AMDRyzen™ 9 9950X 16-Core, 32-Thread Unlocked Desktop Processor

I benchmarked the performacne of FPGA development tools for an AMD 9950X system against an Intel iCore9 13900K system. The relative performance was mixed.The tools tested were Xilinx Vivado, Atlera Quartus Pro, Siemans Questa and a tool of my own, HDLmaker. Both systems were running Ubuntu 22.04. The Intel system was using the standard Ubuntu kernel, the AMD system was using the mainline Ubuntu kernel. The standard Ubuntu kernel lacks Ethernet drivers for the AMD board, the mainline kernel fully supports it.The Intel iCore9 13900K is faster for Vivado and Quartus Pro, The AMD 9950X is faster for Questa and HDLmaker.EnterpriseAMD Ryzen™ 9 9950X 16-Core, 32-Thread128G CORSAIR VENGEANCE DDR5 64GB (2x32GB) DDR5 6000MHzGIGABYTE X870 AORUS Elite WIFI7 AMD AM5 LGA 1718 MotherboardSAMSUNG 990 EVO Plus SSD 4TB, PCIe Gen 4x4 | Gen 5x2 M.2 2280Ubuntu 24.04Kernal 6.14.0-061400-genericYorktownIntel Core i9-13900K - Core i9 13th Gen Raptor Lake 24-Core128G CORSAIR Vengeance 64GB (2 x 32GB) 288-Pin PC RAM DDR5 5600 (PC5 44800)GIGABYTE Z790 AORUS ELITE AX LGA 1700 Intel Z790 ATX Motherboard with DDR5Crucial P3 4TB PCIe 3.0 3D NAND NVMe M.2 SSDUbuntu 22.04Kernal 6.8.0-52-genericVivado: 1Enterprise: synth_design: Time (s): cpu = 00:36:12 ; elapsed = 00:35:42 . Memory (MB): peak = 26506.137 ; gain = 23587.469 ; free physical = 81568 ; free virtual = 447284Enterprise: route_design: Time (s): cpu = 01:39:32 ; elapsed = 00:50:47 . Memory (MB): peak = 17087.441 ; gain = 1562.531 ; free physical = 77223 ; free virtual = 443027Yorktown: synth_design: Time (s): cpu = 00:32:39 ; elapsed = 00:32:12 . Memory (MB): peak = 26503.715 ; gain = 23592.078 ; free physical = 25669 ; free virtual = 109780Yorktown: route_design: Time (s): cpu = 01:43:56 ; elapsed = 00:50:48 . Memory (MB): peak = 17180.012 ; gain = 1554.500 ; free physical = 21966 ; free virtual = 105577Vivado: 2Enterprise: synth_design: Time (s): cpu = 00:19:07 ; elapsed = 00:19:01 . Memory (MB): peak = 13239.812 ; gain = 10322.176 ; free physical = 97811 ; free virtual = 446595Enterprise: route_design: Time (s): cpu = 01:21:12 ; elapsed = 00:38:40 . Memory (MB): peak = 19368.762 ; gain = 0.000 ; free physical = 89228 ; free virtual = 437844Yorktown: synth_design: Time (s): cpu = 00:18:10 ; elapsed = 00:18:06 . Memory (MB): peak = 13231.773 ; gain = 10319.141 ; free physical = 19164 ; free virtual = 108350Yorktown: route_design: Time (s): cpu = 01:19:05 ; elapsed = 00:32:39 . Memory (MB): peak = 19666.379 ; gain = 0.000 ; free physical = 10503 ; free virtual = 99516Vivado: 3Enterprise: synth_design: Time (s): cpu = 00:22:29 ; elapsed = 00:22:23 . Memory (MB): peak = 13740.703 ; gain = 10819.066 ; free physical = 101952 ; free virtual = 447429Enterprise: route_design: Time (s): cpu = 01:45:11 ; elapsed = 00:54:54 . Memory (MB): peak = 19997.387 ; gain = 0.000 ; free physical = 93311 ; free virtual = 438528Yorktown: synth_design: Time (s): cpu = 00:21:39 ; elapsed = 00:21:38 . Memory (MB): peak = 13243.625 ; gain = 10321.988 ; free physical = 15590 ; free virtual = 107900Yorktown: route_design: Time (s): cpu = 01:36:03 ; elapsed = 00:43:00 . Memory (MB): peak = 20184.555 ; gain = 0.000 ; free physical = 7075 ; free virtual = 99039Questa:Enterprise: 57.441u 5.322s 1:04.50Yorktown: 69.688u 8.815s 1:18.79Quartus_pro:Enterprise: Elapsed time: 00:26:08Yorktown: Elapsed time: 00:25:54HDLmaker:Enterprise: 66.094u 12.343s 1:19.03Yorktown: 72.277u 16.625s 1:29.01

