Motherboard vendor Biostar has added support for the unannounced AMD Ryzen 9 3900 and AMD Ryzen 9 Pro 3900 processors for its X470NH motherboard, revealing some specs along the way.
The Ryzen 9 3900 and Ryzen 9 Pro 3900 made their first appearance in an Eurasian Economic Commission (EEC) listing back in July. Today, Biostar has shed some light on the processors' specifications. As with any third-generation Ryzen chips, the Ryzen 9 3900 and Ryzen 9 Pro 3900 utilize AMD's advanced Zen 2 microarchitecture and are built on TSMC's 7nm FinFET process node.
Specs
| Row 0 - Cell 0 | SEP (USD) | Cores / Threads | TDP | Base Frequency | Boost Frequency | Total Cache | PCIe 4.0 Lanes (Processor / Chipset) |
| AMD Ryzen 9 3900X | $499 | 12 / 24 | 105W | 3.8 GHz | 4.6 GHz | 70MB | 24 / 16 |
| AMD Ryzen 9 3900* | ? | 12 / 24 | 65W | 3.1 GHz | 4.2 GHz - 4.3 GHz | 70MB | 24 / 16 |
| AMD Ryzen 9 Pro 3900* | ? | 12 / 24 | 65W | 3.1 GHz | 4.2 GHz - 4.3 GHz | 70MB | 24 / 16 |
*Specifications are not confirmed
The Ryzen 9 3900 and Ryzen 9 Pro 3900 look like they're essentially more power-efficient variants of the original AMD Ryzen 9 3900X. The "Pro" variant comes with enhanced enterprise and security features. Both Matisse chips are expected to wield 12 cores, 24 threads and 70MB of total cache. However, the Ryzen 9 3900 and Ryzen 9 Pro 3900 will compete in the 65W TDP (thermal design power) category against the Intel Core i9-9900. Obviously, the lower TDP envelope will have repercussions on the processors' operating clock speeds.
As per Biostar's information, the Ryzen 9 3900 and Ryzen 9 Pro 3900 sport a 3.1 GHz base clock, which is 700 MHz or 22.58% slower than the Ryzen 9 3900X. The motherboard manufacturer didn't list the processors' boost clocks. However, a well-known hardware leaker known on Twitter as TUM_APISAK seems to think that the boost clock for the Matisse parts can be 4.3 GHz. So we're looking at a 9.52% lower boost clock in a worst-case situation.
It's unknown when AMD will launch the Ryzen 9 3900 and Ryzen 9 Pro 3900. The chipmaker is probably busy building up stock for the Ryzen 9 3950X, which has been pushed to November, and preparing the Ryzen Threadripper 3000-series release. On top of that, TSMC is reportedly in a bit of a pickle. The foundry's 7nm business has been booming lately, and high demand has increased the lead time from 2 months to 6 months. This could have an impact on AMD's CPU production.
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Zhiye Liu is a news editor, memory reviewer, and SSD tester at Tom’s Hardware. Although he loves everything that’s hardware, he has a soft spot for CPUs, GPUs, and RAM.
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salgado18 Thanks to Zen 2's auto-tunning, all you lose compared to the X is 300 MHz maximum clocks. The base clock is the 65W minimum, but given enough motherboard power and cooling, it will work as close to the turbo clocks as possible.Reply
Depending on price, it could be an amazing value.