News AMD Ryzen 9 7950X and Ryzen 5 7600X Review: A Return to Gaming Dominance

[Math Geek]

the efficiency is pretty good for sure, even for a 16 core mega cpu. and as i noted above, it seems the 7600x is still VERY low overall at about 130-140w peak from what i am seeing in other reviews. so still about that same 100-110w more than likely at a gaming load which is about the same as the 3600 and 5600x. still reading reviews and it seems most are focusing on the top cpu, but eventually i'll find someone who measured power for the 7600x at normal loads and not just for torture tests.

so no concerns there at all really now that i see those numbers. i don't think intel is going to be able to touch that at all with their new cpu's coming out. platform costs are still high for both but i guess saving on the cooling and most likely cheaper cpu cost overall (intel is usually a bit higher starting out), will give the nod to the AMD side if those last 5 fps is not that important to you.

 

[peachpuff]

I'm raising an eyebrow over the 95°C being "normal" for Ryzen temps now as the CPUs want to boost as much as they possibly can.

Blame intel, amd doesn't want to be second anymore so they're joining in with the clock the cpu until it throttles thing that intel excels at.

 

[zecoeco]

For me, the most impressive is the 7600X, beating the i5-12600K which has 4 cores more.
AMD cores are so much more power efficient and offer significant performance boost.
The 7900x is on its way to beat the i9-12900k significantly, while the 7950x is miles ahead of any CPU out there. Intel have no chance to catch up a significant lead even with the 24 core i9 13th gen.
Cores are still cores, small or big, and the i5 is no longer a 6 core CPU, and as rumored, the 13th i5 will get 14 cores in total.

 

[Math Geek]

i do like the idea of the P cores combined with the E cores. seems like a good idea especially in laptops.

but it seems like a couple gens away before it is as good as it can be. i am excited to see what intel can do with it once they get the power draw in check. and i wonder if AMD is getting any ideas from it. they already do very well with the chiplet idea as it is and they could prob do something similar as well and do it well.

 

[-Fran-]

Blame intel, amd doesn't want to be second anymore so they're joining in with the clock the cpu until it throttles thing that intel excels at.

I don't like the "they do it; don't blame me" mentality, but I get the idea. I just don't accept it as a valid argument, sorry.

In a related note, I can see PC World and Wendel from L1 did take a look at lower power modes and full efficiency and... Holy cow it's impressive. I was a bit scared these would just consume coal plants like Intel to operate, but they can be made stupid efficient, to the point they embarrass Zen3 and everything Intel. EDIT: To be fair and thinking about this a bit more, yes, Intel can be made really efficient as well, but not to the level of Zen4; at least, not with Alder Lake. I do not believe Raptor Lake will change things much in terms of pure efficiency.

EDIT: The video and credit to PC World

View: https://youtu.be/uks4qQ2MXrM?t=1084


Regards.

 

[King_V]

now i'll sit back and listen to all the folks whine about the new power usage, while noting it's the same people who have been ignoring intel's much higher power draws the last few years simply saying "those 5 extra fps are worth 150w extra!!"

Now, now . . to be fair, there's also some of them who don't say that, but who instead say that Intel's power draw isn't that high at all.

 

[kiniku]

Now that we have actual competitive CPU market -thanks to AMD - how important is "faster" today with both Zen 4 and Alder/Raptor Lake? Consumer wins! Yes indeed. But I won't be upgrading my 12700K CPU for years.

 

[chalabam]

now i'll sit back and listen to all the folks whine about the new power usage, while noting it's the same people who have been ignoring intel's much higher power draws the last few years simply saying "those 5 extra fps are worth 150w extra!!"

It makes sense to complain, because higher power require to spend money in a more powerful PSU.

Only the people who bought a cheaper one, to feed a less demanding CPU, find themselves in trouble by upgrading to a power hungry CPU.

The people who had an expensive one, doesn´t have a reason to complain at the upgrade.

 

[blppt]

I'm a bit disappointed, though I guess it meets all that AMD was promising us.

It doesn't really make a whole lot of sense to upgrade to a 7950 for gaming and being forced to buy new RAM when the X3D uses your old DDR4 (and possibly your same mobo if you already have one). I would've been happier if they were at least able to match the X3D from the last gen in gaming.
Oh well. Lets see if Intel can do any better without needing a custom water loop to avoid melting into the floor.

 

[RodroX]

Perhaps you already caught all of this (Ryzen 7 / 5), but by the time I was reading the article they were there:

"
The Ryzen 9 7950X and Ryzen 7 7600X don’t come with bundled coolers. Instead, AMD recommends a 240-280mm liquid cooler or equivalent for Ryzne 9 processors. Meanwhile, you’ll need a mid-frame tower cooler (or equivalent) for the Ryzen 7 and 5 models. You should expect loaded temperatures to regularly reach 90C, which is within spec and won’t damage the chip.