This chip is an absolute beast! I bought this for my new gaming build, and it can easily handle anything you throw at it. With the right voltage optimization and cooling, it can run pretty cool as well.I considered getting the 9900X before getting this, but I’m glad I got the extra 4 cores. The 32 threads means I can play pretty much any game I want without having to worry about the CPU being the bottleneck, and I can run VMs and still have CPU resources to spare.AMD has really outdone themselves with this chip, and I couldn’t be more satisfied with it! The price might seem high, but it’s worth every cent.

Thrilled with the performance. I do light gaming and some productivity but I've always gotten Ryzen 5 level chips. Decided I wanted to lean more into the workstation side of things a bit.This thing is a beast. Im an Astrophotographer and having a ton of threads is very nice for processing hours of data in short time.Also realized a lot of the games I play are a lot better in performance with 32 threads instead of 12. I play a lot of simulation / city builder games not so much super fast paced high FPS titles. City skylines 2 for example I can run full simulation speed now in a large city. With my 5600X I couldn't run more than 1x speed with a town of 300,000 or more.It does run hot. If you test in cinebench, expect the temps to top out at 95C with multi core tests. This is with a 240aio and fans at 100%. I'm lead to believe this happens even with 360mm rads.It was pulling 220w of power during the test, what do you expect. In gaming it hung out around 65-75 pretty nicely though.

Very fast processor! The fastest I have ever had. I would recommend a better cooling system then a fan, as the processor does seem to run up sometimes during game play. I do have a very good cooling system but I should upgrade it in the short term soon. I have currently 64GB of RAM and do some really heavy gaming. The processor is very stable I haven't had any problems at all with stability, problems, and I program many applications as well. Visual Studio C#, HTML, SQL Server, and I use all Adobe products. My motherboard is a Rog strix B650E-F Gaming Wifi. The memory capacity is 128GB on this motherboard.

I had the unfortunate experience of having to buy this processor twice - the first time I ordered it, I got a box that had clearly been opened previously, taped up and I found inside a $87 Ryzen 5 5500. I immediately returned and reordered, seller made great on the return and I was refunded so I'm happy about that. Second one came and went on a MSI X870 Tomahawk board. Clamped it into place, put my waterblock on it and fired it up. I'm coming from a Ryzen 7 5700X on a MSI 470X and the 9950 is well over double upon testing. I have not tried gaming on it yet but as far as my productivity with work, things are going so much faster for me. I have read plenty of reviews that say this is mediocre and not the best for gaming but so far I have no complaints at all. I hope to not have to replace it again for another 3-5 years.

Amazon sent me a USED open box CPU with scuff marks on it when I ordered this brand new! They accepted the immediate return and sent me a new one on the second attempt. I would give them a pass for this, but they also send me a used and scuffed up CPU cooler the day before which I also replaced. Don't be junk peddlers with expensive electronics please. It would be 5 stars if not for that.Other than those hiccups, it's a great processor so far. It does give off quite a bit of heat under load, so of you aren't in an area with good ventilation you might want to use one of the ECO modes. Make sure your motherboard has settings for both the 65W and 105W ECO modes if heat or power are a concern.Also if you aren't using the integrated GPU, disable it in BIOS because the AMD software reports it using 30W or more when idle, not hooked up to display output and not in use at all.