[Hardware] AMD's Ryzen 9 5900 Blurs The Line Between Performance And Value

[Sxynix]

 

Hardware detective Tum_Apisak has spotted AMD's Ryzen 9 5900 in a new benchmark. The 12-core processor appears to be a complete monster, but it's a shame that the chip is exclusive to OEMs.

Coming out of TSMC's 7nm furnace, the Ryzen 9 5900 is just like any other Ryzen 5000 (Vermeer) processor. Wielding the mighty Zen 3 cores, the Ryzen 9 5900 is essentially the power-optimized version of the Ryzen 9 5900X. The Ryzen 9 5900 retains the same 12-core, 24-thread design with 64MB of L3 cache as its counterpart. Unlike the Ryzen 9 5900X's 105W TDP, the non-X model is restricted to 65W.

With a stricter power limit, the Ryzen 9 5900 obviously arrives with lower operating clock speeds. The processor has a 3 GHz base clock, which is 700 MHz lower than the Ryzen 9 5900X. The boost clock, on the other hand, didn't suffer a huge reduction. The Ryzen 9 5900 easily boosts to 4.7 GHz, only 100 MHz lower than the Ryzen 9 5900X.

It's normal to wonder how the Ryzen 9 5900 performs in comparison to the Ryzen 9 5900X given the lower TDP. Being an OEM-exclusive processor, it's hard to find benchmarks of the Ryzen 9 5900 until Tum_Apisak managed to unearth one for us. UserBenchmark doesn't have the best street cred, but it's what's available so we'll have to settle for that benchmark for now.

Ryzen 9 5900X vs. Ryzen 9 5900

Ryzen 9 5900X vs. Ryzen 9 5900 (Image credit: UserBenchmark)
It's important to highlight that the Ryzen 9 5900X's results are based on over 30,000 user submissions, while the Ryzen 9 5900 results is from a single user. For now, approach the results with an open mind.

The Ryzen 9 5900X reportedly delivers 5% higher single-threaded performance than the Ryzen 9 5900. As for multi-threaded performance, the Ryzen 9 5900X seemingly outperformed the Ryzen 9 5900 by a margin of 7%. However, the Ryzen 9 5900X didn't win all the rounds of the fight. The Ryzen 9 5900 appears to have a 7% lower memory latency as opposed to the Ryzen 9 5900X.

With all things considered, the Ryzen 9 5900 is a very attractive processor, and it's a mystery while AMD won't offer it to the retail market. The Ryzen 9 5900X has a 61.5% higher TDP, and it's less than 10% faster than the Ryzen 9 5900. Of course, we'd have to put the Ryzen 9 5900 through its paces to see whether the performance delta from UserBenchmark is valid.

Officially, the Ryzen 9 5900 is only available to OEMs, but that's what AMD also said with its Ryzen 4000 (Renoir) APUs, and we found them all over the place. It's only a matter of time before the Ryzen 9 5900 hits the grey market if it hasn't already.