Zen 2 Review Summary

[chameleoneel]

That or AMD has figured out how to hide all that memory access latency behind larger and faster caches.

which underscores what I said

 

[Rizen]

Or simply AMD had to max their cpus to match intel

What do you think the 9900K and 9900KS etc are? They're basically binned high speed versions of the same processor just with frequencies much closer to maxed out. AMD is doing the same thing.

I really don't see this as a problem. Everyone gets the most performance possible all the time.

 

[5150Joker]

What do you think the 9900K and 9900KS etc are? They're basically binned high speed versions of the same processor just with frequencies much closer to maxed out. AMD is doing the same thing.

I really don't see this as a problem. Everyone gets the most performance possible all the time.

The 9900KS is 100% maxed out and its not a good thing for consumers. Intel should have been on 7nm by now with plenty of headroom for OC but they fell behind and now we as consumers suffer. I don't view this is as a positive no matter what. I'm very happy AMD is bringing competition to Intel but I'd like to have seen more OC headroom out of these processors. As it stands, why should anyone buy anything but a very basic X470 motherboard for them? I doubt the mobo manufacturers who put in millions of dollars of R&D in OC tools for their boards are happy.

 

[XoR_]

I really don't see this as a problem. Everyone gets the most performance possible all the time.

No
Almost all Core ix series processors had large OC headroom suggesting Intel could just release faster versions if they wanted to.

Squeezing every last drop of performance when not necessary is very stupid idea

 

[Derangel]

No
Almost all Core ix series processors had large OC headroom suggesting Intel could just release faster versions if they wanted to.

Squeezing every last drop of performance when not necessary is very stupid idea

Eh. Its neither a good thing nor a bad thing. Same with AMD's decision to release CPU pushed to their limit. Though, lets not mince words here. The reason K-series CPUs have headroom is so Intel can sell K-series CPUs at a higher price in order to get more money out of enthusiasts. This is the same reason they only allow overclocking on Z-series boards.

 

[Opus131]

Is it me or does it seem like the higher models are better value? Assembling an I5-9600k isn't that more expensive than a Ryzen 3600 or 3600x (if at all if you go x570) and it actually performs better in games, where as once you go to the 3700x and up the intel counterparts are WAY more expensive, making the AMD a much more attractive choice, OC potential or not.

 

[mikeo]

Intel should have been on 7nm by now with plenty of headroom for OC but they fell behind and now we as consumers suffer.

Or if the glass is half full, we as consumers win, having no reason to upgrade from highly overclocked x79/x99 platforms.

 

[5150Joker]

Or if the glass is half full, we as consumers win, having no reason to upgrade from highly overclocked x79/x99 platforms.

LOL that's one way to look at it. Kinda like how I'm still sitting on my Titan X Pascal from 2016 because AMD/NVIDIA haven't brought anything that makes me want to upgrade from it yet (though I am kinda tempted by 2080 Super for RT in a few games).

 

[SighTurtle]

The 9900KS is 100% maxed out and its not a good thing for consumers. Intel should have been on 7nm by now with plenty of headroom for OC but they fell behind and now we as consumers suffer. I don't view this is as a positive no matter what. I'm very happy AMD is bringing competition to Intel but I'd like to have seen more OC headroom out of these processors. As it stands, why should anyone buy anything but a very basic X470 motherboard for them? I doubt the mobo manufacturers who put in millions of dollars of R&D in OC tools for their boards are happy.

Dont worry the R&D cost of the new mobos is going to be repaid with the customers who need PCIe 4.0, including that lovely server and data center money. As it is, its fantastic customers dont need more beefed up mobos to get better performance. I understand the sentiment of the elite hardware community, but more people getting into high-end hardware is also good too.

 

[Hakaba]

Coming from a 2700X, I am impressed with some of the performance jumps offered by 3900X. Additionally, also giving kudos on the XT release.

 

[Iratus]

Damn it, that OC performance is a bit of a kick. I imagine by the time the 7nm process has matured a bit that will get better though. The PCIe4 drives look crazy though.

