AMD Ryzen 9 5950X Review: Total Domination

[Steve]

Here's our first look at Ryzen 5000, starting with a full review of the Ryzen 9 5950X flagship. This new chip packs 16 cores with SMT support for 32 threads. At $800, it's an expensive CPU for the mainstream AM4 platform.

Read the full article here.

https://www.techspot.com/review/2131-amd-ryzen-5950x/

 

[Vladichka]

Cinebench single thread (stock) benchmark is missing

Editor's note: Thanks, Steve fixed this right away.

 

[mAdmAnDingo]

Fantastic! Thanks for the review Steve! I have been waiting all year long to pick up an 5950X (will move my 3700X onto an ASUS B550 MB), and this review just confirms the choice. Well done AMD, a terrific all rounder, with better power to performance ratio than the 3950X, and terrific productivity and gaming performance uplift in many cases. Impressive what AMD has achieved with the same (now mature) 7nm process.

This is going to be my main work horse CPU for many many years (rendering, handbrake etc), and should do exceedingly well at gaming as well. And I can just drop it right in to my ASUS Gaming-F X570 MB. Nice!

I am really excited to see how the 5900X, 5800X and 5600X perform. They should perform fairly similarly in gaming to the 5950X, just as 3000 series all performed quite similar to each other in gaming as well (mostly). So they should make for excellent gaming+productivity CPUs as well, all with AMD/TSMC 7nm efficiency. Truly terrific.

Would love to see some RAM MAX/IF/Frequency + tweaked timings articles if possible as well please Steve? Would love to see their full potential with an optimized memory subsystem.

And I am really interested in RX6000 series as well, It would be great to see how they perform with SAM enabled on X570/B550 MB with an 5000 CPU vs 10th gen with an RX 6000 GPU. Maybe not a massive difference, but maybe enough to sway some to an all AMD platform this year (I think I will be one of them). Exciting times!

And I am sure AMD will release 5600 and 5700X SKUs in the future as well (maybe next year?), and they will be just as popular as the 3600 and 3700X that preceded them. Even if they are slower than the 5800X and 5600X, they likely wont be much slower. And with a price reduced by at least $50 (or more?) on those models, they will make many AMD fans and new buyers happy. Nothing wrong with catering to those with lower budgets, who would also like in on AMDs latest. But that is a discussion for another time. Back to the here and now, I have no doubt the new 5000 series will fly off the shelves, and further solidify AMDs market position.

 

[Irata]

Great review and the title is fitting. The generational improvement is pretty insane in some cases.
What I find most impressive is that they increased performance while decreasing power consumption. The 16C 5950X uses about as much power as my 2700X....

Am also looking forward to the 5600x - 5900x reviews.

 

[EdmondRC]

Well, this looks pretty conclusive. Really kicking myself for building an Intel 300 series last year. I only went Intel because my last AMD was back in the FX days and it was terrible compared to Intel at the time. Looks like I lose again lol. At least if I had built an AMD I would be able to upgrade to the 5000 series, I can't even upgrade to Intel 10, I'm stuck with 9. Oh well, it should still get me by for few years.

 

[Irata]

Steve : I am curious if Bristol Ridge would run on your X570 board. Not that anyone would (want to) do this but I am still curious.

 

[amghwk]

Total Domination indeed!

Intel has been pushed back, in all reality, to the second class place holder.

Simply impressive!

I'm excited to compile more and more in my Linux systems. And smashes intel even in games, in addition. Good times ahead for WINE/Proton too.

Good that I have already planned to upgrade my i7 8700K to Zen 3 this year.

Hopefully my next hopeful 6800XT will also come along well, to go with the Zen 3 Ryzen 7 or 9.

 

[Badelhas]

And all this without asking us to buy a new motherboard. Learn how to do it, Intel.

