Review

AMD Ryzen 7 3700X Processor Review

Today we are reviewing high-performance 7nm-based computing product from AMD offering new levels of performance, features and experiences for PC gamers, enthusiasts and content creators. The 3rd Gen AMD Ryzen 7 3700X Processor based on new Zen2 architecture offering up to 15% estimated instructions per clock (IPC)2 uplift over the predecessor “Zen" architecture. The “Zen 2" CPU core also includes significant design improvements including larger cache sizes and a redesigned floating point engine.

Beside the new processor line, the 3rd Gen AMD Ryzen desktop processor family comes in AM4 socket making it backward compatible with most previous generation AM4 socket motherboards. That is great for people looking for an upgrade and more performance from their existing AMD Ryzen builds

With a new processor, AMD also introduced a new AMD X570 chipset, the world's first PCIe 4.0 supported chipset is now also designed by AMD and not by partner ASMedia as for X470 and X370 chipset.

Now let's see what more the new AMD Ryzen 7 3700X desktop processor have for us.

Features

Zen2 Architecture
“Zen 2" CPU core includes significant design improvements including larger cache sizes and a redesigned floating point engine.

Chiplet Based Design
With Zen 2 architecture, AMD has switched from a monolithic homogenous die to a “chiplet" design. A chiplet design contains multiple heterogenous dies with different functions.

Cache Changes
The 3rd generation Ryzen series CPU's comes in the form of cache changes, each CCD has now has 32MB of L3 cache. Twice what was included with the Zen and Zen+ architecture-based offerings

Energy and Power Efficiency
The 3rd generation Ryzen is made with the 7nm process node which shrinks or die shrink and potentially reduces power consumption and heat. This is what AMD calls its: “7nm Energy Efficiency Leadership"

Windows 10 Optmizations (Build 1903)

AMD X570 Chipset
The AMD X570 chipset offers an increased PCI-Express lane count as well as the option for PCIe Gen4.0 compatibility and throughput.

Specifications

Looks

Testing

For testing the performance for the new AMD Ryzen 7 3700X desktop processor, we ran few CPU benchmarks and compared it with the Intel's newer 8-Core; 16-Thread Coffee lake i9-9900K CPU. All the CPUs under test were kept to their stock factory settings/ clock speeds as provided by their manufacturers. No overclocking is applied, as overclocking capability of CPU varies from chip to chip, cooling capabilities and many more factors. We also used same AIO cooling solution for all CPUs and ran all tests on same approx ambient temperature.

AMD Ryzen 7 3700X test system configuration -

CPU AMD Ryzen 7 3700X
BoardASUS CROSSHAIR VIII Hero Wifi
RAM2 X 8GB GALAX DDR4 3600Mhz
SSDSamsung 970 evo 256GB nvme
GFX AMD RX 5700 XT
PSU Corsair H115i PRO RGB 280mm AIO
PSU Corsair RM650
OS Windows 10 Pro (Build 1903)

Intel Core i9 9900K test system configuration -

CPU Intel Core i9 9900K
BoardMSI Z390 Gaming Plus
RAM2 X 8GB GALAX DDR4 3600Mhz
SSDSamsung 970 evo 256GB nvme
GFX AMD RX 5700 XT
PSU Corsair H115i PRO RGB 280mm AIO
PSU Corsair RM650
OS Windows 10 Pro (Build 1903)

Benchmarks

CPU-Z Bench

AMD Ryzen 7 3700X

Intel Core i9 9900K

CINEBENCH R15

AMD Ryzen 7 3700X

Intel Core i9 9900K

AIDA64 Cache & Memory Benchmark

AMD Ryzen 7 3700X

Intel Core i9 9900K

PCMARK 10

AMD Ryzen 7 3700X

Intel Core i9 9900K

3D MARK – Time Spy

AMD Ryzen 7 3700X

Intel Core i9 9900K

Overclocking

AMD's Ryzen Master

AMD's Ryzen Master utility is a powerful overclocking and monitoring tool for tuning your AMD Ryzen system within the Windows operating system environment.

List of New features for the AMD's Ryzen Master utility

  • Precision Boost Overdrive (PBO): Enable and disable the feature, with and without Automatic Overclocking.
  • Package Power Tracking (“PPT”): The PPT% indicates the distance to configured maximum power (in watts) that can be delivered to the processor socket. “Limit” notes totalmotherboard-provided capacity if PBO is enabled.
  • Thermal Design Current (“TDC”): The TDC% indicates the distance to the configured current limit (in amps) that can be delivered by the motherboard voltage regulators when thermally constrained. “Limit” notes total motherboard-provided capacity if PBO is enabled.
  • Electrical Design Current (“EDC”): The EDC% indicates the distance to the configured current limit (in amps) that can be delivered by the motherboard voltage regulators in a peak/transient condition. “Limit” notes total motherboard-provided capacity if PBO is enabled.
  • Fastest Core Detection: The grey stars represent the fastest core(s) within each CCX, while the gold star indicates the fastest core in the chiplet. The circles represent the second fastest cores within the CCXes. This can be extremely useful for breaking single-core clock speed records.
  • Per-CCX Overclocking: It is now possible to independently control the clock speed of each CCX.
  • Topology View: Cores in the UI are now labeled and grouped according to their physical location in the SoC.
  • Active Power Management Insight: AMD Ryzen™ Processors make extensive use of cc6 sleep, rather than frequency adjustments, for active power management. Windows® is unable to probe and report the state of the core in a cc6 state, and instead reports the last active clock before sleep; this may give the illusion that a core is “stuck” at a high idle clock. With this update, users can now see for themselves when a core has entered cc6 sleep and can observe the complete range of idle/sleep frequencies available to the processor. This is the first and only tool in the market with this capability.
  • DRAM Profiles: Users now have access to every memory timing parameter, including drive strengths, on-die termination, and Rtt values. Users can import and export full memory profiles to share with the community.

Using AMD's Ryzen Master utility we were easily able to overclock AMD Ryzen 7 3700X CPU upto stable 4.30GHz and maximum core clock of 4.85GHz.

Power Consumption

Wattage reading as per displayed by APC Pro 1000VA (Model no. BR1000G-IN) UPS. For max power reading 3D MARK – Time Spy benchmark was used as load.

AMD Ryzen 7 3700X

Intel Core i9 9900K

Pros

  • Great Price
  • CPU cooler included
  • RGB and Copper Cooler
  • Backward compatibility
  • Nice performance
  • New microarchitecture
  • Faster Memory support

Cons

  • Nil

Conclusion

Testing the new AMD Ryzen 7 3700X desktop processor was a very nice experience. Nice to see that the 3rd generation Ryzen CPU is offering a great increase in performance than the first generation and second generation. And the appealing point is that it is still backward compatible with motherboards that support the first generation Ryzen CPUs. The Ryzen 7 3700X CPU comes with AMD Wraith Prism provides ultimate CPU air-cooling solution.

Finally at a price tag of $329 US, the new AMD Ryzen 7 3700X desktop processor offers the best price to performance value with 8 cores 16 threads and a max Boost Clock of 4.4GHz performance against the Intel's expensive 8 cores 16 threads counterpart. AMD Ryzen 7 3700X desktop processor comes along with a very good CPU cooler in the box, offering great value for gamers, content creators and software development environment; make it worthy of our PC TeK Reviews Choice Award.

Manufacturers Info

Site Link

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