It may not be Black Friday, or even some version of Amazon’s Prime Day, but AMD is having a sale anyway: the company is taking up to $50 off its top Ryzen processors, just because. AMD is also confirming that next-gen Ryzen 9000 X3D parts are en route and scheduled for November 7, while providing frustratingly few details about them.
AMD isn’t offering any context for its actions, announcing that the discounts are an “early holiday promotion” that will take place starting October 20 and lasting an indeterminate amount of time. It’s slicing off anywhere between $30 to $50 off of the Ryzen 5 9600X, the Ryzen 7 9700X, the Ryzen 9 9900X, and the Ryzen 9 9950X.
The price cuts are listed below:
AMD
Is it a little weird? Yes. AMD isn’t even saying what the final prices are for the processors in question: it’s up to channel partners.
“AMD is offering this promotional pricing to channel partners, starting on Oct. 20, but final street pricing is dynamic at most retailers – specifically Amazon and Newegg,” an AMD representative said in an email.
Here’s the way the math works out, assuming that retailers offer the maximum discount: the $279 Ryzen 5 9600X is now $249; the $359 Ryzen 7 9700X is now $329; the $499 Ryzen 7 9900X is now $469; and the $649 Ryzen 9 9950X is now $599.
When you compare AMD’s Ryzen 9000 prices to what Intel is charging for its upcoming Arrow Lake processors, however, the discounts make more sense. Although Intel’s Core Ultra 9 285K tops out at $589, the rest of the Arrow Lake family currently resides in the $300 range.
We don’t know how Intel’s Arrow Lake compares to the Ryzen 9000 family, but Intel has already tempered expectations of performance, focusing on its significant power cuts instead. Put another way: We’d expect AMD to charge a premium for the Ryzen 9000 for its likely superior performance, but it’s also possible that the chipmaker wants to bring its prices a bit more in line with its chief competitor.
Here comes the Ryzen 9000X3D
For those who feel that price is no object, however, AMD offers an alternative: its X3D family with its stacks of V-cache that are designed to improve overall performance. And if you consider yourself in that group, know that the Ryzen 9000X3D series is on its way.
AMD
Our Ryzen 9 7950X3D review tells you everything you need to know about what makes the X3D series tick. These gaming and content creation chips are designed for performance first. Did that chip meet its own expectations? Surprisingly, no. While the 7950X3D often beat the Ryzen 7950X, it stumbled against Intel’s Core i9-13900KS and K chips. In retrospect, however, it scored an interesting win in one area: power efficiency, which wasn’t really a concern in desktop processing in 2023 but is certainly in the limelight now.
AMD’s Ryzen 9000X3D family certainly needs a redemption arc of its own. Here’s what we officially know of it: It will use AMD’s AM5 socket and support PCI Express 5.0 and DDR5 memory. No surprises there. If leaks (via Tom’s Hardware) are to be believed, we’ll see three new chips announced later: the 8-core/16-thread 9800X3D, the 12-core/24-thread Ryzen 9 9900X3D, and the 16-core/32-thread Ryzen 9 9950X3D.
When will we hear more about those? AMD isn’t saying anything yet, so for now we’ll just have to wait and see.
Author: Mark Hachman, Senior Editor, PCWorld
Mark has written for PCWorld for the last decade, with 30 years of experience covering technology. He has authored over 3,500 articles for PCWorld alone, covering PC microprocessors, peripherals, and Microsoft Windows, among other topics. Mark has written for publications including PC Magazine, Byte, eWEEK, Popular Science and Electronic Buyers' News, where he shared a Jesse H. Neal Award for breaking news. He recently handed over a collection of several dozen Thunderbolt docks and USB-C hubs because his office simply has no more room.