This is AMD’s biggest launch this year, and the number of sources covering this is huge! Alright, so where do we start? We are going to skip AMD’s GPUs for now (another update, soon) and look at the CPUs:
The Ryzen 7 3700X
Priced at $330, this 8-core/16-thread CPU stands toe-to-toe with Intel’s $500 i9-9900K, matching it perfectly in multi-threaded performance, and barely lagging (~2%) in single-threaded. This means that if your computer usage is absolutely 100% single-thread-performance-dependent, the i9-9900K is a better CPU. For everyone else (read: 99% of the population), you are better off taking the R7 3700X, and spending the $170 you save on something else.
And that brings us to the conclusion that we read in practically every review: AMD just beat Intel’s best CPU, for cheaper! That has not happened in… decades, really. Way to go, AMD! But wait, there’s more!
The Ryzen 9 3900X
AMD’s own $500 offering packs 12-cores/24-threads. Clocked higher than the 3700X, the 3900X matches the 9900K in single-threaded performance, and beats it soundly in multi-threaded. That makes the 3900X the best consumer CPU available for purchase. In fact, it is so good that we will use it as the new base CPU for comparison.
There is not much to say beyond that. When you win, you win!
Other CPUs
The R3 3200G, R5 3400G, R5 3600, and R5 3600X are available for purchase, but (at the time of writing this post) the reviews for these are scarce.
The R7 3800X, which is clocked higher and might have beaten the i9-9900K, has not been released yet.
The R9 3950X, which replaces the TR 2950X and is on the AM4 socket, is expected to be released in the near future.
We will add these CPUs once they are available, and if the reviews show them to be a logical purchase.
Going forward
At the very least, the new AMD CPUs will go into our Excellent, Outstanding, and Enthusiast tiers. We will ensure that compatible HSFs and motherboards are also added to these tiers, as they previously had Intel CPUs.
Descriptions for all CPUs have been updated, as we now use the new 3900X as the base CPU for comparison.
We will be looking at (and adding) the new graphics cards in the next few days, so stay tuned!
Source(s)
Motherboard Addendum (added July 12, 2019)
The less expensive X570 motherboards do not support SLI. As such, we are removing the RTX 2080 x2 option from the Enthusiast tier.