# AMD Ryzen 9 3900XT



## W1zzard (Jul 7, 2020)

The Ryzen 9 3900XT is the flagship of the new AMD Ryzen XT series. It comes with higher boost clocks and can sustain them better, which helps with single-threaded workloads. In our Ryzen 9 3900XT review, we also saw better overclocking and lower temperatures than on the original Ryzen 9 3900X.

*Show full review*


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## Rowsol (Jul 7, 2020)

For 80 dollars you get 1% more performance and no heatsink. What a deal, I'll take 2!


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## kapone32 (Jul 7, 2020)

The best thing about these CPUs is they will hopefully push the 3600 into the sub $250 Canadian range.


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## LocutusH (Jul 7, 2020)

Thats pretty disappointing. I have hoped for a 5% at least. But 1?


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## BorisDG (Jul 7, 2020)

In nutshell Intel > AMD


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## Pumper (Jul 7, 2020)

I still maintain my view that it's just a way to low key increase prices on all Zen2 CPUs: release "new" chips with XT instead of just X, bump up the pricing, stop manufacturing X > profit.


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## dyonoctis (Jul 7, 2020)

Oh, wow, for the price that's not a very interesting product... the benefits are not noticeable in most cases...


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## Melladozzz (Jul 7, 2020)

I think there is a small mistake with the 3900XT and 3800XT frequencies : 
In the introduction 3900XT = 3.8-4.7 and 3800XT = 3.9-4.7. This values are inversed in the tests.


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## Lionheart (Jul 7, 2020)

What a snooze fest AMD


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## R0H1T (Jul 7, 2020)

The only thing mildly interesting here is the increased efficiency of the XT model, probably a cut down 3950x or something.






Also the temps ~


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## yeeeeman (Jul 7, 2020)

100mhz for 70$ more. Nice.


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## RedelZaVedno (Jul 7, 2020)

Pumper said:


> I still maintain my view that it's just a way to low key increase prices on all Zen2 CPUs: release "new" chips with XT instead of just X, bump up the pricing, stop manufacturing X > profit.


The beauty in all this is that AMD doesn't have to do anything. Their 7nm node is so mature by now that they can get away with bumping up frequency +100 MHz on X line and maybe 300 MHz on non X CPUs, rename them to XT and voila, they have just risen profit margin on Zen 2 CPUs. This will also prevent Zen+ kind of discounts on Zen2 when Zen3 finally arrives. AMD is becoming new Intel.


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## yeeeeman (Jul 7, 2020)

R0H1T said:


> The only thing mildly interesting here is the increased efficiency of the XT model, probably a cut down 3950x or something.


Lower voltages.



RedelZaVedno said:


> The beauty in all this is that AMD doesn't have to do anything. Their 7nm is so matured that they can get away with bumping up frequency +100 MHz on X line and maybe 300 MHz on non X CPUs, rename them XT and voila, they have just risen profit margin on Zen 2 CPUs. This will also prevent Zen+ kind of discounts on Zen2 when Zen3 finally arrives. AMD is becoming new Intel.


Exactly, AMD will milk consumers that praised them exactly like Intel did.


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## R0H1T (Jul 7, 2020)

yeeeeman said:


> Lower voltages.


Sure & that's because 
Hint ~ same reason why 3950x is much more efficient.


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## Calmmo (Jul 7, 2020)

Looks like it runs far too hot (with the oc) mine has a much smaller gap oc 4.2 vs stock. Even if i were looking to buy one before, i most certainly wouldn't now. Did they screw up something with the ihs or maybe just poor bios.. hmm


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## W1zzard (Jul 7, 2020)

Melladozzz said:


> I think there is a small mistake with the 3900XT and 3800XT frequencies :
> In the introduction 3900XT = 3.8-4.7 and 3800XT = 3.9-4.7. This values are inversed in the tests.


Fixed, will fix the other reviews too


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## xkm1948 (Jul 7, 2020)

Really nothing interesting. But again most people would be waiting for Zen3 anyway


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## dirtyferret (Jul 7, 2020)

Hey remember when AMD fan boys made fun of the Intel 8086k that didn't even come with cooler?  Well AMD just told them to hold our domestic budget light beer.


