Whether you're a student submitting homework, at work typing away at documents, spreadsheets, or presentations, or you're just someone who wants to access resources online and connect with family and friends, you want a laptop with the components and features you'll need to get the job done. That means a great screen, a comfortable keyboard, and long battery life (and nice design doesn't hurt, either!).

The laptop space is more competitive than ever. Windows machines come from many companies using silicon from three major CPU vendors: Intel, AMD, and Qualcomm. Apple, meanwhile, has a range of powerful and portable systems based on its own Apple Silicon.

In 2026, Intel's most recent chips are its Intel Core Ultra (Series 3) chips, code-named Panther Lake, while AMD launched its "Gorgon Point" Ryzen AI processors at CES. At Computex, Nvidia announced that its RTX Spark chips will launch in laptops from Microsoft, Dell, Lenovo, HP, and more starting in the fall, taking on Qualcomm in the Windows on Arm space. Earlier this year, Qualcomm released its Snapdragon X2 Elite Xtreme, Elite, and Plus chips.

On Macs, Apple's top chips are the M5 series, including the M5 Pro and M5 Max, which can be found in the MacBook Pro and MacBook Air lineup.

Best Laptops You Can Buy Today

The Best Laptop (and Mac) overall

The MacBook Air has been a go-to laptop recommendation for quite some time, thanks to strong performance, a fanless design, excellent built quality, and long-lasting battery life. With the version of the chip with M5, you get the benefits of years of hardware revisions since the Air's last redesign with M2, including a minimum 16GB of RAM and a 12-megapixel webcam.

The M5 chip in the MacBook Air showed off excellent single and multi-core performance. In fact, it;s closest rival was the same chip in the MacBook Pro, which gets a boost because of an active fan.

That being said, the system can throttle under heavy workloads like rendering. But for most people's typical tasks, including writing, editing, making spreadsheets, editing photos, listening to music, programming, and general multitasking, you'll have a very powerful machine.

Apple has boosted the base MacBook Air's price to $1,099, but it now starts with 512GB of memory. Given the price of components these days, the laptop is still a great value. If you want a Mac but don't want to spend that much for it, you could take a step down to the entry-level MacBook Neo, starting at $599, as long as you're willing to sacrifice on power, memory, ports, and a backlit keyboard.

Read: MacBook Air (M5) review

Best Windows laptop

The Dell XPS 14 is back, and while you might expect its performance or design to be the headlining feature, it's the battery life that wows. With its base 1920 x 1200 LCD display, which has a variable refresh rate that goes all the way down to 1 Hz, it lasted 20 hours and 41 minutes on our battery test.

That's not to say the battery life is all there is to like about this laptop. The 3-pound chassis is sleek, and Dell added a function row back to the keyboard, making it way easier to use over the touch bar of yesteryear.

If you're OK with 12 hours of charge, more expensive models with a tandem OLED display have way better colors and more powerful Arc B390 integrated graphics.

That being said, both of them have a low-travel keyboard without space between the keys, which definitely tripped up my fingers, so you'll need time to get your muscle memory going. And the starting price, at $1,600, is a lot to ask but is unfortunately common as the memory crisis rages on.

Read: Dell XPS 14 (2026) review

Best ultralight laptop

Some of the best laptops are barely noticeable in your bag. The Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition, at 2.15 pounds is extremely light.

Still, despite the weight, you get plenty of other benefits. The speakers are surprisingly good for a laptop of this size. Perhaps most impressively, the system ran for 16 hours and 38 minutes on our battery test, outlasting many of the laptops we bit against it by multiple hours.

The system also offers a lovely display. The POLED touchscreen measured 476 nits of brightness while falling in similar gamut ranges as other OLED notebooks that weren't as luminous.

There are some downsides. There are limited ports outside of Thunderbolt 4/USB-C, including a lack of a headphone jack. And CPU performance fell behind some competitors, like Apple's M5 MacBook Air and a thicker AMD-based 2-in-1 from HP.Still, the laptop impressed for its airiness and multimedia strengths. And as tested with 32GB at $1,519, it's not a crazy price as the costs of many laptops skyrocket during an ongoing component shortage.

Read: Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition review

Another great Windows clamshell

We can argue about how much the AI PC is really any sort of revolution, but there are still some strong ultraportables coming out. The HP OmniBook Ultra puts the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 375 in a sleek chassis with strong productivity performance.

HP is offering up decent battery life here, running for 12 hours and 52 minutes on our battery test. That's not the best, but all things considered including the high-resolution display, it's not bad. It's also nice to see Thunderbolt 4 ports on an AMD system, which is exceedingly rare.

The experience is knocked down a bit by a significant amount of bloatware, but if you're looking for a strong AMD laptop, the HP OmniBook Ultra is a strong competitor if you don't mind doing some uninstalling.

Read: HP OmniBook Ultra review

The best budget laptop

If you're looking for an affordable laptop, Apple does it best these days. The MacBook Neo starts at $599 ($499 with an education discount), but you rarely feel like you're not getting enough – unlike most Windows laptops in this price range. The Neo has a premium, all-metal chassis, a bright, vivid screen, and a custom mechanical trackpad that lets you click anywhere. And yes, you get all of macOS running on what was formerly an iPhone chip.

The quality of the 13-inch chassis and screen are key here. You're not getting something plastic. You're not getting something low-resolution, and you're not getting something dim. You also get a great webcam for this price range, and the system stays remarkably cool. There are some niceties you sacrifice, however. Apple has gone without a backlit keyboard. And the two USB ports aren't labeled, so you'll have to remember which is the faster 10 Gbps USB 3 port (the back one) for backup drives and monitors, lest you end up with an error message.

I suspect that most people with light workloads — especially students and people using home computers doing a lot of work in the browser — won't have too much trouble with the 8GB of RAM. That being said, 16GB systems can be found in the Windows world for a bit more money, though you'll need to hunt for sales.

But if a premium laptop experience (including great build quality and a high-res screen) are important to you, Apple delivers that better than any Windows machine priced close to the Neo’s $599 starting price.

Read: MacBook Neo review

The Best Laptop for work

There are plenty of reasons why the ThinkPad X1 Carbon is a classic. It's thin design and strong build quality are beloved by ThinkPad diehards. The latest model, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon (Gen 11), offers long battery life and great speakers.

Perhaps most critically, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon offers an excellent keyboard. Lenovo's reputation was built on great typing experiences, so this is crucial. For those who love Lenovo's TrackPoint, it's still here, allowing you to move the mouse without ever taking your fingers away from the home row on the keyboard.

The latest version comes with Intel's 13th Gen Core processors. We reviewed it with a Core i7-1355U, 16GB of RAM and a 512GB PCIe Gen 4 SSD.

The one real issue we had is that the base screen could benefit from being a bit brighter. Those who want the most vivid experience can opt for an OLED panel, but at a higher price.

When shopping for the ThinkPad X1 Carbon (Gen 11), keep an eye out for Lenovo's frequent sales, as there's often a deal available.

Read: Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon (Gen 11) Review

The Best Windows Tablet

Microsoft may push the Surface Pro as a do-it-all AI machine, but the truth is it's just a really nice, portable, slim PC that lasts a long time on a battery and includes a beautiful OLED display. It's definitively one of the best Surfaces to date.

The Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite processors offer enough performance to keep up with x86 competitors, making this one of the first Arm-based Surfaces that doesn't feel like it's lacking. Add on more Arm-compatible apps than ever, including the Chrome browser, and there's far less to miss from previous Intel models. That's not to say it's perfect — there are still some gaming issues, as well as drivers for specialized peripherals that may need to be rebuilt for the new platform.

The 45 TOPS NPU powers some of Windows 11's Copilot+ features, like Cocreator, Live Captions, and Windows Studio effects. None of these are showstoppers, but they're cool tricks.'

If you want a premium tablet running Windows 11, the Surface Pro is one of the only premium games in town. And that means paying a premium for a separate keyboard. But for those who love this form factor, the Surface Pro remains the best option out there.

Read: Microsoft Surface Pro review

A more powerful Mac laptop

The MacBook Air is a great starting point, but if you want an air-cooled processor and a few more features, the base MacBook Pro adds a few niceties. The 14-inch MacBook Pro starts with an M5 processor, has three Thunderbolt ports (including one on the right side), and a beautiful micro LED display.

For those willing to spend an extra $150, there's a nano-texture display option that is completely worth it if you ever use your laptop outside. The matte display looks excellent, and was great on desks near windows.

If you need the most power possible, we also reviewed the MacBook Pro with an M5 Max, including a 40-core GPU, a mix of Apple's latest performance and super cores, and a blazing fast SSD.

Both the 14-inch and 16-inch laptops offer great speakers and beautiful displays, but you will have to pay quite a bit for any storage or memory upgrades you want, and you won't be able to make changes later.

Read: MacBook Pro (14-inch, M5) review
Read: MacBook Pro (14-inch, M5 Max) review

The Best Gaming laptop

Razer Blade 18 offers some of the strongest gaming performance we've seen in a laptop, but also features excellent design, comfortable features, and the latest connection standards. At $5,199.99 as tested, it sure should be good. It tops our list of the best gaming laptops.

The major highlight is the dual-mode display, which has two options: 3840 x 2400 at 240 Hz or 1920 x 1200 at 440 Hz. Those two choices (which you can switch between in Razer Synapse) is enough to showcase both intensive, graphics-driven games at high settings and esports where frames are more important than resolution and detail.

The laptop, packed with an Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX and Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 Laptop GPU in our review configuration, outperformed the field in our gaming tests, especially at the lower resolution.Razer is one of the few laptop makers using Thunderbolt 5 ports (we've also seen them from MSI and Apple), so this system is ready to go if you're using advanced peripherals or the fastest external storage drives.

Perhaps the biggest downside is that the Blade's dual 2TB storage drives use PCIe 4.0 rather than 5.0. You won’t notice this in games or mainstream productivity, but if you want PCIe 5.0 speed for future proofing or 8K video editing, the Titan may still be the way to go. The Blade 18 does support PCIe 5.0 drives, if you want to upgrade to speedier storage in the future.

Read: Razer Blade 18 review

Other Laptops We Tested

💻 Asus Zenbook A16

The Zenbook A16 has Qualcomm's powerful Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme processor, including 48GB of RAM on the package. While the chip is fast, the laptop, while lightweight, didn't meet our expectations. While light, it flexed and didn't feel premium; battery life was lesser than competitors; and while emulation is better than it used to be, there are still some compatibility issues with Windows on Arm for power users.

Read: Asus Zenbook A16 review

💻 Samsung Galaxy Book6 Ultra

Samsung's Galaxy Book6 Ultra is a powerful system for creatives, thanks in part to the RTX 5070 GPU in the version we tested. The OLED screen is beautiful and you get an nice design (albeit one that is quite similar to Macs), but this laptop is pricey, and you get a shallow keyboard.

Read: Samsung Galaxy Book6 Ultra review

Quick Laptop Shopping Tips 

Finding Discounts on the Best Laptops

Whether you're shopping for one of the best laptops, or just something that is good enough for your needs, you may find savings by checking out our lists of the latest Dell coupon codes, HP coupon codes, Lenovo coupon codes, Best Buy promo codes or Newegg promo codes.

Following retailer listings popping up over the weekend, AMD has made the price of its upcoming Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 official. The CPU has a suggested retail price of $899, AMD's David McAfee announced today on X. That's $200 more than the Ryzen 9 9950X3D released at, and around $230 more than what that chip is selling for now. The Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 is set to arrive at retailers on April 22, and it will slot into existing motherboards with the AM5 socket.

This is AMD's first dual-cache X3D CPU, where it uses its 3D V-Cache packaging on both eight-core CCDs. Previous chips like the Ryzen 9 9950X3D only feature stacked cache on a single CCD, mainly to keep gaming performance in check, as inter-CCD communication can cause big spikes in latency.

Although X3D chips like the Ryzen 7 9850X3D are the best CPUs for gaming thanks to their chart-topping frame rates, AMD is billing the Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 as a workstation-level chip that is "built for developers and content creators tackling complex workloads and massive datasets." To that end, AMD hasn't shared gaming benchmarks for the Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 yet, instead focusing on application performance.

You can see the early results in the chart above, where AMD claims up to a 13% improvement in data science workloads via SPECWorkstation 4, and about a 5% to 8% jump in other applications. Although we don't have gaming numbers yet, there's a good chance we won't see a significant uplift. Crossing the CCDs is already an issue AMD has had to deal with when it comes to the Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Ryzen 9 9900X3D, so we don't expect much on the gaming front.

It won't be long until we know for sure where the Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 lands. The chip is set to hit retailers on April 22, and our test benches are already running at full tilt to see where it ranks among our CPU benchmark hierarchy.

In late October, AMD's mid-cycle Zen 5 refresh leaked, giving us a glimpse at two new X3D CPUs the company has in store for CES 2026. One of those was the Ryzen 7 9850X3D, a higher-boosting version of the existing 9800X3D, and which has been featured in several leaks over the past few weeks. The other chip was a lot more mysterious: a supposed dual-cache Ryzen 9 9950X3D2, but updates on it went radio silent ever since — today, it has finally reappeared on both PassMark and Geekbench.

In PassMark, the 9950X3D2 achieved a multi-score rating of 71,585 and a single-core rating of 4,716. Both of those numbers are within the margin of error of the 9950X and 9950X3D, but a bit far from the highest-scoring CPUs on the database. Keep in mind that PassMark listings can be fabricated, so take all this with a heavy grain of salt.

The 9950X3D2 is reported to carry a whopping 192 MB of total L3 cache, which PassMark confirms, achieved by stacking it across both CCDs. It features the same 16-core, 32-thread layout as the 9950X and 9950X3D, but instead of 3D V-Cache on just one chiplet, it's present underneath both. This doubles the otherwise 96 MB L3 cache (32 MB L3 + 64 MB X3D) to 192 MB.

This would be the first time the chipmaker has achieved such a feat, rounding out an impressive generation as Zen 5 already made a massive leap by fully unlocking these SKUs. That was made possible by putting the extra 3D V-Cache under the CCD instead of on top, allowing for better thermal and power efficiency. Now, doubling that cache can lead to even more (albeit slight) gains in gaming workloads.

The second leak comes courtesy of Geekbench, where it appeared on socketed on a Galax B850M motherboard, paired with 96 GB of DDR5 memory. This listing confirms the boost clocks at 5.6 GHz, which aligns with the initial rumor. The 9950X3D2 scores 3,456 in the single-core test — the highest on Geekbench's processor benchmark database — while netting 21,062 points in the multi-core test, close to its namesake 16-core brethren.

Both the PassMark and Geekbench listings reiterate the core config, while the former mentions the 9950X3D2 as a 170W CPU, going against the 200W TDP that was being thrown around till now. AMD could've tweaked the final specs, or what's more likely is just the lack of samples and early nature of these runs has led to incorrect reporting.

These appearances suggest that either the CPUs have started to be shipped off to reviewers, or that motherboard vendors are testing these to configure the BIOS for launch.

This leak comes with CES 2026 right around the corner, where AMD could reveal new processors.

If you're looking for the fastest gaming chips on the market, AMD has no peer: In fact, the company's own Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs Ryzen 7 9800X3D is really the only competition that most hardcore gamers care about - Intel isn't a factor with its latest-gen chips due to lackluster performance on the gaming front.

At first glance, comparing the $470 AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D with the flagship $670 Ryzen 9 9950X3D might seem like an uneven match. After all, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D commands a $200 higher price point and boasts twice the number of cores, which naturally suggests superior performance.

However, this faceoff dives deeper than just raw numbers and sticker price. It explores how these two processors, both from AMD’s gaming-optimized Zen 5 X3D lineup, cater to different needs and whether the premium flagship truly justifies its cost in real-world scenarios.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D sits at the very top of AMD’s desktop CPU hierarchy, aimed at enthusiasts and professionals who demand the utmost in multi-threaded performance alongside gaming capabilities. It's the "no compromises" option, commanding a premium price befitting its halo status.

In contrast, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D offers a more focused approach, targeting gamers and mainstream users who seek exceptional gaming performance and efficiency without the complexity or cost of a higher-core-count processor.

Priced around $450 compared to the 9950X3D’s $700 tag, the 9800X3D challenges the notion that more cores and higher prices always translate to a better CPU. Forget assumptions, let's dissect where these two exceptional gaming processors truly excel and uncover which one deserves a place in your ultimate rig.

Features and Specifications: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

Both the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Ryzen 7 9800X3D represent the pinnacle of AMD's desktop processor engineering, built on the sophisticated Zen 5 architecture fabbed on TSMC's advanced 4nm manufacturing process. These processors share the same foundational architecture but differ significantly in their core configurations and target use cases.

The 9950X3D is a dual-CCD powerhouse featuring 16 cores and 32 threads, while the 9800X3D adopts a streamlined single-CCD design with 8 cores and 16 threads. This architectural divergence creates distinct performance profiles, with the 9950X3D targeting users requiring substantial multi-threaded performance alongside gaming excellence, whereas the 9800X3D focuses exclusively on delivering optimal gaming performance without the complexity of a multi-die design.

The 9950X3D's dual-CCD configuration incorporates two separate 8-core complexes, with only one CCD receiving the 3D V-Cache treatment. This asymmetric design results in 128MB of layered L3 cache, creating a complex but powerful architecture that requires sophisticated thread scheduling. Thankfully its automated through AMD's innovative driver.

In contrast, the 9800X3D's single-CCD design features a uniform 8-core complex with 96MB of total L3 cache, providing consistent performance characteristics across all cores and simplifying both hardware design and driver optimization.

Clock speed specifications reveal differences between these processors, with the 9950X3D operating at a 4.3GHz base clock with boost capabilities reaching 5.7GHz, representing the highest boost clock in the X3D lineup. The 9800X3D, conversely, features a 4.7GHz base clock with boost frequencies of 5.2GHz.

The second-gen 3D V-Cache tech represents a revolutionary architectural advancement that marks a big improvement over their predecessors. Unlike previous X3D generations, where the 3D V-Cache was positioned above the CCD, both processors feature the cache positioned below the CCD, enabling direct thermal contact between the cores and the integrated heat spreader.

This design transformation dramatically improves thermal characteristics, allowing both processors to achieve full overclocking capabilities (a first for X3D processors) while maintaining higher boost frequencies than their predecessors. The thermal improvements are particularly significant for the 9950X3D, which maintains its 170W TDP despite its larger cache capacity.

Platform support and connectivity specifications show AMD's commitment to the AM5 ecosystem. Both CPUs drop into the AM5 socket (LGA 1718) and are compatible with the full range of AM5 chipsets, including A620, B650, B650E, X670, X670E, X870, X870E, B840, and B850. Memory support extends to DDR5 with official specifications up to 5600 MT/s, though both processors can achieve higher speeds through AMD EXPO memory overclocking technology.

The processors provide 24 usable PCIe 5.0 lanes from the CPU, four native USB 3.2 Gen 2 ports, and comprehensive storage support including NVMe RAID configurations. Power consumption differs significantly, with the 9950X3D coming with a 170W TDP compared to the 9800X3D's 120W TDP, reflecting the increased thermal and power demands of the dual-CCD configuration.

⭐Winner: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Ryzen 7 9800X3D share a common Zen 5 foundation but diverge in their feature sets to serve distinct purposes. On paper alone, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D is more impressive due to its higher clocks and additional cores, thus taking this round.

Gaming Benchmarks and Performance: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

While our in-depth Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Ryzen 7 9800X3D reviews offer a more comprehensive analysis and our test system specs, in this section, we will focus on a gaming performance overview. The following benchmark graphs display average FPS and 1% lows for various games at 1080p. Using a high-end Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 graphics card ensures GPU limitations are removed, making this setup ideal for comparing pure CPU performance.

In our 16-game geometric mean at 1080p with High/Ultra settings, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D narrowly edges out the Ryzen 9 9950X3D with an average of 195.5 FPS versus 194.8 FPS, which is a negligible 0.4% difference. This parity stems from AMD’s 3D V-Cache technology, which minimizes latency in cache-sensitive titles.

However, the 9950X3D’s higher core count rarely translates to gaming gains, as most games prioritize cache and clock speeds over core quantity. For example, in A Plague Tale: Requiem, the 9800X3D leads by 5.9% on average, likely due to its optimized single-CCD design reducing inter-core latency.

On the flip side, the 9950X3D pulls ahead in 1% lows according to our testing, scoring 136 FPS in the geomean compared to the 9800X3D’s 134 FPS, gaining a minor 1.4% advantage. This reflects its superior multi-core capabilities, mitigating stutter during asset streaming or background tasks.

Moving on to individual results, the picture becomes even more nuanced and needs analysis on a case-by-case basis. In our testing, we typically see that cache-bound games favor the 9800X3D. Minecraft RT shows a 10.9% average FPS lead. In Starfield, the Ryzen 7 leads by 1.7% in average FPS.

On the contrary, heavily multi-threaded titles seem to lean toward the 9950X3D. In Baldur’s Gate 3, the Ryzen 9 leads by about 2.6%, exploiting its dual-CCD design to gain an advantage in this title.

The 9800X3D dominates efficiency, achieving 2.46 FPS/W versus the 9950X3D’s 1.61 FPS/W, which is a tremendous 52.8% improvement. It consumes just 79.4W under load according to our testing, while the 9950X3D draws 52% more power at 120.9W. This gap arises from the 9800X3D’s monolithic 8-core design, which avoids the power overhead of the 9950X3D’s dual-CCD configuration.

The 9800X3D also offers superior value for money, gaining a staggering 50% advantage in our FPS per dollar chart. Priced 33% lower, the Ryzen 7 achieves almost the same average FPS in our Geomean as the 9950X3D. Even in titles where the 9950X3D wins, like Far Cry 6, the 9800X3D’s cost efficiency remains unmatched. The 9950X3D does not justify its price premium in the gaming category when compared to its younger sibling.

⭐Winner: AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

Unless you are pairing gaming with heavy streaming or rendering, the 9800X3D’s cache-optimized design and aggressive pricing make it AMD’s gaming champion.

Ultimately, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D emerges as the smarter gaming investment. It matches the 9950X3D in average framerates while excelling in efficiency and value. The 9950X3D’s edge in 1% lows is nice, but it cannot be justified by its hefty price premium.

Productivity Performance: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

According to our benchmark results, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D demonstrates a substantial productivity advantage over the Ryzen 7 9800X3D across both single-threaded and multi-threaded workloads.

In the aggregated single-threaded geomean, the 9950X3D scores 258, while the 9800X3D trails at 243, leaving a 5.8% performance gap. For multi-threaded geomean, the disparity widens dramatically: the 9950X3D achieves 635 versus the 9800X3D’s 367, translating to a 42% delta. This underscores the 9950X3D’s superior power budget and higher core count.

The 9950X3D’s 16-core design obliterates the 9800X3D’s 8-core setup in heavily parallelized tasks. Cinebench 2024 multi-core reveals a massive 43% performance delta; meanwhile, the POV-Ray multi-core test exacerbates this further as the 9950X3D scores a whopping 69% higher than the 9800X3D.

Real-world encoding tests like HandBrake x265 further validate this trend, with the 9950X3D achieving a 63% leap over the 9800X3D. This makes the 9950X3D a powerhouse for video rendering, 3D compilation, or scientific simulations where core scalability is paramount.

In tasks reliant on single-core speed, the 9950X3D also maintains a consistent lead, even though the gap narrows significantly. Cinebench 2024 single-core shows a 4.7% advantage, and the gap expands in POV-Ray single-core, where the 9950X3D has a 7.6% higher score than its younger sibling.

Even in lighter workloads like WebXPRT4 (browser-based tasks), the 9950X3D maintains a modest but notable 4.4% edge. The narrower gap confirms that browser-based tasks are less core-dependent, favoring cache/clock speed, yet the 9950X3D still leads. These modest gains reflect the close architectural similarities between the two CPUs in tasks that don’t necessarily scale with core count.

The 9950X3D’s dual-CCD layout (one with 3D V-Cache, one with higher clocks) optimizes it for hybrid productivity: cache-sensitive tasks leverage the stacked die, while all-core workloads engage both CCDs. The 9800X3D’s single-CCD design restricts it in lighter multi-threaded tasks despite its cache advantage.

Putting it all together, for productivity alone, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D is decisively superior, delivering 10-40% higher performance on average, with peaks exceeding 60% in core-heavy tasks. The Ryzen 7 9800X3D remains viable for budget-focused users handling lighter workloads, but professionals demanding uncompromised rendering, encoding, or compilation speed should opt for the 9950X3D.

⭐Winner: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Its massive compute throughput advantage, driven by its doubled core count, makes the 9950X3D the unequivocal choice for professional productivity, while the 9800X3D serves well for mainstream users where its strong gaming performance and lower cost are prioritized over extreme multi-threaded muscle.

Overclocking: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

Both the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Ryzen 7 9800X3D represent a significant advancement in X3D processor overclocking capabilities compared to their predecessors. Unlike previous X3D generations that had severe overclocking limitations, both Zen 5-based processors support full manual overclocking, including multiplier adjustments, voltage modifications, and extensive tuning options.

This is a revolutionary change from the Zen 4 X3D processors that were largely locked down, with the 7800X3D only supporting limited PBO and Curve Optimizer adjustments. The key architectural improvement enabling this overclocking freedom is AMD's redesigned 3D V-Cache placement.

In Zen 5 X3D processors, the 3D V-Cache is positioned underneath the Core Complex Dies (CCDs) rather than on top, dramatically improving thermal management and reducing the voltage sensitivity that previously restricted overclocking. This design change allows both processors to maintain higher boost frequencies while supporting the same overclocking toolkit as the regular Zen 5 processors.

The processors responds well to both traditional overclocking methods and AMD's advanced tuning tools, including Precision Boost Overdrive 2 (PBO2), Curve Optimizer, and the new Curve Shaper feature exclusive to Zen 5 processors. AMD has plenty of manual tuning option available, but most users are best just engaging the automated Precision Boost Overdrive (PBO) feature.

⭐Winner: Tie

Both chips leverage the same AMD overclocking suite, so this section works out to a tie.

Power Consumption, Efficiency, and Cooling: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

According to our test results, the power profiles of the Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Ryzen 7 9800X3D reveal significant differences under load while showing remarkable similarity at idle, directly impacting efficiency and cooling requirements.

Under sustained AVX workloads, the 9950X3D consumes substantially more power than the 9800X3D, reflecting its higher core count and performance ceiling. In the grueling Prime95 Small FFTs test, the 9950X3D averages 215W compared to the 9800X3D's 171W, which is a substantial 25.7% increase. This pattern repeats in y-cruncher's AVX test, where the 9950X3D draws 23.9% more power than the 9800X3D.

Even in Cinebench 2024 multi-core rendering, which favors thread scaling, the 9950X3D requires 57.8% more power than its younger brother. This consistently higher power draw under heavy vectorized or multi-threaded loads is inherent to the 9950X3D's doubled core resources.

Remarkably, both CPUs demonstrate nearly identical power efficiency during low-activity states. In active idle states (such as YouTube playback), the 9950X3D uses 31% more power than the 9800X3D, but the actual difference is 9W. However, in true idle scenarios, the gap narrows to just 3W, which is pretty negligible in the big picture. This parity highlights that the 9950X3D efficiently powers down unused cores, but also highlights that both chips carry the same power burden of the central I/O die, which ultimately results in higher idle power consumption for Zen 5 processors compared to Intel offerings.

Despite its higher power consumption, the 9950X3D often delivers superior performance-per-watt in multi-threaded tasks. In our Cinebench 2024 "Watts per Point" metric, the 9950X3D scores a 10.8% efficiency advantage over the 9800X3D. Similarly, in HandBrake x265 encoding, the 9950X3D achieves a 6.4% lead in efficiency despite consuming more raw power in the test itself.

This indicates the 9950X3D's additional cores translate workloads into completed tasks more efficiently under heavy utilization. The "Estimated Task Energy" graph further confirms this trend, placing the 9950X3D in a significantly better (lower-right) position than Intel competitors and delivering way more FPS than the 9800X3D despite consuming almost similar task energy.

The 9950X3D's higher sustained power load necessitates more robust cooling. A 360mm AIO liquid cooler is optimal for the 9950X3D to maintain optimal boost clocks during extended AVX workloads. The 9800X3D, with its peak draw nearly 20-25% lower, is far more forgiving. A capable dual-tower air cooler or 240mm AIO should suffice in most cases.

At the end of the day, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D is the clear winner if you just compare the two CPUs by their peak power consumption, especially under heavy AVX loads, making it ideal for users prioritizing low heat output, quieter cooling, or constrained thermal environments.

However, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D consumes 25-58% more power under load but delivers 6-11% better performance efficiency (work completed per watt) in multi-threaded scenarios like rendering and encoding. For users needing maximum multi-core throughput, the 9950X3D's efficiency may justify its higher power ceiling, though it demands stronger cooling to realize its full potential.

⭐Winner: Tie

If you want the absolute lowest power draw, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D is the obvious pick among these two CPUs. It is also easier to cool and is generally quite tame compared to the Ryzen 9 9950X3D, which consumes significantly more power under load.

In contrast, the 9950X3D takes a significant win in power efficiency (performance-per-watt), highlighting that it delivers exceptional power characteristics of its own.

Overall both chips have their charms, depending on the target workload. That leaves us with yet another tie -- the winner just depends on your personal use-case.