The Ryzen 7 7600X was 12% faster than the Core i5-12600K in our gaming tests, but even more impressively, it beat the Intel Core i9-12900K by 4%. That makes it an exceptional gaming chip at the $300 price point. The Core i5-12600K maintains a slight lead in multi-threaded work, but the deltas aren’t large enough to overlook the 7600X’s faster performance in gaming and lightly-threaded work.

If you’re dead set on buying a chip now, the Ryzen 7 7600X is unquestionably the fastest gaming chip on the market for $300. It offers basically the same gaming performance as the 7950X that’s now the fastest ‘standard’ gaming chip on the market, but at less than half the cost. Meanwhile, the Ryzen 9 7950X is the reigning overall performance champ for mainstream PCs, delivering unprecedented levels of performance on a mainstream platform.
"

 

[Phaaze88]

Am I reading the charts wrong? Looks like an overclocked 7950x is slower than a 5800X3D and in a dead heat with an OC'd 12900k which would put it behind an OC'd 12900KS. If that's what the charts are showing, then Raptor Lake is going to comfortably retake the gaming lead in a month.

This is the beginning of AM5, but Raptor Lake is the end of its respective socket, isn't it?

 

[rluker5]

The power efficiency of the Ryzen 7950 is just mind-blowing. We are not talking about a few percent less energy consumtion and a few percent faster task completion. We are talking about 30-40% differences in total efficiency compared with Intels best Alder Lake Processors.

So, kudos to AMD for this amazing uplift.
Now, whole system prices are a different story (DDR5 RAM, new mainboards etc) but heck, those who don't want or don't need the latest and greatest system can easily build a great computer based on previous gen Ryzen 5000 CPUs. For gamers, the 5800X3D still rules the crop, so those whose primary interest is in gaming, can go with that one and and still have the fastest gaming machine in town.

Gamers Nexus has efficiency as a significant regression with the 7950x compared to the 5950x. Considering Zen4 is on a newer node this is pretty bad. AMD is really pushing this gen harder than I've ever seen CPUs being pushed before.
95c stock is pretty unusable. Undervolting/underclocking will be a necessity and you can forget about overclocking. You may have some motherboard manufacturers do this outside of AMD's recommendations just like Intel has some give the CPU more power.

 

[Math Geek]

Now that we have actual competitive CPU market -thanks to AMD - how important is "faster" today with both Zen 4 and Alder/Raptor Lake? Consumer wins! Yes indeed. But I won't be upgrading my 12700K CPU for years.

upgrading only a single generation has never been a good idea. even a solid 10-15% gain is not worth the cost, especially with a completely new platform. normally i wait 2 gens after a new platform to let the bugs work out, costs to come down and so on.

i tend to build a lot of pc's for myself but they are generally an upgrade for myself and i hand down the last one to the rest of the house. so i replace the oldest system as i go and pass it on to someone outside the house through my church's program. for instance my 4690k system is finally passed on to someone who is working from home now and needed the better pc. now a 3600 is the oldest in the house as i've upgraded a lot last few years. for once my house is all AMD with the passing of the 4690k system. will see if intel can earn back a purchase as i am in no way brand loyal, but look purely at bang for the buck.

will be prob 2 gens if not more before we need to upgrade again. most likely some new gpu's will be bought before a new cpu.

 

[TerryLaze]

Gamers Nexus has efficiency as a significant regression with the 7950x compared to the 5950x. Considering Zen4 is on a newer node this is pretty bad. AMD is really pushing this gen harder than I've ever seen CPUs being pushed before.
95c stock is pretty unusable. Undervolting/underclocking will be a necessity and you can forget about overclocking. You may have some motherboard manufacturers do this outside of AMD's recommendations just like Intel has some give the CPU more power.

5000 series was already 90 degrees, 5 more isn't going to make any difference.

Max Safe Temperature for AMD Ryzen 5000 CPUs? | Hardware Times

AMD’s Robert Hallock has clarified that temperatures up to 90C for the higher-end Zen 3 based Ryzen 7 and 9 parts are quite normal, and won’t affect the life-cycle of the chip. Replying to a Redditor, Hallock said that AMD views temperatures up to 90C (for the 5800X/5900X/5950X) as typical and...

www.hardwaretimes.com

RH: Yes. I want to be clear with everyone that AMD views temps up to 90C (5800X/5900X/5950X) and 95C (5600X) as typical and by design for full load conditions. Having a higher maximum temperature supported by the silicon and firmware allows the CPU to pursue higher and longer boost performance before the algorithm pulls back for thermal reasons.

 

[-Fran-]

Gamers Nexus has efficiency as a significant regression with the 7950x compared to the 5950x. Considering Zen4 is on a newer node this is pretty bad. AMD is really pushing this gen harder than I've ever seen CPUs being pushed before.
95c stock is pretty unusable. Undervolting/underclocking will be a necessity and you can forget about overclocking. You may have some motherboard manufacturers do this outside of AMD's recommendations just like Intel has some give the CPU more power.

Not quite...

View: https://youtu.be/uks4qQ2MXrM?t=1084


Regards.

 

[RodroX]

I was very sceptical about Zen 4 and the cost of "launch day"mobos + DDR5 is a real turn down for me (and the fact that my current GPU at 1440p wont benefit that much either).

