that will further boost demand for Socket AM5 processors. These boards will be available under the brands of leading PC component manufacturers, such as ASRock, Asus, Gigabyte and MSI, and will bring new features such as USB 4, Thunderbolt 4 and PCIe 5.