AMD A9-9420e vs Intel Core i7-7567U vs AMD A6-9220e

AMD A9-9420e

The AMD A9-9420e is an entry-level chip from the Stoney-Ridge APU series for notebooks (7th APU generation). It was first found in the Dell Inspiron 3000 with passive cooling and 4 GB DDR4 RAM. The performance in that device was way below the normal A9-9420 as the clock speed only reached up to 2,5 GHz. It also includes a Radeon R5 GPU with 192 shaders as well as a single-channel DDR4-2133 memory controller, H.265 video engine and chipset with all I/O ports.

Architecture

Stoney Ridge is the successor of the Carrizo architecture and the design is almost identical. Thanks to optimized manufacturing processes and more aggressive Boost behavior, however, the clocks are a bit higher at the same power consumption. The memory controller now also supports DDR4-RAM, in this case up to 2133 MHz. Stoney Ridge is the designation for the smaller dual-core and single-core chip, while Bristol Ridge is the bigger quad-core chip with dual-channel memory controller. More technical details are available in the following articles:

• AMD's Bristol Ridge and Stoney Ridge Architecture
• AMD: Bristol Ridge APUs announced

Power Consumption

AMD specifies the TDP of the A9-9420 between 10-25 Watts, but the passively cooled A9-9420e should be positioned lower than 9 Watt.

Intel Core i7-7567U

The Intel Core i7-7567U is a fast dual-core SoC for notebooks based on the Kaby Lake architecture and was announced in January 2017. The CPU has two processor cores clocked at 3.5-4 GHz (two cores up to 3.9 GHz). The processor can execute up to four threads simultaneously thanks to Hyper Threading. It is also equipped with an Intel Iris Plus Graphics 650 GPU with 64 MB eDRAM, a dual-channel memory controller (DDR4) as well as VP9 and H.265 video decoding as well as encoding. The chip is still manufactured in a 14nm process with FinFET transistors.

Compared to the Core i7-7560, the 7567U has a higher TDP of 28 vs. 15 Watts as well as higher clocks.

Architecture

Intel basically uses the same micro architecture compared to Skylake, so the per-MHz performance does not differ. The manufacturer only reworked the Speed Shift technology for faster dynamic adjustments of voltages and clocks, and the improved 14nm process allows much higher frequencies combined with better efficiency than before.

Performance

Thanks to the high clocks pf up to 4 GHz and 64 MB eDRAM (can also be used as L4 cache by the CPU), the Core i7-7567U is the fastest dual-core for notebooks in the beginning of 2017. It competes with lower clocked quad-core models and can convince by the excellent single-thread performance. Some games might require a real quad-core though and could not run perfectly on the dual-core, despite Hyper Threading.

Graphics

The integrated Intel Iris Plus 650 Graphics is the GT3e model of the Kaby Lake GPU (Intel Gen. 9.5). It has 48 Execution Units running at 300-1100 MHz and the performance is comparable to a GeForce 920MX thanks to fast eDRAM cache. However, there aren't any significant improvements compared to the old Iris Pro 550, so modern games can often not be played smoothly or only at the lowest or medium settings, respectively.

Contrary to Skylake, Kaby lake now also supports H.265/HEVC Main 10 with a 10-bit color depth as well as Google's VP9 codec. The dual-core Kaby Lake processors announced in January should also support HDCP 2.2.

Power Consumption

The chip is manufactured in an improved 14nm process with FinFET transistors, which improves the efficiency even further. Intel specifies the TDP with 28 Watts, which can be reduced to 23 Watts (cTDP Down) depending on the usage scenario. The TDP is pretty high compared to the common 15-Watt TDP for dual-core processors, but allows a better utilization of CPU and GPU Turbo.

AMD A6-9220e

The AMD A6-9220e is an entry-level chip from the Stoney-Ridge APU series for notebooks (7th APU generation), which was announced mid 2017. The 9220e is an entry-level Stoney Ridge processor (dual-core version of Bristol Ridge) and integrates two CPU cores (one Excavator module with 2 integer and on FP unit) clocked between 1.6 - 2.4 GHz. It also includes a Radeon R4 GPU, probably with 192 shaders at 600 MHz, as well as a single-channel DDR4-2133 memory controller, H.265 video engine and chipset with all I/O ports. Compared to the similar named A6-9220 the 9220e is significantly slower clocked (2.5 - 2.9 GHz) including the GPU (600 versus 655 MHz) and can be passively cooled thanks to the TDP of 6W.

Architecture

Stoney Ridge is the successor of the Carrizo architecture and the design is almost identical. Thanks to optimized manufacturing processes and more aggressive Boost behavior, however, the clocks are a bit higher at the same power consumption. The memory controller now also supports DDR4-RAM, in this case up to 2133 MHz. Stoney Ridge is the designation for the smaller dual-core and single-core chip, while Bristol Ridge is the bigger quad-core chip with dual-channel memory controller. More technical details are available in the following articles:

• AMD's Bristol Ridge and Stoney Ridge Architecture
• AMD: Bristol Ridge APUs announced

Performance

Because of the significantly lower clock speed, the A6-9220e is noticeably slower than the A6-9220. In the Cinebench R15 Multi benchmark the 9220 reaches 38% higher scores, in the single thread test its more than twice as fast (219% versus the 9220 in the HP 255 G6). Compared to Intel CPUs, the A6-9220e is on par with the old Celeron N2820 in Cinebench (single and multi core). Therefore, the CPU is placed in the lowest segment (performance wise) and only suited for light tasks and light multitasking.

Graphics Card

The integrated Radeon R4 (Stoney Ridge) GPU is probably similar to the R5 with 192 active shader units (3 compute cores), but a reduced clock of just 655 instead of 800 MHz. More details about the GPU are available in the linked articles above. 

Power Consumption

AMD specifies the TDP of the A6-9220e with 6 Watts and therefore significantly below the 15 W of the A6-9220. This means the APU can be passively cooled and is a good choice for thin and light notebooks.