Pricing: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

When comparing the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D and the Ryzen 7 9800X3D, the starting point is their respective CPU prices: the Ryzen 9 9950X3D costs $670 at the time of writing, while the Ryzen 7 9800X3D is priced at $470, a difference of $200. However, to truly assess which CPU offers better value for the money, it’s essential to consider the entire platform cost, including the motherboard, RAM, and CPU cooler.

When examining the complete platform cost, both processors share identical requirements for supporting components, but they do have different needs in some areas. DDR5 memory pricing remains consistent across both builds, with 32GB of DDR5-6000 memory costing around $120-$150.

The AM5 socket requirement means both CPUs could use the same types of motherboards, ranging from budget B650 boards at $125-$160 to premium X870 motherboards that can cost $320-$500. However, the 9950X3D's higher power consumption and thermal output requires a better motherboard than the 9800X3D.

With a higher TDP and peak power consumption, the 16-core 9950X3D necessitates more robust VRM designs on motherboards for full performance, potentially adding $50-$100 to the platform cost.

Cooling the Ryzen 7 9800X3D, which has a lower TDP (120W) compared to its higher-end sibling (170W), can be adequately handled by a mid-tier solution. Options include a $50 to $70 air cooler or a $100 to $150 240mm AIO liquid cooler. In contrast, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D would benefit from a more capable solution, with a 360mm AIO liquid cooler being optimal, which can cost you about $150-200.

Conclusively, the 9800X3D emerges as the superior choice for value-conscious builders, despite both processors delivering nearly identical gaming performance, as we already saw. The nearly $230 price difference represents money that could be allocated toward a better graphics card, faster storage, or premium peripherals, which are components that would provide more tangible benefits for gaming performance.

As for the 9950X3D, its additional productivity capabilities justify its premium only for users who can leverage its extra cores for content creation, streaming, or professional workloads.

⭐Winner: AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

For the vast majority of enthusiasts prioritizing gaming and overall bang-for-buck, the 9800X3D's combination of potent gaming performance and lower total platform cost makes it the clear winner for value. The 9950X3D is best reserved for users who explicitly need its extra cores and are willing to invest in the supporting high-end platform.

Bottom Line: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Ryzen 7 9800X3D both bring impressive strengths to the table, ultimately leaving us with a 4-4 tie, but the winner for you will be clear based on your target workloads and budget.

The Ryzen 7 9800X3D is the clear champion for most users, particularly those prioritizing gaming performance and value. Its dominance in gaming performance, power efficiency, and pricing creates a compelling package that delivers exceptional results without unnecessary complexity. The single-CCD design eliminates the scheduling challenges that can plague dual-CCD configurations, making it the ideal choice for gamers who want maximum performance with minimal fuss.

On the other hand, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D remains the superior choice for a specific audience: professionals and content creators who demand both exceptional gaming performance and serious productivity capabilities. Its 16-core, 32-thread configuration provides superb multi-core performance that makes it the ultimate all-round CPU for users who refuse to compromise between gaming and professional workloads.

For the vast majority of gaming enthusiasts and high-performance PC builders, the AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D is the unequivocal recommendation and king of gaming value. It delivers virtually identical top-tier gaming performance to the 9950X3D while being significantly cheaper, more power-efficient, easier to cool, and less demanding on the supporting platform.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D remains a formidable, niche processor, but its considerable price premium and higher platform costs are only justifiable for users who simultaneously require maximum gaming performance and very high levels of multi-threaded productivity performance on a daily basis.

Both chips have their place, and the clear swim lanes for the 9950X3D and 9800X3D show that AMD has done an excellent job in stratifying the Ryzen 9000 X3D lineup, delivering strong value for two very different chips and ultimately earning its price tag for each chip. Meanwhile, Intel's chips simply can't compete with either of these chips in gaming. Here's hoping for a more competitive Intel with its next-gen chips.

🏆Winner: Tie

More CPU Faceoffs

• AMD Ryzen 9 9950X vs Intel Core i9-14900K
• Intel Core i5-14400 vs AMD Ryzen 5 7600X
• AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D vs Intel Core i9-13900K vs Core i7-13700K
• AMD Ryzen 9 7950X3D vs Intel Core i9-13900K Faceoff

A common thread among increasing user reports of failing Ryzen 9000 CPUs was their connection to an ASRock AM5 motherboard. Citing a conversation with the partner at Computex, Tech Yes City has brought to light that ASRock's initial PBO (Precision Boost Overdrive) presets were set too aggressively for initial CPU samples. It is believed these aggressive settings are what ultimately lead to the premature demise of these processors. AMD declined to comment on the story, while ASRock wasn't immediately available.

Earlier this year, reports of failing AMD Ryzen 9000 (Granite Ridge) processors were common on Reddit and other forums. ASRock initially dismissed reports connecting their motherboards to the problem as 'misinformation', all the while supplying a new BIOS to address boot-up and memory compatibility issues. Affected users had no other choice but to RMA their broken CPUs.

According to new details from Tech Yes City, the problem stems from the amperage (current) supplied to the processor under AMD's PBO technology. Precision Boost Overdrive employs an algorithm that dynamically adjusts clock speeds for peak performance, based on factors like temperature, power, current, and workload. The issue is reportedly confined to ASRock's high-end and mid-range boards, as they were tuned far too aggressively for Ryzen 9000 CPUs.

AMD announced its new Zen 5-powered Ryzen Threadripper Pro 9000 WX-series and non-Pro processors here at Computex 2025 in Taipei, Taiwan, touting up to 96 cores and 192 threads in the flagship 9995WX. AMD's newest 'Shamida Peak' Threadrippers bring the benefits of the Zen 5 architecture to AMD's premier WX-Series workstation and non-Pro processors, saying they deliver up to 2.2X the performance in rendering than Intel's fastest competing Xeon-W chips.

AMD also revamped its non-Pro Ryzen Threadripper 9000-series chips, with the flagship 9980X HEDT chip wielding 64 cores and 128 threads. AMD's full Threadripper 9000 series will be available in July.

The Threadripper 9000 chips have much in common with their predecessors, the Threadripper 7000 series, with AMD continuing to split the chips into the Pro and HEDT swimlanes. The chips also have the same core counts, base clocks, and cache capacities (up to 384MB) as the prior-gen models across the range of the product stack, but the peak boost clocks have been bumped up to 5.4 GHz for all models, an increase ranging from 100 to 300 MHz. The TDP ratings also remain the same 350W for all models.

The processors provide up to 22% more performance than the prior-gen in threaded workloads, and the lion's share of their increased performance from the jump from the Zen 4 architecture to Zen 5, which imparts a 16% IPC gain, and the move from 5nm to 4nm for the compute dies.

AVX-512 support is also fully baked into the design, dramamatically improving performance in applications that utilize the dense instruction set. The chip also come with all of the same I/O connectivity as before, including up to 128 PCIe 5.0 lanes, but memory support has been bumped up from DDR5-5200 to DDR5-6400. ECC is fully supported and AMD's Pro chips feature the AMD Pro Technolgies suite of RAS features.

As with all of AMD's Threadripper chips, these models have the same design as AMD's data center chips, in this case, the EPYC 'Turin' 9005 series, but come with special firmware and power tuning to optimize them for workstation platforms.

As you can see above, the chips have a large central 6nm I/O die flanked by rows of 4nm compute dies. With this generation, AMD has rotated the eight-core compute dies 90 degrees and arranged them into four vertical rows of three chips apiece, for a total of 12 compute dies with 96 cores for the flagship 9995WX. AMD removes four of those chips to create the 64-core 9980X, with further adjustments to the number of compute dies for the different models.

Both families of Threadripper 9000 chips will drop into the same sTR5 socket as the prior-gen chips. The WR90 platform with support for eight channels of memory will house the Pro chips, while value-optmized TRX50 boards with support for four channels of memory house the HEDT processors.

After a BIOS update, the new chips are compatible with existing motherboards. AMD expects a few new refreshed motherboard models from vendors, but it says the chips will largely leverage the existing ecosystem of sTR5 motherboards. As such, all of the existing sTR5 coolers on the market are fully compatible with the new processors.

AMD shared a few benchmarks to underline its performance superiority over Intel's Xeon-W lineup, but as with all vendor-provided benchmarks, take them with a grain of salt. We've included the full test notes below.

AMD claims the 96-core Threadripper 9995WX is 2.2X faster than Intel's 60-core flagship W9-3595X in the Cinebench multi-core rendering benchmark, an incredible lead. It's also 22% faster than the previous-gen 96-core Threadripper 7995WX.

AMD also shared a broader spate of benchmarks, with impressive gains ranging from 140% to 245% faster than the W9-3595X in a diverse set of real-world applications like media and entertainment, design and manufacturing, and LLM inference verticals, among others.

Overall AMD's Threadripper 9000 series appears poised to continue its utter dominance over Intel's competing workstation processors. AMD hasn't shared pricing yet, but given that its most affordable previous-gen HEDT model weighed in at $1,400 while the flagship retailed for $4,999, these chips will undoubtedly be pricey. As you'd expect, we'll have our own benchmarks coming around the time of launch in July.

Most of my cooling reviews are designed to let you know what the best and most powerful cooling solutions are. But not everyone is looking to overclock the hottest Intel i9 CPU. Instead of focusing on the best possible performance, today’s review will be looking at Endorfy’s Fortis 5 air cooler, which won’t win any overclocking competitions, but runs quietly while delivering enough cooling performance to satisfy the needs of mainstream consumers and gamers.

Let’s take a look at the specifications and features of the cooler, then we’ll go over thermal performance so you’ll know how cool it will keep your computer’s processor. We’ll also look at noise measurements to let you know how silently this product operates.

Cooler specifications

Packing and included contents

The exterior of the box isn’t flashy, but it showcases the features of the product well.

Included with the box are the following:

• 140mm fan
• Thick single-tower heatsink
• Thermal paste
• Mounting accessories for modern AMD & Intel platforms

Features of Endorfy Fortis 5 ARGB

▶ Rigid backplate

The included backplate is extremely strong, and won’t bend even under pressure.

▶ AM Clearance

There’s no reason to worry about RAM clearances with Endorfy’s Fortis 5 ARGB. As you can see in the picture below, the fan doesn’t interfere or overhang DIMM slots, allowing full compatibility no matter how tall (or short) your RAM is.

▶ Six Direct Touch Heatpipes

It is generally rare to see coolers with more than four or five direct-touch copper heatpipes, but Endorfy’s Fortis 5 has six of them! In theory, direct touch heatpipes should allow for more efficient heat transfer. Is that really the case? Well, we’ll get to the benchmarks soon enough and you can decide for yourself based on our tests.

▶ Thick single tower heatsink

Most air coolers incorporate one or two smaller heatsink towers, but Endorfy’s Fortis 5 incorporates one larger, thick heatsink.

The backside of the cooler incorporates a canyon in the middle. While Endorfy didn’t specifically comment on this design, other companies with similar designs have claimed it helps increase to static pressure of airflow.

▶ 40mm Fluctus ARGB fan

There’s more to a cooler than just the heatsink or radiator. The bundled fans have a significant impact on cooling and noise levels, as well as how the cooler looks in your case. The included Fluctus ARGB fan has 9 blades, with teeth on the edges of each fan blade. I’m not sure if those teeth serve any real purpose, but they sure look menacing!

Many cheaper products include fans with MTTF ratings of only 40-60,000 hours of operation, but not Endorfy. They indicate confidence in the quality of their product with a rating of 100,000+ hours for the Fluctus 140 ARGB fan.

Real world testing configuration: Intel LGA1700 and AMD AM5 platform

My results may differ from others because I place an emphasis on having results that are comparable to real-world use.

This means that I test CPU coolers inside of a closed desktop case, which increases cooling difficulty compared to other testing methods. Open benches have lower ambient temperatures, which in turn makes weak coolers appear stronger than they really are. Some publications have also used generic thermal plates to test cooling solutions.

I reject both of these methods because they don’t accurately reflect the real-world conditions where a CPU cooler is used.

My previous reviews have also tested Intel’s latest platform, using the Core Ultra 9 285K Arrow Lake CPU. We’re going to be retiring this from our testing suite. Between BIOS updates and Windows updates, Arrow Lake’s thermal characteristics have changed in some scenarios, rendering much of our previous testing data useless.

With today’s review, we’re also testing AMD’s recently released Ryzen 9 9950X3D. This is a beast of a CPU, providing the best gaming and some of the best multithreaded performance on the market, and can prove quite challenging thermally when PBO is enabled for overclocking.

LGA 1700 and AMD AM5 Installation

The installation of this cooler is simple and should be easy to complete for most users. It’s also pretty much the same process for Intel and AMD systems.

1. You’ll first need to place the backplate against the rear of the motherboard on an Intel system, using the standoffs to secure it. AMD users will need to remove the default mounting mechanism and replace it with the included standoffs.

2. Next, place the mounting bracket on top of the standoffs and secure it with the included screws.

3. Apply the included thermal paste to your CPU. If you have any questions on how to do this properly, please refer to our handy guide on how to apply thermal paste.

4. Place the CPU block on top of the CPU and secure it with a screwdriver.

5. Attach the fan and then connect the PWM cable to your motherboard, and installation is complete.

CPU-only thermal results without power limits

Because the CPU reaches its peak temperature (TJ Max) with air coolers like the one we’re looking at with this review, I’ve measured the CPU package power to determine the maximum wattage cooled to best compare their performance. This is why you won’t see results from the best AIO coolers in this chart.

It’s important to note that thermal performance can scale differently depending on the CPU it’s being tested with. First, we’ll look at results with Intel’s i7-14700K.

Looking at the results with Intel’s Raptor Lake CPU, you might think this cooler isn’t very impressive. It’s the worst-performing result I have in this chart, outside of a compact SFF cooler. Let’s take a look at how it handles AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D now.

This is a much more impressive result. With 219W cooled on average, Endorfy’s Fortis 5 is able to handle the full “stock” power of AMD’s flagship CPU (~200W) and has a little bit of room to spare to let PBO push the CPU beyond its typical performance.

Noise levels are where this cooler shines. While thermal performance on Intel’s hottest CPUs isn’t the greatest, this cooler isn’t designed to win overclocking competitions. It’s designed to provide quietly running, essential cooling performance. With a maximum noise level of 37.3 dBA, this cooler is the quietest product I’ve tested on Intel’s Z790 Platform.

CPU-only noise normalized thermal results

Finding the right balance between fan noise levels and cooling performance is important. While running fans at full speed can improve cooling capacity to some extent, the benefits are limited and many users prefer a quieter system.

For noise-normalized testing with Intel CPUs, I typically set the noise levels of the cooler to reach 38.9 dBA. But this presents a problem: Endorfy’s Fortis 5 doesn’t reach that level of noise! Because this issue prevents a proper comparison to the other results I’ve collected, I’ll be skipping noise-normalized tests on Intel’s Core i7-14700K.

Let’s take a look at my initial noise-normalized results using AMD’s flagship Ryzen 9 9950X3D instead. This chart is still lacking the amount of comparison results I’d like, as I’ve just started sting with this CPU. That said, let’s take a look at what I have recorded thus far.

This test was run a little differently than I have done with previous tests on Intel CPUs. I’ve lowered the noise threshold of the CPU cooler down to 37.3 dBA, as some readers have indicated they consider 38.9 dBA “too loud” for this type of test. The other change is that I’ve measured the thermal performance of the cooler while also running Furmark 2 on MSI’s RTX 4070 TI Super, increasing the heat inside the case and increasing cooling difficulty.

The results here are encouraging. With 195W cooled, that’s almost the full power budget of AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D at “stock” settings while the system also handles the full heat of a GPU. It performed significantly better than Thermalright’s impressive Royal Knight 120 SE in the same scenario!

“Stock” 200W results

My recent reviews have focused more on tests with both the CPU and GPU being stressed, but many have indicated they would like to see more CPU-only tests. So let’s take a look at how Endorfy’s Fortis 5 handles the Ryzen 9950X3D with default power levels, which limits consumption to ~200W.

Going by temperature data alone, the results aren’t very impressive here. The CPU reaches a toasty 83.7 degrees. But that really doesn’t matter, because it keeps the CPU under its peak temperature and does so while running very quietly, at or below the lowest measurement my noise meter can measure, at 36.4 dBA. This means the true measurement of noise level might actually be lower.

150W CPU + 290W GPU results

Testing a CPU Cooler in isolation is great for synthetic benchmarks, but doesn’t tell the whole story of how it will perform. If your GPU is running a full load, that heat doesn’t just disappear – it makes it harder for your CPU cooler to do its job due to the increased heat within your computer case.

The CPU power limit of 150W was chosen based on the worst CPU power consumption I’ve seen reported in gaming with AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D. In my personal experience, most games use much lower power, but this might be biased by the games I play.

Again, looking at thermal performance alone would give you the incorrect assumption that this cooler is not impressive. The important thing is that the CPU is operating well under its peak temperature, and the cooler is running whisper quiet – 36.4 dBA!

140W CPU results

The last round of test results we’ll look at in today’s review is a test with a 140W power limit imposed. This level of power is much easier for most CPU coolers to handle. But I’ve recorded lower power results for comparisons with SFF and air coolers for future reviews.

As with previous results, Endorfy’s Fortis 5 keeps the CPU within reasonable thermal values while running whisper quiet.

Conclusion

Endorfy’s Fortis 5 ARGB is a single tower air cooler with whisper-quiet noise levels, intended for users who value silent operation over maximum thermal performance. It’s powerful enough to handle AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D at stock settings, handling 219W when power limits were removed. However, the performance on Intel CPUs was not as impressive. If you’re looking to compete in overclocking competitions or running a previous-generation Core i9, you might want to pass on this one. But for everyone else, this is the level of cooling I’d recommend for AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D, so anything lesser should also run below thermal thresholds and extremely quiet with this cooler.

Noctua has created a new mounting modification for its flagship NH-D15 G2 CPU cooler tailored specifically for Core Ultra 200S series CPUs. Its new NM-IB8 mounting bars provide up to a three-degree temperature improvement by shifting the center of the NH-D15 G2's contact plate north-east of the CPU package.

The NM-IB8 mounting bars only replace the NH-D15 G2's existing units; the rest of the mounting equipment (that comes with the cooler) including the washers and screws are reused. Noctua claims the adjusted mounting spot provides a 3-degree Celsius drop in temperature with the HBC version of the NH-D15 G2 and a 1-degree Celsius drop with the standard version.

Motherboards come in all shapes, sizes, and price points. Over the years, and through this latest generation for Intel, we have reviewed dozens of models, ranging from Mini-ITX to E-ATX and from sub-$100 to over $1,000. Today, we’re on the high end of the spectrum—the highest, actually—with the MSI MEG Z890 Godlike. Priced at $1,329, it’s the most expensive consumer-focused motherboard I can remember. This flagship model features top-of-the-line components and boasts a premium appearance, making it the perfect centerpiece for your showcase build.

Hardware-wise, you do get the best of the best, including the most robust power delivery for the platform, 10 GbE and Wi-Fi 7, a premium audio solution with an integrated DAC, ample storage with eight M.2 sockets (M.2 Xpander-z Slider Gen 5), a Thunderbolt 5 card, and an EZ Control Hub for fans and lighting. If you sift through the additional details, you’re almost certain to find the kitchen sink. In addition to the hardware, you get MSI’s updated Click BIOS X and several “EZ” features, including EZ Link and Ai Overclocking.

Below, we’ll examine the board's details and determine whether it deserves a spot on our Best Motherboards list. However, before we share the test results and discuss the details, the specifications from MSI’s site are listed below.

Specifications of the MSI MEG Z890 Godlike

Inside the Box…

Inside the large motherboard box, you'll find a bunch of extras. Some, like the M.2 Xpander-z Slider Gen5 card, Thunderbolt 5 card, and the Wi-Fi antenna, are snug in foam padding. The rest—cables, stickers, guides, and whatnot—are packed in a separate box.

• M.2 Xpander-z Slider Gen5 AIC
• Thunderbolt 5 AIC
• EZ Control Hub
• USB drive (drivers)
• EZ Wi-Fi Antenna
• EZ M.2 Clips II Remover
• 1 to 3 ARGB G2 extension cable
• 1 to RGB extension cable
• 1 to 3 EZ Conn-Cable (V2)
• EZ Link Cable
• EZ Control Hub SATA power cable
• M.2 Xpander card fan control cable
• Thunderbolt 5 header cable
• EZ Front Panel cable
• (4) SATA cables
• (2) Thermistor cables
• M.2 Xpander card thermal pads
• M.2 screw and standoff set
• EZ Control Hb screw seets
• Cable stickers
• Flyer/installation guide/EU regulatory notice

Design of the Z890 Godlike

The Z890 Godlike certainly looks the part of a flagship motherboard. Nearly all of the matte-black 10-layer PCB is covered by shrouds and heatsinks or the EZ Bridge. On top of the VRM heatsink is one of three RGB features, this one sporting the MSI Dragon. On top of the EZ Bridge is a 3.99-inch full-color TFT offering several features, including real-time hardware monitoring, troubleshooting, BIOS update status, and clock display. You can also personalize it with your own image.

The bottom is covered in plate-style heatsinks with a powder-coat finish, along with grooves for increased thermal dissipation. The top M.2 heatsink and chipset also feature RGB lighting. Overall, the board exudes a premium vibe, and the all-black look is sure to blend in with most builds, while the Dynamic Dashboard III feature sets it apart from others.

Focusing on the top half of the board, we gain a clearer view of the RGB feature and the VRM heatsink, which features a wavy fin design and a direct-touch cross-heatpipe. This design, in part, comprises the Frozr design, which also includes the backplate, thermal pads, and other components. There’s plenty of mass and surface area to keep the high-end power delivery components running cool, no matter which processor and what overclock you’re using.

To the right of the CPU socket are four DRAM slots with a locking mechanism on the bottom side only. MSI lists support for up to 256GB of DDR5 RAM with speeds up to 9200+ MT/s. We had no issues running our DDR5-8200 kit during testing, and I’m sure the board will reach advertised speeds with the proper kit and chip.

MSI’s EZ Bridge consolidates multiple headers and connectors into a single area. With all headers on one side, it creates a more organized cluster of cables, as opposed to having them scattered across the board. At the top are the two front-panel headers, the hub connection, dual 2-pin thermistor headers, tuning controller header, EZConn header, and a USB 2.0 header. At the bottom, there are a total of three fan headers, an ATX and PD Power Connector (up to 60W for the motherboard), a front-panel 20 Gbps USB Type-C header, and an additional Type-C connector for front-panel Thunderbolt 4 support.

For most users, the three available 4-pin fan headers won’t be sufficient. But don’t fret, as MSI includes the EZ Control Hub with seven additional fan headers, a 3-pin water flow header, two 3-pin ARGB headers, and a single 4-pin RGB header. The Sys fan headers output 1A/12W, the CPU Fan header 2A/24W, and the two pump headers each output 3A/36W. If you find yourself short on power or headers, you may want to re-evaluate your needs. MSI's EZ Bridge streamlines cable management by grouping numerous headers and connectors on one side of the motherboard. This creates a concentrated (albeit busy) area for connections, which can be more organized than a scattered set of headers.

This consolidated section includes: two front panel headers, the hub connection, two 2-pin thermistor headers, a tuning controller header, an EZConn header, and a USB 2.0 header. Located along the bottom edge are three fan headers, an ATX and PD Power Connector (supporting up to 60W for the board), a front panel 20 Gbps USB Type-C header, and another Type-C connector enabling front panel Thunderbolt 4.

Power delivery on this board is one of the ‘Godlike’ features. Totaling a whopping 30 phases, MSI splits off 26 dedicated to Vcore. Power heads from the two 8-pin EPS connectors at the top of the board onto the Renesas RAA229131 PWM controller. Power then goes to the 26 Renesas R2209004 110A SPS MOSFETs in a Deut Rail configuration. Some napkin math yields 2,860A available to Vcore, which is enough to support any overclocking adventure, even sub-ambient sessions. You’ll get everything the chip will give you with this board.

On the bottom half of the board, on the left and hidden under metal shrouds, is the flagship Realtek ALC4082 audio codec. Supporting the codec is the ESS9219Q DAC/HBA Combo. This is one of the best native audio solutions available; anything better will come from a discrete sound card.

In the middle of the board are two full-length PCIe slots and a single x4 slot. The top two slots are reinforced and PCIe 5.0-capable. The top slot supports up to PCIe 5.0 x16, while the bottom slot supports up to x8. Anytime the bottom slot is in use, the top slot drops to x8. When using the Xpander-x Slider Gen5 card in that slot, it splits to 5.0 x4/x4. If you have an M.2 drive in M.2_6, the second slot runs at 5.0 x4. You can configure the lanes in the BIOS (Advanced> PCIe Subsystem settings). Lastly, the bottom x4 slot operates at PCIe 4.0 speeds and connects directly through the chipset.

Hiding underneath plate heatsinks and one slightly larger heatsink are six M.2 sockets. M.2_1 hides under the RGB-topped heatsink and runs at PCIe 5.0 x4 (218 Gbps). M.2_2-5 are all PCIe 4.0 x4 (64 Gbps). M.2_5 also supports SATA- based M.2 modules. M.2_6 is unique, as it connects through the chipset and CPU, running up to PCIe 5.0 x4. If, somehow, these six M.2 sockets aren' t enough, the included M.2 Xpander-z Slider Gen5 card adds two more PCIe 5. 0 x 4- capable sockets. I like how the board separates the generally hot-running PCIe 5.0 M.2s, with the second on the bottom and not tucked directly under a video card.

Along the right edge are several more headers, including two 19-pin USB 3.2 Gen 1 (5Gbps) for USB, and another PCIe 6+2 pin for additional board/PCIe power. Next to that are the four SATA ports, a USB 2.0 header, and finally, the front-panel audio. If you're wondering where some connectivity is, it's probably along the right edge.

While an overwhelming majority of headers and connectivity run down the entire right edge, there are still some other headers and switches along the bottom. You'll find things like the TB 5 header, LED and BIOS switches, and even a couple for extreme overclocking. Below is a complete list, from left to right.

• Reset and Power jumpers
• Thunderbolt 5 header
• Dashboard/LED/BIOS switches
• TPM header
• Power LED 1
• Slow Mode/LN2
• Battery
• OC retry button connector
• Safe boot jumper

Looking at the rear IO, the first thing that jumped out to me is the copious number of USB ports. You can connect just about anything back here, including the fast Thunderbolt 4 (40 Gbps) Type-C. In the middle are three convenience buttons (Flash BIOS, Clear CMOS, Smart Button), Marvell 10 GbE and Killer 5 GbE ports, Killer-based Wi-Fi antenna connections, and last, the 2-plug plus SPDIF audio stack.

Although it’s not part of the rear IO the included Thunderbolt 5 accessory card adds even faster ports to the back of the PC. Boasting 160 Gbps transmission speeds (120/40) it’s the fastest port around. The two DisplayPorts support multiple 8K external displays and 27W charging power. What’s missing?

MORE: Best Motherboards

MORE: How To Choose A Motherboard

MORE: All Motherboard Content

Firmware

MSI has updated its BIOS for Z890 (and X870), renaming it “Click X” and improving the aesthetic and functionality. The company changed the format from its previous UEFI, with the headings on the left side, details in the middle, and system status information on the right. Like most other board partners, it has an informational EZ Mode, allowing limited functionality, such as Game Boost, PBO, XMP, and more. The black background that fades to gold with light-colored text is easy to read, and most of what you need is at your fingertips. Overall, I like the new layout, and maneuvering around is intuitive, though it does take some getting used to.

Software

MSI Center is a single utility that offers a wide range of functionality. From hardware monitoring to RGB control with Mystic Light, the software features numerous applets and serves as a one-stop shop for downloading additional utilities, including overclocking and fan control. Those looking to use the Gamebar feature, Super Charger, or any other utilities MSI offers will find them all in MSI Center.

Test System / Comparison Products

We’ve updated our test system to Windows 11 (24H2) 64-bit OS, with all updates applied as of late September 2024, including the Branch Prediction Optimizations for AMD. Hardware-wise, we’ve updated the RAM kits (matching our Intel test system), cooling, storage, and video card. Unless otherwise noted, we use the latest non-beta motherboard BIOS that is publicly available. Thanks to Asus for providing the RTX 4080 TUF graphics card and Crucial for the 2TB T705 SSDs. The hardware we used is as follows:

Test System Components

Benchmark Settings

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Our standard benchmarks and power tests are performed using the CPU’s stock frequencies (including any default boost/turbo) with all power-saving features enabled. We set optimized defaults in the BIOS and the memory by enabling the XMP profile. For this baseline testing, the Windows power scheme is set to Balanced (default) so the PC idles appropriately.

Synthetic Benchmarks

Synthetics offer a valuable method for evaluating a board's performance, as identical settings are expected to yield similar results. Turbo boost wattage and advanced memory timings are areas where motherboard manufacturers can still optimize for stability or performance, and these settings can impact specific testing scenarios.

The Z890 Godlike performed well across the synthetic benchmarks, leading the pack in some and landing around average in others. There’s nothing to worry about here.

Timed Applications

The timed applications told the same story, with the board posting the lowest times in both Handbrake tests and LAME. Everything is in line with the timed applications.

3D Games and 3DMark

Starting with the launch of Zen 5, we’ve updated our game tests. We’re keeping the F1 racing game but have upgraded to F1 24. We also dropped Far Cry 6 in favor of an even more popular and good-looking game in Cyberpunk 2077. We run both games at 1920x1080 resolution using the Ultra preset (details listed above). Cyberpunk 2077 uses DLSS, while we left F1 24 to native resolution scaling. The goal of these settings is to determine if there are differences in performance at the most commonly used (and CPU/system-bound) resolution with settings most people use or strive for (Ultra). We expect the difference between boards in these tests to be minor, with most falling within the margin of error. We’ve also added a minimum FPS value, which can affect your gameplay and immersion experience.