Still stuck with my 7700k for gaming sadly, got a monster overclocker so it’s still top drawer performance wise as there’s little I play that 8 or more cores benefits. Definitely strange to have more cores in my laptop than desktop that’s for sure.

Good news overall for amd though, it’s close enough now to be in the mix if you want a top class gaming build.

 

[SixFootDuo]

One thing I really really hate is when people downplay Intel. And I have seen that all morning.

I've read the reviews all over the internet this morning along with videos on Youtube.

One thing is abundantly clear ... the Intel 9900K @ stock is still faster in gaming. If you have it OC'd to 5Ghz which many of us do, then forget it.

Are you gamer or do you encode videos?

All of a sudden everyone sounds like productivity is more important yet, if you look at the numbers, 99% of the people with PC are gamers.

I would never spend my money on a 12 thread processor if it were slower in gaming regardless of what percentage. That's just me.

AMD is getting there but they will never be faster than Intel in gaming performance. And, I'm a gamer.

 

[Opus131]

That's true. AMD makes sense mostly for budget gamers, and they have spoiled that a bit with the price of the x570, all though one can still buy an older motherboard and be good.

 

[chameleoneel]

One thing I really really hate is when people downplay Intel. And I have seen that all morning.

I've read the reviews all over the internet this morning along with videos on Youtube.

One thing is abundantly clear ... the Intel 9900K @ stock is still faster in gaming. If you have it OC'd to 5Ghz which many of us do, then forget it.

Are you gamer or do you encode videos?

All of a sudden everyone sounds like productivity is more important yet, if you look at the numbers, 99% of the people with PC are gamers.

I would never spend my money on a 12 thread processor if it were slower in gaming regardless of what percentage. That's just me.

AMD is getting there but they will never be faster than Intel in gaming performance. And, I'm a gamer.

Never?

AMD has been there before. And look at the huge jump they just made. Zen 3 is gonna be nuts.

 

[Vengance_01]

Seems like there is no reason to o/c all cores and just let boost do its thing if your mostly just gaming.. going to be testing my 3600 with the 450b chipset on an Asus strix ITX baord.

 

[Brackle]

3600mhz with CL 15 is 8.3 nano seconds of total latency

3200mhz with CL 14 is 8.76 nano seconds


3600mhz with CL 16 and 19 for the rest, is already trading with 3200mhz with CL 14 and 14 for for the rest.

So, I would posit 3600mhz with 15's wins all the time.

However, 3600mhz with straight 15's on the 3 main latencies would be some nice (likely expensive) RAM.

Also, these don't seem to be that "touchy" with memory. The performance differences are very small. Smaller than usual.
https://www.techpowerup.com/review/amd-zen-2-memory-performance-scaling-benchmark/4.html

Yea it was spendy back in the day. You can still get them at newegg, but they are backordered now (I wonder why? lol)

https://www.newegg.com/g-skill-16gb-288-pin-ddr4-sdram/p/N82E16820232306?Item=N82E16820232306

 

[bpizzle1]

One thing I really really hate is when people downplay Intel. And I have seen that all morning.

I've read the reviews all over the internet this morning along with videos on Youtube.

One thing is abundantly clear ... the Intel 9900K @ stock is still faster in gaming. If you have it OC'd to 5Ghz which many of us do, then forget it.

Are you gamer or do you encode videos?

All of a sudden everyone sounds like productivity is more important yet, if you look at the numbers, 99% of the people with PC are gamers.

I would never spend my money on a 12 thread processor if it were slower in gaming regardless of what percentage. That's just me.

AMD is getting there but they will never be faster than Intel in gaming performance. And, I'm a gamer.

The asterisk to this is that it really only holds true for people that game at 1080p and below. Once you hit 1440p, and especially 4k, the differences are negligible between the high end cpus. It's honestly pretty hard to argue with the value the 3700x brings to the table at $329 with a decent cooler included.

 

[TheSlySyl]

I'm playing at 1440p or 4k, and I want to do real time encoding, especially with extra threads to spare for my media on the side. The 3900x looks like an amazing upgrade and I mostly can't wait to see what the 3950x is like, I won't be able to upgrade for a few months anyway. Especially cause I'm gonna need a higher end X570 board. (Looking for 3x pcie-4 m.2 slots and at least 8 SATA ports.)

