AMD’s Ryzen 9 5950X has fallen to $599 for the first time since launch. The 16-core Zen 3 processor packs 72MB of L3 cache across two 7nm chiplets and can boost up to 4.9GHz under load. Although slower than Intel’s Core i9-12900K in gaming and single-threaded workloads, it manages to come out on top in multi-threaded workloads, most notably content creation and rendering.
With the popularization of Intel’s 12th Gen Alder Lake-S processors, the Ryzen 5000 chips have come under fire, losing a fat chunk of the market in almost every geo. AMD has responded by slashing prices across the board. The Ryzen 9 5950X which launched with an MSRP of $799 is now available for $599 for the first time ever.
This makes it extremely competitive against the Intel 12th Gen flagship which features eight performance and eight efficiency cores. The Core i9-12900K is presently going for $625 on Amazon, and $612.96 on Newegg, making it pricier than its Zen 3 rival for the first time since launch. This gives consumers two options: The Core i9-12900K for purely gaming workloads, and the Ryzen 9 5950X for content creators and professionals.
In case you’re looking for a mid-range chip, then the Ryzen 7 5800X or the Core i7-12700K are excellent options as well. The former is discounted to $299, with the latter selling for $399.
