AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D Review: An Ideal CPU For PC Gamers

AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D Review: A New PC Gaming King Is Crowned

	AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D: $479 MSRP The new AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D pairs Zen 5 with 2nd Generation 3D V-Cache to boost gaming performance, increase clocks, and enable more robust overclocking. capabilities.
	•  Great Gaming Performance    •  Power Efficient    •  Easy To Cool    •  No Sacrifice General Computing	•  Only 8 Cores    •  Price Premium

Anyone that has been paying attention to the CPU scene the last few months is aware of the product we’ll be showing you here today, the AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D desktop processor. Not only was there almost immediate anticipation of 3D V-Cache enabled Ryzen 9000 series processors when the standard versions of the chips launched back in August, but AMD teased the Ryzen 7 9800X3D (along with some discounts on other Ryzen 9000 series chips) a few weeks ago, and more recently revealed the model number, specs and availability date – which is tomorrow, November 7.

If you’ve been waiting to build or upgrade a gaming PC until the Ryzen 7 9800X3D launched, you’ll be glad you did. We’ve run the chip through our usual array of tests and benchmarks, and have a lot to show you on the next few pages. The updates and enhancements AMD made with its second generation 3D V-cache have paid dividends in a number of areas. By the end of this performance review, you’ll understand what we mean, so let’s get down to business.

AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D Specifications And Feature Comparison

Find The AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D @ Amazon

How the Ryzen 7 9800X3D compares to the also 8-core Ryzen 7 9700X and the previous-gen Ryzen 7 7800X3D equivalent is laid out in the table above. Except for the base and boost clocks and official memory speed support, it seems like not much has changed. AMD's Ryzen 7 9800X3D and 7800X3D share what appear to be similar cache configurations and TDPs. But, of course, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D features AMD’s latest Zen 5 microarchitecture, and its second generation 3D V-Cache literally flips the script to allow for not only higher clocks, but clocks that remain consistently higher for longer durations.

The Ryzen 7 9800X3D has a 500MHz higher base clock and 200MHz higher boost clock than the Ryzen 7 7800X3D, which alone should boost performance. But AMD has also enlarged the physical size of the 3D V-Cache die to match the CCD, and bonded it to the bottom-side this time around. That means the CPU cores have direct access to cooling, which was a limiting factor with previous generations. 3D V-Cache on the 5000 and 7000 series was bonded on top of the CCD, so the CPU cores radiated heat through the cache, to the cooler – that is no longer the case.

The updates to the Ryzen 7 9800X3D’s design and 3D V-Cache implementation allowed AMD to enable full overclockability as well, which is a first for X3D series processors.

In terms of its actual configuration, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D is an 8-core / 16-thread, single-CCD part, with a base clock of 4.7GHz and a max boost clock of 5.2GHz. There’s 96MB of second generation 3D V-Cache on board and with Zen 5 processors, AMD officially supports a non-overclocked memory speed of DDR5-5600, though higher clocks are easily possible and DDR5-6000 remains the sweet spot for enthusiasts. The Ryzen 7 9800X3D has a 120W configurable TDP and slots into the same AM5 socket as the Ryzen 7000 and other 9000 series chips. We tested on one of the latest X890E-based motherboards, but 600-series chipset-based motherboard will also support the Ryzen 7 9800X3D when flashed with the necessary BIOS update.

Physically there’s not much to see. The Ryzen 7 9800X3D looks just like every other Ryzen 9000 series processor, save for the branding on the top of its heat-spreader. All of the same cooling and accessories that fit the Ryzen 7000 series and current 9000 series will work properly on the Ryzen 7 9800X3D.

AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D CPU-Z Details

The Ryzen 7 9800X3D’s details as reported by CPU-Z are laid out in the images above. The family, stepping and other details are the same as standard Ryzen 9000 series processors and the only change is the amount of L3 cache.

There’s 80K of L1 per core (48K D-Cache [12-way] + 32K I-Cache [8-way]), which is an increase from 64K on Zen 4 / Ryzen 7000. There’s also 1MB of L2 cache per core, which is 16-way set associative. Standard Ryzen 9000 series processors also feature 32MB of L3 cache per compute die, but with the Ryzen 7 9800X3D that compute die is outfitted with an additional 64MB of 3D V-Cache bringing the total L3 up to 96MB (104MB total cache).

And it’s that massive 96MB of L3 cache that allows the Ryzen 7 9800X3D to keep lots of data close to the CPU cores and boost game performance. But the other tweaks to the Ryzen 7 9800X3D can help general performance as well. Now it's time to show you the rest of our test setup’s components and get to some numbers…

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