AMD Ryzen 7 7700

• Pros

  • Decent performance for the price
  • Relatively low power consumption
  • Capable stock cooler in the box

• Cons

  • Outpaced by recent Intel competitors due to core count
  • Priced slightly too high
  • Weak integrated graphics

AMD Ryzen 7 7700 Specs

Editors’ Note, March 2, 2023: The initial performance figures for the integrated graphics (IGP) of the 7700 were lower than expected, probably due to issues with the launch drivers. We have conducted further tests on the 7700 and 7700X, in addition to the Ryzen 9 7950X IGP, and have revised the data in the IGP testing table accordingly. Minor adjustments have also been made to that section to reflect the updated IGP results. However, the core conclusions we reached regarding this chip remain consistent.

The AMD Ryzen 7 7700 processor, priced at is a commendable CPU that comes with a satisfactory stock cooler and offers sufficiently rapid performance. However, the question remains whether it can rival Intel’s latest “Raptor Lake” 13th Generation processors. Upon their release, AMD’s Ryzen 7000-series processors garnered significant attention and acclaim. For a brief period, the Ryzen 9 7950X held the title of the fastest consumer processor globally, showcasing remarkable improvements over its predecessor. This positioned the Ryzen 7000-series chips as groundbreaking at the time of their launch.

The market landscape shifted significantly with the introduction of Intel’s Raptor Lake processors. Their superior performance and competitive pricing have somewhat diminished the attractiveness of AMD’s Ryzen 7000-series chips. Although the AMD Ryzen 7 7700 demonstrates commendable performance, it falls short of expectations relative to its price, particularly when compared to its 13th Gen Intel counterpart, the overclockable Core i5, which benefits from a higher core count due to the inclusion of Efficient cores (E-cores). Nevertheless, the Ryzen 7 7700’s provision of a quality stock cooler—absent in the competing Core i5-13600K—renders it a viable option within its price segment for those opting for the AMD AM5 platform.

The Design: Zen 4, Offered at a More Accessible Price Point

The AMD Ryzen 7 7700, similar to all processors in the AMD Ryzen 7000 series, employs the Zen 4 microarchitecture. For a more comprehensive understanding of this architecture, we encourage you to refer to our review of the AMD Ryzen 9 7950X, where we delve into the details of Zen 4.

In summary, Zen 4 represents AMD’s most recent advancement in high-performance microarchitecture. It maintains the use of chiplets, consistent with earlier versions of the Zen architecture, while demonstrating enhanced performance per clock cycle. Additionally, the capability of Zen 4 processors to operate at elevated clock speeds, combined with the rise in instructions per cycle (IPC), leads to an average performance improvement of 29% compared to the “Zen 3”-based Ryzen 5000-series processors. All Ryzen 7000-series processors are manufactured using TSMC’s 5nm process technology.

The AMD Ryzen 7 7700 processor features eight CPU cores, each capable of handling two threads, resulting in a total of 16 threads. The cores operate at a base frequency of 3.8GHz and can reach up to 5.3GHz without any modifications. All processors in the Ryzen 7000 series come with standard support for DDR5 memory, with the Ryzen 7 7700 specifically accommodating memory speeds of 5,200MHz. Additionally, the processor includes 32MB of L3 cache and is equipped with a basic integrated graphics processor (IGP) based on the Radeon RDNA 2 architecture.

Test Setup

The AMD Ryzen 7 7700 processor underwent testing on our newly upgraded AMD testbed, which features an Asrock X670E Taichi motherboard and a Cooler Master MasterLiquid PL240 Flux 240mm liquid cooling system. This configuration includes 32GB (2x16GB) of G.Skill DDR5 RAM operating at the maximum supported speed of 5,200MHz for the processor. The entire setup is energized by a SilverStone DA850 power supply, with all components mounted on a Praxis Wetbench open-air testbed.

The system was equipped with an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Founders Edition graphics card, which was utilized for the majority of the testing procedures. This graphics card functioned as the primary GPU for all gaming assessments, with the exception of those that specifically examined the integrated graphics capabilities of the processor. Additionally, it acted as the display adapter for all tests that did not pertain to graphics performance.

Identifying the closest competitor to the Ryzen 7 7700 presents a challenge, as the specifications of AMD and Intel have significantly diverged in recent years. Typically, Ryzen 7 processors are positioned to compete with Intel’s Core i7 series; however, we have yet to evaluate the new Core i7-13700K. Nevertheless, the Core i7-12700K is expected to provide strong competition for the Ryzen 7 7700, along with the Core i5-13600K. It is important to note that, in terms of power consumption, none of the other processors listed can rival the Ryzen 7 7700’s specified board power.

