Test Setup
Please read our testing methodologies and benchmarks and review format for an explanation on our procedures. Check out our Test System build.
The Comparison
There isn’t much that compares to this APU at this price point, so to give you some kind of comparison to the benchmarks we are going to include an APU that we have on hand that comes closest to this one. It isn’t a perfect match, but it has several things that are similar and we think you’ll see as show the benchmarks how similar it can be in some ways. Plus, it gives you an idea of where the performance of the Athlon 3000G lies.
We are going to use an APU built-in a Laptop, specifically a Lenovo IdeaPad S145-15API (CPU Review and APU Review) which was released in July of 2019, around the same timeframe as the Athlon 3000G. The APU inside this laptop is a Ryzen 5 3500U. The Ryzen 5 3500U uses the same Zen+ architecture as the Athlon 3000G, so they directly match in architecture. They are both manufactured at 12nm.
The Athlon 3000G maxes out at 3.5GHz base clock, and the Ryzen 5 3500U can boost up to 3.7GHz at its best, but not necessarily all-core. The Ryzen 5 3500U uses the same Radeon Vega graphics, but bumped up to Vega 8 instead of Vega 3, so 8 CUs versus 3. Finally, the Ryzen 5 3500U has a TDP of 15W, while the Athlon 3000G has a TDP of 35W.
Now, there is one glaring difference between both APUs. The Ryzen 5 3500U has a big leg up in that it is a 4 core/8 thread CPU versus the Athlon 3000G 2 core/4 thread. This will offset the multi-thread performance quite a bit. What you will want to look at though is the single-thread performance, we think you’ll find this very interesting. Also, the Ryzen 5 3500U has a much lower TDP of 15W and the constrained laptop cooling will hold it back.
Why not compare with the Ryzen 5 3400G you ask? Well, the Ryzen 5 3400G is most certainly going to be a lot faster. It also has a 4 core/8 thread setup, but it is able to run at a much higher 65W TDP, and it can boost up to 4.2GHz so that is going to just blow the Athlon 3000G away. Plus, it has Radeon Vega 11 graphics, another major upgrade over the Athlon 3000G’s Vega 3. With the Ryzen 5 3500U at least we have a lower Vega Graphics 8 version to closer match the 3000G. Plus, it may have 4 core/8 thread but it has a much lesser 15W TDP. We do have a review of the Ryzen 5 3400G though, so you are welcome to compare results with that if you wish.
As you look through our benchmarks, just keep in mind the core count and thread count difference. Both CPUs are actually going to be clocked very closely. Also, in the overclocked results the Athlon 3000G will be clocked higher than the Ryzen 5 3500U.
Drivers
As for drivers, we are using the latest AMD chipset drivers on both platforms which is 2.07.14.327 for the best performance. We are also using AMD Radeon Vega graphics driver Adrenalin 2020 Edition 20.7.2 which are the latest driver versions for the APU/GPU. We also have Windows 10 installed with the latest 2004 build update. All other software and drivers are up to date.