In the most crucial tests for some people, the board performed on the faster side of average in the actual games, and was merely average in the UL 3DMark benchmarks. In other words, the Godlike is a solid performer across a wide variety of applications.

Overclocking

The Godlike ran our DDR5-8200 memory without issue, but that was to be expected considering the 9200 MT/s peak listed. With the right memory kit (read: one on the memory QVL) and a good IMC, we have no doubt it can reach those speeds, and likely even further with exotic cooling.

Power Consumption / VRM Temperatures

We used AIDA64’s System Stability Test with Stress CPU, FPU, Cache, and Memory enabled for power testing, using the peak power consumption value from the processor. The wattage reading obtained is from the wall via a Kill-A-Watt meter, capturing the entire PC, excluding the monitor. The only variable that changes is the motherboard; all other parts remain the same. Please note that we have moved to using only the stock power use/VRM temperature charts, as this section aims to ensure that the power delivery can handle flagship-class processors.

Power usage on this motherboard peaked at 346W, with the CPU reaching a maximum of around 255W, averaging 225W. Idle use was on the high side at 75W, but still slightly lower than the Taichi OCF and its sibling, the MEG Z890 Ace. Power usage should be marginally higher, as the board features numerous components that require power.

VRM temperatures from our probes peaked at just over 48 degrees Celsius, with the sensor reporting a slightly higher value of 52 degrees Celsius. The Frozr Design heatsink and wavy fin design effectively maintain the high-power components within specification. The only factor holding your CPU back is the cooling method, as the Godlike is capable of taking your scores to the promised land.

Bottom Line

The MSI Godlike boasts the fastest and most comprehensive features available on an E-ATX-sized motherboard. 10 GbE and Wi-Fi 7? Check. Eight M.2 sockets (4x 5.0 with the expansion card)? Check. Thunderbolt 5? Yes. EZ Features and AI Features? They’re in there, too. In terms of aesthetics, the clean design, tastefully implemented RGB lighting, and the Dynamic Dashboard III exude high-end vibes while still prioritizing functionality. It sounds perfect, and hardware-wise, it does have it all.

The competition, including the Gigabyte Z890 Aorus Xtreme AI TOP and the Asus ROG Maximus Z890 Extreme, are priced at $999.99. However, as of this writing, the Asus model is available for $799.99. I won't explore all the differences, but there aren’t many, as both offer 10 GbE, Thunderbolt 5, and overbuilt power delivery, and possess the characteristics of a flagship board.

In other words, the Godlike’s biggest (and maybe only) drawback is the price point. $1,329 is a substantial investment. And although it boasts a ‘Godlike’ feature list and specifications, it is overshadowed by competing companies who offer their competing wares for about $300 less. Still, many desire the best of the best, and the Godlike shares its throne with no one as one of the most capable motherboards on any consumer platform.

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Today, we'll put the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K in a heated contest to see which chip comes out on top. The best processor is not necessarily the one with the most number of cores or the highest clock speeds; rather, it is the one that fulfills your specific requirements and fits within your budget. Gamers do not necessarily require the highest-end chip to enjoy the latest AAA games, although having one wouldn't hurt. However, numerous compelling reasons exist for a consumer to seek to acquire a flagship processor.

You may be part of a small, elite crowd of enthusiastic gamers with the financial capacity to acquire the latest and greatest mainstream processor. Alternatively, you could be among the type of users who use their systems for more than just casual gaming, thereby warranting a more substantial investment in a processor that provides considerable processing power alongside exceptional gaming performance. The million-dollar question remains whether to choose between Intel or AMD, as both chipmakers have released highly compelling flagship processors in the current market.

AMD currently has two coexisting mainstream processor lineups in the retail market. The vanilla Ryzen 9000 (codename Granite Ridge) series was the inaugural launch, later followed by the Ryzen 9000X3D series, which incorporates AMD's 3D V-Cache technology, significantly enhancing gaming performance. Consequently, AMD has two flagship products: the Ryzen 9 9950X3D from the 3D V-Cache branch and the Ryzen 9 9950X from the main family. In contrast, Intel only has the Core Ultra 200S (codenamed Arrow Lake) series to compete against AMD, with the Core Ultra 9 285K as the singular leader of Intel's army.

Features and Specifications: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs Intel Core Ultra 9 285K

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D features Zen 5 execution cores and adheres to a conventional 16-core, 32-thread configuration. On the contrary, the Core Ultra 9 285K employs a hybrid design, integrating P-cores (Lion Cove) and E-cores (Skymont). Consequently, the Core Ultra 9 285K showcases a 24-core, 24-thread design. With Arrow Lake, Intel went with an approach without Hyper-Threading, so the Core Ultra 9 285K has fewer threads than the Ryzen 9 9950X3D.

Concerning clock speeds, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D exhibits a 16% greater base clock speed than the Core Ultra 9 285K. However, both processors possess identical boost clocks. For cache capacity, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D is equipped with AMD's 3D V-Cache, providing a total cache of 144MB (16MB L2 + 128MB L3). On the other hand, the Core Ultra 9 285K is accompanied by a cache capacity of 76MB (36MB L2 + 40MB L3). Consequently, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D has 3.2X more L3 cache, which is advantageous for gaming and specific workloads.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D has a 36% greater TDP (Thermal Design Power) or, in Intel's case, PBP (Processor Base Power), than the Core Ultra 9 285K. Nevertheless, the latter features a 9% higher MTP (Maximum Turbo Power). Therefore, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D has superior power efficiency to the Core Ultra 9 285K.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Core Ultra 9 285K support PCIe 5.0 connectivity and DDR5 memory. Both provide 24 high-speed PCIe 5.0 lanes to support the latest graphics cards and PCIe 5.0 SSDs. Regarding memory support, only the Core Ultra 9 285K has embraced CUDIMMs (Clocked Unbuffered Dual In-line Memory Modules), bumping the native supported frequency up to DDR5-6400. As far as conventional DIMMs are concerned, both support DDR5-5600.

Platform longevity favors the Ryzen 9 9950X3D, as the chip resides on the AM5 platform, which was launched in 2022 with AMD's commitment to providing support until 2027. On the other hand, the Core Ultra 9 285K uses the LGA1851 platform, which was released in 2024, but its life span is likely to be limited. There are indications that Intel may refresh Arrow Lake for LGA1851 before transitioning to the LGA1954 platform for forthcoming processors.

⭐ Winner: Tie

Specification-wise, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D has a big L3 cache thanks to AMD's 3D V-Cache technology and lower power consumption overall than the Core Ultra 9 285K. Another of AMD's strengths is the life expectancy of the AM5 platform, which is substantially higher than LGA1851. Investing in the platform now offers a ticket for future processor upgrades.

The LGA1851, in contrast, represents a fading platform. Arrow Lake may be the sole chip to utilize the LGA1851 platform, or possibly Arrow Lake Refresh, assuming the latest rumors are true. This is not particularly surprising, as the typical cadence for Intel sockets has consistently been two or three generations of chips, unlike AMD.

In LGA1851's defense, it is presently the sole platform that completely supports CUDIMMs. One advantage the Core Ultra 9 285K holds over the Ryzen 9 9950X3D is the possibility of leveraging CUDIMMs, such as high-speed memory DDR5-9200 and beyond. Nevertheless, considering the long life span of AM5, it is likely that full CUDIMM support will be introduced for AMD's platform in due course.

Gaming Benchmarks and Performance: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs Intel Core Ultra 9 285K

This article provides an overview of the Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Core Ultra 9 285K's performance metrics. We have also published in-depth individual reviews of these two CPUs, which you can refer to for more details. These graphs show the geometric mean of our gaming test results with these two CPUs at 1080p (1920x1080) resolution.

We paired both CPUs with the Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 graphics card to minimize potential bottlenecks. Testing at 1080p might seem irrelevant for such a powerful setup, but this resolution allows us to see the full potential of our CPUs in gaming.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D outperformed the Core Ultra 9 285K in gaming performance. This outcome was anticipated, as gaming performance is the former's most notable strength, attributable to the substantial L3 cache enabled by AMD's 3D V-Cache technology.

Cumulatively, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D yielded average frame rates that were 34% higher than those of the Core Ultra 9 285K throughout our testing suite of 16 games, utilizing a combination of High and Ultra graphical settings at 1080p. Furthermore, the AMD flagship demonstrated a 27% higher result in 1% Lows.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Core Ultra 9 285K hit the market at $699 and $620, respectively. The former presents 0.28 FPS per dollar, while the latter offers 0.23. Despite costing 13% more, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D has more gaming value for your money. While the Ryzen 9 9950X3D has maintained its pricing, the Core Ultra 9 285K has dropped to $589, reaching 0.25.

⭐ Winner: AMD

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D is undoubtedly the better choice for gaming enthusiasts. While the Core Ultra 9 285K is a capable gaming processor, it falls short compared to the Ryzen 9 9950X3D, which is almost 35% faster in average frame rates and close to 30% faster in 1% Lows.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D has consistently maintained a higher price point than the Core Ultra 9 285K. Notwithstanding the recent price reductions of the Core Ultra 9 285K, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D continues to provide better value in gaming.

Productivity Performance: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs Intel Core Ultra 9 285K

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D flaunts superior multi-threaded performance, but the contest is heated. The Zen 5 processor delivers a mere 3% higher multi-threaded performance than the Core Ultra 9 285K.

Looking at benchmarks individually, there are times when the Core Ultra 9 285K is substantially faster. For example, the Intel chip boasted 18% higher results in POV-Ray or 11% higher in HandBrake x265. The Ryzen 9 9950X3D also has its moments, such as in V-Ray 6, where it outperformed the Core Ultra 9 285K by 17%.

Intel continues to be the leader in single-threaded performance; however, the disparity has been narrowing, as evidenced by the current generation. The Core Ultra 9 285K achieved a 9% better single-threaded overall than the Ryzen 9 9950X3D.

The POV-Ray benchmark clearly favors the Core Ultra 9 285K, which significantly surpassed the Ryzen 9 9950X3D by an impressive 31%. Conversely, the performance delta between the two processors wasn't as big in other workloads.

⭐ Winner: Tie

There is no definitive victor in this comparison. The Ryzen 9 9950X3D has higher multi-threaded performance relative to the Core Ultra 9 285K. Nevertheless, the disparity stands at merely 3%, a difference that may not be noteworthy across all workloads.

Meanwhile, the Core Ultra 9 285K is better at single-thread performance than the Ryzen 9 9950X3D, where the former exhibits a speed increase of 9% over the latter. It can be argued that a loss of 3% is more tolerable than a loss of 9%; this perspective holds validity when one prioritizes a chip for productivity purposes while overlooking gaming considerations.

Overclocking: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs Intel Core Ultra 9 285K

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Intel Core Ultra 9 285K have unlocked multipliers and are ready for your manual overclocking endeavors. The quality of overclocking can vary significantly between processors, and currently, we do not possess a substantial number of samples from which to derive definitive conclusions. Our results are primarily based on our overclocking experiences with the single sample available in our lab.

In the context of the Ryzen 9 9950X3D, we activated AMD's Precision Boost Overdrive (PBO) functionality. For the PBO configuration, we utilized the 'advanced' and 'motherboard' power settings, accompanied by a 10X scalar adjustment and an increase of 200 MHz in the clock speed. Furthermore, we implemented a -15 all-core Curve Optimizer offset.

We've also experimented with Intel's latest '200S Boost' feature combined with some manual overclocking. But the long story short is that there isn't much practical headroom for performance gains with fabric overclocking. Intel also offers manual tuning for the P-cores and E-cores, though the actual performance gains are heavily weighted towards the latter.

⭐ Winner: Tie

Unlike the old Pentium, modern processors arrive with little headroom for serious overclocking with conventional cooling. It's a two-way street. On a positive note, you can rest easy at night knowing their chips are at or near their potential. However, on the downside, the art of extracting additional performance at no cost is slowly fading away.

Power Consumption, Efficiency, and Cooling: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs Intel Core Ultra 9 285K

On the contrary, the Core Ultra 9 285K reveals a higher power consumption during various workload scenarios. The Intel chip operates within a power range of 219W to 325W, whereas its AMD counterpart operates between 178W and 228W. Notably, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D has a peak power consumption that is 30% lower than that of the Core Ultra 9 285K.

Most PCs rarely truly idle; users might leave various applications open on the desktop. There's also an 'active idle' use case wherein the user does a low-load activity, such as browsing the web or watching a YouTube video. To model this behavior, we created an active idle test (second slide) with two browser windows open (one with two tabs idling on a website and another window with a 4K YouTube video stream playing). We measure this level of activity across a 15-minute timespan.

The Core Ultra 9 285K has 30% lower idle power consumption than the Ryzen 9 9950X3D. Furthermore, the Core Ultra 9 285 K's active idle power consumption during YouTube playback is particularly notable, as it consumes 39% less power.

The Core Ultra 9 285K was more power efficient in the Linpack workload, displaying a 5% lower watt-hour. The Ryzen 9 9950X3D excelled in the Cinebench 2024 workload, landing a 10% higher watts per point and a 13% lower watts per FPS in the HandBrake x265 test.

The ideal balance is performance at a reduced power consumption. To elaborate, the processor at the bottom right corner of the power efficiency charts represents the best chip in terms of efficiency. The Ryzen 9 9950X3D outperforms the Core Ultra 9 285K in multiple benchmarks.

⭐ Winner: AMD

The Core Ultra 9 285K wins at idle power consumption, but the Ryzen 9 9950X3D consumes less power under load. While both idle and average power consumption should be considered, the latter is ultimately more important since we typically use our systems under heavier use or in 'active idle' conditions rather than letting them truly idle for prolonged periods.

Furthermore, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D has better power efficiency than the Core Ultra 9 285K. A power-efficient processor helps reduce system costs, including processor cooling and power supply capacity expenses. It also positively contributes to electricity savings.

Pricing: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs Intel Core Ultra 9 285K

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D launched last month at $699. Since this processor recently came out of the oven, it's unrealistic to expect any price adjustments. Meanwhile, the Core Ultra 9 285K debuted at $620 in October 2024. Nowadays, you can find the flagship Arrow Lake chip at U.S. retailers for $589, 5% below the launch price.

Intel processors usually maintain their value until the next generation arrives. Therefore, it's unlikely that the Core Ultra 9 285K will officially get any cheaper. You may still find a retailer deal here or there.

To put things in perspective, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D's gaming performance is 34% higher than the Core Ultra 9 285K while being 19% more expensive. The Zen 5 part has a 3% multi-threaded advantage over the Core Ultra 9 285K, but the Intel chip does have up to 9% higher single-threaded performance, though.

⭐ Winner: AMD

At $699, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D may look like a scary investment. However, our results show that even with that hefty price tag, the 3D V-Cache flagship gives you more value for your money in gaming. The multi-threaded performance isn't shabby, but it does lose out to the Core Ultra 9 285K in single-threaded performance.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D already looks good. However, its appeal will grow further when the pricing starts to decline, whether through official price reductions or retailer promotions during special events such as Black Friday.

Bottom Line: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D vs Intel Core Ultra 9 285K

The gaming performance of the Ryzen 9 9950X3D was never in doubt, particularly given that lower-tier Zen 5 components equipped with 3D V-Cache have already surpassed the Core Ultra 9 285K by massive margins. However, the more important question is whether the Ryzen 9 9950X3D possesses any appeal outside the gaming realm. The answer to this inquiry is yes.

In addition to being a great gaming processor, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D can double as a productivity monster, similar to the vanilla Ryzen 9 9950X. Thanks to the Zen 5 architecture and the 16-core, 32-thread configuration, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D has no issues tackling demanding workloads, as long as they benefit from multi-threading. Unfortunately, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D's single-threaded performance lags behind the Core Ultra 9 285K.

However, if you can overlook the Ryzen 9 9950X3D's single-threaded weakness, the Zen 5 chip is a fantastic all-around performer that's power efficient and offers support for the latest technology. And unlike the Core Ultra 9 285K, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D doesn't leave you feeling like you just bought an obsolete processor—at least for a couple of years.

The tech industry is facing some headwinds. Manufacturers, sellers, and consumers are more concerned than ever about prices and stock as a global trade war upends the supply chain.

But, even as we face these challenges, many companies continue to innovate in ways that surprise and delight us. It’s time to celebrate those who move the ball forward, even in tough times.

That’s why, as we do at this time of year, we present to you the 2025 Tom’s Hardware Innovation Awards: a set of products that set or expand the standard for others. This year’s list includes laptops with rollable screens, the fastest-ever consumer GPU, and a 3D printer that doubles as a laser cutter, among many others.

Nvidia RTX 5090

The Nvidia Blackwell RTX 50-series launch has been both incredibly exciting and horribly disappointing, and nowhere is that more apparent than with the halo GeForce RTX 5090. It comes with all the Blackwell architectural enhancements, which admittedly can feel more than a bit overhyped — looking specifically at Multi Frame Generation (MFG). But the GB202 chip at the heart of the 5090 offers clear generational improvements.

It comes packing 170 Streaming Multiprocessors (SMs), a 33% increase from the prior generation RTX 4090's 128 SMs. It also comes with a 512-bit memory interface and 32GB of VRAM, another 33% increase. Except that memory is now 28 Gbps GDDR7 instead of 21 Gbps GDDR6X memory, which means the net improvement in memory bandwidth is an impressive 78%. To help the GPU reach its full performance potential, the power limit also got a big 28% bump to 575W.

That's all good for performance, but the 5090 isn't without controversy. Deja vu: All that power, through the 16-pin 12V-2x6 connector, has again resulted in some melting adapters. As frustrating and concerning as that might be, the real problem has been a lack of availability and skyrocketing retail prices. Ostensibly carrying a $1,999 starting MSRP, retail cards have routinely been selling for closer to twice that much. Still, it's the dream GPU that gamers would love to own, assuming they could afford it and find it in stock.

—Jarred Walton

AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

AMD’s 16-core 32-thread Ryzen 9 9950X3D is designed to provide no-compromise leadership performance in both gaming and productivity application performance, and it delivers. Courtesy of its game-boosting 3D V-Cache technology, the 9950X3D ties the best CPU for gaming, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D, in 1080p gaming performance, and even beats Intel’s flagship Core Ultra 9 285K by an incredible 37%, planting AMD’s flag as the uncontested leader in gaming.

Perhaps most impressively, the 9950X3D also preserves the full performance of the standard models’ performance in productivity applications, a first for the company’s 3D V-Cache models. That allows it to outperform the competing Intel chips in a multitude of workloads.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D costs a hefty $699, but it justifies the price tag with the performance served up from the 16 Zen 5-powered cores paired with the voluminous 128MB of L3 cache. The chip is also comparatively easy to cool, borne of its reasonable 170W TDP rating. The CPU cores also boost to 5.7 GHz, a surprising peak for this core-heavy model. AMD also enabled its full suite of overclocking bells and whistles for the 9950X3D, a first for its 16-core 3D V-Cache models, giving enthusiasts a plethora of options to tweak performance.

If you’re focused specifically on gaming, the lower-tier $480 Ryzen 7 9800X3D ramians the best option for most users. However, if you’re looking for fantastic performance in heavily-threaded applications and multitasking without compromising on gaming performance, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D is the best option on the market.

Read: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D review

—Paul Alcorn

Micron 4600 SSD / Silicon Motion SM2508

Two years is a long time to sit at the top, but that's precisely what Phison's E26 controller that powers some of the best SSDs has done. Now, thanks to drives like the Micron 4600, it finally faces some competition courtesy of the Silicon Motion SM2508 controller (which we previewed last September). It delivers equal to or better performance than the incumbent Crucial T705 in nearly every test we ran. Most critically, it also trims down the average and maximum power consumption by several watts.

The key advantage, for the time being, is that the SM2508 uses TSMC's N7 process node, while Phison's E26 uses the older TSMC 12nm FinFET node. Phison is readying its E28 controller built on TSMC N6/N7, but it's not out quite yet — the company appears to have prioritized its lower power DRAM-less E31T controller.

Competition benefits consumers, and the SM2508 brings a healthy rivalry back to the top-tier SSD realm. The biggest issue right now: There are no retail SM2508 drives available, as the Micron 4600 chiefly targets OEMs and system integrators. That means you can't actually buy the 4600 right now, as far as we're aware.

—Jarred Walton

AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT and RDNA 4

Nvidia may control the lion's share of the GPU market, but the AMD RDNA 4 architecture and Radeon RX 9070 XT promised to bring some real competition to the upper-mainstream market segment. On paper, everything looks good, and our testing definitely showed real potential for AMD to recapture some lost ground. The problem, as with Nvidia's GPUs, has been retail availability and pricing.

The RX 9070 XT carries an official $599 starting MSRP, but such prices haven't been seen in the U.S. Even now, nearly two months after the initial launch, the lowest prices we've seen tend to be in the $850–$900 range — and those often go out of stock. It's not really worse than what we've seen from the competing RTX 5070 Ti, but neither is it clearly better.

AMD finally brought some real improvements to the Navi 48 GPU, with greatly improved ray tracing and AI performance. Nvidia still holds onto a raw performance and support lead in those areas, but FSR 4 looks promising and native RT performance ends up being competitive. Now we just need to see cards selling for closer to $599, rather than the 40% or more 'markups' that have plagued recent GPU launches from all the involved parties.

—Jarred Walton

Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6

When you’re at home or at the office, you can connect your laptop to one, two or even four external monitors for more screen real estate. But when you’re on the road, you either need to lug one of the best portable monitors or live with a single screen. Lenovo’s ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 offers a different way to get more pixels of workspace.

The ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 features a rollable screen that, with the press of a button, uses a motorized interface to grow from 14 to 16.7 inches, adding a significant amount of additional real estate along the way. You can use those pixels for an additional window or two, but Lenovo also has a utility to help you take advantage of them.

ThinkBook Workspace, an app which comes preloaded, lets you pin widgets such as a to-do list to the bottom of your screen, where that extra space lies. It also allows you to create a virtual display (a window that the OS treats as a separate monitor) or view Smart Copy – a history of your clipboard. You can even put any individual app you want – the browser for example – into a tab in Workspace so it stays pinned to the bottom of your screen while you perform other work at the top.

Read: Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Hands-On

– Avram Piltch

Intel Battlemage and Arc B580

Intel has fallen on hard times, with massive layoffs and underwhelming new CPUs. It's not down and out by any means, but it faces an uphill battle. GPUs have taken over the data centers, powering huge AI clusters, and Intel has finally entered the dedicated GPU market with its Arc graphics cards. Too little, too late? Perhaps, but the second generation Intel Arc Battlemage takes a step in the right direction.

Headlined by the Intel Arc B580, it kicked off the current generation of new GPU architectures in late 2024. Oh, how naive we now look, praising the $249 starting MSRP — that was before we realized just how bad things could get, though there were definitely tremors already. Nearly five months later, the lowest price we can find is the $329 Onix Lumi Arc B580 (that's made by a sibling company to Sapphire, if you're wondering).

Generationally, the Arc B580 delivers an impressive 20% average performance improvement over the Arc A770 16GB, while using about 40W less power on average. That shows real progress, and when coupled with an attractive price, it proved almost too good to be true. It's still faster and costs less than Nvidia's prior-gen RTX 4060, thanks to having 12GB of VRAM. Let's hope Intel can improve the supply and continue to compete in the GPU realm.

—Jarred Walton

Asus ROG Ally X

Perhaps the best way to innovate is to straight up improve. The Asus ROG Ally X took everything its predecessor, the ROG Ally, did, and largely did it better.

While the Ally X uses the same AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme chip and 7-inch display, it has more, faster RAM to improve graphics performance, adds higher power profiles, a larger battery, and better build quality. All of these in combination make it the best PC gaming handheld that runs Windows out of the box.

The RAM is the biggest deal. Because the Z1 Extreme uses the same RAM for both the system and graphics, it lets the integrated GPU shine, and beat out the regular Ally in all of our gaming tests.

There was no successor to the Z1 Extreme when Asus released the Ally X. It could've let the original continue to sell unchanged. But the Ally X, if you can afford its $799.99 price point, feels so much better in every way.

Read: Asus ROG Ally X review

— Andrew E. Freedman

Mac Mini

Wow, is the Mac Mini tiny. The latest redesign is just 5 x 5 inches wide and deep and a petite 2 inches tall, taking up very little space on a desk. And starting at $599, with an M4, 16GB of RAM and 256GB of storage, this is the first value Mac we've seen in a long time.

Shrinking down the Mac Mini didn't come without issues. The power button is on the bottom of the desktop, which is irksome to some, while others say they never shut their Macs off anyway.

There are some smaller Windows PCs out there, but they're often more expensive and come without RAM, an SSD, or an operating system.

Those looking for a family machine that don't need a laptop have a competitive choice in the Mac Mini, which is small, quiet, and stays out of the way so you can focus on your work.

Read: Mac Mini (M4 Pro) tested: Tiny titan

— Andrew E. Freedman

Tryx Panorama 360 AIO cooler

How do you innovate as an AIO cooler company when the latest generation of CPUs just aren’t as hard to keep cool as previous-gen flagships like the 14900K? If you’re Tryx, you borrow a page from high-end phone makers and slap a massive 6.5-inch curved AMOLED screen on your cooler to make sure it stands out, while also delivering excellent cooling performance (thanks to Asetek’s latest Gen8 pump). Not bad for a company I’d never heard of before seeing this cooler at Computex 2024.

While the screen on your AIO might not be your first priority, our reviewer was quite impressed, noting that the curved screen and absolute black levels created a “striking anamorphic 3D effect” using the pre-loaded visuals. You can of course add your own media using the company’s Kanali software.

A VRM fan is included to help chill components around the CPU, and when we tested it last September, the Tryx Panorama was in most ways the best-performing cooler we’d tested to date. But of course, class-leading performance and a curved screen don’t come cheap. The Tryx Panorama sells for around $350.

Read: Tryx Panorama 360 ARGB review

— Matt Safford

Be Quiet Light Base 900

At a Computex 2024 that was overflowing with multi-sided glass cases, Be Quiet’s Light Base stood out for its tasteful, almost retro-style RGB light strip, and for its ability to be oriented three different ways, horizontally, or vertically with the motherboard on the left or right edge. This is accomplished by some clever internal design and removable feet.

When we got it in for testing, we also appreciated its pre-installed ARGB and PWM hubs, as well as its support for back-connector motherboards. It’s solidly built, as we’ve come to expect from Be Quiet. Its thermal performance wasn’t the best, but we found it to be good enough for the vast majority of PC builders, especially gamers and general-purpose users.

Read: Be Quiet Light Base 900 DX review

— Matt Safford

Lian Li EDGE EG1000 ATX 3.1 power supply

Between rear-connector motherboards, the rise in popularity of dual-chamber setups, and the ever-increasing demands of modern GPUs, PC is still continuing to evolve — which is why we're glad to see products like the Lian Li Edge ATX 3.1 PSU evolving along with it. Designed for dual-chamber cases, its L-shaped, fully modular design gives you much easier access to key (and often tough to connect or disconnect) power cables.

The Edge also has a built-in USB header hub so you can connect more internal accessories, and its internals are well designed, as we saw in testing. It's also quiet until you tax it with a heavy load, and efficient. It won't work well for every case, but for dual-chamber designs where the PSU is mounted vertically, it can make building, cable routing, and maintenance much easier.

Read: Lian Li EDGE EG1000 ATX 3.1 power supply review

— Matt Safford

Corsair EX400U external SSD

After years of limited external storage advances, 2025 has brought us both the first Thunderbolt 5 SSD to land on our test bench, as well as the first truly great USB4 drive we’ve tested, Corsair’s EX400U. And while TB5 drives like LaCie Rugged SSD Pro5 can be faster, unless you own a recent Mac, TB5 ports are exceedingly rare, while USB4 is much more common. That, plus the fact that Corsair’s EX400U is small and designed to magnetically attach to the back of your MagSafe or Qi2-ready phone, makes the Corsair drive feel a lot more innovative.

The EX400U also blasted past every other USB-based SSD in our testing, and sometimes even beat the technically faster Thunderbolt 5 drive in Windows over USB4. In our Crystal DiskMark sequential testing, it edged above 4,000 MB/s reads, and topped 3,700 MB/s writes, while the best USB 3.2 2x2 drives were roughly half as fast. We’re sure to see faster USB4 SSDs before too long, but Corsair’s drive is the first we’ve tested that’s easy to recommend, especially if you want a fast drive that’s designed to connect to your phone.

Read: Corsair EX400U review

— Matt Safford

Mechboards Hyper7 R4 Keyboard

In a world where keyboards keep shrinking their numbers of keys, the Mechboards Hyper7 R4 is a real standout. Loosely based on a 1970s keyboard called the Space Cadet, the Hyper7 has 178 keys and weighs a whopping 5 kg (11 pounds). That makes it three or four times heavier than a typical mechanical keyboard and gives it at least dozens of more keys to play with.

We were fortunate enough to get a late prototype of the Hyper7 R4, of which only about 500 units were made. The unique layout has six blocks of keys, many of which have very unique labels such as “SMOL,” “Hold Input,” ”Suspend,” and “Fun.” A lot of these match commands that no longer matter much in 2025, but the good news is that you can use VIA, a popular keyboard mapping software, to remap the keys into any macro you choose.

