We got our hands on a bunch of AMD Ryzen AI 300-powered systems at the AMD Tech Day in LA last week, and it was surely an impressive line-up of laptops across the board. We saw AMD Ryzen AI 300 series powered laptops from Asus, HP, Acer, and MSI. All of them were running on the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX370 processor, which will be the top-of-the-line chip in the Ryzen AI 300 series processor line-up. From thin and light laptops for everyday use to high-performance productivity machines and some very capable thin and light gaming laptops as well. Before we get to our list of the best of what we saw at the AMD Tech Day, let’s have a quick recap on what the AMD Ryzen AI 300 series APUs have to offer.
Also read: AMD Introduces Ryzen AI 300 and 9000 Series Processors at Computex 2024
As far as the Ryzen AI 300 series processors go, the hero is undoubtedly the XDNA 2 NPU that promises up to 50 TOPs of AI performance. We’ve done a deep dive on the AMD XDNA 2 NPU, do give it a read to know more.
AMD’s Jason Banta (CVP, Business Development, Client) took the stage to emphasize AMD’s approach towards AI PCs. “We want to deliver all the designs you can dream of, and we want innovation across all form factors. The Ryzen brand has become synonymous with performance, we do not want to put somebody in a position to make any trade-offs. We lead on productivity across the board. We lead in content creation. We lead in gaming performance, that’s why when you see these systems coming out in July, these are all systems that are going to support the Copilot Plus standard”, assured Jason Banta.
AMD promises a “no-compromise” AI PC solution that delivers full compatibility, leadership performance, and various form factor options. AMD’s philosophy is to provide a solution that doesn’t require users to sacrifice form factor, compatibility, or performance. The AMD Ryzen AI 300 series is built on the XDNA 2 NPU and promises leadership AI performance with up to 50 TOPs of AI performance from the NPU alone. AMD also claims that the Ryzen AI 300 series powered laptops will offer all-day battery life. In addition, at the event, AMD also spoke out it’s deep partnership with Microsoft. AMD has partnered with Microsoft to deliver Copilot Plus experiences, including recall, real-time translation, and co-creator. The company has also partnered with OEMs, including ASUS, Acer, and HP, to develop AI applications that differentiate their systems. “AMD’s approach is based on partnership as well as great technology,” said Jason during the AMD Tech Day 2024 event.
We’ve picked three laptops running on the AMD Ryzen AI 300 series processors that caught our fancy at the AMD Tech Day 2024 demo zone. Let’s have a closer look at them.
The ASUS ZenBook S16 was projected as a thin and light gaming laptop that can deliver satisfactory native 1080p gaming at medium settings on many AAA titles. The ASUS ZenBook S16 was able to run Fallout 4 at 1200p and we noticed very smooth gameplay, AMD didn’t comment on the FPS bit, the reason given was that the systems were not running on final version of the BIOS (the real-time FPS overlay was set to off). But, with the limited amount of time we spent on the device, we could tell that the game was running above 50 FPS for sure.
What’s interesting though is the form factor, the laptop is probably one of the slimmest 16-inch laptops out there with just 1.1 cm in thickness and weighing a meager 1.5 kilograms. As we mentioned earlier, the ASUS ZenBook S16 shown at the demo zone was running on the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX370 processor. Yes, we will have to get used to the new naming scheme from AMD and these model names are quite a mouthful.
The OmniBook Ultra 14 is a thin and light laptop that’s marketed as an AI powerhouse with great battery life to boot. HP is claiming up to 21 hours of battery life, which is a clear indicator of what we can expect from AMD Ryzen AI 300 powered laptops, the benchmark for good battery life has moved beyond the standard 12-hour claim. The claimed battery life label has moved into the twenties. While the real-world number on mixed usage will most certainly be lower. It would be fair to expect next-gen AI PCs to offer 12-15 hours of battery life, which perfectly syncs with the overarching “all-day battery life” claims. We’re not complaining. Especially if that battery life is supported by excellent performance across the board. And that is what AMD promises with the AMD Ryzen AI 300 series of processors.
As far as the specs go, the HP OmniBook Ultra 14 will run on the top-spec AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX370 processor. It has a 14-inch, 2240 x 1400 pixel touchscreen IPS display, we expected HP to go OLED or MiniLED on this one, but unfortunately, that’s not the case. However, the highlight of the laptop has to be the design, the build quality, and the 9MP wide-angle camera that has a bunch of AI-enabled features that track your attention and also wake up the system and unlock it on approach. The higher-resolution camera can detect faces from a distance and unlock the device by the time you are ready to operate the machine.
This has to be our pick of the lot, the ASUS TUF A14 is a 1.46-kilogram 14-inch gaming laptop that houses an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 under the hood. The combination of the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 processor and the RTX 4060 would make for a very sweet 1440p gaming machine. The TUF A14 has a very slim and elegant profile, it doesn’t scream gaming. And, that’s a good thing.
The 14-inch 2.5K display on the ASUS TUF A14 is true gaming cred, with 165Hz refresh rated and a claimed pixel response time of 3ms. We can’t wait to get our hands on this one. If priced right in India, this will be the perfect gaming laptop for working professionals. It has all the makings of an excellent workhorse that packs the right gaming chops to deliver some serious firepower when it comes to gaming.
We are awaiting review units of the AMD Ryzen AI 300 series powered laptops, we’re not sure which one will make it to India. Our best bet would be on Asus or Acer being one of the first to announce laptops based on AMD Zen 5 in India. AMD surely seems to have an advantage with its line-up promising the best AI performance for now, with Intel Arrow Lake-based laptops still a distance away from coming to the Indian market. Competition in the AI laptop space is heating up for sure!
Also read: Computex 2024: Hands-on with Snapdragon X Elite AI PC laptops from Acer, Lenovo, Samsung, Microsoft
