Today, we’ll be taking a look at AMD’s Ryzen 9 3950X. This CPU was announced back when the rest of the Ryzen 3000 series launched. We knew from the start that the Ryzen 9 3900X would be the flagship of AMD’s lineup for only a couple of months as the specs on the Ryzen 9 3950X told us what to expect from it right away. This review is a bit late to the party due to two very important factors. Chief among them is the fact that AMD didn’t sample anything to us for the launch of its Ryzen 9 3950X and third-generation Threadripper CPU’s. Secondly, the availability of these CPUs has been limited.

AMD’s Ryzen 9 3950X was available on launch day, but only in very small quantities. They’ve trickled out slowly since then. I’ve been to my local Microcenter several times over the last few weeks as I’ve needed fittings and other small parts for various projects. As a result, I’ve checked stock on these CPU’s quite often and I’ve yet to see a 3950X on the shelf. I’ve seen one Threadripper as well, but I don’t expect it to be there for long. In any case, we were able to get one from out of state and get it on the test bench. With the holidays and all, this didn’t get tested and reviewed as fast as I would have liked.