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## The Quim Reaper (Jul 7, 2020)

> Still not as fast as Intel in gaming



Seems like I've been reading this for like....ever

C'mon Zen 3, lets put an end to this tired old trope.


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## neatfeatguy (Jul 7, 2020)

Oh...sad.

I was hoping they might have had something a bit more interesting, something maybe 5-10% over what the original models (3600X/3800X/3900X) gave....but 1-2%, that's kind of like a normal margin of error one would expect when benching. Doesn't really seem like the extra $80 or so is worth it on any of the XT versions.


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## Bee9 (Jul 7, 2020)

@W1zzard can you test the original 3900x heatsink with the new XT to see if it can sustain 4.4ghz all cores in a 33*C ambient temperature?
My friends claim it can but I highly doubt it...
And about the overclock, my 3900X reach 4.2 Ghz all cores at 1.1V without affecting performance and can get up to the clockspeed of the XT when I push the V core to 1.425. Looks like I got a lucky draw since I bought it first week at launch.


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## W1zzard (Jul 7, 2020)

Bee9 said:


> can you test the original 3900x heatsink with the new XT to see if it can sustain 4.4ghz all cores in a 33*C ambient temperature?


There is no way my 3900XT can do 4.4 GHz all-core, period. Well, maybe in some light loads, but not Prime95 Small FFT


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## Bee9 (Jul 7, 2020)

W1zzard said:


> There is no way my 3900XT can do 4.4 GHz all-core, period. Well, maybe in some light loads, but not Prime95 Small FFT



Yeah Prime95 is a no go with 4.4 ghz. Some samples can but that's not representative. I can do 4.2 Ghz just fine. I think it's wise to not include the cooler because (1) they can save tons of money and (2) not getting flamed both literally and metaphorically  lolz. 

Anyway, this is a non-sense product. Everyone should just get the 3900X at $400 then. Cheer ! and thanks for your hardwork.


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## EarthDog (Jul 7, 2020)

Thanks, as always, for the review. Please combine these next time... two different reviews of cpus with a simple bump in clocks seems like a waste of everyone's time when they could've been combined.


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## Chrispy_ (Jul 7, 2020)

The 3900XT is the dumbest of these three relaunches. XT's gains are marginal at best, and only even visible at all in single-threaded workloads. 

HEY HERE IT IS ON A 24-THREAD CPU THAT NOBODY OUTSIDE OF MULTI-THREADED POWER USERS WOULD CHOOSE TO BUY.

At least the 3600XT makes a teeny-tiny bit of sense, even though it's 99.5% pointless against even a vanilla 3600.


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## Sihastru (Jul 7, 2020)

Hopefully a wake up call for certain individuals that hold certain companies with certain identity colors in higher regard than other certain companies with other certain identity colors. Such is life.


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## Mistral (Jul 7, 2020)

Well, I guess it's not the worst way to get more advertising and mindshare for your brand...


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## Bee9 (Jul 7, 2020)

Chrispy_ said:


> HEY HERE IT IS ON A 24-THREAD CPU THAT NOBODY OUTSIDE OF MULTI-THREADED POWER USERS WOULD CHOOSE TO BUY.


Sure, who's going to buy a 12 cores 24 threads except power users? Professional gamers are all Intel and casual gamers will properly choose 3300x or the 3600. 



Mistral said:


> Well, I guess it's not the worst way to get more advertising and mindshare for your brand...


And we are here discussing about it. Quite true. Releasing a technically dump product is still a good marketing move to balance the press a little bit while waiting for the next gen. 



Sihastru said:


> Hopefully a wake up call for certain individuals that hold certain companies with certain identity colors in higher regard than other certain companies with other certain identity colors. Such is life.


Red and Blue team alike. and I'm here teaming up with whatever gives me the most ROI. In this case, still AMD.


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## Totally (Jul 7, 2020)

are there any 8+ cpu part with integrated graphics? Noticed a lack of one was a con for this on the verdict page and the 3800xt when Intel doesn't have such cpus either iirc.


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## ARF (Jul 7, 2020)

Bee9 said:


> Sure, who's going to buy a 12 cores 24 threads except power users?



Ryzen 9 3900X is the third best selling CPU in Germany.

