The story of AMD Ryzen 9 9950x3d is refreshing: Its gameplay is as fast as the excellent Ryzen 7 9800x3d, but has twice the core, so in content creation scenarios all available threads such as 3D modeling or video conversion are used. If you want a CPU that can do it all, then that's what you get – although it's £659 in the UK and $699 in the US.
Just like the 9800x3D arrived in late 2024, the 9950x3D has a larger L3 cache than the standard Ryzen 9000 processor located under the CCD, rather than as we saw on the previous Ryzen X3D design. This means we will gain the performance advantage of changing the game without the temperature and clock speed of the X3D processor before characterizing the X3D processor rather than its vanilla counterpart; the best of both worlds.
To properly master the performance levels provided, we have done 9950x3D with 11 gaming benchmarks of 1080p, 1440p and 4k, including some of the most demanding single player games (Dragon's Dogma, Starfield, Cyberpunk) and MultiPlayer (CS2, F1, F1 24) Reselease.
Before we get to know all this, though, it’s worth exploring the specifications here to see what we can expect in our content creation workloads.
In short, 9950x3D is very promising for content creation because it has the same ratings and base clock speed and TDP ratings with 9950x, while the L3 CACHE is directly doubled. This should mean it should roughly match the 9950x in standard workloads, even surpassing it, even if that 3D V-CACH consumes some extra power and generates extra heat. This is true even for the Ryzen 7000 X3D chip, where reduced clock speeds and higher temperatures lead to smaller net performance regressions for all-core workloads.
It is also worth noting that this is the most expensive Ryzen processor ever, with its $699 price point priced at the same price as the 7950x3d and above the 9950x. The graphics card market has seen models selling well above retail prices, but hopefully we won't see a similar trend for CPUs that don't use the “board partner” model.
| CPU Design | Promote | according to | L3 cache | TDP | price | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ryzen 9 9950x3d | Zen 5 16c/32t | 5.7GHz | 4.3GHz | 128MB | 170W | £659/$699 |
| Ryzen 9 9950x | Zen 5 16c/32t | 5.7GHz | 4.3GHz | 64MB | 170W | £549/$539 |
| Ryzen 9 9900x3d | Zen 5 12c/24t | 5.5GHz | 4.4GHz | 128MB | 120W | £TBA/$599 |
| Ryzen 9 9900x | Zen 5 12c/24t | 5.6GHz | 4.4GHz | 64MB | 120W | £399/$379 |
| Ryzen 7 9800x3d | Zen 5 8C/16T | 5.2GHz | 4.7GHz | 96MB | 120W | £479/$479 |
| Ryzen 7 9700x | Zen 5 8C/16T | 5.5GHz | 3.8GHz | 32MB | 65W | £309/$289 |
| Ryzen 5 9600x | Zen 5 6c/12t | 5.4GHz | 3.9GHz | 32MB | 65W | £214/$229 |
| Ryzen 9 7950x3d | Zen 4 16c/32t | 5.7GHz | 4.2GHz | 128MB | 120W | OOS/$740 |
| Ryzen 9 7950x | Zen 4 16c/32t | 5.7GHz | 4.5GHz | 64MB | 170W | £446/$463 |
| Ryzen 9 7900x3d | Zen 4 12c/24t | 5.6GHz | 4.4GHz | 128MB | 120W | OOS/OOS |
| Ryzen 9 7900x | Zen 4 12c/24t | 5.6GHz | 4.7GHz | 64MB | 170W | £342/$340 |
| Ryzen 7 7800x3d | Zen 4 8c/16t | 5.0GHz | 4.2GHz | 96MB | 120W | £416/$399 |
| Ryzen 7 7700x | Zen 4 8c/16t | 5.4GHz | 4.5GHz | 32MB | 105W | £278/$273 |
| Ryzen 5 7600x | Zen 4 6c/12t | 5.3GHz | 4.7GHz | 32MB | 105W | £193/$212 |
| Ryzen 5 7600 | Zen 4 6c/12t | 5.1GHz | 3.8GHz | 32MB | 65W | OOS/$185 |
All tests were performed on Windows 24H2 and were performed using the latest chipset drivers (7.01.07.634) and BIOS update (on our Asrock X670E Taichi). We are using NVIDIA's slightly larger 565.90 graphics driver to maintain continuity and past results, as our test suite does not include any games that require new drivers. Decomposed bar and core isolation is enabled on each system.
Our current CPU test platform is based on NVIDIA GEFORCE NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 4090 Founder Edition Graphics Card and Trident Z5 Neo DDR5-6000 CL30 RAM. Each CPU is included by a 1000W+ power supply from Corsair or NZXT, a high-end 240mm or 360mm AiO and a suitable premium motherboard: the ASRock X670E Taichi for AMD Ryzen 7000 and 9000, the MSI Z890 Meg Ace for Intel Core Ultra 200S, the Gigabyte Aorus Z790 Master for 12th and 14th-gen Intel Core and the AMD Ryzen 5000 Asus Rog Crosshair 8 Hero – Trident Z Royal DDR4-3600 CL16 is not supported as DDR5 RAM on this platform.
Storage responsibilities are processed by a range of PCIE 4.0 or PCIE 5.0 SSDs, including the WD SN5000 4TB NVME SSD for our AMD Ryzen 9000 system.
