AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D

AMD's Ryzen 7 9850X3D is the fastest gaming processor on the market* - and for some reason, it's now £20 cheaper than the slower 9800X3D. That's thanks to a £100 discount on the 9850X3D chip since its £439 launch at the start of the year, which sees the flagship AMD eight-core CPU retailing for £339 at Amazon.

That's a lot cheaper than I thought would be possible so soon, especially given that we're in an AI-driven PC components crisis that has seen RAM, SSD and GPU prices all multiply out of control with knock-on effects throughout the industry.

AMD suggested in its 9850X3D marketing materials that you can pair the processor with slower RAM than you can get away with on non-X3D CPUs, such is the power of the extra L3 cache that distinguishes these models, but we still saw better results with RAM in the 5600MT/s to 6000MT/s range than base-spec 4800MT/s DDR5. However, in these times, whatever RAM you can get is going to be good enough in most games.

AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D
Architecture Zen 5 Zen 5
Cores/Threads 8/16 8/16
Base Clock 4.7GHz 4.7GHz
Max Boost Clock 5.6GHz 5.2GHz
L3 Cache 96MB 96MB
Default TDP 120W 120W
Socket AM5 AM5
Memory Support DDR5-5600 DDR5-5600
Release Date January 2026 November 2024
How recently did you buy/upgrade your desktop PC's CPU?

In any case, it's nice to see a genuine reduction on a sensible CPU selection. If you don't have quite this much to spend, I'd have a look at the 7800X3D, which currently has been discounted to the same price as the slower 7700X3D, or the 7600X, which is cheaper than the 7600 and offers the cheapest proper entry-point to the modern AM5 platform.

We have more PC building tips in our Steam Machine DIY alternative article, newly updated this month, and of course you're welcome to leave a comment below if you'd like any questions answered or advice delivered.

*I guess the much more expensive 9950X3D2 has a claim to that fastest gaming CPU title too, though it's mostly useful for content creators that need far more CPU cores as it doesn't offer a noticeable improvement for the vast majority of gaming workloads.

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[source amazon.co.uk]