It comes with caveats, and the generational multi-core improvements are barely worth mentioning.
1.Price, availability, and specs2.Multi core performance3.Single core performance4.The competition5.Should you buy?
Whether that matters to you would vary depending on a few value-centric factors.
There’s no free Wraith cooler, but the price drop is a great trade-off.
Here’s how it performed in my testing and where it ranks against its top rivals.
This review was made possible by a review sample provided by AMD.
The company did not see the contents of the review before publishing.
AM5 sockets remain the standard for modern Ryzen CPUs, supported by AMD, until at least 2027.
Improvements delivered throughAMD’s Zen 5 architecturewill be the key to how much performance has improved this year.
AMD recently launched theRyzen AI 300 Seriesmobile chips, focusing on generative AI with laptops instead.
Expansion depends on yourmotherboard choice, though PCIe 5.0 support for modern GPUs and mandatory DDR5 RAM are standard.
The previous-generation Ryzen 7 7700X pulls ahead in one multi-core benchmark, compressing and decompressing synthetic 7-Zip archives.
It also came close in the CPU-Z benchmark test but never outperformed the Ryzen 7 9700X in single-core performance.
Is the AMD Ryzen 7 9700X good for gaming?
If your suite of apps and games perform better with single-core optimizations, you’ll love the 9700X.
Ryzen 7 9700X: Should you buy?
You should buy this if … On the contrary, most comparable Intel Core desktop processors are unaffected or remedied with a simple BIOS update.
It’s an outstanding display from Team Red and scores one of the easiest recommendations I’ve ever made.
Geekbench 6 tests CPUs with burst performance.(Image credit: Windows Central | CPU Monkey)
Cinebench 2024 tests CPUs with sustained stress.(Image credit: Windows Central | CPU Monkey)
CPU-Z benchmarks both single and multi core performance in short bursts.(Image credit: Windows Central | CPU Monkey)
7-Zip simulates archive compression and decompression techniques on the CPU.(Image credit: Windows Central | CPU Monkey)
The mild multi-core bump from the Ryzen 7 7700X to the 9700X is more evident when compared with the older 5700X.
The 9700X pulls ahead of the 7800X3D in burst processing.(Image credit: Ben Wilson | Windows Central)
Even in sustained stress tests, the 9700X edges past the 7800X3D.(Image credit: Ben Wilson | Windows Central)
Sorting by single-core performance shows the 9700X on top.(Image credit: Windows Central | CPU Monkey)
Rendering a virtual scene in Cinebench 2024 performed best on the 9700X with a single-core test.(Image credit: Windows Central | CPU Monkey)
Intel’s 14th Gen i7 pulls ahead ever so slightly in single-core performance with CPU-Z’s benchmark.(Image credit: Windows Central | CPU Monkey)
If you’re prepared to face potential issues, Intel has Core i5 and i7 alternatives in its 13th and 14th Gen.
AMD still uses the ugly heat spreader pattern with the 9700X, but I’ll give them a pass based on its performance.
