AMD Zen 4 Ryzen 9 7950X and Ryzen 5 7600X Review: Retaking The High-End
by Ryan Smith & Gavin Bonshor on September 26, 2022 9:00 AM ESTTest Bed and Setup
As per our processor testing policy, we take a premium category motherboard suitable for the socket, and equip the system with a suitable amount of memory running at the manufacturer's maximum supported frequency. This is also typically run at JEDEC subtimings where possible. It is noted that some users are not keen on this policy, stating that sometimes the maximum supported frequency is quite low, or faster memory is available at a similar price, or that the JEDEC speeds can be prohibitive for performance.
While these comments make sense, ultimately very few users apply memory profiles (either XMP or other) as they require interaction with the BIOS, and most users will fall back on JEDEC-supported speeds - this includes home users as well as industry who might want to shave off a cent or two from the cost or stay within the margins set by the manufacturer. Where possible, we will extend out testing to include faster memory modules either at the same time as the review or a later date.
The Current CPU Test Suite
For our AMD Ryzen 9 7950X and Ryzen 5 7600X testing, we are using the following test system:
AMD Ryzen 7000 Series System (DDR5) | |
CPU | Ryzen 9 7950X ($699) 16 Cores, 32 Threads 170 W TDP Ryzen 5 7600X ($299) 6 Cores, 12 Threads 105 W TDP |
Motherboard | GIGABYTE X670E Aorus Master (BIOS 813b) |
Memory | G.Skill Trident Z5 Neo 2x16 GB DDR5-5200 CL44 |
Cooling | EK-AIO Elite 360 D-RGB 360 mm AIO |
Storage | Crucial MX300 1TB |
Power Supply | Corsair HX850 |
GPUs | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Ti, Driver 496.49 |
Operating Systems | Windows 11 21H1 |
As we are in a transitional period between our current CPU 2021 suite and data, and optimizing our CPU 2023 suite with different data comparisons required, we have included a varied selection of benchmarks for this review. This ranges from our traditional un-updatable Google Octane 2.0 web test, through a variety of rendering benchmarks such as CineBench R23 and Blender, to encoding, and all the way to our more scientific-related tests.
With our processor reviews, especially on a new generational product such as AMD's Ryzen 9 7950X, we also include SPEC2017 data to account for any increases (or decreases) to generational single-threaded and multi-threaded performance. It should be noted that due to the terms of the SPEC license because our benchmark results are not vetted directly by the SPEC consortium, we have to label them as ‘estimated’. The benchmark is still run and we get results out, but those results have to have the ‘estimated’ label.
Moving Foward to Our CPU 2023 Suite: What to Expect
Looking ahead to our updated CPU 2023 suite, we've updated some of our existing benchmarks to the latest and current versions (as of Sept 22) such as Blender 3.3. In terms of benchmarks from our CPU 2021 suite, we've included benchmarks such as Dwarf Fortress, Factorio, and Dr. Ian Cutress's 3DPMv2 and Crysis CPU benchmarks.
We've also added some completely new benchmarks and workloads to our suite, including an update to Blender (v3.3), C-Ray 1.1 rendering, as well as more scientific-based workloads such as SciMark 2.0 and Primesieve 1.9.0. We have also decided to add UL's latest Procyon suite which measures overall system performance when doing tasks such as office-based tasks, as well as video, and photo editing.
As it stands, we have also updated our pool of games going forward into 2023 and beyond, including the latest F1 2022 racing game, the CPU-intensive Total War Warhammer 3 real-time strategy, and the popular Hitman 3 assassin-based title.
Our aim is to provide varying levels of data points across a variety of different workloads, instruction sets, and tasks. Going forward, we will keep our CPU 2023 suite updated as frequently as possible, and when we have a consistent and suitable number of data points, it will feature on our Bench database as we continue testing new and older CPUs for varying data points.
Some of these new benchmarks will make an appearance in this review, while others won't. Our aim is to assess and subjugate our way through whatever CPUs we have on hand to add vital data points. However, some parts of our CPU 2023 suite are still under testing and it should make a full debut in our next CPU review.
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tuxRoller - Monday, September 26, 2022 - link
When does an explanation become an excuse? ReplyUltraTech79 - Friday, September 30, 2022 - link
Well rehire them or youre going to see a real quality loss. Is it really worth it in the longrun? ReplyRyan Smith - Friday, September 30, 2022 - link
"Is it really worth it in the longrun?"That's a question for the people that pay the bills. It's not my call. Reply
Iketh - Saturday, October 1, 2022 - link
I will professionally edit for next to nothing just because I love this site. Email me iketh28@yahoo.com ReplyScottSoapbox - Tuesday, October 4, 2022 - link
Grammarly is a cheap replacement that will catch the worst of it. ReplySivar - Monday, September 26, 2022 - link
I agree that the paragraph was in need of some work, but "thinkos" happen, esp. with an article of this depth. I like that you reported it, but I wonder if it could have been worded differently. Imagine spending days aggressively writing a detailed analysis, only to have one's writing compared to a stroke victim because of a tiny percent of the article. ReplyJasonovich - Sunday, October 9, 2022 - link
Grammar fascism is distracting from the main body of the article. It's like the cream from your glass of Guinness pouring on to your fingers, no big deal just lick it off. The integrity of the article is intact and I'm sure the message was received loud and clear from Anandtech's spoof readers.Anyway many thanks for the excellent article, other sites don't try half as hard as the folks from Anandtech. Reply
philehidiot - Wednesday, September 28, 2022 - link
This sentence seems perfectly cromulent. I think the point purvulates nicely and is quite unfornitabulated. Replygryer7421 - Monday, September 26, 2022 - link
Hi, thanks for the article. In the future .. please start posting HIGHEST all-die TEMPS hit during each benchmark..It would be help to know and see the temps for building workstations given that INTEL and AMD both just uncorked the genie by not caring about temps anymore and only caring about ''top cou speed'' at ant (thermal) cost. Reply
Gavin Bonshor - Monday, September 26, 2022 - link
With Zen 4, the highest all-die temp is essentially 95°C, due to the way Precision Boost Overdrive works. The idea is that it will use all over the available power/thermal headroom, so those with better CPU cooling, should technically benefit more. Reply