AMD has introduced its new Ryzen AI Max chip, a 16-core processor designed for laptops with a focus on AI and graphics performance.
The company has been marketing the chip as a powerful option for creators and gamers, boasting impressive performance in various benchmarks. However, there’s a crucial detail missing from AMD’s comparison with Apple’s M4 chips.
AMD’s Ryzen AI Max was tested against Apple’s 12-core M4 and 14-core M4 Pro, showing a strong performance edge in benchmarks like Blender, Corona, and v-ray. In some cases, the Ryzen AI Max claimed up to an 86% advantage in rendering tasks.
However, the Ryzen chip did not perform as well in the multi-threaded Cinebench 2024 test, where it only slightly outperformed the 12-core M4 Pro by 2% and trailed the 14-core M4 Pro by 3%.
What AMD conveniently left out of the comparison was the 16-core M4 Max, which could potentially outperform the Ryzen AI Max in relevant tests.
The M4 Max is the highest-performing chip in Apple’s M4 lineup, offering up to a 40-core GPU, significantly more powerful than the 10-core GPU in the 12-core M4 or the 20-core GPU in the 14-core M4 Pro.
AMD’s decision to omit the M4 Max from the benchmarks suggests that the Ryzen AI Max might not hold up as well in direct competition with Apple’s most powerful chip.
While AMD’s chip is marketed as a strong contender, the absence of the M4 Max in the tests raises questions about its true performance capabilities.