I'm very pleased.

 

[Randall Stephens]

3600mhz with CL 15 is 8.3 nano seconds of total latency

3200mhz with CL 14 is 8.76 nano seconds

The 3200 looks really good performance wise.
3600mhz with CL 16 and 19 for the rest, is already trading with 3200mhz with CL 14 and 14 for for the rest.

So, I would posit 3600mhz with 15's wins all the time.

However, 3600mhz with straight 15's on the 3 main latencies would be some nice (likely expensive) RAM.

Also, these don't seem to be that "touchy" with memory. The performance differences are very small. Smaller than usual.
https://www.techpowerup.com/review/amd-zen-2-memory-performance-scaling-benchmark/4.html

 

[NKD]

I couldn't get hte chip today. Microcenter dropped the ball sent more inventory to select stores and left some in the wind. Got the Asus CrosshairVIII hero. Looks like a solid board for overclocking. I think its really going to boil down to power delivery. But 4.3ghz all core is not bad on 12 core chip. When I pick up the chip they will honor the combo for $50 off the board and $50 off the video card.

Also keep in mind Precision boost was sort of locked in the review bios, for people complaining about boost clocks issue. Anandtech reported it as well as they couldn't mess with it in the review bored they had. Final bios likely had some tweaks that was released by all manufacturers on 7/5. I am guessing AMD was tweaking it, Asrock actually states that this for the bios update on 7/5 "

Enhance Ryzen 9 CPU performance" Plus hardware unboxed literally said they tested these with stock cooler and intel on water with power unlocked, lol. I was like wtf? But it still performed pretty damn good. With stock I don't expect them to boost alot all core but they were boosting to 4ghz it seems. Putting it under water with latest bios with a higher end board might do the trick. Hopefully microcenter gets some this week who got left behind so I can build it up.

 

[Derangel]

The asterisk to this is that it really only holds true for people that game at 1080p and below. Once you hit 1440p, and especially 4k, the differences are negligible between the high end cpus. It's honestly pretty hard to argue with the value the 3700x brings to the table at $329 with a decent cooler included.

1440p at 144hz (and especially the upcoming 240hz) might see more difference between Zen 2 and Gen 9, though I wonder if it might still be close to margin of error.

 

[tangoseal]

I'll benchmark this monster once I get it together tonight or tomorrow

 

[NKD]

No OC headroom is something that should be praised? Wtf are you smoking buddy. I've seen some weird weird mental gymnastics of logic when ones favorite company does well but this one is definitely up there in the WTF stratosphere.

WOW what a way to twist his words dude. At no point he said no oc headroom should be praised lol. He said the simplicity of what AMD is doing should be praised. Common don't twist his words to get your point across. Ridiculous how you just come up with stuff to get your point across, this isn't politics you know.

 

[chameleoneel]

I couldn't get hte chip today. Microcenter dropped the ball sent more inventory to select stores and left some in the wind. Got the Asus CrosshairVIII hero. Looks like a solid board for overclocking. I think its really going to boil down to power delivery. But 4.3ghz all core is not bad on 12 core chip. When I pick up the chip they will honor the combo for $50 off the board and $50 off the video card.

Also keep in mind Precision boost was sort of locked in the review bios, for people complaining about boost clocks issue. Anandtech reported it as well as they couldn't mess with it in the review bored they had. Final bios likely had some tweaks that was released by all manufacturers on 7/5. I am guessing AMD was tweaking it, Asrock actually states that this for the bios update on 7/5 "

Enhance Ryzen 9 CPU performance" Plus hardware unboxed literally said they tested these with stock cooler and intel on water with power unlocked, lol. I was like wtf? But it still performed pretty damn good. With stock I don't expect them to boost alot all core but they were boosting to 4ghz it seems. Putting it under water with latest bios with a higher end board might do the trick. Hopefully microcenter gets some this week who got left behind so I can build it up.

