AMD both recently and very quietly added two 3rd generation Ryzen CPUs into its lineup. The new CPUs are the Ryzen 9 3900 and Ryzen 5 3500X.
Starting with the Ryzen 9 3900, the new high-end desktop processor is essentially a watered-down version of AMD’s Ryzen 9 3900X. It retains the same 12-cores, 24-threads layout and same 7nm die lithography, but its clockspeeds are drastically, if not significantly lower. Where the 3900X has a base and boost clockspeed of 3.8GHz and 4.6GHz, the 3900 ships out at 3.1GHz and 4.3GHz, respectively.
The good news is, because of its less demanding nature, the 3900 only has a TDP of 65W, versus the 3900X’s 105W TDP.
Moving forward, the Ryzen 5 3500X is a new mid-range CPU with specifications very nearly identical to the Ryzen 5 3600. Both CPUs have a base clock of 3.6GHz, but the new 3500X has a boost clock of 4.1GHz; just 100MHz less than the 3600.
The major difference between the two, however, is the simultaneous multithreading (SMI) element, or lack thereof. Like the 3600, the 3500X will have 6-cores, but will only be able to execute 6-threads instead of the typical 12-threads. That said, the CPU is still based on AMD’s Zen2 architecture and supports the new PCIe 4.0 interface.
Unfortunately, AMD did not provide any pricing for both the Ryzen 9 3900 and Ryzen 5 3500X. Further, it seems that the 3500X will only be available within the Chinese market, while the 3900 will reportedly only be sold to AMD’s OEM partners, and not to the general public.
(Source: AMD via Hot Hardware)