Testing the Ryzen 7 7700

We begin our analysis with the memory benchmark provided by AIDA64, which offers valuable insights into the processor’s internal mechanisms. It is crucial to recognize that various architectures respond differently to fluctuations in bandwidth; therefore, the resulting figures may not be directly comparable to those of many other processors.

In any case, it is quite simple to compare processors with identical architectures. In this instance, the Ryzen 7 7700 demonstrates a slight deficiency in memory performance when compared to the Ryzen 7 7700X across all metrics.

The remaining CPU-centric evaluations provide a clearer insight into processor performance. Beginning with Cinebench R23, it is evident that the Ryzen 7 7700 significantly surpasses the previous AMD Ryzen 5000-series processors and maintains a notable advantage over the Intel Core i5-12600K. This clearly illustrates the generational advancements in the Zen 4 architecture; however, the performance enhancements are insufficient for the Ryzen 7 7700 to exceed the Core i7-12700K or the Core i5-13600K in the majority of tests, both of which demonstrate considerably higher speeds.

In our evaluations of Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Premiere Pro, the Ryzen 7 7700 demonstrates a stronger performance, surpassing the Core i7-12700K in the Photoshop assessment. While it approaches the performance of its rivals in the Premiere Pro evaluation, the Core i7-12700K still maintains a speed advantage, and the Core i5-13600K outperforms the Ryzen 7 7700 in both applications.

In the applications of Handbrake and Blender, the Ryzen 7 7700 demonstrates a notable performance deficit compared to the Core i7-12700K and the Core i5-13600K. The situation improves marginally in POV-Ray 3.7; however, the Ryzen 7 7700’s performance in the single-threaded test can only be described as a smaller loss relative to its competitors.

In summary, the Ryzen 7 7700 stands out as one of the most rapid eight-core processors we have evaluated thus far; however, it frequently falls short when compared to the performance delivered by the 14 cores of Intel’s Core i5-13600K. The Core i5, similar to numerous other Raptor Lake processors, employs a unique core architecture consisting of six Performance cores (P-cores) and eight Efficient cores (E-cores). As indicated by their designation, the E-cores do not match the speed of the P-cores and are not on par with AMD’s full-fledged Zen 4 CPU cores. Nevertheless, akin to a collective of industrious worker ants, they can achieve remarkable results when functioning in unison, which enhances the overall performance of the Core i5 relative to the Ryzen 7 7700.

Gaming Tests

In summary, the performance of the Ryzen 7 7700 appears to be somewhat underwhelming when compared to its competitors. This observation is not indicative of its inherent capabilities, but rather highlights the superior performance of rival processors. While the discrepancies in CPU benchmarks range from minor to significant, the variations observed in gaming tests are less pronounced.

Bypassing 3DMark, which serves as a synthetic benchmark and does not accurately reflect real-world performance, the Ryzen 7 7700 demonstrates a 5% advantage over both the Ryzen 9 7950X and the Ryzen 7 7700X in F1 22 across all resolutions. This marginal lead may seem trivial; however, it becomes noteworthy when considering the significantly lower price point of the Ryzen 7 7700 compared to the other two processors. Furthermore, the remaining benchmarks reveal no more than a 2% variance among the three Ryzen 7000-series models.

The Core i5-13600K and the Ryzen 7 7700 exhibit minimal differences in performance. The benchmark results for these two processors fall within a 3% margin of error, making any distinctions virtually negligible. The only notable exception occurs in Bioshock: Infinite at 1080p, where the Core i5-13600K demonstrates a slight advantage, achieving a modest 4% lead over the Ryzen 7 7700.

Based on these findings, it is reasonable to conclude that the gaming experience you can anticipate from the Core i5-13600K or the Ryzen 7 7700 is likely to be comparable, as well as with several other processors. This assessment holds true provided that your GPU is similar in performance to the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 utilized during our testing. However, this equivalence may not be maintained if you possess a significantly more powerful GPU, such as the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 or the AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX.

We will not focus extensively on the performance of the integrated graphics processor (IGP) that AMD includes with the majority of its Ryzen 7000-series CPUs. Our previous tests, along with the recent evaluations, yielded nearly identical outcomes. In summary, the IGP falls short of our expectations for a contemporary integrated graphics solution, making it primarily suitable for non-gaming applications or older games that are over ten years old. While it is possible to engage in gaming under certain circumstances, achieving playable frame rates necessitates lowering both the resolution and graphics settings significantly. Essentially, its primary function is to support basic monitor operations for everyday computing tasks.

System Power and Thermals

The power consumption of the test system is assessed utilizing a Kill-A-Watt power meter, which indicates that the Ryzen 7 7700 ranks among the more energy-efficient processors evaluated in recent years. In the context of Adobe Premiere, the workload is distributed between the CPU and GPU, resulting in increased power consumption that surpasses that of the Core i5-13600K.