The symmetrical shape of the Hyper7 R4 takes some getting used to. Normally, keyboards have their spacebars offset a little to the left, not directly in the center. And if you want to use this with Windows, you’ll need to map yourself a Windows key and a CTRL key. However, once you’ve done the work, you’ll be gifted with more macros than you know what to do with.

Read: Mechboards Hyper7 R4 Review

– Avram Piltch

Asus ProArt PA32UCDM 4K 32-inch Gaming Monitor

The Asus ProArt PA32UCDM is a gaming monitor with a dual mission, appealing to two distinct groups of consumers. On the one hand, it’s a highly capable professional monitor with a 32-inch 4K QD-OLED panel, rich, accurate colors, excellent build quality, Dolby Vision support, and bountiful calibration options.

However, the PA32UCDM also caters to gaming enthusiasts by supporting a heady 240 Hz refresh rate at 4K, Nvidia G-Sync, and AMD FreeSync. We’d also be remiss if we didn’t mention the ultra-low input lag, which is critical for gamers looking for every slight advantage in twitchy online multiplayer games.

As if those fundamentals weren’t enough, the PA32UCDM also features HDMI 2.1 connectivity and Thunderbolt 4 ports, which turns the monitor into a professional-oriented peripheral hub with support for up to 96-watt power delivery.

Read: Asus ProArt PA32UCDM 4K 32-inch Gaming Monitor Review

– Brandon Hill

Asus ZenWiFi BT10 Wi-Fi 7 Mesh Router

If you’re looking for a high-end Wi-Fi 7 mesh router to upgrade your home network, look no further than the Asus ZenWiFi BT10. While it doesn’t sit at the tippy top of Asus’ mesh router lineup (that distinction belongs with the ZenWiFi BQ16 Pro), it delivers scintillating performance, broad connectivity options, a rich web user interface with countless configuration options, and a full-featured smartphone app for those that like to tinker with router settings on the go (the BT10 support remote configuration).

We observed strong performance across 6 GHz, 5 GHz, and 2.4 GHz bands, with the former delivering over 2,600 Mbps throughput at close range. The BT10 supports the full Wi-Fi 7 spec, unlike lesser dual-band Wi-Fi 7 mesh routers, and even allows you to utilize up to a 10 Gbps backhaul between the satellites for improved network performance. When you throw in no-cost software features like AI Protection, which is powered by Trend Micro, support for Apple Time Machine backups, and smartphone cellular tethering in case of an ISP outage, and a street price of around $600, the BT10 is hard to beat.

Read: Asus ZenWiFi BT10 Wi-Fi Mesh Router Review

– Brandon Hill

Logitech G Pro X Superlight 2 Dex

The Logitech G Pro X Superlight 2 Dex isn't necessarily the most innovative mouse we've ever seen, but it's a big innovation in Logitech's Superlight lineup, as it's the first non-ambidextrous Superlight mouse. The Superlight lineup has been highly popular with gamers since it debuted, so it's no surprise Logitech hasn't done much to mess with the style — the most recent G Pro X Superlight 2, which came out in Sept. 2023, was almost identical to its predecessor. But the G Pro X Superlight 2 Dex, which came out last September, is a whole different shape: a contoured, right-handed shape with a hump that's shifted toward the center-left.

It's designed to be more ergonomic and easier to hold, and it feels a little like the Razer DeathAdder V3 Pro, which is one of the best gaming mice we've ever used. While we didn't love the smooth finish as much as we like the DeathAdder V3 Pro's matte texture, it does come with precut grip tape in the box, which is perfect for adding extra friction. It's also superlight (of course) — weighing just 2.12 ounces (60g), while the DeathAdder V3 Pro is 2.22 ounces (63g). The G Pro X Superlight 2 Dex has top-notch specs: it sports Logitech's Hero 2 sensor with a maximum resolution of 44,000 DPI, a maximum speed of 888 IPS, and can handle up to 88 G's of acceleration. It also gets polling rates of up to 8,000 Hz, and up to 95 hours of battery life (with a standard 1,000 Hz polling rate).

Read: Logitech G Pro X Superlight 2 Dex Review

— Sarah Jacobsson Purewal

Bambu Lab H2D

The Bambu Lab H2D is one of the most anticipated (and highly speculated about) 3D printers to come out this year and it does not disappoint. Similar to the popular X1 Carbon, the H2D is an amazing high-speed XY core machine that comes fully enclosed with multi-color and multi-material support — but it's so much more than that.

What makes the H2D better is its bigger build volume, the addition of a dual nozzle hotend, an upgraded heated AMS (Automatic Material System), and of course, a laser and cutter module that turns this 3D printer into every elite hobbyist’s dream machine.

Bambu Lab packed the H2D with great innovative features, such as a dual nozzle system, which makes multi-color printing easier and more efficient. It also saves time because you can print multiple colors, minimizing waste. You can even print using different materials, such as PLA with TPU, at the same time. The upgraded AMS is heated and provides the optimal environment for your filaments, keeping them dry and preventing cracking and storage issues.

And best of all, Bambu Lab has added a laser and cutter module that is easy to install and use, equipped with a laser, blade cutter, and pen plotter. It is available with 10W and 40W laser options. Add in a larger, 350 x 320 x 325mm build volume, and makers can complete bigger and more complex projects faster.

The H2D Laser Combo is available for pre-order at $3,499 (10W) and $4,399 (40W). The H2D AMS Combo is now available for $2,699, while the H2D stand-alone model, priced at $2,399, will be available in June 2025.

Read: Bambu Lab H2D Review

— Anj Bryant

Pimoroni Picade Max

A two-player arcade cabinet is hardly an innovation, but what Pimoroni has done with its latest iteration of the Picade series integrates the Raspberry Pi Pico’s PR2040 into multiple aspects of this DIY arcade cabinet kit.

We start with the controls. The dual arcade sticks and corresponding buttons can take the punishment when trying to land that kick, punch or shot in your favorite arcade game. But linking these controls to your choice of a Raspberry Pi 4, 5 or even an ITX based PC is a custom designed arcade controller to USB adapter.

Powered by the RP2040, Picade Max USB Controller handles 25 inputs for a two player setup, and it worked flawlessly with Recalbox. The Raspberry Pi 5 running Recalbox detected the controls as if it were a typical USB controller. Picade Max USB Controller can also work with StemmaQT devices, which means with some clever coding you could install a spinner for games such as Tempest.

Next is sound, and again the RP2040 powers another add-on board. The Picade Max Audio provides 3W of stereo sound output that really impresses. The “attract” screens, used to entice players to part with their quarters, really grab your attention when the booming audio starts to play. Speaking of the attract screen, the large 19 inch IPS display is a huge upgrade over previous models and it provides plenty of screen for two players to fight it out.

The build process is enjoyable, and it will certainly test your skills with a screwdriver. We had access to a beta unit and provided feedback on the build process which is now part of the final retail instructions. If you’ve got kids, this would be an ideal project to learn how to build electronics projects as the goal is just as exciting as the journey to get there.

This is my third Picade, and it just happens to be my favorite, as now I can play games, shoulder to shoulder with my friends and family, just like the old days.

Read: Picade Max Review

– Les Pounder

Arctic is a name well-known and beloved by many PC enthusiasts for providing high-value, quality cooling solutions. I caused a bit of a controversy with my last review, where I didn’t mince words, stating “the Liquid Freezer III is unimpressive.”

Well, it appears that Arctic took my feedback to heart. We’re looking at the Liquid Freezer III Pro today, and let me tell you guys, they take the pro moniker very seriously. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear they designed this cooler just for me. Its performance blew away my expectations – I honestly couldn’t believe my own results until I tested it with both Intel’s Core i7-14700K and AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D CPUs.

Will Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III Pro make our list of best coolers on the market? There’s no doubt about it. Let’s take a look at the specifications and features of the cooler, then we’ll go over thermal performance with both Intel and AMD CPUs, as well as noise levels. Since this is our first review including AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D, I’ll try to spend a little more time explaining how I test coolers and why I chose the methods shown in today’s review.

Cooler specifications

Packing and included contents

The packaging for the cooler is typical for Arctic, advertising the cooler on the outside. Opening the box reveals the contents, carefully protected and packaged with foam, plastic, and cardboard.

Included in the box are the following:

• 120mm P12 Pro fans
• 38mm 360mm radiator
• Thermal paste
• Mounting accessories for modern AMD and Intel platforms
• Installation manual

Features of Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III Pro

▶️ 38mm thick radiator

This AIO’s radiator is thick. At 38mm radiator and 25mm fans, that’s a combined thickness of 63mm – this will present compatibility issues with some cases. So make sure to do some measuring before buying if you’re installing in an existing build.

▶️ Offset mounting for Intel and AMD CPUs

Different CPUs on the market can have different hotspots, which can impact the effectiveness of a cooler. This is why some coolers seem to do better – or worse – with AMD or Intel. Arctic refined its mounting for AMD AM4/AM5 and LGA 1851 systems, resulting in claimed performance increases of up to 9 degrees C with a 250W power limit.

▶️ Pump noise

This AIO’s pump can run a little louder than some users may prefer at full speed. It doesn’t interfere with my noise-normalized testing at 38.9 dBA, but as part of testing this cooler I’ve been investigating different ways to do noise-normalized testing at lower noise levels. To test this cooler normalized at 37.3 dBA required limiting the speed of the liquid pump. That said, if you set up this cooler using the all-in-one cable, the pump will not run at full speed except in the most intensive scenarios, resulting in a quietly running pump that never overpowers the noise of fans.

▶️ New P12 Pro Fans – and a VRM fan too!

There’s more to a cooler than just the heatsink or radiator. The bundled fans have a significant impact on cooling and noise levels, as well as how the cooler looks in your case.

The new P12 Pro fans include 7 blades instead of the 5-bladed fans included with previous Liquid Freezer CPUs, and are pre-installed for convenience. Arctic claims they perform at the same level as their MAX fans, but at a lower noise level. That’s not to say these fans run quietly though. As you’ll see in our benchmarks below, they can get pretty loud!

Real world testing configuration – Intel LGA1700 and AMD AM5 platform

My results may differ from others because I place an emphasis on having results that are comparable to real world use.

This means that I test CPU coolers inside of a closed desktop case, which increases cooling difficulty compared to other testing methods - many will test CPU coolers outside of a case, on an open test bench. Open benches have lowered ambient temperatures, which in turn makes weak coolers appear stronger than they really are. Some publications have used generic thermal plates to test cooling solutions.

I reject both of these methods because they don’t accurately reflect the real world conditions a CPU cooler is used in.

My previous reviews have also tested Intel’s latest platform, using the Core Ultra 9 285K Arrow Lake CPU. We’re going to be retiring this from our testing suite. Between BIOS updates and Windows updates, Arrow Lake’s thermal characteristics have changed in some scenarios – rendering much of our previous testing data useless.

With today’s review, we’re adding AMD’s recently released Ryzen 9 9950X3D! This is one beast of a CPU, providing the best gaming and multithreaded performance on the market – and can prove quite challenging thermally when PBO is enabled for overclocking.

AM4/AM5 and LGA 1700/1851 installation

The installation of this cooler is simple, but a bit of a pain for Intel users due to the required use of a custom contact frame for the CPU.

1. You’ll first need to remove the standard CPU socket if you’re using an Intel CPU. AMD users will remove the default mounting mechanism.

2. Next you’ll set the rubber standoffs on AMD systems, or carefully install the custom mounting frame for Intel systems.

You may notice the additional standoffs present in the Intel system’s photo below. This is because I used another cooler’s mounting to secure the CPU socket while I installed the custom frame.

3. Next, AMD users should take the mounting bars and place them on top of the rubber standoffs, securing them with the included screws. Intel users can skip to the next step.

4. Apply the included thermal paste to your CPU. If you have any questions on how to do this properly, please refer to our handy guide on how to apply thermal paste.

5. Mount the CPU block and secure it with a screwdriver.

6. Once complete, connect the cabling to the CPU block’s head. For the purposes of testing, I chose the option with individual PWM control for the fans, pump, and VRM fan. However, some users may prefer the simplicity of the all-in-one cable. Connect the cables and place the VRM fan on top of the CPU block, and installation is complete!

CPU-only thermal results with PBO enabled: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Without power limits enforced, the hottest CPUs on the market will hit their peak temperature (TJ Max) and thermally throttle with even the strongest of air coolers, and even most liquid coolers on the market, in intensive stress testing. For the best liquid coolers on the market, the results of this test will be shown using the CPU’s temperature. However, when the CPU reaches its peak temperature, I’ve measured the CPU package power to determine the maximum wattage cooled to best compare their performance. It’s important to note that thermal performance can scale differently depending on the CPU it’s being tested with.

We’ll start by looking at the performance of this cooler with AMD’s newly released Ryzen 9 9950X3D CPU, with the disclaimer that I’ve only had a limited amount of time to test coolers with this system and Arctic’s previous coolers have performed better on AMD systems.

Honestly, the results shown above blew my mind. When even Hyte’s massive THICC Q60 throttled after enabling PBO – I doubted that any AIO could fully tame AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D - but Arctic proved that assumption wrong, easily taming AMD’s flagship CPU!

CPU-only thermal results with power limits removed: Intel’s i7-14700K

My last reviews of Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III did not show impressive performance with Intel’s i7-13700K or i7-14700K – at least when pure CPU performance was being considered.

Arctic’s engineering team appears to have taken my feedback to heart, as they delivered the most incredible performance improvements that I have ever seen in an AIO – thrashing their competition, outperforming the closest competitor by a whopping 13 degrees C! I was convinced I had made a mistake or some kind of error, until I retested Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III Pro again the next day, finding the same incredible results!

But of course, a cooler’s maximum performance can’t be considered in and of itself. You should also consider the noise levels of a cooler. And to be honest, this is Arctic’s noisiest product yet, reaching a whopping 52.6 dBA! If you are sensitive to noise, you’ll want to limit this AIO’s fan speeds.

CPU-only thermal results with noise normalized to 38.9 dBA

Finding the right balance between fan noise levels and cooling performance is important. While running fans at full speed can improve cooling capacity to some extent, the benefits are limited and many users prefer a quieter system.

With this noise-normalized test, I’ve set noise levels to 38.9 dBA using the i7-14700K system. This level of noise is a low volume level, but slightly audible to most people. The LF3 Pro reigns supreme here, tying for the best results I’ve seen from any AIO yet.

I’ve also begun to test noise-normalized results with AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D, but I’m going to wait until I’ve recorded more data to present this information. One important observation from this testing: the pump will interfere with lower levels of noise-normalized testing if it is run at 100% RPM. If you want a silently running cooler running less than 38.2 dBA, you’ll need to run the pump at less than maximum speeds.

200W Power Limit

My older reviews have focused more on tests with both the CPU and GPU being stressed, but many of y’all have indicated that you would like to see more CPU-only tests. So we’re going to look at thermal and noise performance for AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D at stock CPU settings – which limits power consumption to 200W.

There’s only a limited selection of coolers here, because I’ve only just started testing AMD’s new flagship CPU. However, it is no surprise Arctic dominates this chart based on our earlier results. It does get a bit noisy by default, so again I’d advise limiting maximum fan speeds.

150W CPU + 290W GPU results

Testing a CPU Cooler in isolation is great for synthetic benchmarks, but doesn’t tell the whole story of how it will perform. If your GPU is running a full load, that heat doesn’t just disappear – it makes it harder for your CPU cooler to do its job due to the increased heat within your computer case.

The CPU power limit of 150W was chosen based on the worst CPU power consumption I’ve seen reported in gaming with AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D. My personal experience has shown most games to use much lower amounts of power, but this might be biased by the games I play.

The lead over competing liquid coolers lowers in this scenario, but Arctic commands a significant improvement over air coolers – nearly 15C! Noise levels are tolerable here, reaching 43.8 dBA. This isn’t quiet, but it’s not too bad either.

140W CPU results

The last round of test results we’ll look at in today’s review is a test with a 140W power limit imposed. This level of power is dramatically easier to cool for most CPU coolers – and as a result, this is the easiest test we’ll run with AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D CPU for liquid coolers – but I’ve recorded lower power results for comparisons with SFF and air coolers for future reviews.

In line with the rest of our test results, Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III Pro delivers outstanding performance – even outperforming Hyte’s infamous THICC Q60 by over 6C!

Conclusion

Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III Pro delivers outstanding performance, taking the thermal crown when tested with both AMD and Intel’s most difficult to cool CPUs. At only $125 USD, it offers a relatively budget price – and can often be found for even less (it was selling for just $89 on Amazon when this was edited). The LF3 Pro is an improvement in every way compared to its predecessor, earning our rarest rating – 5 stars! My biggest complaint is that the fans can run a little loud; most users will want to limit the maximum speeds of the fans. Other than that, the LF III Pro is basically AIO perfection.

PC overclocking and hardware expert Roman ‘Der8auer’ Hartung has shared his before-and-after AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D delidding test results. His conclusion: enthusiasts can expect up to 10% higher performance with direct-die cooling, but the cost will be significantly higher power consumption. Alternatively, Der8auer observed that users could run the delidded CPU at stock settings and enjoy far lower temperatures, around 23 degrees Celsius lower in this case, plus improved efficiency. A comfortable compromise might be found between these sampled extremes.

In the above video we see Der8auer introduce the awesome AMD Ryzen 9950X3D, then establish a baseline performance / thermal profile, before the delidding operation. Subsequently, he used the same liquid cooler, settings, and benchmarks to see what benefits the delidding process could deliver.

During the delidding process, Der8auer provided some sage advice. He used the still-compatible Delid-Die-Mate Ryzen 7000 device for the 9950X3D. Please take your time ‘wiggling’ the HIS, perhaps up to 100 times, “until it falls off by itself,” plead the overclocker. An example of a rush job he shared (reproduced below) should be warning enough for would-be delidders to be patient.

The overclocking expert published two charts with the before and after delidding performance and power consumption on show. In the Cinebench R23 multi-thread tests chart, which we embedded below, you can see a key takeaway: the delidded Ryzen X3D chip could deliver up to 9% better performance in this productivity benchmark. However, it is questionable whether the 73% increase in power consumption would be worth it. Der8auer also tested Counter Strike 2 4K during his video, and provided a similar chart.

If you buy the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D but don't feel driven to wring every-last-ounce of performance out of it – Der8auer notes that the delidded CPU can run much cooler at stock settings. He seemed impressed that his sample could run at 65 degrees Celsius under load – which is a temperature reduction of 23 degrees Celsius compared to the CPU as shipped from AMD with IHS ‘octopus’ attached. This modded chip also ran at 290W under load, using about 20W less power than the original chip.

If you are interested in more 9950X3D delidding news, we recently retold the hair-raising tale of an ‘amateur’ delidding one of AMD’s best CPUs for gaming using some fishing line and a clothes iron - plus nerves of steel.

Today, G.Skill announced two new high-speed and high-capacity DDR5 memory kits to compete against the best RAM. Tailored toward enthusiasts under the Trident Z5 RGB and Z5 Royal Neo series, the latest offerings include what G.Skill claims is the world's first 128GB (64GBx2) memory kit running at DDR5-8000 speeds alongside a 64GB (32GBx2) DDR5-9000 offering for those prioritizing speed. There's no word on pricing and availability, though we expect more details to be unwrapped in the future.

128GB memory kits, typically configured as 64GBx2 for optimal speed, are widely available with speeds ranging from DDR5-5600 to DDR5-6000. G.Skill's latest Trident Z5 Royal Neo 64GB modules fill this gap in the market. They are advertised to hit DDR5-8000 speeds when overclocked.

The "Neo" designation indicates that this memory kit is designed and optimized for AMD's AM5 platform. Likewise, the 32GB DDR5-9000 modules are intended for Intel's Arrow Lake platform. However, the press release doesn't specify if these kits are CUDIMM-based.

G.Skill prepped a test bench featuring an AMD Ryzen 9 9950X on an Asus ROG Crosshair X870E Apex motherboard. The attached validation screenshot shows the 128GB Trident Z5 Royal kit running at DDR5-8000 CL44-58-58 speeds. If tighter timings are your priority, G.Skill recently introduced a 96GB DDR5-6400 kit with CL30 latency. However, they haven't explicitly stated support for AMD's EXPO technology.

Moving over to the Intel setup that was outfitted with the Core Ultra 7 265K and the Asus ROG Maximus Z890 Apex, the 64GB Trident Z5 RGB counterpart operates at an impressive 9000 MT/s with CL48-64-64 timings under MemtestPro 4.0. Intel's Arrow Lake processors officially support DDR5-5600 for standard DIMMs and DDR5-6400 for CUDIMM. Anything above that is out of JEDEC specifications and might require some tuning to ensure stability.

Likewise, Raphael and Granite Ridge work best at DDR5-6000 and DDR5-6400 speeds, respectively. Achieving DDR5-8000 on AM5 typically requires a 1:2 ratio, with the UCLK running at half the MCLK frequency. Your mileage may vary depending on your motherboard and CPU's memory controller, but these are impressive results. When purchasing high-end kits, ensure your motherboard is on the Qualified Vendor List of your RAM kit for compatibility. Keeping your BIOS up to date can also enhance stability.

German tech retailer Alternate has explained a controversial recent listing on its website for an RTX 5090 with missing ROPs. On the site it was classified as "B-stock" that, despite the apparent defect, was being sold for more than the graphic card model's MSRP. The online store confirmed has now that this GPU was part of a customer return and was never intended for sale (via ComputerBase).

The first case of an RTX 50 series GPU with missing ROP units dates back to late February, with many subsequent reports to follow as awareness increased. ROPs are hardware units on your GPU responsible for pixel processing, blending, anti-aliasing, and writing to the frame buffer. All displayed pixel data must go through the ROP units before it can be written to the GPU's memory.

Nvidia later issued a clarification asserting only 0.5% of produced RTX 5090s and RTX 5070 Tis were impacted, asking affected customers to push their respective board partners for a replacement. After it was revealed that this manufacturing defect extended to the RTX 5080 as well, testing by Gamer's Nexus showed that GPUs with a missing ROP cluster take an up to 11% performance hit while gaming.

Considering the broad Blackwell shortage, retailers selling defective units with missing ROPs at a discount wouldn't be surprising. Last week, Alternate listed a "B-stock" RTX 5090 with 168 (out of 176 advertised) ROPs for €2,899 ($3,100), a price that's comparable to fully functional models. After the news emerged, the German store contacted ComputerBase, explaining that the listed GPU was the consequence of an internal system error and was never intended to be sold.

B-stock typically refers to products that are no longer considered new due to issues like cosmetic flaws or customer returns. Based on the extent of these issues, retailers then establish a reasonable price tag for these items. The defective RTX 5090 at Alternative was likely misclassified as B-stock in their database due to a part defect: the missing ROP units. Moreover, the system defaulted to the cost of a brand-new RTX 5090, as it was probably not designed to price GPUs with missing ROPs in the first place.

The GPU has now been delisted from the website, and it was apparently a customer return, likely intended for replacement. Blackwell supply is gradually improving but the same cannot be said for the prices.

Even though street prices barely adhere to the MSRP, AIBs are continuing to increase them as we move into April. The average selling price of an RTX 5090 Founders Edition at eBay has stabilized at $4,000 but we're still likely months away from normality. Sadly, this trend continues to plague both current-gen and last-gen GPUs, not just from Nvidia, but from all three vendors.

Update 4/1/2025 4:21 PT: Clarified the below text that not all of the 100 reports are indicative of chip failures. Rather, some could be due to boot issues.

Updated article:

The Ryzen 7 9800X3D, regarded as one of the best CPUs, has captured the attention of gamers seeking to upgrade their gaming rigs. However, AMD's 3D V-Cache chip has also sparked another discussion, as user feedback regarding alleged premature failures on Reddit (courtesy of natty_overlord) has grown to over 100 cases. Many of the cases have been resolved by RMA'ing the CPUs.

The first cases of the Ryzen 7 9800X3D issues date back to November of last year. However, it seems to be an ongoing issue, as new user reports have periodically popped up over the past few months. Redditor natty_overlord, who did all the legwork, compiled a list of all the user reports with their respective links in the Reddit thread. So far, the tally of problematic Ryzen 9000 (codenamed Granite Ridge) processors has reached 120 cases. However, it isn't entirely clear how many units have failed to boot due to defective silicon or are simply refusing to boot due to a firmware issue. Regardless, a large number of the units have been RMA'd, and replacement CPUs tend to correct the issue.

According to the statistics, 108 incidents are associated with the Ryzen 7 9800X3D, while there have only been two cases involving the Ryzen 9 9950X3D. Meanwhile, the remaining 10 incidents originate from the vanilla Ryzen 9000 lineup. Overall, the numbers aren't alarming, considering that AMD likely sells hundreds of thousands of these Zen 5 chips. Nonetheless, history has taught us that no matter how small the number of affected cases may be, they still warrant an investigation.

Ryzen 9000 Failures By Motherboard Brands

Most of the Ryzen 7 9800X3D problems seemed to have occurred on ASRock motherboards. Up to 82% of the incidents were on an ASRock motherboard. Asus, MSI, and Gigabyte rank second, third, and fourth, respectively, with participation rates of 13%, 4%, and 1%.

It's important to highlight that the data has nothing to do with motherboard quality or reliability. It could be a matter of consumer preference, as ASRock motherboards are typically more friendly on the pocket than rival brands. It's hard to pinpoint a specific model since the failures have appeared on entry-level models, such as the B850M-X, up to the flagship X870E Taichi SKU.

In February, ASRock released new firmware for its AM5 motherboards that reportedly solves boot issues. The firmware's description reads, "improve minority proportion of AMD 9000 series CPU boot issue." While ASRock addresses the boot issues, the company didn't share any information on whether these issues are related to all of the Ryzen 7 9800X3D issues. It is possible that these boot issues spurred many of the RMA requests.

Ryzen 7 9800X3D Failures By Chipset

The Ryzen 7 9800X3D's issues have happened on the latest 800-series motherboards and the last-generation 600-series motherboards. However, it was more prevalent in the former, with the X870 chipset accounting for 45% of the boot failures and the B650 accounting for 33%. At first glance, the problem should not be about motherboard quality since the X870 chipset is usually featured on premium motherboards with robust design and components.

It was the opposite on the 600-series motherboards, where the B650 chipset corresponded to 15% of the Ryzen 7 9800X3D failures and the X670 chipset with just 7%.

Only a thorough investigation can uncover what is truly happening. ASRock Japan previously attributed the issue to a memory problem and stated that the recently released firmware would resolve it. We can't help but recall the earlier Ryzen 7000 burnout scandal related to AMD EXPO profiles and SoC voltages and wonder if we're witnessing a similar malfunction. ASRock retrieved one malfunctioning Ryzen 7 9800X3D, found debris in the AM5 socket, and demonstrated that properly cleaning the AM5 socket restored it to working order. However, not all cases are related to debris in the socket.

The time of failures looks random, with some user feedback pointing to a couple of hours and others to a few months. It's not a contest or anything, but the record is currently at the half-hour mark. The problem continues to spread as we see constant user feedback in the ASRock subreddit's mega-thread. The last report was from an hour ago, where one Redditor showed the underside of his Ryzen chip with scorch marks, which points to a severe problem in that case.

A PC overclocking enthusiast says that they successfully delidded their AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D with just a length of fishing line and a clothes iron. VideoCardz spotted Redditor UserBhoss asserting that the operation went smoothly, and that they saved $60 and the waiting time that ordering a Thermal Grizzly Delid Die Mate would have required.

They wrote that “boy was it scary,” so there’s the cost of shredded nerves to account for.

First in the subreddit? 9950X3D Delid and Direct Die! from r/overclocking

The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D is a highly desirable gaming and productivity processor, as well as a rather expensive piece of tech, so UserBhoss was rightfully nervous when following a makeshift delidding procedure without specially crafted tools.

Current AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D price = $699.99
Compatible Delid Die Mate Amazon price = $54.90

Put off by the cost and wait involved with acquiring proper delidding hardware, UserBhoss says they “did the clothes iron fishing string method.” Later the redditor specified that “Seaguar 15lb 0.11 diameter” fishing line was chosen, which “didn’t snap once.” We are more familiar with DIYers using dental floss for this purpose.

The Redditor provided some further insights into their personal delidding experience, which was apparently their “first ever delid for a CPU.” The process began by using the fishing line to cut through the adhesive between the ‘octopus’ IHS legs and the chip's substrate.

Then, it was time to wield the clothes iron, to heat up the IHS and melt the solder AMD uses to stick this metal to the chip beneath. Holding the iron on the processor for “2-3 seconds, about 5-7 times” resulted in the IHS easily sliding off. Lastly, liquid metal was used to remove most of the remaining indium.

The overclocking enthusiast did actually have some Thermal Grizzly gear to hand for the next step. They employed a TG Direct Die Frame to correctly join the exposed silicon with a custom loop CPU liquid cooling system.

“Overall she works perfect, able to hit ALMOST 6,000 MHz overclocked, 5,942 MHz to be exact, perfectly stable.” UserBhoss asserts. “Hits about 72-73 in FurMark CPU burner, which is pretty good.”

This article covers our picks for the best graphics cards for gaming in 2026. Amid the AI gold rush and consequent supply crunch for consumer silicon, no truly new gaming GPUs have been introduced in almost a year. If you haven't already upgraded your graphics card after the GeForce RTX 50-series and Radeon RX 9000-series launches in 2025, well, you're still looking at the exact same products now.