View attachment 161308


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## Bee9 (Jul 7, 2020)

ARF said:


> Ryzen 9 3900X is the third best selling CPU in Germany.
> 
> View attachment 161308


Sure that means lots of people are power users  and the definition of power users varies a lot. For me, editing some photos while waiting for the videos to complete or crunching numbers for market forecast. That requires lots of power.. 



Totally said:


> are there any 8+ cpu part with integrated graphics? Noticed a lack of one was a con for this and the 3800xt when Intel doesn't have such cpus either iirc.


Adding an iGPU will reduce the yield and therefore, lower the margin. They reserve the iGPU for their APU line up. Consider you have a limited amount of production capacity in your FAB, you must prioritize what get produced first.


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## Deleted member 193792 (Jul 7, 2020)

Bee9 said:


> Adding an iGPU will reduce the yield and therefore, lower the margin. They reserve the iGPU for their APU line up. Consider you have a limited amount of production capacity in your FAB, you must prioritize what get produced first.


I'm wondering if they could integrate the smallest possible RDNA2 iGPU in a 7nm I/O die, along with a 5nm chiplet in Zen 4.

Not for gaming, just for regular desktop use. An iGPU also allows you to sell your dGPU when it still has value and wait for the next one (i.e. Turing -> Ampere), without making your PC totally useless for browsing etc.


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## Bee9 (Jul 7, 2020)

jermando said:


> I'm wondering if they could integrate the smallest possible RDNA2 iGPU in a 7nm I/O die, along with a 5nm chiplet in Zen 4.
> 
> Not for gaming, just for regular desktop use. An iGPU also allows you to sell your dGPU when it still has value and wait for the next one (i.e. Turing -> Ampere), without making your PC totally useless for browsing etc.



The problem here is cannibalizations. Ryzen with iGPU will turn their APU line up into history. Good luck selling APU when the best Ryzen has one. Ryzen CPUs also play a key role in the halo effect, so it's not nice if it has an weaker iGPU. Technicality aside, I will veto this idea sorely on the marketing point of view.


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## ARF (Jul 7, 2020)

Bee9 said:


> The problem here is cannibalizations. Ryzen with iGPU will turn their APU line up into history. Good luck selling APU when the best Ryzen has one. Ryzen CPUs also play a key role in the halo effect, so it's not nice if it has an weaker iGPU. Technicality aside, I will veto this idea sorely on the marketing point of view.




It could be marketed as large, potent audio/video acceleration unit for 8K and 16K processing, because obviously you can't do it with x86 instructions.


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## Deleted member 193792 (Jul 7, 2020)

Bee9 said:


> The problem here is cannibalizations. Ryzen with iGPU will turn their APU line up into history. Good luck selling APU when the best Ryzen has one. Ryzen CPUs also play a key role in the halo effect, so it's not nice if it has an weaker iGPU. Technicality aside, I will veto this idea sorely on the marketing point of view.


How doesn't Intel cannibalize their product line?



ARF said:


> It could be marketed as large, potent audio/video acceleration unit for 8K and 16K processing, because obviously you can't do it with x86 instructions.


You can do it with x86 SIMD (AVX256/512).


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## Bee9 (Jul 7, 2020)

ARF said:


> It could be marketed as large, potent audio/video acceleration unit for 8K and 16K processing, because obviously you can't do it with x86 instructions.


Then the graphic department will file a complaint... But yeah, 3900XT with integrated Vega 20 graphics will make me wet, extremely wet (drooling all over my keyboard).
Back to the topic at hand: look at 3900 binning, it takes time to reach the maturity for the node and you already see how good the 3900X does nowadays compare to the first launch. The XT is just cherry on top to steal the press. 



jermando said:


> How doesn't Intel cannibalize their product line?


Within Intel product lines, I don't see anything marketed as APU. That's just how marketing works in corporation. You have multiple departments compete for the resources.


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## ARF (Jul 7, 2020)

Bee9 said:


> Then the graphic department will file a complaint... But yeah, 3900XT with integrated Vega 20 graphics will make me wet, extremely wet (drooling all over my keyboard).
> Back to the topic at hand: look at 3900 binning, it takes time to reach the maturity for the node and you already see how good the 3900X does nowadays compare to the first launch. The XT is just cherry on top to steal the press.
> 
> 
> Within Intel product lines, I don't see anything marketed as APU. That's just how marketing works in corporation. You have multiple departments compete for the resources.




