The AMD Ryzen 9 3950X Review: 16 Cores on 7nm with PCIe 4.0
by Dr. Ian Cutress on November 14, 2019 9:00 AM ESTTest Bed and Setup
As per our processor testing policy, we take a premium category motherboard suitable for the socket, and equip the system with a suitable amount of memory running at the manufacturer's maximum supported frequency. This is also typically run at JEDEC subtimings where possible. It is noted that some users are not keen on this policy, stating that sometimes the maximum supported frequency is quite low, or faster memory is available at a similar price, or that the JEDEC speeds can be prohibitive for performance. While these comments make sense, ultimately very few users apply memory profiles (either XMP or other) as they require interaction with the BIOS, and most users will fall back on JEDEC supported speeds - this includes home users as well as industry who might want to shave off a cent or two from the cost or stay within the margins set by the manufacturer. Where possible, we will extend out testing to include faster memory modules either at the same time as the review or a later date.
| Test Setup | |
| AMD Ryzen 3000 | AMD Ryzen 9 3950X AMD Ryzen 9 3900X |
| Motherboard | ASRock X570 Taichi 2.50 (AGESA 1004B) |
| CPU Cooler | Kraken X62 |
| DRAM | Corsair Vengeance RGB 4x8 GB DDR4-3200 |
| GPU | Sapphire RX 460 2GB (CPU Tests) MSI GTX 1080 Gaming 8G (Gaming Tests) |
| PSU | Corsair AX860i |
| SSD | Crucial MX500 2TB |
| OS | Windows 10 1909 |
We must thank the following companies for kindly providing hardware for our multiple test beds. Some of this hardware is not in this test bed specifically, but is used in other testing.
| Hardware Providers | |||
| Sapphire RX 460 Nitro | MSI GTX 1080 Gaming X OC | Crucial MX200 + MX500 SSDs |
Corsair AX860i + AX1200i PSUs |
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| G.Skill RipjawsV, SniperX, FlareX |
Crucial Ballistix DDR4 |
Silverstone Coolers |
Silverstone Fans |
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Netmsm - Saturday, November 16, 2019 - link
Also, in section "x264 HD 3.0: Older Transcode Test" the result of "3DPM v1 Multi-Threaded" is mistakenly placed instead of "x264 HD 3.0 Pass 2".The_Assimilator - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
"I’m sure some people will disagree about those 50 MHz"We call those people "whiny bitches who should STFU".
nathanddrews - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
In a world of such precision and technical pedants, you have to admit that it is false advertising to say 4.7GHz, when it is 50MHz shy. Rounded up, it's OK, but it's only 1% shady.For my use case, this sentence nails it perfectly: "the Core i9-9900KS is still running at 5.0 GHz for sustained single threaded work, which is still 7-15% higher than the Ryzen 3950X, and as a result it does pull out ahead in a number of ST tests as well as in low resolution (CPU-bound) gaming". Most of the games I play are not current-gen visual spectacles, but rather twitch and competitive games that are a few years old. My priority is the highest possible frame rates for high refresh gaming. I'm not sure that I do enough video editing to justify Ryzen, as tempting as the rest of the package is.
Cooe - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
Most every other review I've seen has it hitting the full 4.7GHz, with many even going beyond into the 4.75GHz range when adequate cooling is used. The silicon binning quality of the 3950X seems to be absolutely freaking insane. Meethinks this -50MHz deficit is unique to something specific to Ian's setup here.RSAUser - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
Gamersnexus also seems to have gotten a bit of a dud. LTT seems to have gotten a good one.Cooe - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
Not just Linus, most people have gotten "good ones". I can count the number reviews with chips that didn't reach the advertised 4.7GHz on one hand & have fingers left over to spare (and if I include all those within 50ishMHz or so, like Ian's here, it drops to just one).zmatt - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
Every cpu I have ever owned has always been a percent or so off the advertised frequency either above or below. The number on the box is really just an average and always has been.uefi - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
Don't forget, Intel has their share of the occasional performance shaving microcode patches every year or so.eek2121 - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
I walked away with a very different picture. Right now Anandtech is clearly GPU bound in the benchmarks. They are benchmarking on a GTX 1080, and the results clearly reflect that. Having run some of these games on a 1080ti on my stock 1950X, I get a better result. They really need a 2080ti or 2080 super at this point.plonk420 - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
they can't really use a 1080Ti or better with GTA5... check out GN's coverage: if you hit over ~180fps, you hit a cap that results in insane stuttering (same with RDR2 and 144hz or so)