But never the less after reading the review (first one I read for Zen 4), seeing the R5 7600X with and wihtout PBO matching or even beating the Core i9 12900K in some games just blew my mind. Specially considering the amount of cores and the power drawn.

Its going to be a time battle for AMD to keep tweaking the BIOS before Raptor Lake.

Fun times ahead!!!

 

[Johnpombrio]

I purposely bought an i7-12700K just to avoid the high temps of the more powerful chips. I want quiet computers and these high-end power-hungry CPUs really call for water cooling. I will wait for at least Meteor Lake before upgrading my CPU again. Kudos to AMD for going past the divide.

 

[rluker5]

Not quite...

View: https://youtu.be/uks4qQ2MXrM?t=1084


Regards.
[/QUOTE]
Stock. Not undervolted like I said would be necessary in my post.
And you were right that Intel can be efficient. I made this video a while back to show cpu watts and temps. The cooler is a NH-D15.

View: https://youtu.be/qcGePBU11Co
Edit: and the cpu is a 12700k, one of the early ones, not that efficient, but still has it's 512.

 

[JamesJones44]

One thing we can say for sure here. It looks like it's a 2 horse race again. Should be positive for consumers, not so much for fanboys.

 

[Johnpombrio]

upgrading only a single generation has never been a good idea. even a solid 10-15% gain is not worth the cost, especially with a completely new platform. normally I wait for 2 gens after a new platform to let the bugs work out, costs come down, and so on.

I tend to build a lot of PC's for myself but they are generally an upgrade for myself and I hand down the last one to the rest of the house. so I replace the oldest system as I go and pass it on to someone outside the house through my church's program. for instance, my 4690k system is finally passed on to someone who is working from home now and needed a better pc. now a 3600 is the oldest in the house as I've upgraded a lot last few years. for once my house is all AMD with the passing of the 4690k system. will see if intel can earn back a purchase as I am in no way brand loyal, but look purely at bang for the buck.

will be prob 2 gens if not more before we need to upgrade again. most likely some new GPUs will be bought before a new CPU.

10% uplift was my minimum criteria for years for CPUs until I realized that in the past decade or so, I simply could tell that I upgraded. My performance supposedly improved but it did not FEEL any different. Web pages loaded the same, Handbrake ran about the same, and games at 4K were totally unnoticeably faster, The biggest difference was that I could not overclock as high as the temps would rise very quickly as the CPUs were already running close to the edge under their normal clocks. With Alder Lake, I passed on the best chip (the first time I have EVER done that) and went for the cooler i7 option. Like MathGeek here, it will be a while before I upgrade again and pass my old computers down to my sons and my friend. I too expect that a new graphics card will come a lot sooner than a CPU and mobo upgrade.

 

[spongiemaster]

This is the beginning of AM5, but Raptor Lake is the end of its respective socket, isn't it?

I don't think when THG titled the review article, A Return to Gaming Dominance, they meant, at some point in the future AM5 motherboards will have a CPU that's faster than what LGA1700 will support. That's a nonsensical take on that.

 

[Eximo]

upgrading only a single generation has never been a good idea. even a solid 10-15% gain is not worth the cost, especially with a completely new platform. normally i wait 2 gens after a new platform to let the bugs work out, costs to come down and so on.

i tend to build a lot of pc's for myself but they are generally an upgrade for myself and i hand down the last one to the rest of the house. so i replace the oldest system as i go and pass it on to someone outside the house through my church's program. for instance my 4690k system is finally passed on to someone who is working from home now and needed the better pc. now a 3600 is the oldest in the house as i've upgraded a lot last few years. for once my house is all AMD with the passing of the 4690k system. will see if intel can earn back a purchase as i am in no way brand loyal, but look purely at bang for the buck.

will be prob 2 gens if not more before we need to upgrade again. most likely some new gpu's will be bought before a new cpu.

CPUs still have re-sell value. Not like you throw the old one in the trash.

Though I also practice handing it down through the family most of the time, so I get what you are saying.

Buying a first gen AM5 means the opportunity to get the last generation when the socket is on the way out.

AM4 had a fairly logical path if you bought the right motherboard. 1000 -> 3000 -> 5000, and even a mid generation motherboard swap wasn't too costly.

 

[SunMaster]

I don't like the "they do it; don't blame me" mentality, but I get the idea. I just don't accept it as a valid argument, sorry.

I don't like it either, but I do accept it as perfectly acceptable given Intel's previous default boost strategy. If people are to compare apples to apples this is what AMD needs to do.

 

[lmcnabney]

Good initial testing, but my biggest question in regards to performance is how memory speed / latency impacts scores on the new AM5/DDR5 platform. All of the testing shown is done using DDR5-5200. AMD has stated many times that 6000mhz is the sweet spot and I (and many others) would like to see how the memory speed impacts performance.

 

[tomachas]

Which would be a better buy i5 12600K or 7600X? Given I can buy 12600K 15% cheaper.