I think GP's point is that "zen" is the architecture, same as some random lake. Sure, 2 comes before three, whereas it's not clear whether the sky comes before the tiger.
Whereas the AMD model number is 5600, say.
But then you have interesting things, like 5500U mobile parts which are actually "zen 2+" and others, like the 5560U which are "zen 3".
This was an issue for me last year when attempting to jump on the "zen 3 bandwagon", but having to look up "enterprise laptop" models, which wouldn't specify which kind of zen the cpu was, only some xyz number. Most were 4xxx, so I knew those were "mobile zen 2", but I almost picked one of the "zen 2+" 5xxx models.
I haven't followed things that closely, but I'm pretty confident that an intel Xyyy is "gen X". And, usually, marketing copy says i5-Xyyy.
AMD is at least making it so the second digit will indicate architecture (the first will be year released).
> AMD is at least making it so the second digit will indicate architecture (the first will be year released).
Unfortunately, that's not always the case. See, for example, the Ryzen 5 5500U which is a zen 2 part and the 5560U which is a zen 3 part. The architecture is quite different, too: the first being a 2x3 configuration, while the second is 1x6.
The Zen 3 one was also released as a 54xx "PRO" version. See [1] note 1.
They were both released in January 2021, but then you have the Ryzen 5 4680U which was released later, in April 2021, while being a zen 2.
As a matter of fact, I'm quite sure the second digit is the model's place in the range. See 3700 desktop parts, which are zen 2, and 5700 ones which are zen 3.
Moreover, to your point about differences between desktop and laptop parts, I've always considered that a given. Zen 2 desktop parts already had pci-e 4, whereas the zen 3 laptop ones only had pci-e 3, even the higher end ones. The first mobile parts to have pci-e 4 seem to be the 6xxx models.
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[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen_2#Lucienne_(5000_series)
https://www.theverge.com/2022/9/7/23340934/amd-ryzen-model-n...
The Windows 11 supported CPU list is pretty arbitrary and doesn't have much to do with the capabilities of the CPU. The main real requirement is TPM 2.0 and even that can be worked around. And there are some officially supported 7th gen CPUs because MS realized how dumb it was for the Surface Studio they were still selling to not be supported.
Nevertheless, all the "Kaby Lake" proper are "7th gen", not "8th gen".
Among the "8th gen" there are only "Kaby Lake R" (R from Refresh) and "Kaby Lake G" (G from GPU, i.e. discrete AMD GPU on package).
There are also 2 kinds of CPUs that have been weirdly branded as "8th gen", but which, both based on the date of their launch and on their features should have been branded as "9th gen", together with Coffee Lake Refresh: Whiskey Lake U and Amber Lake Y.
The remaining CPUs branded as "8th gen" were Coffee Lake and Cannon Lake U.
The actual break down is quite simple and described on their website: https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/processors/processor...
tldr; Intel processors are numbered like 13900K (13th gen) the first 1-2 digits are the generation. So 9800 is 9th gen 10850K is 10th gen.
Not sure how that's relevant. By name, I have no idea if Cannon Lake is before or after Skylake. I only know because I've heard of Skylake longer than Cannon Lake. I'd have no idea how to place any of the post-Skylake architectures amongst each other chronologically or performance-wise. I know that Zen 1 is older then Zen 3, because that's how the naming scheme works.