Test Notes
We list the test system particulars at the bottom of the page. All Ryzen entries with "PBO" indicate an auto-overclocked configuration with DDR4-3600 memory. Intel's overclocked configurations also use DDR4-3600.
It's notable that widely-available motherboard firmwares enable the Ryzen 9 3900, but they aren't tuned specifically for the processor. OEMs will likely add further system-specific tuning for their respective platforms, but these results represent a good measure of expected performance.
VRMark and 3DMark
The 3DMark DX11 and DX12 tests indicate the amount of raw horsepower exposed to game engines, but most game engines don't scale as linearly with additional compute resources.
The Ryzen 9 3900 impresses at stock settings with more performance than the Ryzen 7 3700X, but within a similar power envelope. Uncorking the power limits via the PBO feature exposes performance that is comparable to the 3900X, and even outstrips its counterpart in the DX11 tests. Again, we do expect some differences in performance between the two, as silicon quality varies. AMD's processors also feature a mix of fast and slow cores, with the frequency range of the slower cores being undefined. That means we could see greater variation between samples than we're accustomed to.
The same trend plays out with the VRMark test sequence, though Intel's chips leverage their per-core performance (a mixture of frequency and IPC throughput) advantage to take a commanding lead.
Civilization VI AI and Stockfish
Civilization VI prizes per-core performance, so it isn't surprising to see the Intel chips take the lead in this test of AI engine performance in a turn-based strategy game. We can also see that the engine doesn't scale as well with AMD's architecture, as the 105W 3900X provides a slim advantage over the stock 3900 at 65W. Performance between the two chips is similar after tuning.
Stockfish, an open-source chess engine, is designed to extract the utmost performance from many-core chips by scaling well up to 512 cores. That scalability plays well to AMD's threaded heft and allows the Ryzen 9 3900X to deliver more performance than the 3900 due to its higher power envelope. The stock Ryzen 9 3900 once again proves impressive compared to the stock Ryzen 7 3700X.
Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation
Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation finds the stock Ryzen 9 3900X with a slight lead over the 3900, and it retains that slight lead after tuning. The Ryzen 7 3700X beats both 39xx models at stock settings, though the 3900X pulls slightly ahead after overclcoking.
Civilization VI Graphics Test
The tuned 3900 achieves parity with the 3900X, but the benchmark slightly favors the 3900X at stock settings. It's important to remember that these deltas would shrink appreciably with higher resolutions.
Dawn of War III
The Warhammer 40,000 benchmark responds well to threading, but it's clear that Intel's clock speed advantage has an impact.
Far Cry 5
The Ryzen 9 3900 takes a 0.3 fps lead at stock settings over the 3900X in the Far Cry 5 benchmark, but this is essentially a tie. After tuning, the two tie again.
Final Fantasy XV
We run this test with the standard quality preset to sidestep the impact of a bug that causes the game engine to render off-screen objects with the higher-resolution setting.
Here we see the Ryzen 9 3900 trail the 3900X at stock settings, but it notches a slight win over the 3900X after tuning.
Grand Theft Auto V
Grand Theft Auto V continues to be popular six long years after its release. This title favors Intel architectures and, more generally, multi-core designs with high clock rates. The Ryzen 9 3900X offers more performance at both stock and overclocked settings than the 3900, proving there are some cases where the more expensive model offers a performance advantage.
Hitman 2
The same trend emerges during the Hitman 2 benchmark, but it's important to remember that these performance deltas are slim.
Project Cars 2
Although Project CARS 2 is purportedly optimized for threading, clock rates obviously affect this title's frame rates. Intel's per-core performance advantage pays big dividends in this title and the -9900K and -9700K take a commanding lead over the Ryzen competition, particularly after tuning.
World of Tanks enCore
The World of Tanks benchmark doesn't hold any surprises, with performance trending within our expectations.
Test Setup
| AMD Socket AM4 (X570) | AMD Ryzen 9 3900 and 3900X, Ryzen 7 3700X |
| MSI MEG X570 Godlike | |
| 2x 8GB G.Skill Flare DDR4-3200 | |
| Row 3 - Cell 0 | 2x 8GB G.Skill FlareX DDR4-3200 - Stock: DDR4-3200, OC: DDR4-3600 |
| Intel LGA 1151 (Z390) | Intel Core i9-9900K, i7-9900K |
| MSI MEG Z390 Godlike | |
| 2x 8GB G.Skill FlareX DDR4-3200 - Stock: DDR4-2666, OC: DDR4-3600 | |
| All Systems | Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 Ti |
| 2TB Intel DC4510 SSD | |
| EVGA Supernova 1600 T2, 1600W | |
| Windows 10 Pro (1903 - All Updates) | |
| Cooling | Corsair H115i |
CONTENT
1: Cramming 12 Cores & 24 Threads into a 65W TDP
2: AMD Ryzen 9 3900 Gaming
3: AMD Ryzen 9 3900 Application Testing
4: Conclusion
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