AMD has officially announced their flagship and the fastest Ryzen desktop processor to date, the Ryzen 9 3950X. The AMD Ryzen 9 3950X is not only the highest core count chip released on AM4 mainstream platform, but it's also the fastest clocked chip released to date.
AMD Ryzen 9 3950X Announced For $749 US - 16 Cores, 32 Threads, 4.7 GHz Boost, Availability in Septemeber
It's official, AMD is indeed preparing a 16 core, 32 thread processor under their Ryzen 3000 series and it's called the Ryzen 9 3950X. Being AMD's beefiest mainstream chip to date, the AMD Ryzen 9 3950X gives HEDT performance on a mainstream platform, competing directly against Intel's 16 core, Core-X processors (Core i9-9960X) at a much lower price point.
In terms of specifications, the AMD Ryzen 9 3950X would feature the 7nm Zen 2 core architecture. There would be three Chiplets on the Ryzen 9 interposer which include two Zen 2 dies and a single I/O die which is based on a 14nm process node. The AMD Ryzen 9 3950X would be fully enabled, offering 16 cores and 32 threads. The core configuration has never been available on mainstream platforms such as AM4, even the 12 core, 24 thread Ryzen 9 3900X configuration hasn't been seen on mainstream platforms and AMD is the first to bring such high core counts that used to be HEDT exclusive, down to mainstream users.
In terms of clock speeds, the AMD Ryzen 9 3950X runs at a base frequency of 3.5 GHz and boosts to a blistering fast 4.7 GHz which is the highest for AMD's Ryzen 3000 series processor. The chip will feature 72 MB of total cache and just like the other Ryzen 9 parts, feature a TDP of 105W. The TDP is based on the base frequency numbers so it would actually be higher when the chip boosts or is manually overclocked by users. When it comes to overclocking, we also know that like all other Ryzen CPUs, the Ryzen 9 3950X would feature a soldered design which should help deliver better thermals than TIM.
Some performance numbers for the processor were also showed which were tweeted a while ago by Videocardz and can be seen in the following tweet:
Ryzen 3rd Gen vs HWBOT World Records
Cinebench R15:
9960X: 5320
3950X: 5344Cinebench R20:
7960X: 10895
3950X: 11101— VideoCardz.com (@VideoCardz) June 10, 2019
AMD Ryzen 3000 Series CPU Lineup
| CPU Name | Ryzen 5 3500 | Ryzen 5 3500X | Ryzen 5 3600 | Ryzen 5 3600X | Ryzen 7 3700X | Ryzen 7 3800X | Ryzen 9 3900X | Ryzen 9 3950X |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cores/Threads | 6/6 | 6/6 | 6/12 | 6/12 | 8/16 | 8/16 | 12/24 | 16/32 |
| Base Clock | 3.6 GHz | 3.6 GHz | 3.6 GHz | 3.8 GHz | 3.6 GHz | 3.9 GHz | 3.8 GHz | 3.5 GHz |
| Boost Clock | 4.1 GHz | 4.1 GHz | 4.2 GHz | 4.4 GHz | 4.4 GHz | 4.5 GHz | 4.6 GHz | 4.7 GHz |
| Cache (L2+L3) | 16 MB | 32 MB | 35 MB | 35 MB | 36 MB | 36 MB | 70 MB | 72 MB |
| PCIe Lanes (Gen 4 CPU+PCH) | 40 | 40 | 40 | 40 | 40 | 40 | 40 | 40 |
| TDP | 65W | 65W | 65W | 95W | 65W | 105W | 105W | 105W |
| Price | $149 US | $179 US | $199 US | $249 US | $329 US | $399 US | $499 US | $749 US |
AMD's Next-Gen X570 Chipset – First Mainstream Platform To Support PCIe Gen 4, Feature Rich and Ready For Ryzen 3000 CPUs
As we saw with X470, there were a few features for the Ryzen 2000 series processors which were only supported by new motherboards such as Precision Boost Overdrive and XFR 2.0. There’s no doubt that AMD’s Zen 2 based Ryzen mainstream processor family has some amazing new features but the main highlight would be support for PCIe Gen4. The X570 platform will be an all PCIe Gen4 solution, which means this would most probably be the first consumer platform to feature support for the new PCIe standard.
In terms of IO details, the CPU will once again be offering a total of 24 PCIe Gen 4 lanes while the PCH will be providing a total of 16 PCIe Gen 4 lanes. There would be one direct link heading out to the first PCI Express x16 and PCI Express x4 slot from the CPU while the rest of the IO would be handled by the X570 PCH which would be linked to the CPU through an x4 link.
We have already rounded up all the X570 motherboards that were announced during Computex 2019 including the flagship X570 boards for all major manufacturers.
That, however, doesn’t mean that AMD Ryzen 3000 series would only be compatible on X570 boards since just like last time, the new CPUs will be backward compatible with X470 & X370 boards too. Following are links to the respective motherboard manufacturers BIOS release for existing motherboards to support 3rd Gen AMD Ryzen CPUs:
- ASRock AM4 (3rd Gen Ryzen) BIOS Support Link
- Gigabyte AM4 (3rd Gen Ryzen) BIOS Support Link
- ASUS AM4 (3rd Gen Ryzen) BIOS Support Link
- MSI AM4 (3rd Gen Ryzen) BIOS Support Link
- BIOSTAR AM4 (3rd Gen Ryzen) BIOS Support Link
They certainly won’t display the same feature set that will be available on the newly launched X570 lineup but will feature fully stable functionality for users who just want to drop in a new CPU and continue using their PCs without the hassle of upgrading the motherboard and everything from scratch. AMD's X570 platform and Ryzen 3000 CPUs are planned for launch on 7th July while the AMD Ryzen 9 3950X would be available in September 2019.