Except that Navi is much better than Vega..


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## R0H1T (Jul 7, 2020)

Because Intel doesn't sell mainstream chips without an IGP, the ones with F or KF are disabled IGP chips, for various reasons. AMD have moved from regular chips, pre BD i.e. phenom II for instance, to a CPU & APU post 2011.





Bee9 said:


> Within Intel product lines, I don't see anything marketed as APU. That's just how marketing works in corporation. You have multiple departments compete for the resources.


Nothing to do with marketing, Intel's selling IGP less desktop chips only on HEDT platforms for nearly a decade now.


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## Deleted member 193792 (Jul 7, 2020)

Bee9 said:


> Within Intel product lines, I don't see anything marketed as APU. That's just how marketing works in corporation. You have multiple departments compete for the resources.


An APU is a heterogeneous processor that integrates a CPU and a GPU and Intel has had that for a long time.

It's not like AMD has an exclusivity to that concept... even mobile SoCs do that.


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## Bee9 (Jul 7, 2020)

ARF said:


> Except that Navi is much better than Vega..


We should stay on 3900XT topic. 
PS: my work require heavy compute so vega is favorable.


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## ARF (Jul 7, 2020)

jermando said:


> An APU is a heterogeneous processor that integrates a CPU and a GPU and Intel has had that for a long time.
> 
> It's not like AMD has an exclusivity to that concept... even mobile SoCs do that.




I think Intel avoids the term APU because it leads to AMD's Fusion concept and they would give AMD a free advertisement help.



Bee9 said:


> We should stay on 3900XT topic.
> PS: my work require heavy compute so vega is favorable.



Yes, and this is why Ryzen 9 3900X with Navi IP would be better..


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## Deleted member 193792 (Jul 7, 2020)

ARF said:


> I think Intel avoids the term APU because it leads to AMD's Fusion concept and they would give AMD a free advertisement help.


Welp, that sounds rather dumb.

Imagine if AMD didn't use the GPU term, only because nVidia used it first.


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## ARF (Jul 7, 2020)

jermando said:


> Welp, that sounds rather dumb.
> 
> Imagine if AMD didn't use the GPU term, only because nVidia used it first.




The detail here is that if it depends on Intel, AMD won't exist whatsoever. They have done everything possible to bankrupt AMD.
They simply don't respect anything AMD's.


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## R0H1T (Jul 7, 2020)

How about APU sounds a little unnecessary? It's basically a CPU with an IGP, do (most) people really care what it's called? You give them a thousand terms to gnaw upon & they'll tear their brains out, this is why marketing often times relies on tried & testing naming conventions & branding like i3 - i9 so no need to sell the consumers on a *novel* *concept*. The lesser the time they spend on thinking, the more likely they'll splurge on your products at least that's how I observe many of the average folks operate.


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## yeeeeman (Jul 7, 2020)

yeeeeman said:


> Exactly, AMD will milk consumers that praised them exactly like Intel did.


Now I saw. Besides the fact that people have to pay 50-100$ for 100mhz, now the cooler is not included anymore. Niiice!


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## nangu (Jul 7, 2020)

Calmmo said:


> Looks like it runs far too hot (with the oc) mine has a much smaller gap oc 4.2 vs stock. Even if i were looking to buy one before, i most certainly wouldn't now. Did they screw up something with the ihs or maybe just poor bios.. hmm



I think it's just very high voltage used in this review. My 3900X can run stable @1.2v for a 4.2Ghz all core OC, and temps are the same as stock + PBO.


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## jesdals (Jul 7, 2020)

Strange in Denmark retailers list the 3900XT as haveing 70mb cache


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## W1zzard (Jul 7, 2020)

jesdals said:


> Strange in Denmark retailers list the 3900XT as haveing 70mb cache


64 mb L3, 512 kb L2 per core, amd felt like adding them all up makes for a better specs sheet


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## Jism (Jul 7, 2020)

When this drops around 380 euro, im picking one up.