AMD did make its formerly China-only Radeon RX 9070 GRE available globally after Computex 2026, but in our review, we found that $549 product to be too expensive given the level of performance it delivers and the compromises made to hit its price point, so it isn't joining the list here. Check out that coverage for all the details.

Most of the products we recommend remain at elevated prices compared to their MSRPs, but this is just life in mid-2026.

It's admittedly cold comfort, but unless you're shopping for an RTX 5090, graphics card prices haven't risen much more than they already did earlier this year. Compared to the doubling or tripling of prices we've seen for RAM kits and SSDs in 2026 versus last year, a GPU upgrade remains a relatively affordable (and self-contained) option, either as a boost for an existing PC or part of an all-new parts list.

Even if you can’t build an all-new system, you can just put a new graphics card in an older PC and still enjoy boosts to gaming performance, image quality, or both—especially if you can upgrade your monitor at the same time.

As we discuss in further depth below, the arrival of DLSS 4.5 upscaling (for RTX 40-series and 50-series cards, at least) and expanded multipliers for Multi-Frame Generation, which now can boost frame rates by up to 5x or 6x, means that driving a high-resolution, high-refresh-rate monitor is now easier than ever if you're considering a GeForce RTX 50-series graphics card.

Read on to see our picks in today's gaming graphics card market.

Best graphics cards for gaming, at a glance

The above list shows all the latest-gen graphics cards we feel stand out in their segments. If you want to see how all of the current and prior generation GPUs stack up, check our GPU benchmarks hierarchy. We also have performance benchmarks further below.

When accounting for pricing, we perform our own research to find the midpoint of current prices for a given graphics card, rather than taking a vendor's MSRP at face value. We feel this method tends to be most representative of the price you're likely to see for products in stock.

If you can find a card for less than this midpoint, it's likely closer to (or even less than) a vendor's MSRP and a better value. Conversely, if you find one for more than this midpoint, it could be a worse value (or too close in price to a more powerful card that's a step up). Tread carefully.

The overall performance ranking incorporates 19 games from our 2026 test suite, which takes the geometric mean (i.e., equal weighting) for both rasterization and ray tracing games. Note that we are not including any upscaling or frame generation results in the table.

Raw performance may be the most important consideration for most gamers, but it's not the only metric that matters. Our subjective rankings below factor in price, power usage, and power efficiency, and features colored by our own years of experience. Others may offer a slightly different take, but all of the cards on this list are worthy of your consideration.

Upscaling and frame generation mean GPUs are more than just a chip

GPU performance goes beyond the hardware these days. Choosing a particular GPU vendor means you're buying into a complex software stack that includes upscaling, frame generation, and (more rarely) AI-powered RT denoising technologies.

In Nvidia's corner, the DLSS 4.5 upscaling model and its second-generation transformer architecture offer superior image quality to other upscaling tech (and with lower input resolutions, meaning higher potential performance), but it's more computationally expensive than past DLSS models and works best on RTX 50-series and 40-series cards.

The DLSS 4 model and its first-gen transformer architecture still work with cards going all the way back to the RTX 20-series family. Not all games implement DLSS 4 natively, but Nvidia allows you to force the usage of that model in many older titles through the Nvidia App utility, so you can practically always get the latest and greatest.

Between native support and driver overrides, DLSS is available in virtually any modern game you might want to play. Nvidia recently marked DLSS feature availability in over 1000 titles.

RTX 50-series GPUs are Nvidia's first with support for multi-frame generation (MFG), which allows Blackwell GPUs to insert anywhere from one to five AI-generated intermediate frames between each native one (for a 2x, 3x, 4x, or even 5x or 6x frame rate boost). RTX 40-series GPUs also support framegen, but only with a 2x boost.

Meanwhile, AMD's FSR 4 offers AI-enhanced upscaling with superior image quality to other FSR versions, but official support for it is limited to RX 9000-series Radeons for now. AMD will bring FSR 4 upscaling to RX 7000-series cards in July 2026 and RX 6000-series cards in early 2027.

In the meantime, AMD's FSR 3.1 and earlier upscalers still work on any GPU, but the image quality tends to be noticeably lower than both DLSS and FSR 4.

AI-enhanced FSR framegen (aka ML Frame Generation) arrived on AMD cards as part of the FSR Redstone update late last year. Like FSR 4 upscaling, ML Frame Generation is limited to Radeon RX 9000 cards, and it can be enabled in compatible games using a control panel override for titles that don't natively have it.

Legacy FSR frame gen remains available, too. Its framerate-doubling boost remains cross-compatible with GPUs from all vendors, but its image quality can't keep up with the AI-powered frame gen tech of the latest AMD and Nvidia models.

Intel XeSS upscaling can be superior to FSR 3.x, but it isn't available in as many games as FSR or DLSS. It works best on Arc GPUs, but like FSR, it's cross-compatible with a wide range of graphics cards from AMD and Nvidia if you need it.

XeSS 2 with AI-enhanced frame generation is now available in 95 games as of this writing and requires an Arc GPU. XeSS 3 brings multi frame generation to the party through both native support and a driver override in compatible titles.

All that said, we don't think you should go out of your way to buy an Intel Arc card for gaming in 2026 for reasons we'll get into later.

1. Best high-end graphics card: GeForce RTX 5070 Ti, $1099.99

If you want the best blend of high performance and cutting-edge graphics tech out there for 1440p or 4K gaming, the GeForce RTX 5070 Ti is it. This card comes with full support for Nvidia’s latest DLSS 4.5 upscaling and Multi Frame Generation tech, and its 16GB of VRAM gives you full freedom to enable every DLSS 4 feature.

AMD’s closest competitor, the Radeon RX 9070 XT, is way cheaper than the RTX 5070 Ti right now, but the AMD card obviously doesn’t support DLSS 4 or MFG. For the privilege of those capabilities, you'll generally need to spend a whopping 45% more cash right now for just 5% more baseline performance than AMD’s best before you start enabling all the DLSS 4 features Blackwell supports.

Is that worth it? Yes, if you can swing it. Here's why: getting the best gaming performance on modern graphics cards is as much a software problem as a hardware one. Tuning your gaming experience to taste requires access to high-quality upscaling, frame generation, and (more infrequently) an AI-powered RT denoiser like DLSS Ray Reconstruction.

Even amid its shift to AI and data center products, Nvidia ensures that its full suite of DLSS tech is adopted in virtually every new game, whereas AMD's support of FSR 4 adoption has become rather hit-or-miss.

The RTX 5070 Ti also offers superior RT performance versus the RX 9070 XT across our 2026 test suite. Beyond that baseline, Nvidia is working with developers to enable impressive path-traced effects in many of the latest AAA releases.

In our recent experience, path-traced games play best with DLSS 4.5 upscaling and MFG at your disposal, and being able to consistently rely on the availability of those features makes the extra cash for the 5070 Ti worth it.

Our recent GPU Hierarchy retesting has shown that high-end graphics cards are becoming five- to eight-year investments, and Nvidia's ongoing commitment to developer relations and new software features means that you'll enjoy a first-class gaming experience throughout the life of your 5070 Ti no matter what games you want to play on it.

Spread out over that time span, the extra cost of the RTX 5070 Ti versus the RX 9070 XT is worth it for the better experience.

What about the RTX 5080? Nvidia's second-fastest Blackwell card is anywhere from 8% to 16% faster than the 5070 Ti, with the biggest gap at 4K. Prices for the 5080 in June 2026 remain insane, however, and at the midpoint of current prices, the 5080 is 33% more expensive than the 5070 Ti.

There's no way the RTX 5080 offers anywhere close to enough value for the money to justify the step up right now unless you're looking for the fastest thing this side of a 5090 for 4K gaming.

Read: Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070 Ti review

2. Best enthusiast value graphics card: Radeon RX 9070 XT, $759.99

The Radeon RX 9070 XT is AMD's most well-rounded graphics card in years. It delivers raw gaming performance within spitting distance of the GeForce RTX 5070 Ti for far less money, making it a strong value at first glance. But that appealing price tag comes with a number of asterisks in mid-2026 that mean it's no longer our first pick for high-end PC gaming.

AMD shored up two of its greatest weaknesses against Nvidia with the RX 9070 XT's RDNA 4 architecture: RT performance and AI acceleration, both of which are closer to Nvidia's latest and greatest. And AMD did all that while keeping power efficiency right there with Nvidia, too.

The FSR 4 upscaler is a big jump in image quality over FSR 3, and FSR ML Frame Generation now offers higher-quality framegen on the RX 9070 XT than FSR 3's approach, although it's still limited to a simple doubling of frame rates versus DLSS Multi Frame Generation's versatility.

The problem for the RX 9070 XT in mid-2026 is that FSR 4.x upscaling still trails Nvidia's flagship DLSS 4.5 in image quality, and AMD isn't driving the adoption of FSR 4 features nearly as aggressively as Nvidia is for DLSS. Driver-level overrides for those features can't entirely close the gap.

Worse, you might find the RX 9070 XT entirely shut out of features that you might want to enable in certain games. For just a couple of examples, Radeon gamers can't enable path-traced effects at all in recent titles like Pragmata and Resident Evil Requiem, and 007 First Light sticks you with FSR 3 upscaling that can't be overriden through a driver toggle due to the way it's implemented.

And in our latest GPU Hierarchy retesting with the RX 9070 XT, we saw major performance issues in Grand Theft Auto V Enhanced and minor visual corruptions in Stalker 2 that weren't present on GeForces or on RX 7000- or RX 6000-series cards. We don't think these issues should have slipped past any QA program, especially for such popular and high-profile games, but they sting especially hard on a current-gen product.

All that means the overall ownership experience of an RTX 5070 Ti and an RX 9070 XT is significantly different in mid-2026. We think that gamers shopping in this price class should be able to expect a consistently high level of software feature support and quality across all the games they might want to play, and Nvidia provides that assurance better than AMD does right now.

If you're willing to gamble with the availability of FSR 4 features, for RT or path-traced effects, and don't care to tune the smoothness of your gaming experience with frame generation, the RX 9070 XT's shortcomings versus the RTX 5070 Ti may be easier to overlook given the large amount of cash that will remain in your pocket.

But we also think that you should look closely at what you're giving up before reflexively choosing an RX 9070 XT over an RTX 5070 Ti, despite its strong value at a glance.

Read: AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT review

3. Best midrange graphics card: GeForce RTX 5070, $659.99

Until 2026 rolled around, the GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB had been our entry-to-midrange Blackwell gaming favorite. But the $579 midpoint of current pricing puts the 5060 Ti 16GB's on-shelf price above that of the RTX 5070's $549 MSRP, and the 5070 is one of the least marked-up graphics cards out there at the moment.

As a result, it's possible to find RTX 5070s for about $670, and that makes it an easy call to step up for less than $100 more than 5060 Ti 16GBs.

The RTX 5070 is about 30% faster than the RTX 5060 Ti 16GB across our 2026 test suite, and that's a huge leap that you'll easily see on the right monitor for just 15% more money.

The advent of DLSS 4.5 upscaling, which makes it possible to achieve superior delivered image quality at lower input resolutions than older DLSS versions, also takes some VRAM pressure off the RTX 5070's 12GB of GDDR7, making the deployment of RT and DLSS MFG more practical on this card than it has been in the past.

And as with the RTX 5070 Ti, the universal availability of DLSS 4.5 (both natively and through app overrides) plus MFG makes this card a fast and flexible performer across all of the games you might want to play in 2026.

Given the image quality of DLSS 4.5 and the smoothness boost of MFG, along with the higher baseline RT performance of this card versus the 9070 in our 2026 testing, we think the 5070 should be your first pick for a midrange gaming card right now.

In an ideal world, the RTX 5070 would have more VRAM to allow for unhindered exploration of everything DLSS 4 and MFG have to offer, especially at a native 4K resolution. If you're pushing those limits, we'd still recommend the Radeon RX 9070 thanks to its 16GB of VRAM.

But if you're on a 1440p monitor where VRAM is less of an issue and want DLSS 4.5 over FSR 4, as most gamers do, the RTX 5070 is still a strong performer, and you're less likely to run into its limits.

Read: Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070 review

4. An AMD midrange alternative: Radeon RX 9070, $629.99

If you primarily play raster titles at native resolution and aren't on board with upscaling or framegen, the Radeon RX 9070 remains a strong midrange alternative to the RTX 5070. It's one of the least marked-up 16GB graphics cards available even with today's AI headwinds, and in a world where MSRPs have largely been forgotten, that makes the RX 9070 a strong value.

The GeForce RTX 5070 and RX 9070 go neck-and-neck in our test suite, but the RX 9070 has 16GB of VRAM and the RTX 5070 has just 12GB. Especially if you're trying to push 4K games at native resolution, that extra VRAM matters.

But the advent of DLSS 4.5 upscaling, which provides image quality that's practically indistinguishable from native rendering even at relatively low input resolutions, means that the RTX 5070 is a more potent midrange graphics card in 2026 than it was at launch.

On top of their inherent technical superiority, you can find DLSS 4 and MFG in most every game released today, which can't be said for FSR 4.x upscaling or ML framegen. AMD's driver overrides make up some of the gap, to be sure, but not all of it.

And as with the RX 9070 XT, AMD gamers may find themselves locked out of certain features like path tracing (in major releases like Pragmata and Resident Evil Requiem) or FSR overrides (in 007 First Light) entirely.

The RX 9070 is subject to the same minor image quality issues and performance hitches we saw with the RX 9070 XT, and those issues could certainly be overcome with future software updates. But we think that if you're looking for the best midrange graphics card, it should be free of those issues entirely, and so the RTX 5070 is our first pick for this price point right now.

Read: AMD Radeon RX 9070 review

5. Best enthusiast value graphics card: Radeon RX 9060 XT 16GB, $469.99

AMD's Radeon RX 9060 XT 16GB can handle basically anything the mainstream gamer can throw at it at 1920x1080 and 2560x1440, all at a price that comes in way under the sky-high markups on the RTX 5060 Ti 16GB as of this writing.

At a midpoint of $459.99 in mid-2026, prices for the RX 9060 XT 16GB are the highest we've ever seen, dulling the 9060 XT 16GB's reputation as the value-minded builder's GPU of choice. But with no cheaper Radeons worth recommending in the lineup, what can you do?

In any case, the RX 9060 XT enjoys the much-improved ray-tracing and AI performance of the RDNA 4 architecture, both of which bring Radeons a lot closer to the latest Nvidia competition. And its 16GB of VRAM gives mainstream gamers the assurance they'll basically never find VRAM a bottleneck in modern games at 1080p and 1440p resolutions.

Like the RX 9070 XT, the 9060 XT 16GB gives you access to AMD's much-improved FSR 4 upscaling tech, allowing you to boost performance with a small hit to image quality in the small but growing list of titles that support it.

Even with its new ML-powered model, FSR Frame Generation remains limited to a doubling of output frame rate at best, so it’s not a direct competitor to Nvidia’s DLSS 4 with MFG.

If you want more frames, AMD just launched the RX 9070 GRE globally for $549, and it provides a decent step up in performance for less than $100 more, especially if you're only gaming at 1080p or 1440p. But the more powerful RX 9070 can be found for just $50 more than the GRE, and then you're contemplating the even more powerful and versatile RTX 5070, too.

The RTX 5060 Ti 8GB is the RX 9060 XT 16GB's closest Nvidia competition, dollar for dollar, but we can’t recommend it at all. If you're spending over $350 on a GPU, we don't think you should have to fine-tune every setting to avoid running out of VRAM. The RX 9060 XT is easy to live with for a wide range of gamers in a wide range of titles, and that’s why it won our Editor’s Choice award.

Read: AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT 16GB review

6. The best graphics card for 1080p gaming: Nvidia GeForce RTX 5060, $369.99

If you want to get your game on at 1080p, we think the RTX 5060 is still your best bet in mid-2026. The midpoint of RTX 5060 prices is around $370 right now thanks to the AI crunch, but you can still find them for as little as $350 if you're willing to shop around.

The RTX 5060 has impressive baseline performance for 1080p gaming in wildly popular titles like Fortnite, Counter-Strike 2, Marvel Rivals, and Apex Legends that aren't hungry for giant pools of VRAM. And if you are trying to push higher output resolutions in demanding AAA games, the universal availability of DLSS 4.5 upscaling means that it's easy to achieve near-native image quality at lower input resolutions than before, making the RTX 5060 a more flexible performer than ever.

If you can tune your settings right, enabling DLSS 4 Multi-Frame Generation could make for an even smoother ride on this card, but we find that 8GB of VRAM isn't enough to consistently enable framegen in the titles where you'd really want it. The feature often doesn't work if you're already at the limits of the RTX 5060's memory pool (or that of any 8GB Blackwell card), since the MFG AI model needs some VRAM of its own to run.

AMD's toughest competition for the RTX 5060 is the RX 9060 XT 8GB, which also lists for $299 but is now selling for about the same $350 as you'll see RTX 5060s going for. Supply of those cards has largely dried up in mid-2026, however, and you're likely to see only a couple options for them from any e-tailer.

Despite its much-maligned 8GB of VRAM, the 9060 XT 8GB put in a strong showing in our 2026 GPU Hierarchy testing, but not consistently enough to beat out the RTX 5060 and take home our general recommendation.

When the RX 9060 XT can bring its full compute horsepower to bear in certain games, it can handily outpace the RTX 5060, so it's worth checking out results like those from our RX 9070 GRE review and seeing whether a game you love benefits from the Radeon's raw muscle.

But if you want a more consistently solid gaming experience, we'd still recommend the RTX 5060.

Read: Nvidia GeForce RTX 5060 Ti review

7. The best graphics card, period: GeForce RTX 5090, $4299

There's nothing else like the GeForce RTX 5090. If you want to turn on every bell and whistle in modern games at 4K (or beyond), the RTX 5090's sheer shader and Tensor Core horsepower, along with support for Nvidia's DLSS 4 upscaling and multi-frame generation, lets you tune your gaming experience to perfection even on high-refresh-rate 4K displays.

If you're a hardcore PC gamer who demands only the best, the hair will stand up on the back of your neck when you watch the RTX 5090 breeze through workloads that other graphics cards leak out all their thermal gel about.

Prices for the RTX 5090 have always been elevated, but they're stratospheric in early 2026. Major e-tailers only have a few different models listed, and prices start at $3500 or so and only go up from there. Nvidia's $1999 MSRP is pure imagination in current market conditions.

At those prices, an RTX 5090 is an indulgence of the highest order, but then again, it always has been. Without a compelling AMD alternative even on the horizon, considerations of value don't really apply here. If you truly need (or want) this class of gaming or AI performance, you're going to have to pay up.

This card needs a system with a massive power supply, one of our best gaming CPUs, and a top-shelf monitor to take full advantage of its astounding capabilities, and all those spendy components add up quick. But if you have a big enough bankroll to consider shopping for a graphics card of this caliber, you probably don't need us to tell you all that.

If Nvidia and its industry partners fixed the meltdown-prone ATX12V-2x6 connector, the RTX 5090 would be as close to gaming perfection as any graphics card that's ever been made. Guess that's something to improve on the RTX 6090, if it ever arrives.

Read: Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 Founders Edition review

8. The cheapest graphics card worth buying: GeForce RTX 5050

If you have to save every penny on a new graphics card in 2026, you're hard up for good budget options. We previously recommended Intel's Arc B570 here, but after completing our 2026 GPU Hierarchy retesting, we're bumping it in favor of the RTX 5050, which is currently selling for about $300, or about $50 more than the B570.

Here's why: we think if you're spending any amount of money on a graphics card, it should just work. You should expect consistent feature support over time in games, universal support for upscaling and (optionally) frame generation when you need them, and consistently high performance in games.

The RTX 5050 unreservedly checks all those boxes, while we couldn't even complete our testing of the Arc B570 (or B580) for our 2026 GPU Hierarchy until the literal day before this guide update goes live, due to a months-long settings lockout with UE5's Nanite and Lumen in a little title you may have heard of called Fortnite.

We can't say when a similarly major issue might occur again with the Arc B570 in any game, and so we're no longer recommending it. Unless you're willing to gamble and need to save every possible dollar on a graphics card, we think you should just save up a bit more cash and buy an RTX 5050.

The RTX 5050 isn't the fastest GPU around, to be sure, and its 8GB of VRAM is a constraint for anything beyond 1080p gaming in mid-2026. But it delivers solid enough native raster performance at 1080p, and it beats out the Arc B570 even before you enable DLSS 4.5 upscaling. And if you do want the performance boost of DLSS, you're getting access to the best and most widely adopted upscaler on the market.

On top of that, the extra $50 over the Arc B570 means that you have the full strength of Nvidia's developer relations team and software support behind you when you go to play the latest games, and we think that reliable software support makes all the difference between a GPU that's fun and affordable and one that's merely cheap.

Read: GeForce RTX 5050 review

How we test the best graphics cards

Determining pure graphics card performance is best done by eliminating all other bottlenecks — as much as possible, at least. To that end, we've selected components for our test rig , most notably AMD's Ryzen 7 9800X3D CPU, one of the best CPUs for gaming.

We test across the three most common gaming resolutions, 1080p, 1440p, and 4K, using a mix of high and ultra settings, depending on the title. Where possible, we use 'reference' cards for all of these tests, like Nvidia's Founders Edition models and AMD's reference designs. Most midrange and lower GPUs don't get reference models, however, and in some cases we only have factory-overclocked cards for testing. We do our best to select cards that are close to the reference specs in such cases.

For each graphics card, we follow the same testing procedure. We run one pass of each benchmark to "warm up" the GPU after launching the game, then perform our actual test runs across each resolution.

We carefully review our test data and check for anomalies. For example, we always expect the RTX 5080 to be faster than the RTX 5070 Ti. If it's not, and we're not in a CPU limited situation, we'll recheck both cards to ensure that our standings our accurate. We also check and retest in cases of subtler issues, as when a transient hitch or frame-time spike causes a large dip in 1% low FPS.

Due to the length of time required for testing each GPU, updated drivers and game patches inevitably come out that can impact performance. We periodically retest a few sample cards to verify our results are still valid, and if not, we go through and retest the affected game(s) and GPU(s). We may also add games to our test suite over time, if one comes out that is popular and conducive to testing. See what makes a good game benchmark for our selection criteria.

Best graphics cards performance results

Our updated test suite of games consists of 19 games at present, eight of which have ray tracing enabled (or require RT to run at all).

We test without any upscaling or frame generation technologies enabled. We expect that most gamers will want to enable these features, but they complicate apples-to-apples comparisons between GPU vendors due to inherent differences in output image quality. To keep it simple, we present native resolution performance as a baseline.

The data in the following charts is from testing conducted during the past several months. We've tested all of the latest GPUs at every resolution and setting, even where it generally doesn't make sense (e.g. 4K with ray tracing at single digit framerates).

For each resolution and setting, the first chart shows the geometric mean (i.e. equal weighting) for all tested games. The second chart shows performance in the 11 pure raster games, and the third chart focuses in on ray tracing performance in eight games.

The charts below contain all the current Nvidia RTX 50-series and AMD RX 9000-series graphics cards. We're leaving Intel Arc cards out of the standings for now due to software compatibility issues with our test suite, and we'll include those results when those issues are corrected and we have the opportunity to retest them.

Our GPU benchmarks hierarchy contains additional data for every GPU spanning multiple generations of hardware. The charts are color coded with AMD in red, Nvidia in blue, and Intel in gray to make it easier to see what's going on.

The following charts are up to date as of June 2026.

Best Graphics Cards — 1080p

Best Graphics Cards — 1440p

Best Graphics Cards — 4K

Additional Shopping Tips

When buying a graphics card, consider the following:

• Monitor Resolution: The more pixels you're pushing, the more performance you need. You don't need a top-of-the-line GPU to game at 1080p, but you will certainly want more power at 1440p or 4K.
• PSU: Make sure that your power supply has enough juice and the right 6-, 8- and/or 16-pin connector(s). Nvidia, AMD, and Intel board partners will all make PSU recommendations alongside their products that you can use as a baseline, so if you're unsure whether your PC can provide enough power, be sure to check those spec sheets first. If you have an older PSU, be mindful that power supplies do lose capacity with time, so if you're contemplating a high-end GPU, it might be time to upgrade your GPU, too.
• Video Memory: In 2026, 8GB of VRAM is the bare minimum you'll want to play the latest games at 1080p, and it's the smallest amount of memory you'll find on a new card. Midrange cards tend to feature 12GB of VRAM, which is generally enough for raster gaming all the way out to 4K but may present limitations for RT even at 1440p. If you're planning to push a 4K display without upscaling or want to explore RT gaming without restriction, we recommend a 16GB card.
• FreeSync or G-Sync? Either variable refresh rate (VRR) technology will synchronize your GPU's frame delivery with your screen's refresh rate. Nvidia supports G-Sync and G-Sync Compatible displays (for recommendations, see our Best Gaming Monitors list). And most every G-Sync Compatible display also supports AMD FreeSync these days, so this vendor war is largely over.
• Upscaling and Frame Generation technologies: Nvidia's DLSS is in practically every game, and the latest DLSS 4.5 tech provides high-quality upscaling and frame generation (on RTX 40-series to boost performance to taste with practically no loss of image quality. AMD FSR 4 provides AI-enhanced upscaling on RX 9000-series cards, and a version compatible with RX 7000-series cards arrives in July 2026. Intel XeSS can deliver better image quality than older versions of FSR, but the core upscaler hasn't been updated in some time, and it's not as widely adopted as either DLSS or FSR, so it shouldn't influence your buying decision either way.

Finding Discounts on the Best Graphics Cards

While deep discounts are rare on graphics cards in 2026, you might find some particularly tasty deals on occasion. Check out the latest Newegg promo codes, Best Buy promo codes and Micro Center coupon codes for potential savings.

Want to comment on our best graphics picks for gaming? Let us know what you think in the Tom's Hardware Forums.

MORE: HDMI vs. DisplayPort: Which Is Better For Gaming?

MORE: GPU Benchmarks and Hierarchy

AMD's Ryzen 9 9950X was the flagship Zen 5 CPU for the company’s latest Granite Ridge family of processors before the arrival of the $699 Ryzen 9 9950X3D, but if gaming prowess isn't your main concern, then the 9950X is still king for 16-core workloads. One of the most powerful consumer CPUs around, the 9950X is the perfect processor for multiple-core and multi-threaded workloads and tasks such as content creation and video editing. You can use the 9950X for gaming, but there are better CPU options now available.

Hitting an all-time low price in Amazon's Big Spring Sale, the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X processor is only $528. The Ryzen 9 9950X has an impressive 16 cores with 32 threads and uses 80MB of combined L2/L3 cache with only a TDP of 170W. The base clock speed of the 9950X is 4.3GHz, which can boost to a clock speed of 5.7GHz.

If you're already on the AM5 ecosystem and looking to upgrade, the Ryzen 9 9950X drops into the existing AM5 LGA1718 socket and is backward-compatible with all 600-series chipsets. The Ryzen 9 9950X shines in multi-threaded performance applications and can still be used for gaming but pales compared to gaming-focused CPU iterations like the 9800X3D and recently released 9950X3D. The 9950X3D is also a 16-core processor, so you're paying $167 more for the 3D V-Cache and gaming performance.

For detailed testing and benchmarking results, please check out our review of the Ryzen 9 9950X. In our testing, we found the Ryzen 9 9950X is up to 23% faster than Intel's Core i9-14900K in heavily threaded workloads but falls slightly behind in single-threaded performance. The same is true when compared to Intel's latest Core 9 285K CPU, which also outperforms in multi-core/threaded workloads but is slightly behind in single-core performance.

AMD's Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Ryzen 7 9800X3D are the best gaming CPUs around, but both of those cost well over $400 and are often out of stock. What if you're planning a PC Build that's more budget-conscious? The Ryzen 5 9600X is a great choice for mid-range gaming and productivity.

This 6-core, 12-thread CPU can run at up to 5.4 GHz and now it's on sale for its lowest price ever: $223 at Amazon.

When we reviewed the Ryzen 5 9600X, we tested it against our suite of 1080p games and found that it was capable of outputting an average of 163 fps. When we turned on Precision Boost Overdrive, the number jumped to 175 fps.

These numbers are with an RTX 4090 card so your results will vary, depending on your graphics card. However, the point is that you will not be significantly CPU limited and can depend on your discrete GPU for good gaming performance.

Asus has unveiled a new BIOS feature called AI Cache Boost, which is designed to enhance AI performance on systems equipped with AMD’s Ryzen 9000 series processors. The new feature is part of a recent BIOS firmware update for Asus AMD 800 Series motherboards. It focuses on improving the efficiency of data transfers between the CPU cores, cache, and memory, which is crucial for handling extensive AI workloads.

Upon enabling AI Cache Boost in the BIOS under the Extreme Tweaker tab, the system overclocks the Infinity Fabric clock (FCLK) to 2100MHz. This increase in FCLK enhances the bandwidth of data transfers within the CPU architecture, which Asus says facilitates more efficient processing of large datasets commonly associated with LLMs. As per Asus, enabling AI Cache Boost can boost performance by up to 12.75% when working with LLMs (Large Language Models).

This feature is tailored for AI enthusiasts, researchers, and professionals who utilize AMD Ryzen 9000 Series processors, specifically those with AMD 3D V-Cache Technology, like the recently launched Ryzen 9 9950X3D. Asus says it is particularly beneficial for users engaged in AI workloads that involve processing massive datasets, such as training and deploying large language models.

