AMD Ryzen 9 3950X Reviews - 16 core beast

Snowdog said:
I think you have those backwards. Consumer is the non pro parts. Mainstream is the inexpensive parts.
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I don't feel that I do. As I said before, it's not the consumers fault that Intel has vastly expanded their mainstream product portfolio over the decades and added many different models and pricing segments.

They can market-speak it however they want to make the "i7/i9 power users" open their wallets further over the "volume i3 and i5 users"...because let's face it: most consumers and businesses can get by just fine with i3s.

Hell, if I didn't have a need to rip/encode so much of my media library back then, then I would have gone with an upper tier i3 or i5 which would also have done just fine for gaming.
 
DejaWiz said:
As I said before, it's not the consumers fault that Intel has vastly expanded their mainstream product portfolio over the decades and added many different models and pricing segments.
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Intel has had a diversified set of products for consumer sockets as far back as the Pentiums. Pretty broad range of costs and performance available; with the Celeron, they really started to split it up, and one hasn't really needed more than that to run typical desktop stuff since.
 
DejaWiz said:
I don't feel that I do. As I said before, it's not the consumers fault that Intel has vastly expanded their "Consumer" product portfolio over the decades and added many different models and pricing segments.
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FTFY
 
IdiotInCharge said:
Intel has had a diversified set of products for consumer sockets as far back as the Pentiums. Pretty broad range of costs and performance available; with the Celeron, they really started to split it up, and one hasn't really needed more than that to run typical desktop stuff since.
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It goes back further than that...I'd say that Intel really started to expand their mainstream portfolio when they had 386SX vs 386DX models.
 
DejaWiz said:
Synonymous. Consumer = Mainstream
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True -- the effort I see here is to draw a line within 'Consumer' between the cheap stuff your average 'Mainstream' user would need (APU) and what an enthusiast would shoot for, both of which fall short of the 'pro' and 'commercial' stuff.
 
If u buy it. It’s mainstream. We get your definition. Don’t agree with the logic but whatever floats your boat. Because perhaps 75% of sales is in your “low tier” which I would propose as mainstream.
 
DejaWiz said:
Can be synonymous. Consumer = Mainstream.
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There is overlap, but they are NOT synonymous:

http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/consumer-product.html
"Merchandise or other item of common or daily use, ordinarily bought by individuals or households for private consumption. See also consumer goods."

http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/mainstream.html
"Products and services which are readily available to and appealing to the general public, as opposed to being of interest only to a very specific subset of the public."

Key differentiation in Consumer products. Is the dividing line between private personal use, againts Business/Professional use.
Key differentiation in Mainstream products. Is the dividing line between general appeal, against niche appeal.

You are using them backwards.

A 2080ti is a consumer product. It's bought by individuals for private consumption (as opposed to the professional Quadro line). But it is NOT a mainstream product owing to it's high end niche.

Also clearly in use in the tech community:
Nvidia GeForce GTX 1660 Ti vs. GeForce RTX 2060: Which Mainstream GPU to Buy?

Thus a high end GPU like the 2080Ti is not considered "mainstream".
 
A real picture of cpu sales is as follows be it slanted to the high end due to being a custom sales shop and not oem.

upload_2019-11-15_8-48-42.png
 
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Snowdog said:
There is overlap, but they are NOT synonymous:

http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/consumer-product.html
"Merchandise or other item of common or daily use, ordinarily bought by individuals or households for private consumption. See also consumer goods."

http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/mainstream.html
"Products and services which are readily available to and appealing to the general public, as opposed to being of interest only to a very specific subset of the public."

Key differentiation in Consumer products. Is the dividing line between private personal use, againts Business/Professional use.
Key differentiation in Mainstream products. Is the dividing line between general appeal, against niche appeal.

You are using them backwards.

A 2080ti is a consumer product. It's bought by individuals for private consumption (as opposed to the professional Quadro line). But it is NOT a mainstream product owing to it's high end niche.

Also clearly in use in the tech community:
Nvidia GeForce GTX 1660 Ti vs. GeForce RTX 2060: Which Mainstream GPU to Buy?

Thus a high end GPU like the 2080Ti is not considered "mainstream".
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So the 2080Ti isn't readily available nor *appeals* to the general public? Just because it's priced out of most people's comfort zone doesn't mean that it isn't available to them or doesn't still appeal to them.

You're falling into the trap of marketing-speak that draws illusionary divides between mainstream product tiers.

Mainstream CPUs and GPUs = products for consumers and SMBs.

This encompasses Atoms to i9s and GTX1650 to RTX2080Ti.

Intel, AMD, or Nvidia don't give a shit which mainstream product of theirs you buy, just as long as you do buy one at whatever price they tacked on.

The top tier products just happen to be titled "flagship" of the mainstream.
 
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DejaWiz said:
So the 2080Ti isn't readily available nor *appeals* to the general public? Just because it's priced out of most people's comfort zone doesn't mean that it isn't available to them or doesn't still appeal to them.