Techpowerup didn't mention any issues with Precision boost in their reviews. And they actually put the PBO Max performance numbers up against stock turbo and manual overclocks, in their charts. They also did a whole separate article where they did it again, on an X470.

*annnd they plotted the boost frequencies from 1 - 24 threads
https://www.techpowerup.com/review/amd-ryzen-9-3900x/20.html

 

[SighTurtle]

One thing I really really hate is when people downplay Intel. And I have seen that all morning.

I've read the reviews all over the internet this morning along with videos on Youtube.

One thing is abundantly clear ... the Intel 9900K @ stock is still faster in gaming. If you have it OC'd to 5Ghz which many of us do, then forget it.

Are you gamer or do you encode videos?

All of a sudden everyone sounds like productivity is more important yet, if you look at the numbers, 99% of the people with PC are gamers.

I would never spend my money on a 12 thread processor if it were slower in gaming regardless of what percentage. That's just me.

AMD is getting there but they will never be faster than Intel in gaming performance. And, I'm a gamer.

The people with money to spend on a 9900k, 2080ti and who will overclock to 5 Ghz is small as shit. The amount of gamers with 4 cores is still the majority of the world, the most GPUs sold are mid-range, so budget matters. And if budget matters.....the money going for a 9900k can go instead to another tier of GPU, and bring way more value than the 9900k vs Ryzen 3000. Unless Intel drops pricing, Intel is done for in the vast majority of gaming, except the ultra-high refresh rate with a boatload of money. Nothing to downplay, Intel is being wiped except for this one small tier of consumer.

 

[DuronBurgerMan]

All of a sudden everyone sounds like productivity is more important yet, if you look at the numbers, 99% of the people with PC are gamers.

Embrace the power of "and". I game and I work. Else I wouldn't be able to afford to game. A lot of PC gamers are also developers, designers, "content creators", engineers, etc...

 

[Vengance_01]

Any reviews with B450 and 470 boards?

 

[chameleoneel]

Any reviews with B450 and 470 boards?

https://www.techpowerup.com/review/amd-ryzen-3900x-3700x-tested-on-x470/

 

[DuronBurgerMan]

Any reviews with B450 and 470 boards?

Hardware unboxed did some B450 testing and saw a consistent, but very slight, drop of ~1% or so. So not much.

 

[Opus131]

Hardware unboxed did some B450 testing and saw a consistent, but very slight, drop of ~1% or so. So not much.

On which model? 3700x or higher? I'm assuming the higher the cpu the harder it is for older boards to handle it?

 

[Vengance_01]

Hardware unboxed did some B450 testing and saw a consistent, but very slight, drop of ~1% or so. So not much.

Perfect as very little choice for ITX boards. I don't care about the extra features brought by the 570.

 

[Derangel]

On which model? 3700x or higher? I'm assuming the higher the cpu the harder it is for older boards to handle it?

B450 Tomahawk and both the 3700X and the 3900X. B450 boards with decent VRMs (like the Tomahawk) can handle an overclocked 2700X.

 

[Nightfire]

https://www.techpowerup.com/review/amd-ryzen-7-3700x/22.html

Gaming wise it splits the difference between 2nd Gen and Intel.

CPU Tasks it is neck and neck with Intel and 15-20% over Ryzen Gen 2.

All very impressive considering similiar clocks to Gen 2. The 3700x runs an all core of 4.2ghz while the 9900k runs at 4.7ghz.

Factor in a lower price, better efficiency, and a better stock cooler these new CPUs deserve high praise.

 

[n=1]

View attachment 172508

Per the tech spot reviews this is the worst performance in a game for AMD and even then it is nothing I would lament sacrificing. The rest of the game reviews are pretty solid with it beating the 9600K in total value while delivering close to 8700K and 9700K performance.

Not what TPU's getting:

 

[NKD]

FPS review is solid. ITs amazing how much IPC improvement AMD has made and it literally beats the 9900k clock for clock at 4.2ghz.