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## Vya Domus (Jul 7, 2020)

Sihastru said:


> Hopefully a wake up call for certain individuals that hold certain companies with certain identity colors in higher regard than other certain companies with other certain identity colors. Such is life.



Yeah, a better binned refresh with slightly higher clocks is a brutal wake up call ... from what exactly ?  

You've posted cringe bro.


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## Totally (Jul 8, 2020)

Vya Domus said:


> Yeah, a better binned refresh with slightly higher clocks is a brutal wake up call ... from what exactly ?
> 
> You've posted cringe bro.



It's just bait ignore and move along.


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## Crackong (Jul 8, 2020)

My regular 3900X can do 4.4GHz all core with 1.3v

No idea how this 3900XT doing 4.2 at 1.4v ............................


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## Palladium (Jul 8, 2020)

Kinda hard to help the economy when new stuff are stuck between boring and boring-er.


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## Jism (Jul 8, 2020)

Crackong said:


> My regular 3900X can do 4.4GHz all core with 1.3v
> 
> No idea how this 3900XT doing 4.2 at 1.4v ............................



And you proberly have your LLC on ultra on some stuff that shoots 1.45V ~ 1.5V into your CPU. Good job.

This is a refined silicon that offers a few percentage more performance. This could lead to lower power consumption if same clocks or more performance since you can raise the clocks while maintaining the same simular voltage.


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## heky (Jul 8, 2020)

@W1zzard 
I wonder if it is the Motherboard or you really got unlucky with both your chips (X and XT), since i get much better results with a regular 3900X in pretty much all tests. For example my R20 score is 7258 Pts stock, with PBO disabled and the Blender render gets done in just  1.58,54 so like 119s, also stock. Not dissing your results or anything, just wondering.


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## W1zzard (Jul 8, 2020)

heky said:


> @W1zzard
> I wonder if it is the Motherboard or you really got unlucky with both your chips (X and XT), since i get much better results with a regular 3900X in pretty much all tests. For example my R20 score is 7258 Pts stock, with PBO disabled and the Blender render gets done in just  1.58,54 so like 119s, also stock. Not dissing your results or anything, just wondering.


3200CL14 ?


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## heky (Jul 8, 2020)

Oh, running 3800 CL16, could that be it? Hm...guess that's that then...


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## Neotheone (Jul 8, 2020)

Thank you so much for yet another outstanding professional and authentic review.  This CPU is trashed all over YouTube by the biggest YouTubers and none disclose the lower temperature at same clock. Thanks again, you're awesome as always.


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## Calmmo (Jul 8, 2020)

heky said:


> Oh, running 3800 CL16, could that be it? Hm...guess that's that then...


My stock xmp result after just updating to 1.0.0.2 combo bios is 7332/525 in r20 for example. And I know from manual OC that my chip isn't particularly good (req. voltage too high to get 4.3 all core)


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## Crackong (Jul 8, 2020)

Jism said:


> And you proberly have your LLC on ultra on some stuff that shoots 1.45V ~ 1.5V into your CPU. Good job.
> 
> This is a refined silicon that offers a few percentage more performance. This could lead to lower power consumption if same clocks or more performance since you can raise the clocks while maintaining the same simular voltage.



I ran 4.4 @ 1.3v on games, benchmarks and some P95, voltage never goes beyond 1.306v

Maybe my HWinfo64 is lying to me.
Maybe you knew better without knowing my whole setup is.


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## HenrySomeone (Jul 8, 2020)

LocutusH said:


> Thats pretty disappointing. I have hoped for a 5% at least. But 1?


That's the name of their game - Another Moderate/Massive Disappointment


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## ARF (Jul 8, 2020)

It's a joke - in some cases the "new" XT is slower than the old X.
Why do they have to relaunch these things now ?


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## HenrySomeone (Jul 8, 2020)

Well, they like to joke...


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## ARF (Jul 8, 2020)

HenrySomeone said:


> Well, they like to joke...




Nah, the customers will vote with their wallets. Once AMD says "Buy it", I will go with the big grin face


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## Markosz (Jul 8, 2020)

WTF AMD, you haven't done anything with these XT CPUs.


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## Shatun_Bear (Jul 8, 2020)

ARF said:


> It's a joke - in some cases the "new" XT is slower than the old X.
> Why do they have to relaunch these things now ?