You're falling into the trap of marketing-speak that draws illusionary divides between mainstream product tiers.

Mainstream CPUs and GPUs = products for consumers and SMBs.

This encompasses Atoms to i9s and GTX1650 to RTX2080Ti.

The top tier products just happen to be titled "flagship" of the mainstream.
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No I am using actual definitons, and actual community usage. Not sure what you are doing.

As I said there is overlap between the terms. Now you are ignoring the differentiating part of the term definitions, and focusing on the overlap. Which seems either misplaced or disingenuous.

You are also ignoring that "mainstream GPU" in the tech community is a clear tier. It has been the around NVidia '60 series for MANY years, for practically the entire community uses it:

Old Mainstream GPU: GeForce GTX 960 vs. GTX 1660 & RTX 2060

https://www.pcgamer.com/the-best-graphics-cards/
"But you don't need to buy at the top of the chart to get good performance, as mainstream cards like the RX 570/580 and GTX 1060 3GB/6GB are still totally viable"

https://www.lifewire.com/best-pc-video-cards-834108
"Best Mainstream: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 1060 at Amazon
"Everything you would want as a mainstream gamer, and it even includes support for virtual reality."

https://www.anandtech.com/show/12050/best-video-cards
"In this respect the GTX 1660 Ti is a much better value proposition than the RTX 2060 above it, but it’s also more expensive than the GTX 1060 6GB it replaces, so it runs the risk of drifting out of the mainstream market entirely. Thankfully pricing here is a lot more grounded than the RTX 20 series cards, but the mainstream market is admittedly more price sensitive to begin with."


You are ignore both the actual definition of the terms, and the community usage of the term, to replace it with your personal opinion and arguing vociferously that must be correct. :rolleyes:
 
Snowdog said:
No I am using actual definitons, and actual community usage. Not sure what you are doing.

As I said there is overlap between the terms. Now you are ignoring the differentiating part of the term definitions, and focusing on the overlap. Which seems either misplaced or disingenuous.

You are also ignoring that "mainstream GPU" in the tech community is a clear tier. It has been the around NVidia '60 series for MANY years, for practically the entire community uses it:

Old Mainstream GPU: GeForce GTX 960 vs. GTX 1660 & RTX 2060

https://www.pcgamer.com/the-best-graphics-cards/
"But you don't need to buy at the top of the chart to get good performance, as mainstream cards like the RX 570/580 and GTX 1060 3GB/6GB are still totally viable"

https://www.lifewire.com/best-pc-video-cards-834108
"Best Mainstream: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 1060 at Amazon
"Everything you would want as a mainstream gamer, and it even includes support for virtual reality."

https://www.anandtech.com/show/12050/best-video-cards
"In this respect the GTX 1660 Ti is a much better value proposition than the RTX 2060 above it, but it’s also more expensive than the GTX 1060 6GB it replaces, so it runs the risk of drifting out of the mainstream market entirely. Thankfully pricing here is a lot more grounded than the RTX 20 series cards, but the mainstream market is admittedly more price sensitive to begin with."


You are ignore both the actual definition of the terms, and the community usage of the term, to replace it with your personal opinion and arguing vociferously that must be correct. :rolleyes:
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Yeah...definitions from a "business dictionary" = marketing terminology to draw illusionary divides between pricing tiers.

The fact that those marketing nomenclatures are widely adopted means that the money spent on advertising was a raging success.

Kind of like how most people refer to all facial tissue as "Kleenex".
 
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DejaWiz said:
Yeah...definitions from a "business dictionary" = marketing terminology to draw illusionary divides between pricing tiers.

The fact that those marketing nomenclatures are widely adopted means that the money spent on advertising was a raging success.
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So your personal opinion trumps both definitions and community usage for "reasons".

Ok Boomer.
 
mls1995 said:
as they'd say in Pittsburgh, will you jagoffs quit yacking about mainstream and consumer and just talk about the pros/cons/availability of the damn 3950x?
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Pros = the best consumer CPU available as of November 25th 2019 release date.

Cons = initial retailer price gouging.
 
DejaWiz said:
Remember when the *mainstream* Slot 1 PII-300 was going for $800+ and was sold out just about everywhere back in early 1998 ($1274 today)?


Or how about the Socket 939 Athlon X2 4800+ launched at $1001 back in 2005 ($1325 today) and they flew off the shelves?

Xeon and Opteron models were available for both Slot 1 and S939 of those years, making a distinct divide between mainstream and HEDT/Enterprise processor offerings.


That being said, $700-800 for a 16C/32T mainstream CPU that has no current rival and should offer one hell of a longevity run is quite a bargain, especially when compared to just the couple of examples I gave above.

Amazing time we live in. Truly.
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What these high prices have in common are periods of time when one manufacturer or the other had a clear advantage the other couldn't keep up with

In those situations ALL companies would charge a premium.