 

[Avro Arrow]

This is a pretty momentous day. I've been using x86 CPUs since the 8088 and I have NEVER seen such absolute and total domination by one manufacturer over another. When AMD was at their absolute worst (2015-2016), they were still a better value than Intel. Intel doesn't even have that today. Sure Intel was ahead in a couple of games but on average, Intel lost. Not by much, but it's clear that Intel's last bastion is truly gone. AMD has won in EVERY SINGLE METRIC and in most metrics, the only word that comes to mind is CURBSTOMP.

BTW, This little passage made me chuckle:
"In the case of the X570 Godlike, we could slot in either the Ryzen 5 1600 or the new Ryzen 9 5950X, and both worked perfectly, so that’s four generations of CPUs on a single motherboard."
Considering what the MSi X570 Godlike costs (almost $1000CAD ), it should be able to handle AM2+ and AM3+ as well.

 

[AKBrian]

You might want to fix the game graphs, most of them say [Lower is better] for framerate average results. :'P

Editor's note: Thanks, now fixed.

 

[Julio Franco]

So, I was hoping to score a cheap Ryzen 3000 series CPU for my first-gen Ryzen motherboard, but as it turns out, Ryzen 5000 is more efficient

This AM4 compatibility thing is huge honestly. Even if it dies off with this generation, I hope AMD can keep it up on their next big thing. Not to mention, Intel can learn from this, too.

 

[treetops]

I have a 1440p monitor so meh. I do lower my res to 1080p at times for higher fps. If I sell my old GPU and buy a 6800 I dont think that will be a problem. Anddd my b450 mobo still needs a bios update. Stock is empty atm

 

[fps4ever]

You might want to fix the game graphs, most of them say [Lower is better] for framerate average results. :'P

Yeah that caught my eye immediately.

 

[candle_86]

You might want to fix the game graphs, most of them say [Lower is better] for framerate average results. :'P

no he's prepping for the logic of intel fanboys, arguing that you need lower fps

 

[wiyosaya]

So, I was hoping to score a cheap Ryzen 3000 series CPU for my first-gen Ryzen motherboard, but as it turns out, Ryzen 5000 is more efficient

This AM4 compatibility thing is huge honestly. Even if it dies off with this generation, I hope AMD can keep it up on their next big thing. Not to mention, Intel can learn from this, too.

I suspect Intel could learn much from AMD. However, since they have hired a business wonk as a CEO and he has basically stated that Intel is going to focus on chips, I doubt they will learn anything. I used to work for a company that had a similar mindset. They were known internally for not reversing decisions that even they knew were wrong.

 

[wiyosaya]

Way to go AMD!

 

[tellmewhy]

I think for AMD it would be better to establish an ecosystem with "+1000" new customers with 100$ profit on each of them instead "+250" new customers with 400$ profit on each of them.

 

[Lionvibez]

Looking good now I'm just waiting for stock at my local computer store so I can pick one up.

 

[Gmachine]

All Heil AMD the Great

 

[meric]

Lisa Su tortures intel and nvidia at the same time

 

[Irata]

So, I was hoping to score a cheap Ryzen 3000 series CPU for my first-gen Ryzen motherboard, but as it turns out, Ryzen 5000 is more efficient

This AM4 compatibility thing is huge honestly. Even if it dies off with this generation, I hope AMD can keep it up on their next big thing. Not to mention, Intel can learn from this, too.

Now all you need to do is get a Bristol Ridge CPU and try if it works on your X570 board. If it did that would be awesome.

 

[Achaios]

Chipzilla has been cornered by the Good Guys. Not much the beast can do now.

 

[Khanonate]

Reminds me of a kid's song.
"Oh where, oh where is the AMD 5000 series cpu? Oh where, oh where can it be? "
):

 

[Karl Hungus]

Let's see what the 1440p results are. I'm thinking the 5600 as I will likely hand my 3600 to my son for his 'new' system. I'm guessing there won't be more than a 5% difference between them at 1440p gaming. Makes no sense to get a B450 board at this point as they are so overpriced and you can get a good 550 board for $10 or $20 more.

 

[Aryassen]

Seems that the claimed IPC gains were not only claims...I LIKE IT!

Thanks for the detailed review, and looking forward to seeing how the smaller brothers do (especially the 5800X)