Because they're the market leader, 3000 series selling so fast they are cashing in by serving the market buying those with something 'new'. It'll help them continue to dominate Amazon, OverclockersUK, Mindfactory etc sales charts much to Intel's chagrin.


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## AddSub (Jul 8, 2020)

Aside from a occasional and rare non-very-techy builder who is just picking up a random CPU for a build and stumbles upon something like this and goes, "Okay looks good, add to cart...", this is largely directed at the brand loyalists. Ones who will buy anything with a certain brand no matter what. Ya know, the ones with more RGB fans in their Fortnite game boxes than brain cells.

As for overclocking bandwidth somebody was talking about, Ryzens, all of them, don't really overclock out of the box. These are maxed at factory. These XT's seem to be extra MAXED in fact. Every bit of fruit seems to have been picked at this point from the Zen tree (at this architectural junction) unless you are going the extreme super-duper-exotic cooling route. Mid 4GHz seems to be it for Zen right now, and that ain't enough to get that gaming crown.


(multi CPU Ryzen owner for three years now, before the "loyalists" get started.)



...
..
.


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## MikeDDS06 (Jul 8, 2020)

Crackong said:


> My regular 3900X can do 4.4GHz all core with 1.3v
> 
> No idea how this 3900XT doing 4.2 at 1.4v ............................


Yeah, this is a terrible result.  My 3900x from August can't quite do 4.4 all-core but easily does 4.3 at about 1.325v.  Other reviewers are hitting around 4.5 all-core and some over 4.6 on the first chiplet when doing per ccx overclocking with the 3900xt.


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## John Naylor (Jul 9, 2020)

How it does in things I do compared to Intel product at same price
Slower in Office Apps
Slower in Photoshop
Slower in video editing
Slower in Gaming
31C Hotter

How it does in things I never do
I didn't look cause I have no reason to care

How many cores and what's the die size ?
See abave ... have no reason to care


Well that's one decision I won't have to think about.


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## EarthDog (Jul 9, 2020)

Shatun_Bear said:


> Because they're the market leader, 3000 series selling so fast they are cashing in by serving the market buying those with something 'new'. It'll help them continue to dominate Amazon, OverclockersUK, Mindfactory etc sales charts much to Intel's chagrin.


This suddenly feels hip when the shoe is on the other foot.


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## Shatun_Bear (Jul 9, 2020)

EarthDog said:


> This suddenly feels hip when the shoe is on the other foot.



Well yes, I dont mind if they cash in ten-fold actually. Because if you look at AMD's financials, they make about 1/20th of the profit Intel make a year. It's much better for the consumer if AMD are doing it than Intel for competition.

Also, Intel add a meaningless 100mhz on top of boost clocks and calls it an entire new gen (Comet Lake) so I hope you voiced your displeasure there too.

But I suspect you were the type hooting and hollering over 220fps vs 210fps using a 2080 Ti @ 1080p res gaming results....


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## jesdals (Jul 9, 2020)

Hmmm did I miss the part about Infinity settings - can this one do above 1900Mhz?


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## EarthDog (Jul 9, 2020)

Shatun_Bear said:


> Well yes, I dont mind if they cash in ten-fold actually. Because if you look at AMD's financials, they make about 1/20th of the profit Intel make a year. It's much better for the consumer if AMD are doing it than Intel for competition.
> 
> Also, Intel add a meaningless 100mhz on top of boost clocks and calls it an entire new gen (Comet Lake) so I hope you voiced your displeasure there too.
> 
> But I suspect you were the type hooting and hollering over 220fps vs 210fps using a 2080 Ti @ 1080p res gaming results....


Easy there, killer... that isn't me. Just pointing out the hypocrisy of some opinions. I didn't expect you to admit it and then try to justify it like that. Good stuff. Telling....


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## Agent_D (Aug 24, 2020)

The amount of voltage it took for you to get the OC on both the 3900X and XT is pretty insane, must've gotten really unlucky on the silicon lottery. My 3900X will do 4250MHz @ 1.275v with SMT off and 1.3v with SMT on, and I've seen many other with chips able to do the same; sucks to get so unlucky twice


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