If you read our review of the AMD Ryzen 7 3700X, the results in this article will not surprise you in the slightest. The 3.9GHz base clock paired with a 4.5GHz boost have helped the 3800X edge out the 3700X in almost all of our tests (where it hasn’t beaten the 3700X, the result was well within a margin of error).
It’s clear that AMD have improved their Zen formula hugely with this latest release; their memory support for higher frequencies is welcoming, as is the huge drop in latency that helps with improving frametimes while gaming. They’ve also improved the IPC (instructions per clock) to get a lot closer to what Intel can offer in game engines that don’t yet fully utilise multi-core processors.
PCI-E 4.0 is also included with Zen 2, on the X570 chipset. This allows GPU and SSD manufacturers to take advantage of doubled bandwidth, up to 64GB/s on a x16 interface. This additional bandwidth won’t necessarily provide much advantage to graphics at the current moment in time, even if you were to buy into AMD’s latest Navi range of GPUs, but we’re already seeing NVMe 4.0 SSDs that are approaching the 5GB/s barrier, so if storage speed is important, you can have plenty of that with the latest chipset.
Now, if we’re to compare the 3800X to the 3700X, it’s a difficult recommendation considering the increased power draw and associated heat output as well as the 3700Xs ability to keep up in every task with only a couple of percent separating them. Even when considering the overclocking ability, we found no difference at all between the two processors other than the 3800X being hotter.
All things considered, if you were looking at buying the 3800X, buy the 3700X and invest the £60-£70 price difference into a stronger GPU, faster memory, a more feature-rich motherboard or just pocket the change and enjoy a day out somewhere.
Having said that, at roughly the same price as an Intel Core i7 9700K, we see no reason to go Intel this time around.
All things considered, if you were looking at buying the 3800X, buy the 3700X instead. It’s almost all of the performance for 20% less money.
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It’s clear that AMD have improved their Zen formula hugely with this latest release; their memory support for higher frequencies is welcoming, as is the huge drop in latency that helps with improving frametimes while gaming. They’ve also improved the IPC (instructions per clock) to get a lot closer to what Intel can offer in game engines that don’t yet fully utilise multi-core processors.
PCI-E 4.0 is also included with Zen 2, on the X570 chipset. This allows GPU and SSD manufacturers to take advantage of doubled bandwidth, up to 64GB/s on a x16 interface. This additional bandwidth won’t necessarily provide much advantage to graphics at the current moment in time, even if you were to buy into AMD’s latest Navi range of GPUs, but we’re already seeing NVMe 4.0 SSDs that are approaching the 5GB/s barrier, so if storage speed is important, you can have plenty of that with the latest chipset.
Now, if we’re to compare the 3800X to the 3700X, it’s a difficult recommendation considering the increased power draw and associated heat output as well as the 3700Xs ability to keep up in every task with only a couple of percent separating them. Even when considering the overclocking ability, we found no difference at all between the two processors other than the 3800X being hotter.
All things considered, if you were looking at buying the 3800X, buy the 3700X and invest the £60-£70 price difference into a stronger GPU, faster memory, a more feature-rich motherboard or just pocket the change and enjoy a day out somewhere.
Having said that, at roughly the same price as an Intel Core i7 9700K, we see no reason to go Intel this time around.
All things considered, if you were looking at buying the 3800X, buy the 3700X instead. It’s almost all of the performance for 20% less money.
Pros
+ Clear IPC advancement over Zen+
+ Vastly better memory performance
+ Reasonable overclocking performance
+ Objectively better than the 9700K
Cons
- High power draw at idle and load (particularly compared to the 3700X)
- High temperatures
- Expensive
+ Clear IPC advancement over Zen+
+ Vastly better memory performance
+ Reasonable overclocking performance
+ Objectively better than the 9700K
Cons
- High power draw at idle and load (particularly compared to the 3700X)
- High temperatures
- Expensive
Click here for an explanation of our awards at Vortez.net.
Stay connected with the Vortez Social Media pages:
Join in with the discussions on Discord