In Cinebench, a benchmark that relies solely on CPU performance, the Ryzen 7 7700 demonstrates a significantly lower power consumption. Intel can partially account for this with the Core i5-13600K achieving a Cinebench score that surpasses the Ryzen 7 7700 by 25%. However, this advantage does not compensate for the fact that the Core i5-13600K consumes approximately 46% more power than the Ryzen 7 7700, indicating that the Ryzen 7 7700 likely offers superior efficiency and performance per watt.

Increased power consumption correlates with elevated heat generation, as demonstrated by our thermal testing in Cinebench. The results indicate that the Ryzen 7 7700 operates at a temperature of 71 degrees Celsius, while the Core i5-13600K reaches 85 degrees Celsius. This represents a 20% rise in temperature when comparing the Ryzen 7 7700 to the Core i5-13600K, despite both processors being equipped with the same cooling solutions.

Stock Cooler Testing

AMD provides the Ryzen 7 7700 with the Wraith Prism CPU cooler, which demonstrates commendable performance. This cooler is equipped with a copper baseplate and copper heat pipes, along with a heatsink that is larger than what is generally found on standard coolers. Additionally, the fan operates quietly and is enhanced with RGB LED lighting.

A significant stigma has developed regarding stock coolers, stemming from the subpar performance of certain models produced by AMD, Intel, and various system manufacturers over the past several decades. However, it is important to note that not all stock coolers are created equal, as demonstrated by AMD. The primary objective of this evaluation is to determine whether it is necessary to purchase an aftermarket cooler or if the cooler provided by AMD will suffice for your needs.

The AMD Wraith Prism demonstrates outstanding thermal performance in cooling the AMD Ryzen 7 7700. Although it does not match the efficiency of the Cooler Master MasterLiquid PL240 Flux, which is utilized for all CPU reviews, it still performs adequately. During the Cinebench R23 test, the Ryzen 7 7700 remains below 78 degrees Celsius, and the performance disparity observed between the two cooling solutions is minimal, registering less than a 2% difference.

Considering its capabilities, the Wraith Prism cooler is likely adequate for the majority of users purchasing the Ryzen 7 7700. I would not be reluctant to utilize it for moderate overclocking; however, if you plan to engage in more aggressive overclocking or are constructing a compact system with restricted internal airflow, it may be prudent to explore a water cooling solution.

Conclusion: Impressive Performance in a More Challenging Environment.

Prior to concluding this review, it is essential to address one significant aspect that warrants further discussion: the pricing. The Ryzen 7 7700 is priced at an MSRP of and based on its performance metrics, it presents a superior choice compared to AMD’s Ryzen 7 7700X. Not only is it priced considerably lower than the Ryzen 7 7700X, but this assessment does not even take into account the added value of the stock cooler, which is not included with the Ryzen 7 7700X. Additionally, the Ryzen 7 7700 operates at a much cooler temperature, consumes significantly less power, and delivers comparable performance.

When comparing the Intel Core i7-12700K to the Ryzen 7 7700, the former demonstrates superior overall performance. However, it is important to note that the Core i7-12700K is significantly more expensive, retailing at. This price disparity suggests that the Ryzen 7 7700 may represent a more advantageous choice in terms of performance relative to its cost.

The primary challenge facing the Ryzen 7 7700 is the Core i5-13600K, which is similarly priced at and demonstrates a significant performance advantage over the Ryzen 7 7700. When considering the alternatives, the Core i5-13600K emerges as the superior choice. Although the Ryzen 7 7700 may find a limited market segment due to the absence of a stock cooler with the Core i5-13600K, necessitating an additional purchase for cooling solutions, this factor only partially mitigates the price difference between the two processors. It is important to note that cooling solutions, particularly bulkier air coolers, are generally not prohibitively expensive, raising questions about whether this additional expense provides the Ryzen 7 7700 with a compelling enough advantage to sway potential buyers from the Core i5.

The reduced power consumption of the Ryzen 7 7700 may appeal to customers interested in constructing compact, energy-efficient systems. When viewed as a potential solution for an office environment aiming to minimize system size, heat output, and energy usage, the Ryzen 7 7700 appears to be a strong contender in this regard. Additionally, while it could serve as a viable choice for a home theater PC, competing Intel processors with slightly superior integrated graphics performance might be more effective in this application.

The AMD Ryzen 7 7700 may initially appear to be a compelling choice for office power users, yet it faces significant challenges in other areas. Similar to AMD’s other Ryzen 7000-series processors, a reduction in price would enhance its competitiveness against Intel’s more robust Raptor Lake chips. While it is certainly not an unfavorable option, particularly for those who favor AMD or wish to economize on their gaming PC build by forgoing a stock cooler, the Ryzen 7 7700 falls short for those seeking maximum performance for their investment. For superior performance, consider the Core i5-13600K, or, if your budget allows, the Core i7-13700K, which we intend to review in the near future.