 

[NKD]

The 9900KS is 100% maxed out and its not a good thing for consumers. Intel should have been on 7nm by now with plenty of headroom for OC but they fell behind and now we as consumers suffer. I don't view this is as a positive no matter what. I'm very happy AMD is bringing competition to Intel but I'd like to have seen more OC headroom out of these processors. As it stands, why should anyone buy anything but a very basic X470 motherboard for them? I doubt the mobo manufacturers who put in millions of dollars of R&D in OC tools for their boards are happy.

for 12-16 core chips its going to require beefy VRM and good power delivery. PCI-E 4 for NVME drives? Yea if you are going 8 core there is no need to by x570 unless you need top of the line storage speed. But for 12 -16 core you definitely wanna pair it up with a solid board to get max OC. if you can get 4.3-4.4, I say that is pretty solid for 12 core part. It has more to do with TSMC as it seems they couldn't deliver the clock speeds they initially thought they could. I think 7nm+ is what 7nm should have been, and that is were you will see AMD squeeze ahead towards 4.8ghz or so. With the IPC bump and few hundred mhz above Zen+ does make up for it with the IPC bump they got. Clock speeds will slowly keep going up but its the IPC bump that counts in the long run.

 

[NKD]

Techpowerup didn't mention any issues with Precision boost in their reviews. And they actually put the PBO Max performance numbers up against stock turbo and manual overclocks, in their charts. They also did a whole separate article where they did it again, on an X470.

*annnd they plotted the boost frequencies from 1 - 24 threads
https://www.techpowerup.com/review/amd-ryzen-9-3900x/20.html

Nice. I think it wasn't all the reviewers. Anandtech did mention their board was limited, they might have been mentioning overcoming the power limits.

So TPU got all core boost to 4.2 ghz, but couldn't OC it past 4.0ghz? That is real weird. Or am I reading it wrong. Must be something going on with the board.

 

[NKD]

https://www.techpowerup.com/review/amd-ryzen-7-3700x/22.html

Gaming wise it splits the difference between 2nd Gen and Intel.

CPU Tasks it is neck and neck with Intel and 15-20% over Ryzen Gen 2.

All very impressive considering similiar clocks to Gen 2. The 3700x runs an all core of 4.2ghz while the 9900k runs at 4.7ghz.

Factor in a lower price, better efficiency, and a better stock cooler these new CPUs deserve high praise.

Actually check out FPS review on clock for clock IPC. It actually beats the 9900k in almost all benchmarks but 1 think. So its really a solid gain in IPC.

 

[Derangel]

for 12-16 core chips its going to require beefy VRM and good power delivery. PCI-E 4 for NVME drives? Yea if you are going 8 core there is no need to by x570 unless you need top of the line storage speed. But for 12 -16 core you definitely wanna pair it up with a solid board to get max OC. if you can get 4.3-4.4, I say that is pretty solid for 12 core part. It has more to do with TSMC as it seems they couldn't deliver the clock speeds they initially thought they could. I think 7nm+ is what 7nm should have been, and that is were you will see AMD squeeze ahead towards 4.8ghz or so. With the IPC bump and few hundred mhz above Zen+ does make up for it with the IPC bump they got. Clock speeds will slowly keep going up but its the IPC bump that counts in the long run.

Solid B4550 and X470 boards can handle the 3900X without a problem. The 3950X remains to the seen.

 

[sirmonkey1985]

One thing I really really hate is when people downplay Intel. And I have seen that all morning.

I've read the reviews all over the internet this morning along with videos on Youtube.

One thing is abundantly clear ... the Intel 9900K @ stock is still faster in gaming. If you have it OC'd to 5Ghz which many of us do, then forget it.

Are you gamer or do you encode videos?

All of a sudden everyone sounds like productivity is more important yet, if you look at the numbers, 99% of the people with PC are gamers.

I would never spend my money on a 12 thread processor if it were slower in gaming regardless of what percentage. That's just me.

AMD is getting there but they will never be faster than Intel in gaming performance. And, I'm a gamer.

yes.. the 9900k is faster in gaming if all you give a crap about is potato graphics and high frame rate, if you actually care about playing a game you spent money on at quality settings that matter then no they perform pretty much the same for significantly less money..