Asus has clarified that the new AI Cache Boost feature is specifically designed to enhance AI workloads, not gaming performance. While the feature can technically be enabled alongside other BIOS settings like GPU Boost, doing so may compromise overall system stability without delivering any noticeable benefit in gaming scenarios.

For users focused solely on maximizing AI capabilities, Asus offers additional tuning options beyond AI Cache Boost. By activating both Game Turbo and AI Cache Boost modes, disabling simultaneous multi-threading, and deactivating one CCD (Core Complex Die) on Ryzen processors, Asus says AI performance can be pushed even further. In fact, Asus own tests on a Ryzen 9 9950X3D configured with a single eight-core chiplet showed up to a 19.4% improvement in AI tasks. As with all company-provided benchmarks, take that with a grain of salt.

Asus conducted internal testing using a system equipped with ROG Crosshair X870E Hero motherboards, Nvidia RTX 5090 or 4090 GPUs, and Ryzen CPUs with AMD 3D V-Cache, showing performance uplifts in various AI benchmarks. In Geekbench AI tests, enabling AI Cache Boost resulted in improvements between 3.4% to 8%, with the Ryzen 7 9800X3D demonstrating the most significant gains. The uplift was similarly positive when tested with previous-gen RTX 4090 GPUs, showing a boost of up to 7.57%.

Asus testing using the UL Procyon AI Computer Vision Benchmark the Ryzen 7 9800X3D achieved double-digit improvements of up to 12.75%. As mentioned earlier, Asus says combining AI Cache Boost with Turbo Game Mode can yield even higher gains. For example, the company says the Ryzen 9 9950X3D saw up to a 19.35% performance increase in specific AI workloads when both features were enabled. This combination is particularly beneficial for AI users whose tasks don’t fully utilize the CPU's multithreading capabilities.

If it works as advertised, the AI Cache Boost features could be a straightforward way for Ryzen 9000 series users to extract more performance out of their systems when working with AI-related tasks.

Where-To-Buy Quick Links

• AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D: Check Amazon
• AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D: Check Newegg
• AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D: Check Best Buy
• AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D: Check B&H Photo

One of the best processors for outright gaming, AMD's Ryzen 7 9800X3D, with its hefty stacked 3D V-Cache, has been the in-demand CPU for gaming since its initial launch in January and has been very hard to get hold of.

AMD even stated that they were trying to get weekly rollouts of stock to retailers to cope with the demand, but that didn't stop the CPU from disappearing almost instantly from website pages when new stock came in. Prices for the 9800X3D skyrocketed, with third-party resellers trying to cash in on the demand for this processor and charging egregious prices.

It's been two months, but finally, you can get hold of AMD's current-generation gaming king. Maybe it's the stock levels catching up, or perhaps the launch of the 9900X3D and 9950X3D CPUs recently has pulled away some of the demand on the 9800X3D, but, whatever the reason, if you're looking to build a top-of-the-line gaming rig, now, you can actually get your hands on this impressive CPU.

Available for its $479 MSRP launch price, you can find the AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D for sale at Amazon, Newegg, Best Buy, and B&H Photo. I don't see any discounts coming for this super-popular processor anytime soon, but it's great to see the price come back to normal now that there is availability. Here's hoping the same happens with graphics cards, but I'm not going to hold my breath.

You can find more details of the performance of the Ryzen 7 processor in our detailed review of the 9800X3D. With an 8% performance gain on the previous generation 7800X3D, and easily outperforming the competition from Intel in gaming benchmarks. The 9800X3D is unlocked for overclocking and doesn't have excessive cooling requirements, making this processor one of the best CPUs for pure gaming.

AMD's Radeon RX 9070 series GPUs are a welcome addition to the GPU market, assuming you can get one at MSRP. AMD has faced fewer complications than Nvidia's lackluster GPU launch, marred by a shortage of supplies. UserBenchmark has not taken lightly to AMD's and the tech media's supposed antics. In its purported review of the RX 9070 XT, one of the best graphics cards, the website claims that Radeon GPUs fall short in real-world performance while failing to mention the GPU in question even once.

For the uninitiated, UserBenchmark (UB) is infamous in the tech landscape for its radical perspectives versus AMD, which it commonly refers to as "Advanced Marketing Devices." For context, it once recommended readers purchase a Core i5-13600K over the Ryzen 7 9800X3D, asserting, and I quote, "Spending more on a gaming CPU is often pointless."

For those considering an RDNA 4 GPU, be warned of the tech propaganda that preys on unsuspecting gamers—or so says UserBenchmark. The website claims, "Every year, an army of influencers target first-time buyers, normally declaring AMD as a godsend for PC gamers."

That's a gross oversimplification of the tech media, portrayed as a large entity with a unified agenda. This is a textbook example of the strawman fallacy, where UserBenchmark distorts and exaggerates our opinions to make them easier to attack. The review further alleges that Radeon GPUs only shine in cherry-picked benchmarks but cites a now-six-year-old RX 5700 XT to defend its claims.

Afterward, UserBenchmark links to a 3% Radeon dGPU market share statistic from the Steam Hardware Survey. This is followed up by what the website believes to be the cause behind AMD's decline in the GPU market: "High average fps are worthless when they are accompanied with stutters, random crashes, black screens, excessive noise and a limited feature set." First, Radeon GPUs reportedly lack real-world performance. Now they do, but do stutters and crashes accompany them? So, which one is it?

Across the entire review, UserBenchmark failed to mention the RX 9070 XT (RDNA 4) even once. Any claim regarding performance is baseless as they haven't provided a single "real-world" benchmark of the RX 9070 series to back their arguments. In fact, Nvidia's latest RTX 50 GPUs suffer from hardware defects, BSODs, crashes, and melting 16-pin power connectors, but that bit hasn't been mentioned anywhere.

Per our testing, which is backed by actual statistics and data, the RTX 5070 Ti is just 2% faster than the RX 9070 XT at 4K across a geomean of 16 games. Sadly, new buyers searching the term "RX 9070 XT vs RTX 5070 Ti" are directed to this site, where they claim a 23% lead in favor of the RTX 5070 Ti based solely on their synthetic tests, potentially misleading many.

Tom’s Hardware has tested dozens of processors from AMD and Intel to find the best CPU for gaming. Our list of 2026 CPU gaming benchmarks currently comprises 17 of the most demanding titles available on the market, which we run each gaming processor through to see the chips that come out on top. We select our picks based on the data in our CPU benchmark hierarchy, so all of the CPUs below are backed by hundreds of hours of real-world, hands-on testing where we gather extensive data on how a CPU performs and behaves while gaming. If you want a broader look at the CPU market, our AMD vs. Intel article shows you where the current CPU duopoly stands, while our CPU buying guide can help you narrow down the best processor for you.

Now in the back half of the year, we don’t expect major new releases from AMD or Intel. AMD has been on a tear with refreshes, particularly among X3D CPUs. We recently reviewed the Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 Dual Edition, AMD’s first CPU with 3D V-Cache on both CCDs, and it’s the most powerful chip from Team Red currently available. It’s earned a spot on this list, though the (much cheaper) Ryzen 9 9950X3D isn’t far behind in overall performance.

We’ve also seen the Ryzen 7 9850X3D, which is technically the fastest gaming processor on the market, as you can see in our Ryzen 7 9850X3D review. However, we’ve kept the base Ryzen 7 9800X3D as our top recommendation for the best CPU for gaming due to its price. It’s only marginally behind the refreshed model (about 3% on average), and much cheaper. For most gamers, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D makes more sense.

Intel has seen a recent boost in gaming performance with Arrow Lake Refresh, and both the Core Ultra 5 250K Plus and Core Ultra 7 270K Plus have earned spots on our list. AMD dominates in gaming at the moment, however. Our sights are set on Intel’s next-gen Nova Lake chips for a big gaming boost from Team Blue, as well as the rumored ‘Raptor Lake Next’ lineup that’s supposedly arriving early next year.

For the rest of the year, we have the Ryzen 7 7700X3D and Ryzen 7 5800X3D 10th Anniversary Edition to look forward to, which are arriving in July and June, respectively. We don’t anticipate they’ll make a major impact on our rankings here, but we plan on reviewing both CPUs as soon as they’re available.

In addition to the fastest CPUs from AMD and Intel, we’ve included a few DDR4 options on this list. The price of DRAM and NAND flash has made building even a budget PC prohibitively expensive, so DDR4 platforms are a great way to save money. Vendors are signaling a shift back toward DDR4 platforms at the moment, so we may reconsider some older CPUs for our rankings as pricing and availability allows.

Here are the gaming CPUs we recommend buying. We have a shortlist of the top options and some alternatives below, but you can click the ‘More’ links to read our thoughts about a particular CPU and where it stands in the current market.

Best CPU for Gaming in 2026 at a glance (more info below):

The list below is for the best CPUs for gaming, while the best budget CPUs can help you find a cheap chip. Processors benefit from the best thermal paste, so check out our guide if you're shopping for a new processor. But if you're after the best CPU for gaming, you're in the right place.

Best CPU for Gaming Benchmarks

We rank all the Intel and AMD processors based on our in-depth CPU benchmarks hierarchy. You can see some of those numbers in the charts above, including CPU overclock performance results (marked as PBO for AMD processors). We're currently retesting all of these processors with the Nvidia RTX 5090, but only the first four slides have that testing. The remainder are historical testing results with the RTX 4090, which we'll remove once we have fully retested all of the gaming CPUs with the RTX 5090 for our benchmarks. This group of results comprises only the chips that have passed through our newest test suite. Additionally, the tables in our CPU benchmark hierarchy include rankings based on past CPU benchmarks and breakdowns of single- and multi-threaded performance in productivity applications across a broad spate of processors. Finally, be aware that the pricing in the charts above can fluctuate.

Quick Shopping Tips

When choosing the best CPU for gaming in 2026, consider the following:

• You can't lose with AMD or Intel: As noted in our AMD vs. Intel feature, AMD tends to make the best all-around CPU for gaming for mainstream PCs lately, but both offer compelling performance options at any given price point.
• Eight cores is sufficient for gaming: If you’re looking at a pricey flagship, you’re likely wasting some money if gaming is your primary focus. You can game on as little as a quad-core CPU, but performance scaling really falls off past eight cores.
• Budget platform costs: You never want to pair a strong CPU with a weak GPU, RAM, and storage. Right now, it’s especially important to consider platform costs, however. DDR5 prices are peaking, and you’ll need to factor in the cost of DDR5 and a new motherboard if you’re coming from an older socket like AM4.
• Overclocking isn’t for everyone, but if you follow our How to Overclock a CPU guide, you can scrape out extra performance gains.

Best CPU for Gaming 2026 - $300 to $400

The Ryzen 7 9800X3D technically isn’t the fastest gaming chip on the market any more. That title goes to the new Ryzen 7 9850X3D, though the victory is marginal. As you can read in our Ryzen 7 9850X3D review, AMD’s latest X3D offering pushes ahead by 3.3% on average. Despite a minor uplift, we’re still recommending the Ryzen 7 9800X3D. With prices as they currently are, the Ryzen 7 9850X3D is only 3.3% faster despite costing around 6% more than the Ryzen 7 9800X3D.

This chip really has no peer in the market outside of the Ryzen 7 9850X3D — the Ryzen 7 9800X3D delivers outstanding gaming performance, beating Intel's fastest gaming chip, the $469 Core i9-14900K, by 30% in our test suite. The 9800X3D is also almost unbelievably 35% faster than the current-gen Intel flagship, the $560 Core Ultra 9 285K. The stock Ryzen 7 9800X3D's 1% low frame rates (a good smoothness indicator) also deliver an exceptionally smooth gaming experience, benefiting gamers even in GPU-limited scenarios.

The Ryzen 7 9800X3D has eight cores and 16 threads that operate at a 4.7 GHz base and 5.2 GHz boost clock rate. The chip employs AMD's 3D V-Cache tech with a new spin, which places a 3D-stacked SRAM chiplet underneath the die to deliver an incredible 96MB of L3 cache to great effect. AMD moved the L3 cache chiplet from the top to the bottom of the compute die this generation. That gives the integrated heat spreader (IHS) direct access to the compute die, allowing for more thermal headroom, and in turn, higher clock speeds. The end result is a comparatively low-power chip that delivers incredible gaming performance and comparable productivity performance to other eight-core models on the market.

3D V-Cache previously came with trade-offs in the productivity department, but that’s not the case with the Ryzen 7 9800X3D. Still, 3D V-Cache doesn’t provide a performance benefit in every game, and the performance benefit is less pronounced as your display resolution climbs.

The Ryzen 7 9800X3D has much lower power consumption than the Intel competition, making it a far cooler processor that won't require as expensive accommodations, like a beefy cooler, motherboard, and power supply. It also takes particularly well to undervolting, which is easy to accomplish with AMD’s Curve Optimizer. That means the 9800X3D delivers top-notch gaming performance and a cooler, quieter, and less expensive system than you'll get with an Ultra 9 or Core i9.

Read: AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D Review

The $305 Ryzen 7 9700X had a rough initial product launch, but AMD's targeted firmware and operating system improvements have changed the picture tremendously, allowing the chip to place much higher on our CPU benchmark hierarchy (head there for the most up-to-date gaming benchmarks). Combined with lower-than-launch pricing, the Ryzen 7 9700X is a strong contender, tying Intel's Core i9-14900K in gaming and beating the Core i7-14700K. That's not to mention that it beats Intel's entire lineup of Arrow Lake processors as well. Now, all of those processors offer faster performance in heavily-threaded productivity applications than the 9700X, but when it comes to a pure gaming experience, the 9700X either ties or beats all current Intel competitors.

The Ryzen 7 9700X has eight Zen 5 cores with 16 threads that operate at a 3.8 GHz base and 5.5 GHz boost clock. The chip has a 65W TDP, though AMD retroactively added a 105W TDP option you can select in the BIOS that helps boost performance in productivity applications. It's covered by the warranty, as well. With either setting, the 9700X has comparatively tame power consumption, so it is an easy chip to cool. You'll have to buy your own cooler for the processor, though.

The Ryzen 7 9700X drops into socket AM5 motherboards, and B-series motherboards make the most sense for this class of chip. B850 and B840 motherboards get AMD's latest chipset with features like mandatory PCIe 5.0 support on the top M.2 slot and better availability for features like Wi-Fi 7. However, the Ryzen 7 9700X will still work with the older B650 chipset if you can find a board on sale.

Read: Ryzen 5 9700X Review

The $350 Core Ultra 7 270K Plus performs like a flagship CPU, but it costs about half as much. In games, it narrowly outclasses the Core i7-14700K and offers a 2.4% boost over the competing Ryzen 7 9700X. AMD’s last-gen Ryzen 7 7800X3D still offers around a 10% boost over the Core Ultra 7 270K Plus, but it’s also around $50 to $80 more expensive depending on sales.

It’s a solid gaming CPU, and certainly a better recommendation than the Core i7-14700K given prices right now. Compared to the Ryzen 7 9700X, things are tighter. The Core Ultra 7 270K Plus gains an edge with productivity performance. Short of the 9950X, it’s at the top of our multithreaded performance rankings, more than doubling the performance of the Ryzen 7 9700X.

On the gaming front, it supports Intel’s new Binary Optimization Tool, which offers an average of an 8% improvement in gaming performance based on our testing. It’s only available in a limited number of games at the moment, but Intel says it plans to support the feature with updates in the future.

For specs, the Core Ultra 7 270K Plus is close to the 285K. It comes with 24 cores and threads, split across eight Lion Cove P-cores and 16 Darkmont E-cores. The P-cores boost up to 5.4 GHz and the E-cores can climb to 4.7 GHz. Across the CPU, you get a total of 76 MB of combined L2 and L3 cache. It comes with a 125W TDP and 250W MTP. Critically, the Core Ultra 270K Plus also comes with a 900 MHz boost in die-to-die frequency and 400 MHz boost in fabric frequency compared to stock Arrow Lake chips.

The Core Ultra 7 270K Plus slots into existing 800-series motherboards with the LGA 1851 socket. This is an unlocked chip, so if you want to get the full benefits of overclocking, you’ll need a Z890 board. However, it’ll still work with H- and B-series motherboards, just without CPU overclocking support.

Read: Core Ultra 7 270K Plus Review

Mid-Range Best CPU for Gaming - $200 to $300

Intel has returned to gaming prominence with its Arrow Lake Refresh CPUs, and nowhere is that clearer than with the $220 Core Ultra 5 250K Plus. It’s priced like a budget CPU at $220, but it can perform as well (and sometimes even better) than chips that cost twice as much. It doesn’t dominate the gaming charts in the same way as AMD’s X3D offerings, but at this price, it doesn’t need to. It offers marginally better performance than AMD’s competing six-core Ryzen 5 9600X in games while running the tables with application performance.

On average, the Core Ultra 5 250K Plus is 1% faster than the Ryzen 5 9600X at 1080p, and 9% faster than the 245K. It’s functionally identical, but Intel’s new iBOT feature allows the chip to hold some solid leads in certain titles. For instance, it’s 10% ahead of the 9600X in Cyberpunk 2077. Even in a non-iBOT title like Doom: The Dark Ages, the 250K Plus leads by 12%. There are still some games that struggle with the unique Arrow Lake architecture like F1 2024, but the losses are less pronounced with the souped-up Arrow Lake Refresh chips compared to the stock offerings.

The application performance is what really stands out with the 250K Plus, however. With 18 cores, it outpaces the Core i7-13700K, nearly matches the Core i7-14700K, and more than doubles the performance of the Ryzen 5 9600X in multithreaded applications. In single-threaded applications, it beats the Ryzen 5 9600X by 6%.

Although you get 18 cores, they’re split between six Lion Cove performance cores and 12 Darkmont efficient cores. The P-cores climb up to 5.3 GHz, while the E-cores top out at 4.6 GHz. The CPU comes with a combined 60 MB of L2 and L3 cache, along with a TDP of 125W and a MTP of 159W. Like all Arrow Lake chips, it doesn’t support Hyper-Threading, so you get 18 total threads.

The Core Ultra 5 250K Plus slots into existing motherboards with the LGA 1851 socket. It’s unlocked for overclocking, so a Z-series motherboard is an ideal pairing. However, Intel increased the die-to-die frequency and the fabric frequency out of the box, and you’ll see those improvements in action on B- and H-series motherboards, as well. It’s locked to DDR5 memory, unlike Raptor Lake and Alder Lake platforms, and it officially supports speeds up to 7200MT/s.

Read: Core Ultra 5 250K Plus Review

The $230 Ryzen 5 7600X3D is currently the best value gaming CPU you can get right now, though it trades performance in other areas to reach that status. It's just 4.5% slower than the Ryzen 7 7800X3D based on our testing, giving you most of the performance of AMD's coveted 3D V-Cache in games without the extra cost.

In games, it outclasses more expensive CPUs with ease, including the Ryzen 7 9700X, and averaged just 65W of power draw during our gaming tests. Outside of games, however, the Ryzen 5 7600 X3D struggles. The Core Ultra 5 250K Plus is more than twice as fast in multithreaded performance, and in single-threaded performance, even the base Ryzen 5 7600X is around 13% faster.

The lagging productivity performance makes sense. The Ryzen 5 7600X3D is a six-core / 12-thread chip, so it has limited multithreaded potential, and it only clocks up to 4.7 GHz. The limited specs give AMD room to cram 102 MB of combined L2/L3 cache on the die, however, which comes with a sizeable boost in gaming performance. Compared to the base Ryzen 5 7600X, the X3D version is 22% faster despite coming in at lower peak clocks and power draw.

You can slot the Ryzen 5 7600X3D into socket AM5, which is available on 600- and 800-series motherboards, though the latter may require a BIOS update. Memory and CPU overclocking is available on both B- and X-series chipsets; however, the Ryzen 5 7600X3D has a locked multiplier, so the only overclocking you can access is through AMD's Precision Boost Overdrive, or PBO.

Read: Ryzen 5 7600X3D review

Highest Performance Best CPU for Gaming - $400+

How do you improve upon a CPU that already claims a dominating position in gaming and productivity workloads? You add more cache, of course. The Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 is powerful, expensive, and hungry for wattage, but it’s the best of the best if you want top-shelf gaming and application performance. It throws value out the window, and it’s only marginally better than the Ryzen 9 9950X3D, but it is still better.

Based on our testing, it’s about 3.9% ahead of the Ryzen 9 9950X3D in multithreaded applications, and in lockstep in gaming at 1080p. Compared to Intel’s Core Ultra 7 270K Plus, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 is 9% ahead in multithreaded performance and 23% ahead in average gaming performance. The Ryzen 7 9800X3D delivers a better value on the gaming front, and the Core Ultra 7 270K Plus is a monster productivity chip at a third of the price of the 9950X3D2. But the magic trick of this chip is that it can do both without breaking a sweat.

Under the hood, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 is similar to the Ryzen 9 9950X3D. It’s a 16-core / 32-thread chip packing AMD’s Zen 5 architecture, and it tops out with a 5.6 GHz boost clock; just 100MHz behind the 9950X3D. As the name suggests, this processor is unique because it uses AMD’s 3D V-Cache on both CCDs. Both eight-core CCDs have 32 MB of onboard cache, plus an additional 64 MB chunk placed under the cores, giving you a total of 192 MB of L3 cache.

The extra cache slightly accelerates multithreaded performance overall, though only by around 4%. There are specific workloads where the advantage is more present, with some data science workloads showing performance gains in the realm of 26% over the Ryzen 9 9950X3D. Those specific workstation-class workloads are where the Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 earns its stripes.

Otherwise, it’s the chip to buy because you simply want the best, no matter what the cost or how marginal the improvements are. It slots into existing AM5 motherboards, and it’s best suited for newer 800-series chipsets. AMD officially supports memory speeds up to DDR5-5600, though we find that DDR5-6000 is the sweet spot for Zen 5 CPUs.

Prices have dropped since release, though the 9950X3D2 is still expensive. It launched at $1,000, but you can find the chip for around $900 now.

Read: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 Review

The prior-gen $469 Core i9-14900K is now selling for all-time low pricing, primarily because the newer $560 Core Ultra 9 285K has arrived to take its place. However, the Core Ultra 9 285K is actually slower than the 14900K in gaming, so it isn't a suitable replacement. The new Core Ultra 7 270K Plus is marginally slower based on our testing, as well. Even in the face of Intel’s 200S Boost update, which was meant improve gaming performance, the competitive landscape remains unchanged. In our testing, the Core Ultra 9 285K gained an average of 7% from the update, which means it’s still slower than the Core i9-14900K.

You should be aware that the much more economically-priced 14700K (listed above) is only 2% slower than the 14900K in gaming but costs over $100 less. The Ryzen 7 9700X, also listed above, is also less expensive and effectively ties the 14900K in gaming.

However, there are Intel fans willing to pay extra for the absolute most gaming performance they can get from an Intel platform. Also, the 14900K does offer more multi-threaded horsepower than the 14700K and 9700X, which could be useful if you game, stream, and record simultaneously or do other heavy multi-tasking while gaming. Just make sure that your use case justifies the extra cost.

The 14900K sports leading-edge connectivity, supporting DDR4-3200 or up to DDR5-5600 memory, along with 16 lanes of PCIe 5.0 and an additional four lanes of PCIe 4.0 from the chip for M.2 SSDs.

The chip comes with eight P-cores that support Hyper-Threading and 16 single-threaded E-cores for a total of 32 threads. The P-cores have a 3.2 GHz base, and peak frequencies reach an amazing 6.0 GHz with Turbo Boost Max 3.0 (this feature is only active on P-cores). Meanwhile, the E-cores have a 2.4 GHz base and stretch up to 4.4 GHz via the standard Turbo Boost 2.0 algorithms. The chip also has 36MB of L3 cache and 32MB of L2.

This 14900K has a 125W PBP (base) and 253W MTP (peak) power rating, but we recorded considerably lower power consumption than its prior-gen counterpart. You'll need to buy a capable cooler for the chip, and you'll also need either a 700-series or 600-series motherboard. Like other Raptor Lake Refresh chips, you can find DDR4 and DDR5 motherboards, though you’ll need to go with a DDR5 board for the highest performance.

The lower price of DDR4 might entice some gamers, but you'll lose anywhere from 5-8% of gaming performance with higher-end Intel chips. You can step up to the much more expensive DDR5 if you need access to more memory throughput and, thus, every bit of performance possible.

Beyond specs, the Core i9-14900K was at the center of a years-long controversy concerning instability. An error in the microcode (CPU firmware) meant the Core i9-14900K would degrade faster than expected, starting with instability in games. Intel has rectified the issue with microcode 0x12F, so make sure you update your BIOS immediately if you pick up Intel’s last-gen flagship

Read: Intel Core i9-14900K Review

Best Budget CPU Pick - $100 to $150

The $164 Ryzen 5 7600X is an attractive budget CPU at its new price, forced down by Intel's new Arrow Lake Refresh chips. It’s marginally slower than the Ryzen 5 9600X, but also marginally cheaper – the Ryzen 5 7600X offers about 90% of the performance of the Ryzen 5 9600X for 94% of the price. It’s a slightly worse value, but it’s still a good option to keep in mind, especially if you find it on sale. The Ryzen 5 7600, sans X, is available at around the same price. We’ve yet to see it drop below the Ryzen 5 7600X, however.

With the 7600X, you get six cores and 12 threads based on the Zen 4 architecture, clocked at 4.7GHz with boost speeds up to 5.3GHz. Unlike the Ryzen 5 9600X, the Zen 4-based version comes with a TDP of 105W. Cooling it shouldn’t be an issue, and you’re free to run in AMD’s 65W Eco mode through the Ryzen Master software.

The Ryzen 5 7600X slots into AM5 motherboards, including 600- and 800-series chipsets, and it supports PCIe 5.0. DDR5 is required, which is a tough pill to swallow at this bang-for-your-buck price point, but it’s hard to avoid soaring RAM prices.

Read: Ryzen 5 7600X review

The $135 AMD Ryzen 5 5600 delivers a solid blend of performance in both gaming and productivity applications, bringing a new level of value to the Zen 3 lineup. If you're fine sticking with a previous-gen AM4 motherboard, the Ryzen 5 5600 makes a great base for a budget build. The primary trade-off for the AM4 platform is that you're limited to DDR4, and you don't have access to PCIe 5.0. You also have a limited runway for upgrades, as the fastest gaming CPUs on AM4 – the Ryzen 7 5700X3D and Ryzen 7 5800X3D – have reached end of life.

The Ryzen 5 5600 also makes an absolutely unbeatable budget chip if you're updating a first-gen Ryzen system. The 5600 unseats the Ryzen 5 5600X, a long-time favorite. The 5600X is only a mostly imperceptible ~1% faster in gaming and multi-threaded PC work than the non-X model, but provides a 4% advantage in single-threaded work.

Our testing shows that the Ryzen 5 5600 generally matches the gaming performance of its more expensive sibling, the ~$230 Ryzen 7 5800X. That makes the 5600 an incredibly well-rounded chip that can handle gaming well, from competitive-class performance with high refresh rate monitors to multi-tasking gaming workloads like streaming, while also serving up more than enough performance for day-to-day productivity apps. As with all AMD CPUs for gaming, you can fully overclock the chip.

The Ryzen 5 5600 has a 3.7 GHz base and 4.6 GHz boost clock. The chip also has a 65W TDP rating, so it runs cool and quiet. Existing AMD owners with a 500-series motherboard will be happy, as the 5600X drops right into existing 500-, 400-, and 300-series motherboards. If you need a new motherboard to support the chip, AMD's AM4 motherboards are plentiful and relatively affordable, with the B-series lineup offering the best overall value for this class of chip.

Prices for the Ryzen 5 5600 have drifted upward as stock depletes, but that’s offset by platform costs. In addition to low prices on AM4 motherboards, the Ryzen 5 5600 is limited to DDR4. High DDR5 prices are a significant roadblock to opting for a newer chip, as prices continue to surge. So it’s hard to recommend a newer budget CPU, even if it’ll net you higher performance. In the event you already have a kit of DDR5, the $189 Ryzen 5 7600 is a compelling option, and it includes AMD’s Wraith Stealth cooler.

Read: AMD Ryzen 5 5600 Review

Entry-Level Best CPU for Gaming - For gaming on integrated GPUs

The $268 Ryzen 7 8700G, AMD's flagship desktop APU, delivers the fastest socketed performance on the market from integrated graphics, bringing passable 1080p gaming to the desktop PC without a discrete graphics card, but its high price point relegates it to a niche audience.

In contrast, the $191 Ryzen 5 8600G delivers 90% of the 8700G's performance but for ~$80 less, making it a solid alternative for gaming systems that don't use a discrete GPU.

Naturally, you'll have to accept lower fidelity settings and be realistic about which titles can play at 1080p resolution. Still, AMD's Hyper-RX suite of features, which includes in-driver Radeon Super Resolution upscaling tech, frame generation with AMD Fluid Motion Frames (AFMF), Anti-Lag+, and Radeon Boost, helps boost performance at a slight cost to image quality. This new feature set, a first for AMD's iGPUs, is a boon for budget gamers.

The Ryzen 5 8600G has six Zen 4 CPU cores and the RDNA 3 GPU engine with eight CUs. The Ryzen 5 8600G drops into the AM5 platform, with value-focused B650 and A620 motherboards being the obvious best combination. These systems offer a new level of connectivity for AMD's APU processors, which were previously on the aging AM4 platform but require DDR5 memory. That adds some cost, so do a value analysis before selecting this processor. If you're looking for the lowest entry price possible with an APU, the Ryzen 5 5600G listed below slots in as the value alternative.

