If you’re in the market for a new Ryzen PC, beware: AMD is updating some of its older Ryzen processors with a new brand and updated model numbers and passing them off as new processors.
AMD has created a number of “new” Ryzen 100 series chips as well as a pair of new Ryzen 10 series model numbers. However, the chips are apparently identical to a number of older Zen 2 and Zen 3+ processors announced years ago in 2022. The difference is that these new Ryzens were “launched” in the last few weeks.
AMD calls these new chips the Ryzen 7 170, Ryzen 7 160, Ryzen 5 150, Ryzen 5 130, Ryzen 3 110, as well as the Ryzen 5 40 and Ryzen 3 30, 3Dcenter.org reported, citing a post from “Gray” on Twitter. The updated chips are simply rebadges of the Zen 3+ (Rembrandt-R) and Zen 2 (Mendocino) chips that AMD released years earlier. The chipmaker calls them “10-series” and “100-series” chips.
As far as I can tell, the new processors are exactly the same as the older versions, both of which appear on AMD’s website. For example, the “new” Ryzen 5 40 is listed as a “Mendocino” core with four cores, eight threads, 2MB L2 cache/4MB L3 cache, and speeds up to 4.3GHz. It’s manufactured using a 6nm FINFET process at TSMC, so it’s not even a shrink process. It looks identical to the older Ryzen 5 7520U, which also appears on AMD’s site with what appear to be identical specs.
Well, except one. The “new” chips were launched in September and October 2025, while the old chips date back to 2022.
AMD had not responded to a request for comment as of press time.
To be fair, AMD is not the first to go down this path. As WCCFtech noted, Intel quietly released the Core 5 120 processor earlier this year, which is just a rebadged “Raptor Lake” processor that the company launched in the third quarter of 2025. Intel has been saying for some time now that customers prefer its older processors to the latest AI-assisted chips.
Still, the actions of both processor makers are confusing at best and misleading at worst. It certainly seems unlikely that a buyer of a standalone processor wouldn’t be looking for what they’re buying, but what about someone looking for a deal on a “new” laptop? If someone were to buy a new car marketed as a “2026” model when it was really just a 2023 version, are they really buying a “new” car?
You may not need AMD’s decoding wheel to figure out these new model numbers. But if these new processors appear in laptops and on store shelves, it gives new meaning to the phrase “buyer beware.” You could be buying outdated technology presented as AMD’s latest and greatest offering.
