dominate in the age of AI and video games

Officially, CES 2026 in Las Vegas starts tomorrow, January 6, but as usual, some companies have wanted to stand out to capture the spotlight. One of those is an AMD that is pushing its processor division hard and that has stood at the event with three new Ryzen. Not three different processors: three categories.

As it could not be otherwise, there are many “artificial intelligence” in the equation. It is something that the company’s latest processors for Consolidated PCslike the Asus ROG Xbox Allythey have made it clear, and that in these new families it continues to be promoted.

That said, we are going with all the new AMD processors, including some more industrial ones that are not interesting for us as users, but that says a lot about the state of the technology industry in general and The United States and AMD itself in particular.

New AMD Ryzen AI 400 APUs

First things first: the Ryzen AI 400. It is an APU, a package that integrates CPU, GPU and NPU to process artificial intelligence tasks. This type of units is found in established consoles, laptops and PCs, and this AI is responsible for “inventing” frames per second with tools such as ‘frame generation’ or reconstructing the image with AMD’s FSR and the Nvidia DLSS.

In this new family, we see improvements in memory speed, cores and frequency, but what stands out is the performance of the NPU. It has 1.2 times more TOPs than previous Ryzens.

Manufacturers are expected to start launching compact laptops and desktops at the end of January this year, and the features of all Ryzen AI 400 processors are as follows:

Ryzen AI Max+

On the other hand, there are the Ryzen AI Max+. They are also APUs that integrate graphics, processor and NPU, but the TDP is higher because they are designed for more demanding tasks such as 3D modeling, video editing and video games with comparable image quality, according to AMD, to what we would have if we used a conventional CPU plus a graphics card.

Now we will see the frequencies, cores and bandwidth, but AMD has focused on commenting that the characteristics of this processor allow AI models to run in local mode without depending on the limitations of the cloud. In fact, the model Liquid AI It is the one they mention as local execution and it can be downloaded for free by everyone who has a Ryzen AI processor.

And, of course, comparisons are odious, but they have put an Asus ROG Flow Z13 face to face with an AI Max and at MacBook Pro M5 to tell us that the Asus performs 1.4 more in AI tasks, 1.8 more in content creation, has 1.8 faster multitasking and better performance -1.6x- in ‘Cyberpunk 2077‘.

Here is the entire family:

New Ryzen 9000, because not everything is AI

If the two previous families rely on AI to be able to handle models locally and to improve visual parameters in video games, now we move on to the new Ryzen 9000. These are processors designed for the desktop, and within the new family of Ryzen 5, Ryzen 7 and Ryzen 9we have real beasts with a TDP of up to 170 W and maximum frequencies of up to 5.7 GHz in the most powerful of them: the Ryzen 9 9950X3D.

It is a processor with 16 cores and 32 threads with a combined cache of 144 MB and AMD itself is not the one it has used for its comparisons because it is a processor more designed for creating content than for video games. Looking for a greater balance, there is the Ryzen 7 9850X3D.

It has 8 cores, 16 threads, a TPD of 120 W and a maximum frequency of 5.6 GHz. This is 400 MHz more than the fabulous 9800X3D and maintains compatibility with the AM5 socket. If you already had a previous processor compatible with that socket, the change is very simple.

These are all the new Ryzen 9000:

And, although it is not new, AMD has recalled that they launched Redstone recently. This is the name they have given to FSR, its image reconstruction technology and pixel generation.

Most new games are already compatible with Redstone and it is something that we can see in this video and that only interests you if you have a Radeon RX9000:

Embedded APU, the most industrial branch

It is clear that AMD has planted itself at CES to show muscle. In GPUs they are still behind, in some aspects, the raw power of Nvidia, but in processors, they have been establishing themselves as the best option for both gaming and integrated graphics to be mounted on consoles for years.

And, within this presentation, they have highlighted its most boring part for the consumer, but interesting for something more important: the market. AMD Embedded is the industrial branch of solutions for the aerospace, defense, data centers, retail, robotics and medical industries. Within the portfolio of new processors in this category, the P100 and the X100 have stood out, APUs manufactured in 4 nanometerswith TDP from 15 to 54 W and with a package prepared to last a decade operating 24/7.

As we say, for the user it is something that is not of much interest, but it shows how focused the company is on being one of the greats in this era of artificial intelligence. They not only prepare solutions for industry, but also for data centers with the aim that United States achieve sovereignty in AI.

Now we just have to wait for manufacturers to implement these new processors and APUs in their equipment, and we must keep an eye, above all, on established PCs that in recent months have taken a giant leap in raw power to offer desktop experiences on equipment with very low consumption.

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