AM4 has been around for so long and is owned by so many people, there's still a big market for those who want to upgrade without replacing their motherboard and RAM at the same time.
Ryzen desktop chips use the same compute chiplets as server (server has a long tail for adoption and a steady need for replacement parts), so they have a large supply of chiplets that don't meet server requirements but can be downclocked or given more voltage for desktop. This also fulfills the low end desktop market, so they don't have to produce lower end chips on more expensive nodes. There's also a lot of AM4 platforms that can get a new lease on life with a drop in Zen3 replacement.
Then you also have supply from the laptop side with similar issues (don't meet voltage requirements for efficiency), which is where the APUs come from.
I agree it's a bit puzzling? It's crazy that AMD is releasing a new CPU for a 7 year old platform.
But admittedly I am personally still running with my trusty old Ryzen 5 1600, maybe I'd consider an upgrade just because it's easy and cheap, but it's not like I really need it.
I'm guessing there are a lot of AM4 motherboards out there, so there is still a market for making upgrades for them.
They have to produce Zen3 still for server contracts, so they're making the chips anyway. The ones that don't make the cut are still suitable as desktop chips.
It's a win-win. AMD gets to sell the chips. Consumers, particularly that already have AM4 boards, get the option of having these rather than replacing multiple components and taking their entire PC apart.
But yeah it's wild that a socket from September 2016 is still getting new CPUs now. AM4 is the best CPU socket there has ever been IMO.
Here's the summary for the wikipedia article you mentioned in your comment:
A three-dimensional integrated circuit (3D IC) is a MOS (metal-oxide semiconductor) integrated circuit (IC) manufactured by stacking as many as 16 or more ICs and interconnecting them vertically using, for instance, through-silicon vias (TSVs) or Cu-Cu connections, so that they behave as a single device to achieve performance improvements at reduced power and smaller footprint than conventional two dimensional processes. The 3D IC is one of several 3D integration schemes that exploit the z-direction to achieve electrical performance benefits in microelectronics and nanoelectronics.
3D integrated circuits can be classified by their level of interconnect hierarchy at the global (package), intermediate (bond pad) and local (transistor) level. In general, 3D integration is a broad term that includes such technologies as 3D wafer-level packaging (3DWLP); 2. 5D and 3D interposer-based integration; 3D stacked ICs (3D-SICs); 3D heterogeneous integration; and 3D systems integration.
0.4Ghz on the base clock is kind of a big difference when you can't overclock that headroom back. I'd personally wait till the benchmarks are out to really gauge how much you are giving up.
Obviously, we aren’t gauging whether the APU is overcockable or not, but about their performance in base. Talking about overclock is moot when comparing base clock speed… we will look at benchmark and compare there.
What's the point of 5600gt? With the rising price of ram and nand, ddr4 motherboard winding down availability wise (only ASRock still has many options at this point), it feels like by the time it comes out, the saving on a 5600g, even 5700g will be null.