Now, let's go into content creation benchmarks to better understand how 9950x3D is built on its predecessor. After all, 9800x3d may be totally enough for pure gaming purposes, so if you choose 9950x3D, you hope you will use these extra cores for video production or 3D modeling.
| Cinebench | 2024 (1T) | 2024 (MT) | R20 (1T) | R20 (MT) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ryzen 5 3600x | 77 | 578 | 485 | 3654 |
| Ryzen 7 5800x3d | 95 | 915 | 546 | 5746 |
| Ryzen 9 5900x | 98 | 1171 | 610 | 8393 |
| Ryzen 5 7600x | 114 | 845 | 744 | 5814 |
| Ryzen 7 7700x | 118 | 1127 | 758 | 7609 |
| Ryzen 7 7800x3d | 112 | 1074 | 688 | 6988 |
| Ryzen 9 7900x | 116 | 1605 | 776 | 11196 |
| Ryzen 9 7950x | 121 | 2004 | 784 | 14272 |
| Ryzen 5 9600x | 132 | 935 | 850 | 6358 |
| Ryzen 7 9700x | 130 | 1172 | 862 | 7851 |
| Ryzen 9 9800x3d | 134 | 1342 | 823 | 8938 |
| Ryzen 9 9900x | 135 | 1784 | 879 | 12617 |
| Ryzen 9 9950x | 138 | 2237 | 881 | 15845 |
| Ryzen 9 9950x3d | 139 | 2343 | 881 | 16343 |
| Core i5 14600k | 120 | 1400 | 777 | 9420 |
| Core i7 14700k | 127 | 1987 | 818 | 13614 |
| Core i9 14900k | 133 | 2107 | 875 | 15297 |
| Ultra 5 245K | 128 | 1435 | 841 | 9864 |
| Ultra 9 285k | 144 | 2386 | 895 | 16055 |
Starting with our Cinebench test results, including the popular R20 and the most recent 2024 version, the 9950x3D actually shows better results than the 9950X – in CB 2024 multicore, the multi-core test of the CB R20 is about 5% faster. Surprisingly, this means it now has an overall record of the R20, which is ahead of the core Ultra 285K while being only behind the same processor in Cinebench 2024.
There is also a good lead compared to the previous generation 7950X – a single core of about 15%, and a multi-core of 17% in CB 2024. The difference in CinebenchR20 is slightly narrower, with a single-core lead of 12% and 15% multi-core advantage.
| Handbrake | H264 (FPS) | HEVC (FPS) |
|---|---|---|
| Ryzen 5 3600x | 26.66 | 10.80 |
| Ryzen 7 5800x3d | 42.00 | 18.71 |
| Ryzen 9 5900x | 57.59 | 23.83 |
| Ryzen 5 7600x | 41.29 | 18.31 |
| Ryzen 7 7700x | 53.27 | 23.65 |
| Ryzen 7 7800x3d | 49.63 | 21.54 |
| Ryzen 9 7900x | 78.35 | 32.59 |
| Ryzen 9 7950x | 98.58 | 41.68 |
| Ryzen 5 9600x | 42.51 | 19.77 |
| Ryzen 7 9700X (maximum 191W) | 51.80 | 23.79 |
| Ryzen 7 9800x3d (maximum 259W) | 59.59 | 27.44 |
| Ryzen 9 9900x | 82.96 | 35.33 |
| Ryzen 9 9950x (363W maximum) | 105.43 | 45.35 |
| Ryzen 9 9950x3d (maximum 403W) | 109.24 | 46.40 |
| Intel Core i5 14600k | 59.42 | 25.39 |
| Intel Core i7 14700k | 80.26 | 31.07 |
| Intel Core i9 14900k (maximum 476W) | 85.06 | 35.08 |
| Intel Ultra 5 245K (maximum 286W) | 61.05 | 26.88 |
| Intel Ultra 9 285K (362W maximum) | 97.17 | 38.44 |
Although Cinebench is designed to reflect 3D modeling and animation tasks in Cinema 4D, our Cinebench test reflects our real-life use case: transcoding Patreon video files to H.264 and H.265 (HEVC). Here we measure the full inclination of 9950x3D absorbs a healthy 403W, but in the H.264 encoding, the 9950X has a 3.6% decrease, while in the HEVC encoding 2.3%. It is important to note that the 403W number is the instantaneous power that the test starts to approach, while the 300W-355W is the more typical graphics for most operations.
In context, this is 11% faster than the 7950x, and the margins are similar before the Intel Core Ultra 285K. We do plan to retest the 245K and 285K to see if the performance upgrades that Intel promised to be finally here, although other stores have not drawn particularly rose-colored pictures.
Now, let's get into the tests in Türkiye and Yorkshire, the game benchmark. We have 11 games in total and check the power usage.
AMD Ryzen 7 9950x3D Analysis
- Introduction, Testing rigs and content creation benchmarks [this page]
- Game benchmark: Dragon's Doctrine 2, Bauddle's Gate 3, Starfield
- Game Benchmark: Flight Simulator 2020, F1 24, Forza Horizon 5
- Game Benchmark: Counterattack 2, Cyberpunk 2077, Crysis 3 Remastered
- Game benchmark: “Killer Crying 6”, “Killer Assassination World”
- Power Analysis: Counterattack 2, “Far-Crying 6”, “Forza” Horizon 5
- AMD Ryzen 9 9950x3d: Digital Casting Verdict