Economic research suggests that you really need a market with 3 or 4 active competitors to have true competitive pricing. Otherwise you just have a series of leapfrogs where the leader at the time chargers a lot.

I fondly remember ~1999-2004 when I repeatedly bought the fastest CPU money could buy, for under $300.

I wish we could have that kind of competition all the time.
 
Snowdog said:
I think you have those backwards. Consumer is the non pro parts. Mainstream is the inexpensive parts.
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I tend to agree with this.

Enterprise parts certainly tend to cost more than similarly capable consumer parts, but that doesn't mean that all consumer parts are mainstream.

Within the consumer market segment there are different price points.

I'd argue that mid range is about $300 for each, both CPU and GPU.

Mainstream is a bit below that in i3 land.

Once you get above $300 per component you are starting to enter high end enthusiast territory.
 
Snowdog what is the price point where a CPU switches from "mainstream" to "not mainstream"? $300 like Zarathustra[H] says above? Do we all agree that $300 is the limit for "mainstream"? Because if we don't, then the whole word is meaningless and subjective.
 
Azrak said:
Snowdog what is the price point where a CPU switches from "mainstream" to "not mainstream"? $300 like Zarathustra[H] says above? Do we all agree that $300 is the limit for "mainstream"? Because if we don't, then the whole word is meaningless and subjective.
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I think it is much more nebulous than that.

Everyone sees the mainstream price point differently, and it changes drastically both within and outside of products cycles.

It's by no means anything official.
 
Azrak said:
Snowdog what is the price point where a CPU switches from "mainstream" to "not mainstream"? $300 like Zarathustra[H] says above? Do we all agree that $300 is the limit for "mainstream"? Because if we don't, then the whole word is meaningless and subjective.
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Look more toward there being a difference than trying to put down a hard limit. It's subjective, and yet we can also see evidence of there being a difference around US$300 in most reviews.
 
Azrak said:
Snowdog what is the price point where a CPU switches from "mainstream" to "not mainstream"? $300 like Zarathustra[H] says above? Do we all agree that $300 is the limit for "mainstream"? Because if we don't, then the whole word is meaningless and subjective.
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I feel it's around $300 or less. Above $300, we are into Enthusiast, and High End.
 
DejaWiz said:
I don't feel that I do. As I said before, it's not the consumers fault that Intel has vastly expanded their mainstream product portfolio over the decades and added many different models and pricing segments.

They can market-speak it however they want to make the "i7/i9 power users" open their wallets further over the "volume i3 and i5 users"...because let's face it: most consumers and businesses can get by just fine with i3s.

Hell, if I didn't have a need to rip/encode so much of my media library back then, then I would have gone with an upper tier i3 or i5 which would also have done just fine for gaming.
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True to a point.

If I just did web/email/office type of work I would have no need for anything more than an i3.

Honestly I don't do much that requires a ton of cores. I'll do an occasional reencode, but it is rare (and the last time I did my computer caught on fire)

Most of the heavy load my machine sees us from games, which is a minority of what it is used for. There the emphasis is mostly on lightly threaded loads with high per thread performance.

An i3 would probably be a little light for that. For my workload I wouldn't go under six cores today, probably 8 cores to have more future proofing, but most of the time all of that stuff is going to go to waste.
 
Zarathustra[H] said:
True to a point.

If I just did web/email/office type of work I would have no need for anything more than an i3.

Honestly I don't do much that requires a ton of cores. I'll do an occasional reencode, but it is rare (and the last time I did my computer caught on fire)

Most of the heavy load my machine sees us from games, which is a minority of what it is used for. There the emphasis is mostly on lightly threaded loads with high per thread performance.

An i3 would probably be a little light for that. For my workload I wouldn't go under six cores today, probably 8 cores to have more future proofing, but most of the time all of that stuff is going to go to waste.
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My use case is nearly identical. I'm still using a 10+ year old C2Q, and it is really only gaming that is driving an upgrade. Most of the rest of the time, I might have 90%+ of even my ancient CPU idle.

Other than gaming I might do one Video Encode/week, that exercises the CPU. Typical Office type stuff doesn't load a CPU, neither does Web. I used to do a lot more Video encoding form OTA TV, but I moved to small town nowhere, and we don't even have one english OTA HD channel. So encoding has dried up as a use case.

So when I get a new CPU, gaming first works because if it can do gaming, it can do everything else with ease.
 
Snowdog said:
By that logic, the RTX 2080 Ti is a "mainstream" GPU.
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No, the 2080 ti is an enthusiast class GPU. The 3950x is a mainstream class CPU. The 3950x could cost $7000 and it would still be a mainstream class CPU because it goes into the mainstream socket. Price is entirely irrelevant in this situation and seems more like you just want something to nit-pick without putting the in effort of finding a real problem. The market segment for the AM4 platform is called "mainstream", that is the official term for it. Just like TR4 is called "HEDT". If you have a problem with the name, talk to Intel. They're the ones that came up with the terminology.
 
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