The Ryzen 7 8600G only supports 16 usable lanes of PCIe 4.0 connectivity, while other processors on the AM5 platform support PCIe 5.0. However, we don't feel this will impact this class of system.

More: AMD Ryzen 7 8700G and Ryzen 5 8600G Review

The Ryzen 5 5600G steps into the arena as the value champ for APUs, which are chips with strong enough integrated graphics that they don't require a discrete GPU for light gaming—just be sure you're willing to accept lowered quality settings.

The Ryzen 5 5600G gives you 96% of the gaming performance on integrated graphics than its more expensive sibling, the Ryzen 7 5700G, but for 25% less cash. Our testing shows that its level of performance makes it the best value APU on the market. As long as you're willing to sacrifice fidelity and resolution and keep your expectations in check, the Ryzen 5 5600G's Vega graphics have surprisingly good performance in gaming.

The 5600G's Vega graphics served up comparatively great 1280x720 gaming across numerous titles in our tests, but options become more restricted at 1080p. Of course, you can get away with 1080p gaming, but you'll need to severely limit the fidelity settings with most titles.

With eight cores and 16 threads that operate at a 3.9 GHz base and boost up to 4.4 GHz, the Ryzen 5 5600G also offers solid performance for its price point in standard desktop PC applications. The chip also comes with a bundled Wraith Stealth cooler, sweetening the value prop, and drops into existing 500-series and some 400-series motherboards, though support on the latter will vary by vendor.

The Ryzen 5 5600G is nearly five years old, and as a result, it’s hard to find it in stock at a reasonable price. AMD updated this model with the Ryzen 5 5600GT in early 2024, which features identical silicon and a slight boost to clock speed, and you’ll generally find it for less at around $150.

If your budget is tight and you're looking to build a system for modest gaming, you should check out our Best Cheap CPU feature. Some of those chips can deliver passable gaming performance without a graphics card, and their prices start at just $55 (£40).

Read: AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review

• MORE: CPU Benchmark Hierarchy
• MORE: AMD vs Intel
• MORE: Best Cheap CPUs
• MORE: Best CPUs for Workstations

ASML and Imec this week established a five-year partnership designed to enable Imec's researchers and developers access to ASML's latest tools. The move is focused on sub-2nm process technologies that will require ASML's latest lithography (including High-NA), metrology, and inspection tools. Imec will ensure that engineers from academia and various companies have the latest equipment for their research, whereas ASML will ensure that its tools are incorporated into leading-edge process technologies.

Under the partnership, Imec will gain access to ASML's comprehensive range of advanced wafer fabricating equipment (WFE), including range-topping Twinscan NXT (DUV), Twinscan NXE (Low-NA EUV tools with a 0.33 numerical aperture optics), and Twinscan EXE (High-NA EUV tools with a 0.55 numerical aperture optics) lithography systems. Additionally, imec will incorporate ASML's YieldStar optical metrology solutions and HMI’s single- and multi-beam inspection tools into its facilities.

These tools will be installed in Imec's pilot line in Belgium and incorporated in the EU- and Flemish-funded NanoIC pilot line.

The latest-generation of equipment from ASML will be used to develop next-generation semiconductor production technologies, particularly sub-2nm fabrication technologies. It is believed that for efficient manufacturing at fabrication nodes below 2nm, lithography tools must support an 8nm resolution with a single exposure, something that only High-NA EUV tools can achieve. However, each High-NA EUV system costs $350 million, which makes it impossible for new players or researchers to obtain one.

ASML and Imec researchers previously worked with High-NA (0.55 NA EUV) tools primarily at ASML’s dedicated research facilities in Veldhoven, Netherlands. ASML installed these first-generation High-NA EUV machines at its own sites for initial tests, evaluations, and collaborative research with Imec and other partners.

Now, under the new agreement, Imec will have direct, on-site access to High-NA equipment within its own research lines in Leuven, Belgium, specifically in its state-of-the-art pilot facility and the EU- and Flemish-funded NanoIC pilot line. This marks the first time Imec researchers can use the High-NA EUV technology directly at their own facility, which will speed up their work.

Providing Imec with access to the High-NA EUV technology was included in the Next Gen-7A project (IPCEI22201) and financed by the Dutch government as an Important Project of Common European Interest (IPCEI).

"We are excited to continue our longstanding unique partnership with ASML, offering the industry access to the most advanced patterning solutions for over 30 years," states Luc Van den hove, President and CEO at Imec.

"The inclusion of ASML’s full product portfolio will allow us to expand and further mature the capabilities of our pilot line, providing the entire semiconductor ecosystem with the most advanced R&D to tackle the challenges of AI-driven technological advancements. Since Imec has a strong focus on sustainable innovation, having this explicitly included in our partnership is a great addition."

In addition to working collaboratively on next-generation sub-2nm nodes for logic chips, ASML and Imec plan to collaborate on DRAM process technologies, silicon photonics, and advanced packaging solutions.

AMD's latest addition to its Zen 5 stack includes all-new high-core count Ryzen 9 9950X3D and 9900X3D models. Based on our review, AMD has struck a remarkable balance with the flagship 9950X3D, matching the Ryzen 7 9800X3D in gaming while productivity results approach the vanilla Ryzen 9 9950X. If you're out to get your hands on these processors, we've compiled a list of several stores across the US to facilitate your buying experience.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D sports 16 cores and 32 threads based on the Zen 5 architecture, with 144MB of total cache (16MB L2 + 128MB L3), and can be yours for $699. Its 12-core brethren, the Ryzen 9 9900X drops to 140MB and is set to retail starting at $599.

While specifications remain unchanged compared to the last generation, Ryzen 9000X3D processors are built using the second generation of AMD's V-Cache technology. This time, AMD has reversed the 3D stacking hierarchy with the SRAM block sitting below the heat-producing CCD for more thermal headroom. This directly leads to higher frequencies, and an elevated TDP in case of the 9950X3D, rated at 170W (230W PPT).

Thanks to the updated software stack, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D can dynamically act as a single-CCD Ryzen 7 9800X3D when gaming or a full-fledged 16-core powerhouse when you need the extra multi-core chops. The 9900X3D clocks at up to 5.5 GHz while its elder sibling is advertised to hit 5.7 GHz, so gaming performance should remain relatively close. The improved design likely also narrows the turbo frequency delta between the CCD with the X3D cache and the standard CCD.

Where to buy the Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Ryzen 9 9900X3D in the US

AMD has suggested a $699 and $599 MSRP for the Ryzen 9 9950X3D and 9900X3D respectively. As always, street pricing is heavily influenced by the laws of supply and demand, something we saw first hand with the elusive Ryzen 7 9800X3D. Currently, the 9950X3D and 9900X3D are not listed at most retailers; the retail embargo is expected to lift at 9 AM ET (Eastern Time) tomorrow. We'll regularly update this article with the latest listings as availability improves.

AMD's 3D V-Cache technology has proven to be the killer tech that delivers dominating performance over Intel in gaming, and the second-gen revision propels the 16-core, 32-thread $699 Ryzen 9 9950X3D to a whole new level of gaming performance — all while preserving the lion's share of performance in productivity applications. Our CPU benchmarks show the 9950X3D is an incredible 37% faster than Intel's flagship Core 9 285K on average in 1080p gaming. It also beats Intel’s fastest competing gaming chip, the Core i9-14900K, by 26% on average in our test suite. In fact, on average, the 9950X3D even ties the hands-down best CPU for gaming on the market, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D.

Naturally, performance will vary by title due to the vagaries of the 3D V-Cache tech, but the 9950X3D is impressive in a wide range of workloads, and its higher 170W TDP also unlocks exceptional Intel-beating performance in many of our productivity benchmarks.

AMD's game-boosting 3D V-Cache tech is now in its third generation, and this time around, AMD moved the vertically-stacked 64MB L3 cache chiplet from the top to the bottom of the compute chiplet to enable higher thermal headroom (details here). As a result, the 9950X3D has the same 170W/230W TDP threshold as the standard Ryzen 9 9950X model instead of the 50W lower rating the company used with the previous-gen 7950X3D model, which ultimately hampered performance.

AMD's goal is to master both disciplines — gaming and productivity — with its dual-chiplet X3D processors, but that's a tricky technical challenge. To build on the success of the first-gen models, the company also refined its chipset drivers to deliver more accurate thread scheduling in some corner cases. This helps reduce the performance delta between its single- and dual-chiplet X3D models. AMD also whipped in full overclocking support for the 9950X3D, which we’ve tested, allowing you to eke out more performance in gaming and productivity work.

AMD also launched the lower-tier $599 Ryzen 9 9900X3D today, saying its new drivers help reduce the vast differences between the two last-generation models. We don't yet have the 9900X3D for testing, but we're working to obtain a sample.

If you're looking for a quick take on performance, see the image album below, which breaks down performance in gaming and productivity applications. These overall measurements are backed up by our benchmarks on the following pages, so be sure to check those out. As you can see, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D is a tremendous chip in nearly every single category.

For now, all eyes are on the Ryzen 9 9950X3D, and from what we've seen, it's another grand slam against Intel. Team Blue still hasn't developed a counter to AMD's 3D V-Cache technology, effectively ceding the gaming crown to its rival in the desktop PC market. AMD's new optimizations serve widen the gap even further. Let's take a quick look at the new tech, then move on to the benchmarks.

AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D Pricing and Specifications

As with the prior-gen 7000X3D chips, the two new 9000X3D chips use two compute dies, with one die featuring a 3D-stacked V-Cache chiplet that increases L3 cache capacity to 128MB. This keeps game data close to the execution cores, boosting performance in many types of titles (but not all). Meanwhile, the other standard chiplet can boost to higher frequencies to deliver more performance in both single- and multi-threaded tasks. Overall, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D is built on the same foundation as the Ryzen 9 9950X; it just has a single L3 SRAM chiplet placed under one of the compute dies.

The Zen 5-powered Ryzen 9 9950X3D comes armed with 16 cores, 32 threads, 144 MB of total cache, and a peak boost clock rate of 5.7 GHz. This chip has a 170W TDP, 50W higher than the prior-gen model. That's because AMD’s previous-gen 3D V-Cache chips employed a 3D-stacked chiplet on top of the compute die, which trapped heat and constrained the operating temps/voltages, ultimately forcing AMD to lower the TDP.

The new models now have the L3 SRAM die on the bottom of the chip, removing a barrier between the hotter compute die and the chip cooler. That unlocks higher thermal headroom. AMD extracts the additional headroom with the higher 170/230W TDP, allowing higher clocks and longer sustained boost activity.

The Ryzen 9 9900X3D sports 12 cores, 24 threads,140 MB of total cache, and a 5.5 GHz boost. This chip has the same 120/162W TDP as its predecessor and its non-X3D counterpart, the Ryzen 9 9900X, so we expect significantly less performance than the 9950X3D across the board. AMD hasn't sampled this chip but says it has dramatically reduced the performance gulf between the two Ryzen 9 X3D models. We included the company's 9900X3D benchmarks at the bottom of the following page.

AMD's Updated Chipset Drivers 

We've covered AMD's chipset drivers in-depth in the past. The drivers have a suite of components that enable its dual-chiplet processors to operate as close as possible to the single-chiplet comparables, despite having only a single L3 cache die under one of the compute chiplets.

AMD's first dual-chiplet X3D processors employed a new version of thread targeting that works in tandem with putting unneeded cores to sleep, thus forcing game code to run on the single chiplet that houses the performance-boosting L3 cache. However, this implementation made an irreversible change to the operating system that could hamper performance if the chip were later swapped out for a single-CCD processor, with the only remedy being a complete reinstallation of the operating system.

As you can see in the slides above, AMD has now fixed that issue with an updated Provisioning Packages Service (the engine that manages core parking and thread targeting). After roughly 15 minutes of idle time, this driver now automatically detects when a new processor has been installed in the system and adjusts the provisioning accordingly, so there's no need for an operating system reinstall. Things are essentially plug-and-play now, as they should be. AMD also addressed a shortcoming with its 3D V-Cache Performance Optimizer, so it now works when Virtulization-Based Security (VBS) is enabled on Windows 10.

Despite multiple components working in concert to ensure that games run smoothly on the dual-CCD models, some game titles remain problematic. To fix this, AMD revived its Application Compatibility Database (ACD), a technology that debuted with the first Threadripper CPUs. The ACD is a list-based feature that detects when certain games are launched (listed in the image above). It then triggers a mechanism that reduces the number of threads, thus hiding them from the operating system and fully preventing the game code from running on the unoptimized chiplet.

Internally, AMD has affectionately nicknamed this 'Core Lie' because the feature lies with the operating system about the number of cores available. This mechanism assures optimal performance with several of the more stubborn titles, helping to once again reduce the difference between the single- and dual-chiplet X3D models.

Let's see what all of this looks like in our gaming benchmarks on the next page.

AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D Gaming Benchmarks — The TLDR

Nearly every title in our 16-game test suite benefits tremendously from 3D V-Cache acceleration, but this isn't the case with all games in the wild. Some games simply don't benefit as much, or at all, from the 3D V-Cache. This can be due to either the game code or a GPU limitation. We have also included AMD's benchmarks with a very broad range of 40 titles at the end of this page to provide a more balanced view of the impact of 3D V-Cache in some titles that don't benefit.

Here is the high-level view of gaming performance, using the geometric mean of our 16 gaming benchmarks at 1080p, which is then followed by our individual benchmarks further down the page. We're testing with an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 FE to reduce GPU-imposed bottlenecks as much as possible, and differences between test subjects will shrink with lesser cards or higher resolutions and fidelity.

Once again, AMD's 3D V-Cache technology impresses us with stunningly good performance across our gaming benchmarks, with the Ryzen 9 9950X3D matching AMD's claims of being within roughly one percent of the current fastest CPU for gaming, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D. The 9800X3D was 0.4% faster than the 9950X3D across our full 1080p gaming suite, which is a tie. However, this removes much of the underlying nuance — the dual-CCD Ryzen X3D models are faster than the single-CCD models in some titles, while roles are reversed in others. You can see which titles favor which below, but the big takeaway is that the 9950X3D is wicked fast in gaming.

AMD only claims a 20% lead over the 285K, but the Ryzen 9 9950X3D leads the Core Ultra 9 285K by a whopping 37% in our benchmarks, mirroring the delta we saw with the 9800X3D launch. Intel's previous-gen Core i9-14900K is actually the best contender against the AMD lineup in gaming, but the 9950X3D is still an insurmountable 26% faster.

Surprisingly, during our tests, we regularly saw the 9950X3D's V-Cache CCD boost to ~5.5 GHz, while the 9800X3D was often in the 5.2 to 5.3 GHz range. In the albums below, you can see the average clockspeeds of each processor during each game.

Intel's troubled Arrow Lake continues to suffer. Intel originally said the Core Ultra chips would match the previous-gen Core i9-14900K, but a chaotic launch found the chips severely trailing even the prior-gen parts. Intel promised fixes to bring Arrow Lake up to the original claims of performance parity with its 14th-Gen chips, but our testing found that those fixes didn't help. In our testing, the latest Windows updates benefited the 14th-Gen chips more than Arrow Lake, worsening the situation.

We retested again for this review. Even with the latest version of Windows and the RTX 5090, things haven't improved for our Arrow Lake test platform.

The 9950X3D is also a respectable 15% faster than the prior-gen Ryzen 7 7800X3D and 20% faster than the Ryzen 9 7950X3D. As you can see above, there isn't as much of a gap between the new 9000X3D series models as with the prior-gen 7900X3D and 7950X3D.

AMD has finally brought full overclockability to its X3D series, but we haven't done much fine-grained tuning. Instead, we tested with AMD's simple auto-overclocking Precision Boost Overdrive feature (marked with 'PBO' in the chart), and it delivered less than a 1% gain in gaming. As such, we left that entry out of the individual game tests below. However, PBO was very impressive in the heavily threaded workloads in our productivity benchmarks, which you can see on the following page. More targeted tuning might yield better results in gaming, but as always, your mileage will vary.

Our gaming suite is very heavily skewed toward CPU-limited titles, and our selection is also very 3D V-Cache-friendly. Again, not all games will benefit equally. The competition between AMD and Intel chips can vary based on the title (particularly with X3D models) and the GPU you use. It's best to make an informed decision based on the types of titles you frequently play, so be sure to check out our individual game tests below. (Our lab isn't as temperature-controlled as we would like, so consider the gaming temperature measurements a rough guide.)

A Plague Tale: Requiem Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

The Ryzen 9 98000X3D starts out the gaming results with what will become a familiar trend throughout the rest of the results — it resides comfortably above the competing Intel processors.

Baldur's Gate 3 Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

As you can see, the dual-CCD 9950X3D beats the single-CCD 9800X3D in this title, and the previous-gen dual-CCD Ryzen 9 7950X3D also beats its single-CCD comparable, the 7800X3D.

There are several more examples of this trend throughout the albums below; some titles respond better to the dual-CCD design, while others favor the single-CCD design. Given that most games are locked to a single CCD regardless, we think this is largely the result of the 9950X3D's higher effective clock rates on its cache-equipped CCD.

Cyberpunk 2077 Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Cyberpunk 2077 can be an incredibly GPU heavy game with ray tracing, and we're opting for the more CPU constrained ultra (non-RT) settings, without upscaling — and note that none of our CPU gaming tests have upscaling of any form enabled.

F1 2024 Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

We test F1 24 with the ultra preset, which does enable some RT effects. They're relatively lightweight compared to other games, and of course we're still hitting 200+ FPS on most of the CPUs.

Far Cry 6 Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Far Cry 6 is an AMD-promoted game that responds incredibly well to 3D V-Cache.

Final Fantasy XIV Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Hitman 3 Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Hitman 3 leverages Intel's E-cores for certain game functions, but it also likes Ryzen X3D's voluminous L3 cache. We enabled ray tracing effects for this title to further tax the CPUs, but as you can see, the RTX 5090 still chews through this title easily if the CPU keeps it fed.

Hogwarts Legacy Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Hogwarts Legacy is yet another game that slightly favors the Ryzen 9 9950X3D's dual-CCD design.

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 obviously benefits from L3 cache — the Ryzen X3D chips are incredible in this title. We've added the newer version of this game to our benchmark suite, too, but we'll keep this one around as well due to its popularity.

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

We've also begun testing Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024. This title relies heavily on data streaming and has a unique game engine, so it's time to start poking at it. As you can see, it inherits Flight Simulator 2020's love for 3D V-Cache (perhaps even more so).

Minecraft — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Monster Hunter Wilds — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Spider-Man 2 Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Starfield Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

The Last of Us, Part 1 — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Watch Dogs Legion Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Watch Dogs Legion closes out our testing with mundane scaling instead of the typical large deltas we see with the X3D chips.

AMD's Ryzen 9 9950X3D Gaming Benchmarks

As mentioned, performance can vary based on the title. AMD shared its own benchmarks to highlight what you should expect in various titles, so this is useful information — especially given that our test suite is 3D V-Cache-friendly. As with all vendor-provided performance data, view it with the appropriate skepticism. AMD's test notes are on the final slide.

AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D Productivity Benchmarks — The TLDR

We boil down productivity application performance into two broad categories: single-threaded and multi-threaded. These slides show the geometric mean of performance in several of our most important tests in each of these categories, but be sure to look at the expanded results below for more granular analysis.

Selling a 16-core chip for $699 means it has to deliver the goods in productivity workloads, too. The Ryzen 9 9950X3D lives up to that billing, delivering a solid 20% gain over the prior-gen Ryzen 7 7950X3D. Unlike the trends we saw with the previous-gen models, the 9950X3D matches the vanilla Ryzen 9 9950X in our overall measure of performance in multi-threaded workloads. Notably, there are plenty of examples of the 9950X taking the lead in the heavily threaded workloads in the albums below, but the difference in many of the real-world workloads is surprisingly slim.

The $620 Core Ultra 9 285K is the 9950X3D's real competitor in productivity workloads; it delivers far more performance in threaded workloads than the Core i9-14900K. Regardless, the 9950X3D is 11% faster in threaded workloads than the 285K. However, our overall measurement is heavily influenced by performance in AVX-512 workloads. The 9950X3D has an easy leg up due to its support for AVX-512, while the 285K can't leverage the performance-boosting instructions. The results below also have plenty of examples where the 285K takes the lead over the 9950X3D in threaded workloads.

Our simple PBO overclock yielded a 6% boost for the 9950X3D with no real effort, and we also included those results in the albums below. Remember, the Intel processors would also benefit from overclocking, but this would require far more manual intervention.

What the Intel chips lack in sheer threaded horsepower, they make up for in single-threaded performance. In our cumulative single-thread performance measurement, the Core Ultra 9 285K is 7% faster than the 9950X3D, and the 14900K is 3% faster.

Rendering Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Intel's Arrow Lake excels in many of the heavily threaded rendering workloads, like its huge leads in POV-Ray, C-Ray, and LuxMark C++. It also delivers leading performance in the single-threaded Cinebench R23 and 2024 benchmarks.

The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D also has its advantages, easily leading in Blender, Embree, and both Cinebench multi-core benchmarks, among others. Again, we see strong gains in some workloads from the PBO feature and a surprisingly slim difference between the 9950X and 9950X3D.

Encoding Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Most encoders tend to be either heavily threaded or almost exclusively single-threaded — and it takes an agile chip to master both disciplines. Handbrake, SVT-HEVC, and SVT-AV1 serve as our threaded encoders, while LAME and FLAC are indicative of how the chips handle lightly-threaded engines.

Adobe Photoshop, Premiere Pro, DaVinci Resolve — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

The PugetBench for Creators suite is a wonderful tool for benchmarking multiple types of Adobe applications, not to mention DaVinci Resolve. We used the benchmark for Photoshop, Premiere Pro, and DaVinci workloads.

Web Browser, Office Benchmarks — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

Compilation, Compression, AVX, Chess Engines, Others — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

This selection of tests runs the gamut from massively parallel molecular dynamics simulation code in NAMD to compression/decompression performance.

Y-cruncher computes Pi with the AVX instruction set, making for an exceedingly demanding benchmark. This benchmark was recently updated with specific tuning for AMD's AVX-512 implementation. The new code delivers a big boost to Ryzen. Intel's new chips make big strides in this benchmark over the prior generation, but they only support AVX-256 natively, so AMD gets an easy win — the Ryzen 9 chips are incredibly impressive in the BPP benchmark.

Intel has historically performed well in compilation tasks, but the 9950X/3D clawed back the leadership spot in the LLVM benchmark, but by a slim margin. The 285K takes a strong lead in the NAMD simulation code benchmark, while the AMD processors excel at most Chess engine benchmarks and the John the Ripper password cracker.

Geekbench 6, Geekbench AI — AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D

The GeekBench AI results in the slide deck above show performance with the workload running on the CPU cores via OpenVino and ONNX. Only two CPUs in this group have in-built NPUs — the Core Ultra 9 285K and Ultra 7 265K — making them the only processors capable of running the workload on a dedicated NPU. Given that the NPU is focused on low-power inference tasks, the results are impressive relative to the performance when the workload executes on the CPU cores.

AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D Power Consumption and Efficiency

We are now measuring CPU power consumption metrics at the EPS12V connector, so our new results are not comparable to the data in our prior reviews. We previously used software monitoring tools like AIDA64 and HWinfo for our power measurements. These tools scrape power consumption measurements directly from the motherboard's sensor loop, thus removing VRM inefficiencies from the values and presumably showing us exactly how much power the processor consumes.

However, motherboard OEMs can game these measurements, so we always did spot checks with various hardware-based measurement tools (Powenetics hardware or Passmark's In-Line PSU), and we've avoided using certain motherboards with unreliable power metrics in the past. We ultimately chose software monitoring because we can integrate it into our scripted tests, thus simplifying and speeding up the process, and it allows us to catch more granular workload data.

Intercepting power at the EPS12V connectors (the eight-pin connectors on the motherboard) is great for measuring power consumption. However, the main drawbacks are that it doesn't measure the true amount of power flowing into the processor due to VRM inefficiencies, typically in the range of 10 to 15% on high-end motherboards, and it wasn't easy to script a software trigger.

We finally have hardware-based power monitoring with Benchlab equipment that can be integrated and scripted into our test suite. You can see those results below. As a reminder, these values are measured before VRM inefficiencies are taken into account.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D is a comparatively miserly chip, given the level of performance it delivers throughout our test suite. The chip peaked at 233W but hovered in the low 200s during most workloads.

In comparison, the Core i9-14900K is an egregious power guzzler, sucking down up to 383W during a Blender workload, and bear in mind this chip doesn’t match the 9950X3D in productivity workloads.

The Core Ultra 9 285K is more miserly than the 14900K, but it peaks at 325W, showing it can also have a voracious appetite. In most workloads, the 285K draws as much or more power than the 9950X3D in its overclocked PBO configuration.

As expected, we see a disproportionately large increase in power consumption for slim performance gains when we kick on the 9950X3D’s PBO feature. Given the small gains in gaming, PBO certainly isn’t worth it for gaming, but it is far more useful for those focused on productivity work.

The watts-per-FPS chart quantifies power efficiency during an x265 HandBrake workload. As you can see, the 9950X3D is near the top of the list with exceptional power efficiency, particularly given its 16-core design.

The last two slides take a slightly different look at power consumption by plotting the cumulative energy required for an x265 HandBrake and Blender workload. We plot this 'task energy' value in Kilojoules on the left side of the chart, with performance charted on the x-axis.

These workloads consist of a fixed amount of work, so we can plot the task energy against the performance during the job (bottom axis), thus generating a useful power chart. Faster compute performance and lower task energy are ideal. That means processors closest to the bottom right corner of the chart are the best.

As you can see, the newest AMD chips gather in that area during the HandBrake workload but migrate to the upper right corner in the Blender plot. Meanwhile, the 285K and other Arrow Lake chips greatly improve over their 14th-Gen predecessors.

AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D Test Setup

We have moved from the RTX 4090 to the RTX 5090 FE for our game testing, which spurred an update to our gaming and application suites. We tested with the latest version of Microsoft Windows 24H2 (22631) and updated all drivers, BIOSes, and applications to the latest versions (sans y-cruncher). To speed up the testing process, we use XMP/EXPO as the default memory profiles for all tested configurations. The memory speeds used for each chip are shown in the table below.

We tested the Ryzen 9 9950X3D in standard stock trim and with the auto-overclocking Precision Boost Overdrive (PBO) feature enabled. We used the 'advanced' and 'motherboard' power settings for the PBO configuration with a 10X scalar and 200 MHz clock adjustment. We also dialed in a -15 all-core Curve Optimizer offset.

We used lifted power limits for the Intel processors, which results in higher power consumption and heat, but you get faster performance in exchange.

Microsoft has advised gamers to turn off several security features to boost gaming performance. For maximum performance, we disabled Virtualization Based Security (VBS) on all systems. Be aware that, due to hardware acceleration, some processor architectures handle virtualization better than others. This can provide a performance advantage when gaming with VBS enabled, but we haven't observed meaningful differences in our testing.

The $699 Ryzen 9 9950X3D sets a new bar for the company’s potent lineup of gaming-optimized X3D processors, sharing the top spot with the Ryzen 9 9800X3D as the fastest gaming CPUs in the world. AMD’s continued evolution of its ground-breaking 3D V-Cache tech has dramatically reduced the tradeoffs of lower productivity performance that used to be associated with its X3D chips, leaving little reason not to buy the chip if you prize both leading-edge gaming performance and real grunt power in productivity workloads.

Intel doesn't have a chip that can deliver a comparable blend of performance in both gaming and productivity. For gamers interested in Intel chips, the 14th-Gen processors remain the fastest for gaming, but they can’t compete with AMD’s X3D processors, and their aging design isn’t as powerful in productivity workloads as Intel’s newer Arrow Lake Core Ultra 9 285K.

Unfortunately for the Core Ultra 9 285K, while it maintains a lead over the 9950X3D in single-threaded work, it doesn’t establish itself firmly enough in multi-threaded applications to give it a complete win over Ryzen 9 in productivity work, and it is obviously a painfully inadequate competitor in gaming. That leaves Intel without a meaningful competitor for the Ryzen 9 9950X3D.

Below, we have the geometric mean of our gaming test suite at 1080p and a cumulative measure of performance in single- and multi-threaded applications. We conducted our gaming tests with an Nvidia RTX 5090, so performance deltas will shrink with lesser cards and higher resolution and fidelity settings.

It’s a dead heat in 1080p gaming at the top of the chart, with the Ryzen 9 9950X3D matching the 9800X3D. More impressively, the 9950X3D dispatches Intel’s chips easily, beating the 285K by 37% and the Core i9-14900K by 26%. Gaming is simply a no-contest.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D is impressive in productivity work, too, matching the standard Ryzen 9 9950X in our overall measure of both single- and multi-threaded workloads, an impressive accomplishment. It’s also 11% faster than the 285K in threaded workloads, though Intel fires back by taking a 7% lead in single-threaded work.

It isn’t often that a generational increase in TDP and power consumption is considered a good thing, but that’s exactly what we get with the Ryzen 9 9950X3D. The previous-gen 7950X3D had to step back 50W behind its standard counterpart due to its top-mounted L3 cache chiplet, but AMD's decision to move the chiplet to the bottom has drastically improved its ability to dissipate heat effectively. While we saw strong gains from this new technique with the single-chiplet 9800X3D, it is perhaps most important with the dual-CCD models. In the case of the 9950X3D, the extra 50W of headroom unleashes more horsepower for gaming and productivity work, making it the most powerful all-arounder that money can buy.

AMD will also release the 9900X3D tomorrow, but this chip doesn't look as promising. AMD's previous-gen 7900X3D suffered from a sizeable performance gap with its more powerful counterpart, scuttling the value proposition. The company says it has reduced that disparity this time around; however, the price delta is still slim between the two chips, especially given what will be substantial differences between the chips in productivity workloads. Don't pull the trigger on that chip until you see third-party testing.

Meanwhile, Arrow Lake remains a disappointment for us, and pretty much everyone else, too. Despite a string of BIOS, driver, Management Engine, and Windows updates, the Arrow Lake processors remain underwhelming on the multiple platforms we've tested.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D scores another walk-in touchdown for AMD, easily earning its $699 price tag. Given the intense demand for the Ryzen 9 9800X3D and the resulting rolling shortages, we expect it might be hard to get your hands on the Ryzen 9 9950X3D at first, especially at MSRP. For those on the hunt for the highest-end performance money can buy, it will be worth the effort. If you can afford it, you won't find a mainstream desktop PC chip that offers a stronger blend of gaming and productivity performance.

The new Mac Studio continues Apple's practice of placing its homegrown Arm-based chips into a workstation chassis far more compact than what we find in its PC counterparts. While you might not immediately be clued into just how powerful Apple's new Mac Studio is by looking at it, don't be fooled. While the previous generation Mac Studio with M2 Ultra was powerful, Apple has dialed up performance even more with this generation.

We don't often test pre-built workstations, but we couldn’t turn down the chance to review two configurations of the new Mac Studio: a lower-end system with the M4 Max and a higher-end configuration with what is currently Apple's most powerful processor, the M3 Ultra.

Apple is aiming the Mac Studio with M4 Max at creative professionals, particularly photographers, video editors, and engineers (among others). The M3 Ultra-equipped variant is equipped to handle more demanding tasks like LLMs and scientific research.

Design of the Mac Studio (2025)

Apple has not changed the design of this year's Mac Studio, which is a good thing. The chassis is 7.7 inches wide, 7.7 inches deep, and 3.7 inches tall. Our M4 Max review unit weighs 6.1 pounds, while our M3 Ultra unit weighs a more substantial 8.0 pounds due to its inclusion of a larger copper heatsink to keep thermals in check.

Although the two systems look identical from the front, some internal differences exist. The M4 Max system has two USB-C ports up front that support 10 GB/s speeds and an SDXC (UHS-II) card slot. The M3 Ultra also has an SDXC card slot, but its two USB-C ports support Thunderbolt 5 at speeds up to 120 Gb/s.

The port allotment on the back of the two systems is identical. You'll find four Thunderbolt 5 ports, two USB-A ports (5 Gb/s), an HDMI 2.1 port, 3.5 mm headphone jack, and a 10 Gb/s Ethernet port. The Mac Studio has Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3 for wireless connectivity. Even though Wi-Fi 7 is becoming more commonplace on high-end PC motherboards, laptops, and desktops, Apple hasn't yet made that shift with the Mac Studio.

Above the rear ports you'll find a large panel with exhaust holes for the internal fan. Cool air is drawn in from the bottom of the unit.

We’ve grown accustomed to Macs not allowing for hardware upgrades post-purchase (with the exception of the Mac Pro's storage). That remains the case with the Mac Studio. CPU, RAM, and storage configurations must be selected at the time of purchase. If you get your Mac Studio home and want to later add more memory, you’re out of luck. Technically, the internal SSD is removable, but Apple’s on-SoC encryption protocols make a DIY change difficult. Some third parties have developed SSD modules that reverse-engineer Apple’s efforts, but that’s a risky proposition for a workstation-grade system that starts at $1,999 and can creep into 5-digit territory with all the trimmings.

Mac Studio Specifications

M3 Ultra and M4 Max Performance on the Mac Studio

The M4 Max is a known quantity; This is the same chip that debuted with the most recent refresh of the 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pros. Our M4 Max review unit has a 16-core CPU (12 performance cores, 4 efficiency cores), 40-core GPU, 128GB of unified memory, and a 128GB SSD.

The M3 Ultra is the more interesting of the two chips, and not just because it isn’t called the M4 Ultra. Apple’s official response to the lack of an M4 Ultra is that not every generation of its M-Series chip will get an “Ultra” variant. So, that leaves us with the M3 Ultra, which joins together two M3 Max chips (they are joined using what Apple eloquently calls “UltraFusion”). The 184 billion-transistor chip inside our review unit has 32 cores (24 performance cores, 8 efficiency cores) and can be paired with up to 512GB of unified memory (256GB in our review unit) and delivers a maximum of 819 GB/s of memory bandwidth. Apple says that customers opting for the full 512GB allotment can run large language models (LLMs) that have up to 600 billion parameters completely within memory.

Given that our review unit also has a fully-enabled version of the M3 Ultra, it also incorporates 80 GPU cores, up from a maximum of 70 on the previous-generation M2 Ultra. It also has a 32-core neural processing unit (NPU) and a dedicated hardware media engine for H.256, HEVC, and ProRes encoding/decoding.

Joining our M3 Ultra and M4 Max review units in our testing are two PC-centric workstation chips: Intel’s Xeon W9-3495X and AMD’s Threadripper Pro 5995WX. We already had systems built around these processors in-house, so it seemed appropriate to compare them. The Xeon w9-3495X is a 56-core chip with a $5,889 MSRP. The Threadripper Pro 5995WX is a 64-core chip with a suggested retail price of $6,499. Those are before being built into systems, so it's a big difference from Apple, which makes entire PCs, not just chips.

We started our benchmarks with the Geekbench 6.4 CPU test. Here, the M3 Ultra delivered a single-core score of 3,349, putting it well ahead of the M2 Ultra (2,815) and beyond what’s possible with our AMD and Intel workstation systems. Apple’s decision to use two different generations of SoCs in the new Mac Studio shows the first quirk in our testing when it comes to the M4 Max. The M4 Max uses TSMC’s second-generation 3nm process node, along with a new, faster, and more powerful CPU architecture. The M3 Ultra, on the other hand, is using a first-generation 3nm TSMC node.

Geekbench reported that our M3 Ultra ran at 4.05 GHz, while the M4 Max ran at 4.5 GHz. As a result, the M4 Max put up a single-core score of 4,113. Multi-core performance was surprisingly close between the two, despite the M3 Ultra having double the cores. The M3 Ultra scored 27,929 on the multi-core benchmark, while the M4 Max wasn’t too far behind at 26,966.

Our file transfer test involves copying 25GB of mixed media files. The M3 Ultra finished the task, recording 2,685 MBps along the way, while the M4 Max hit 2,441 MBps, essentially tying the result of the last M2 Ultra Mac Studio that we tested.

The Mac Studio with M3 Ultra really stretched its legs in our Handbrake test, which involves transcoding a 4K video file to 1080p. The M3 Ultra completed the task in just one minute and 16 seconds compared to one minute and 56 seconds for the M4 Max. The Mac Studio with M2 Ultra finished in 2:45. The Xeon and Threadripper systems finished the transcode in roughly 2:40.

Moving on to the Xcode benchmark, which we use for simulating a large development project, the M3 Ultra finished in 64 seconds, which was an oddity compared to the M2 Ultra, which took just 58 seconds. The M4 Max completed the task in 79 seconds.

Using Cinebench 2024 we stress tested the M3 Ultra and M4 Max over ten runs in the multi-core benchmark. The M3 Ultra started the test just under 3,000, but remained consistently between 3,000 and 3,100 through the subsequent runs. The M4 Max, on the other hand, hovered between 2,050 and 2,100. We also use Cinebench 2024 to measure CPU temperatures, and TG Pro is our go-to macOS utility for measuring this data. TG Pro doesn’t fully support the M3 Ultra yet, but showed a system temperature of 43 degrees Celsius, while the M4 Max measured 42 degrees Celsius.

We use the Blender benchmark for testing performance applying visual effects and 3D modelling. We tested the CPU and GPU on the Mac Studio systems, while only the CPU was tested on the Xeon and Threadripper systems. While the M3 Ultra put up a valiant fight in Monster (339.9 samples per second), it was still no match for the core-packed Xeon (446.67) and Threadripper (485.33). The M4 Max was further behind at 240.52. It was a similar story in Junkshop, where the M3 Ultra and M4 Max recorded 243.2 and 153.9, respectively, compared to 302 and 350 for the Xeon and Threadripper. Finally, the Classroom test (173.3 for the M3 Ultra, 104.28 for the M4 Max) chalked up another win for the x86-64 stalwarts (212.33 for the Xeon, 230 for the Threadripper).

However, the M3 Ultra had the last laugh when switching to the GPU testing where it absolutely clobbered the competition. The M3 Ultra hit 3,246.45 samples per second in Monster, 1,581.17 in Junkshop and 1,643.26 in Classroom. The M4 Max also had a strong showing at 2,344.09, 1,271.57, and 1,234.93, respectively.

To test the gaming acumen of the new Mac Studios, I opted to try Resident Evil Village. I tested both systems with a 49-inch Philips Evnia 8000 DQHD 240 Hz QD-OLED gaming monitor. The game looked absolutely brilliant with all detail settings maxed out and with MetalFX upscaling turned on. I saw around 100 fps on the M3 Studio and around 80 fps on the M4 Max at 5120 x 1440.

My daily driver is a 14-inch MacBook Pro with an M3 Pro processor and 36GB of RAM. Either variant of the Mac Studio was overkill for my daily needs. I was never left wanting for more performance while gaming, editing photos in Pixelmator Pro (now an Apple app), or editing videos of my kids.

Software and Warranty on the Mac Studio

The new Mac Studio ships with macOS Sequoia 15.3.1, and required no additional OS or security updates out of the box (though by the time you get one, your mileage may vary). This is the latest version of the operating system that we first visited in our review of the 14-inch MacBook Pro in late 2024. Apple hasn’t given macOS a significant design overhaul in many years, and most of the updates to the operating system have been iterative and mostly fly under the radar.

The biggest addition to Sequoia is Apple Intelligence, which makes better use of context clues to find information in your treasure trove of digital data. Apple Intelligence also means that Siri is no longer dumber than a box of rocks when it comes to answering complex (and sometimes, rather basic) queries thanks to integration with ChatGPT. However, a fully rebuilt Siri is still way off in the distance for Mac users. Continuity updates mean that you can now mirror your iPhone on your macOS desktop using iPhone Mirroring, and you can drag and drop files and media between your Mac and iPhone. There are also quality of life improvements to Apple’s pack-in apps like Safari, Mail, and Messages.

There's no egregious bloat among the included software. Apple’s usual array of programs that are preinstalled include Safari, Maps, Notes, FaceTime, Mail, and Calendar. Apple also wants to lure you in on the recurring revenue train with its popular services like Apple Music and Apple TV. All of Apple’s apps, and a significant segment of third-party apps natively support Apple Silicon. After all, Apple first made the shift to its in-house chip designs in late 2020. For developers that haven’t yet gotten onboard the Apple Silicon train, Rosetta 2 serves as a translation layer between older apps designed for x86 software. When you first start an x86, Rosetta 2 automatically downloads from Apple to ensure that the app runs flawlessly.

All Mac Studios ship with a one-year warranty. If you’d like to add AppleCare+ coverage (Apple’s extended warranty), which in my opinion seems a little unnecessary for a desktop system, Apple charges $59.99/year.

Mac Studio Configurations

The base Mac Studio costs $1,999, which gets you an M4 Max processor with 14 CPU cores and a 32-core GPU. 36GB of unified memory comes standard, as is a 512GB SSD. Our M4 Max review unit was configured with the 16-core CPU/40-core GPU variant of the M4 Max, 128GB of unified memory, and a 1TB SSD, which retails for $3,699.

Our M3 Ultra review unit came with a 32-core CPU and 80-core GPU. Add in 256GB of unified memory and a 4TB SSD pushes the price to an eye-watering $8,099. If you have an itch for the M3 Ultra but want to save a few bucks, you can go with a smaller SSD, less memory, or opt for the 28-core CPU/60-core GPU version. The base M3 Ultra with the 28-core CPU/60-core GPU, 96GB of unified memory, and a 1TB SSD costs $3,999.

If you want to fully max out the M3 Ultra version of the Mac Studio, opting for 512GB of unified memory and a 16TB SSD brings the grand total to $14,099. You don’t get a mouse/trackpad or keyboard in the box, so be sure to source those as well if you’re speccing out a new system.

Bottom Line

The Mac Studio is a fascinating product. For less than the cost of just a Xeon or Threadripper workstation processor, you can get a fully-functioning macOS machine with some serious horsepower under the hood. The M3 Ultra dominated most of our CPU tests, except for the single-threaded Geekbench test that favored the M4 Max, and the Blender CPU tests which favored the Xeon and the Threadripper with their huge advantage in core counts.

The M3 Studio blew through our Handbrake transcode test in record time, aced our file transfer test, and held its own on the Blender CPU benchmark tests against the Intel and AMD competition. However, when we switched to the GPU in the Blender tests, the Mac Studio blew the doors off the competition, with the M4 Max trailing not too far behind.

The new Mac Studios achieves these feats silently, as even under full load, I could only hear the dual internal fans if my ear was up against the exhaust vent. But for all its plusses, the Mac Studio still has some downsides. There’s no way to upgrade your memory or SSD after purchase, so you’ll need to forecast what your needs will be a few years down the road regarding hardware resources. Also, memory and SSD upgrade prices are far pricier than what you find on the PC side.

But if you’re firmly in the Apple camp, or even a PC stalwart that doesn’t mind expanding his or her horizons to the macOS realm, the Mac Studio remains a compelling choice in a compact package.

Well-known hardware reviewers aren't immune to tech retail fakers, and to demonstrate this, Hardware Busters has shared images of a counterfeit AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D and its packaging. Dealing with fakes seems to be part and parcel of being a tech enthusiast nowadays, but luckily Aris from Hardware Busters will very likely get his money back, via the returns process he has now begun on Amazon.de.

The retail box that the fake Ryzen 7 9800X3D was shipped in was a decent enough copy to pass inspection (the packaging might even have been genuine). Aris Mpitziopoulos, the head honcho at Hardware Busters (and who you may also know for his in-depth power supply reviews here on Tom's Hardware), says that he received the CPU on March 4, but only got around to ripping away the shrink wrap on March 9, due to a hectic schedule.

Once the box was opened, fakery was immediately apparent. See the side-by-side genuine Ryzen 9000 chip (left) and faked 9800X3D (right) in our gallery, and the coveted X3D chip is obviously a fraud. AMD transitioned to the now-familiar octopus shaped IHS with the advent of the Ryzen 7000 series of desktop processors.

So, perhaps Aris got an AMD CPU that was a couple of generations old? No. As you can see from the amazing IHS sticker peel image (top) under the sticker was an AMD FX-4100, a 32nm quad-core Bulldozer architecture chip that launched in 2011. Even in its prime, this AMD CPU lagged behind the Intel’s Core i3-2100 in gaming comparison tests we conducted in early 2012.

The faked 9800X3D also features a completely different package with pins rather than pads, so an unobservant amateur PC DIYer could accidentally kill an expensive motherboard trying to crush this processor in an AM5 socket. That would be a terrible loss, and Aris was thankfully awake when he unboxed the counterfeit processor.

There are a few more details about this Amazon.de purchase that are interesting to repeat. Aris says that this 9800X3D was bought new, not used or returned, from Amazon direct, rather than a third-party seller. The sealed packaging seemed genuine to him.

Now Hardware Busters has to deal with the waste of time and inconvenience of receiving this fake 9800X3D. Aris reckons it will take three weeks to be refunded the significant chunk of cash spent on this fake CPU.

If you are in the market for the Ryzen 7 9800X3D, which sits confidently among the best CPUs, please be scam-aware. We have previously reported on Amazon US being flooded with fake $199 9800X3D listings – targeting the Black Friday sales events last year. More recently, we noticed fake Ryzen 9000 series chips in China upcycling Ryzen 7000 parts, giving the fake CPU substrates a characteristic green tinge (they should be a shade of blue).

AMD’s upcoming Zen 6 processors will remain compatible with AM5, but they are set to introduce a new chiplet-based CPU design and significantly boost core counts across desktop and laptop products, according to sources of ChipHell, as well as Moore's Law Is Dead. Premium processors for gamers will also feature 3D V-Cache.

AMD's next-generation Ryzen processors based on the Zen 6 microarchitecture will feature 12-core core chiplet dies (CCDs), marking a major shift from eight-core CCDs used in Zen 3/4/5 generation processors, if the linked reports are accurate. As a result, desktop AM5 processors will be able to feature up to 24 cores. Meanwhile, advanced laptop APUs will transition from a four Zen 5 eight Zen 5c (8+4) configuration to a 12-core structure, at least according to MLID. A Zen 6 CCD is 75mm^2 large, MLID claims.

Now, the increased number of cores is a big deal. However, premium versions of AMD's desktop processors will feature up to 96MB of L3 cache, which is 4MB per core. 4MB per core is in line with existing Zen 5 configurations, so AMD does not cut down caches in favor of core count.

AMD is expected to release Zen 6-based products in 2026, so it is reasonable to expect them to use a more advanced node than they use today (TSMC's 4nm-class), so think TSMC's N3P (3nm-class) given that AMD does exactly use leading-edge nodes (possibly due to supply constraints), which will be N2 (2nm-class) next year.

AMD's Zen 6-based Ryzens for gaming PCs will also feature 3D V-Cache. Some laptop processors with built-in graphics will also feature 3D V-Cache, though exact configuration is something that remains to be seen.

AMD Medusa Point and Medusa Ridge

Interestingly, and according to MLID, AMD's standard APUs will be chiplet-based, moving away from the monolithic approach. Medusa Point — a laptop APU — is expected to feature a Zen 6 CCD with 12 cores and a 200mm^2 I/O die (IOD), featuring eight RDNA work groups, a 128-bit memory controller, and a large NPU. There is speculation that Infinity Cache may be added to enhance GPU performance.

MLID also claims that the desktop version of Medusa Point — allegedly called Medusa Ridge — will use up to two 12-core Zen 6 CCD in the AM5 form-factor. That product will have a 155mm^2 IOD without an advanced built-in GPU, but possibly with a large NPU.

AMD's latest additions to its Zen 5 stack include the 16-core Ryzen 9 9950X3D and 12-core 9900X3D, set to launch on March 12. Just days before the retail embargo, a handful of Ryzen 9 9950X3D samples appear to have been tested in PassMark, a benchmarking utility (via x86deadandback on X). Based on the first few sets of runs, the 9950X3D keeps pace with its non-X3D counterpart in single-threaded performance, while landing solid wins against its last-gen counterpart in PassMark. Remember that these benchmarks may not accurately reflect the CPU's performance in all real-world applications.

Coming in at $699, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D retains its predecessor's specifications with a 16-core and 32-thread layout. All Ryzen 9000X3D chips integrate the 2nd generation of AMD's V-Cache technology, under which the SRAM block is placed below the heat-producing CCDs for more thermal headroom. This is reflected through the elevated clock speeds and higher power limits, with the 9950X3D rated at 170W.

The cache configuration hasn't changed much with Zen 5 so you still get 144MB (9950X3D) and 140MB (9900X3D) of total cache on both chips. AMD claims the 9950X3D is 20% faster than Intel's flagship Core Ultra 9 285K and 8% faster than the last-gen Ryzen 9 7950X3D in 1080p gaming. It's best to wait for third-party results for a clearer picture.

In single-threaded performance, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D beats its predecessor by around 14%. Previously, the inclusion of an SRAM block limited the boost clocks and TDP of AMD's X3D processors. Since single-core benchmarks heavily depend on frequency along with other variables, there was a certain gap between a given CPU and its X3D equivalent. AMD has seemingly narrowed this gap to a great extent, as these benchmarks reveal no difference between the Ryzen 9 9950X3D and the 9950X.

CPU Mark, which is a proprietary set of benchmarks used to gauge a processor's performance, sees the Ryzen 9 9950X3D lead the pack, boasting an 11% lead against the Ryzen 9 7950X3D. From the looks of it, CPU Mark can leverage the extra L3 cache, as a result of which the 9950X3D ends up 5% ahead of the 9950X. This ability to extract more performance from added cache is not code-agnostic, so don't expect a similar outcome in every scenario.

The Ryzen 9 9950X3D and 9900X3D are set to hit shelves starting March 12, at $699 and $599 respectively. While AMD hasn't promised widespread availability, expanding the X3D lineup should help alleviate supply constraints on the popular Ryzen 7 9800X3D.

AMD announced its latest RDNA 4 GPUs last week, with the cards on sale just a few days ago. The AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT and RX 9070 graphics cards deliver excellent value, and given that Team Red had weeks, if not months, to prepare for it, we expected these GPUs to have ample supply. Some retailers claimed they have thousands of RX 9070 XT GPUs of a single model in stock and are ready to sell come March 5.

However, it seems that the alleged good supply of AMD’s RDNA4 GPUs is not enough to satisfy the demands of gamers. We looked around major PC retailers like Micro Center and Newegg only to find almost all listings out of stock. Even Best Buy is mainly sold out, so even if you know where to buy AMD Radeon RX 9070 series GPUs, you’ll likely not find them available now.

On the other hand, when we checked listings for these GPUs on Amazon, we found some stores selling them at prices way beyond the MSRP of $549 and $599. For example, we saw a listing for an XFX Mercury RX 9070 XT OC Magnetic Air White Edition for $2,024.99 — more than three times the suggested retail price. We also saw an Asus TUG Gaming RX 9070 XT OC Edition selling for $1,795.00.

Note that major retailers or manufacturers don’t sell these items; instead, they’re offered by third-party shops with an online storefront on the e-commerce platform. Surprisingly, scalpers on eBay and Facebook Marketplace are a bit more reasonable, with many asking between $700 and $1,500 for an RX 9070 XT.

Of course, we are disappointed to see ‘Out of Stock’ signs again on GPU listings, with scalpers putting them up for sale at ridiculous prices. Intel launched the Arc B580 entry-level GPU to great acclaim late last year, but it’s still mostly out of stock even after several months. Nvidia has had it worse, admitting a GPU shortage for its 50-series GPUs.

We can hardly blame AMD for the situation, though, as it seems the company had more stock at launch than Nvidia or Intel ever had. It could be that the pent-up demand for mid-range GPUs that neither Team Blue nor Team Green could satisfy finally burst like a dam and gobbled up all available RDNA 4 GPUs.

Until these companies announce how many chips they’ve produced and poured into the market before a launch, we can’t explain why these shortages happen, especially as we’re already over the supply chain crisis caused by the 2019 global pandemic. But remember, no matter how excited you are for a new GPU, you should never purchase from these scalpers.

AMD has announced that it will release its long-awaited Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Ryzen 9 9900X3D processors on March 12th. AMD's new top-of-the-line CPUs will be sold for $699 and $599, respectively.

After being announced at CES 2025, AMD's new flagships will arrive to an excited market that has not seen a new CPU release since the Ryzen 7 9800X3D arrived in November. The 9800X3D has suffered from inflated pricing since its launch, and the addition of new X3D models should help to broaden the availability of AMD's gaming-optimized tech, though these new premium models will come at a much higher price point

The $699 Ryzen 9 9950X3D will launch at the same price point as its predecessor, the Ryzen 9 7950X3D. We fully expect the 9950X3D to become among the best CPUs for gaming on the market, as the current top dog, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D, already beats Intel in gaming workloads, and 9950X3D's 16 cores are likely to make it a solid productivity CPU as well.

While we still don't know the base clocks of the two new releases, what we do know about their speeds and feeds is exciting, to say the least. The chips will be 16-core and 12-core parts, with the 9950X3D turboing up to 5.7 GHz. The "X3D" in the CPU names refers to the inclusion of 3D V-Cache technology, a game-boosting AMD invention that stacks a wicked-fast cache chiplet beneath the CPU dies to maximize gaming performance.

The 9950X3D will arrive with 144MB of total cache, dwarfing the 80MB found on the 9950, non-X3D. The 9900X3D's 12 cores will turbo up to 5.5 GHz and be aided by 140MB of total cache, almost double that of its non-X3D flavor. The chips will run mighty warm, with TDPs rated at 170W and 120W.

As far as getting your hands on a 9950X3D on release day, there are no promises to be made. The top-end CPUs and GPUs have been scarce lately; the Ryzen 7 9800X3D is currently out of stock via AMD and selling at inflated pricing at retailers, and not much needs to be said about the difficulty of obtaining Nvidia or AMD's newest GPU releases. So, while AMD's 9950X3D will be wonderful for gaming, if a CPU crushes frames with no one around to buy it, is it still the best number cruncher?

Ryzen 9 9950X3D Gaming and Content Creation Benchmarks

While we don't have independent benchmarks just yet, AMD claims the gaming and productivity performance of the 9950X3D and 9900X3D are outstanding. Per AMD's own internal testing shown at CES, the 9950X3D is 20% faster than Intel's flagship Core Ultra 9 285K in 1080p high gaming tests. The chip also ekes out an 8% performance increase over the last-gen AMD Ryzen 9 7950X3D, a nice generational improvement.

AMD's CES panel also stated that 9950X3D's performance is within 1% of the Ryzen 7 9800X3D, which comes as little surprise as it matches the performance delta between last-gen's 7950X3D and 7800X3D. The 9900X3D didn't get nearly as much love in the panel, receiving no comparative tests, which is a bit worrying but not entirely surprising; last-gen's Ryzen 9 7900X3D was a 3-star chip at best playing in 7950X3D's shadow.

In terms of productivity, the same 3D V-Cache technology that blesses gaming speeds typically hampers productivity numbers a fair bit. The 3D V-Cache chiplet affixed to the die doesn't seem to be too much of an albatross around the neck of 9950X3D, with AMD claiming a 10% lead over the Core Ultra 9 285K in performance benchmarks. The testing suite shown off at CES seemed to be heavily weighted towards multi-core workloads, which the 16-core 9950X3D understandably run away with, but the 285K already leads over AMD's non-X3D SKUs in single-threaded performance testing, so those users with a productivity suite prioritizing single-core power may not fall in love with the 9950X3D.

For everything else we know about the Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Ryzen 9 9900X3D, be sure to check out our CES writeup on the chips. March 12th will likely bring with it a new chapter in AMD's gaming CPU dominance, though whether it also brings enough supply to keep up with rabid demand is entirely up in the air. Keep your eyes on us for our full benchmark reviews on the chips coming very soon.

Bolt Graphics, a GPU startup from Sunnyvale, California, this week introduced its Zeus GPU platform that is designed for gaming, rendering, and supercomputer simulations. The company says that its Zeus GPU not only supports features like upgradeable memory and built-in Ethernet interfaces, but it can also beat Nvidia's GeForce RTX 5090 by around 10 times in path tracing workloads, according to slide published by ServeTheHome.

There is one catch: Zeus can only beat the RTX 5090 GPU in path tracing and FP64 compute workloads. It's not clear how well it will handle traditional rendering techniques, as that was less of a focus. In speaking with Bolt Graphics, the card does support rasterization, but there was less emphasis on that aspect of the GPU, and it may struggle to compete with the best graphics cards when it comes to gaming. And when it comes to data center options like Nvidia's Blackwell B200, it's an entirely different matter.

RISC-V multi-chiplet GPU

Unlike GPUs from AMD, Intel, and Nvidia that rely on proprietary instruction set architectures, Bolt's Zeus relies on the open-source RISC-V ISA, according to the published slides. The Zeus core relies on an open-source out-of-order general-purpose RVA23 scalar core mated with FP64 ALUs and the RVV 1.0 (RISC-V Vector Extension Version 1.0) that can handle 8-bit, 16-bit, 32-bit, and 64-bit data types as well as Bolt's additional proprietary extensions designed for acceleration of scientific workloads.

As Zeus is aimed at path tracing rendering technique as well as compute workloads, we weren't sure whether it has traditional fixed-function GPU hardware like texture units (TMUs) and raster operation units (ROPs). The company reached out to us and said that Zeus does have TMU and ROP engines, but it's not disclosing any of the specifications just yet and is currently working on further optimizations. Each Zeus GPU has one DisplayPort 2.1a and one HDMI 2.1b output.

Like many processors these days, Zeus relies on a multi-chiplet design. The entry-level Zeus 1c26-032 features a single processing unit that is equipped with 32GB of LPDDR5X memory with 273 GB/s of bandwidth, and can be mated with up to 128GB of DDR5 memory using two SO-DIMMs (at 80 GB/s). The Zeus GPU is also paired with an I/O chiplet that packs a QSFP-DD port for 400GbE/800GbE, two PCIe Gen5 x16 slots with CXL 3.0 on top (enabling efficient memory sharing across multiple cards), and a GbE port for BMC. The GPU chiplet connects to its I/O chiplet at 256 GB/s.

The more advanced Zeus 2c26-064/128 uses two Zeus processing units, an I/O chiplet, and supports either 64GB or 128GB of LPDDR5X memory. The most powerful variant — Zeus 4c26-256 — integrates four processing units, four I/O chiplets, 256GB LPDDR5X and up to 2TB of DDR5 memory. The quad-chiplet Zeus implementation is not a card but rather functions as a server.

Unlike high-end GPUs that prioritize bandwidth, Bolt is evidently focusing on greater memory size to handle larger datasets for rendering and simulations. Also, built-in 400GbE and 800GbE ports to enable faster data transfer across networked GPUs indicates the data center focus of Zeus.

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