AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D vs. Ryzen 9 7900X: Which Ryzen CPU should you buy?

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  AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D

  AMD’s Ryzen 7 7800X3D CPU is the company’s cheapest model with 3D V-Cache and can deliver gaming performance on par or even better than that of the Ryzen 9 7950X.

  Pros

  • Solid gaming performance
  • Lower power consumption
  • Higher cache

  Cons

  • More expensive
  • Lower compute performance

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  Source: AMD

  AMD Ryzen 9 7900X

  AMD Ryzen 7900X offers the best performance in the budget right now, packing 12 Cores and 24 Threads, with great performance in gaming as well as other tasks.

  Pros

  • Higher core count
  • More affordable
  • More balanced performance

  Cons

  • More power hungry
  • Lower cache

AMD has been upping the game with its Ryzen series of CPUs. It has made considerable leaps in performance generation over generation. There are several great CPUs across AMD’s Ryzen range, so it can get a little confusing to pick the best one for your needs. This is especially true for CPUs in the same price bracket — like the AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D and the AMD Ryzen 9 7900X. The two CPUs retail very close to each other in price while sharing some similarities and differences. We’ve extensively tested both chips and here’s how they stack up against each other.

AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D vs. Ryzen 9 7900X: Price, specs & availability

The AMD Ryzen 9 7900X launched back in September 2022 in the first batch of AMD’s Ryzen 7000 Zen 4 chips. AMD priced the AMD Ryzen 9 7900X at $549 at launch, but over the last few months, it has settled to somewhere around $420. On the other hand, the Ryzen 9 7800X3D launched in April 2023 at a price of $450. So as of now, the two are pretty level on the pricing, with the 7900X coming in a few bucks cheaper.

As far as the platform cost goes, the situation here will be the same for both the chips. Both, the AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D and the Ryzen 9 7900X are Zen 4 generation chips using the AM4 socket. It’s AMD’s latest platform, and will require you to get a new motherboard, DDR5 RAM, and other components as needed. The platform cost was high at launch, since you only had the X670 series motherboards available.

However, now the cheaper B650 series motherboards have joined the ranks of the best AMD motherboards you can buy, significantly reducing the cost barrier to entry for this platform. As far as picking between these two chips goes, the additional costs you would have to bear are going to be the same for both.

• 	AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D	AMD Ryzen 9 7900X
  Cores	8	12
  Threads	16	24
  Architecture	Zen 4	Zen 4
  Process	TSMC 5nm	TSMC 5nm
  Socket	AM5	AM5
  Base Clock Speed	4.2GHz	4.7 GHz
  Boost Clock Speed	5.0GHz	5.6 GHz
  Cache	96MB L3	76 MB
  PCIe	5.0	5.0
  TDP	120 watts	170 W

Architecture differences: Both Zen 4, but still quite different

Both the Ryzen 7 7800X3D and Ryzen 9 7900X are based on the same Zen 4 platform and use the same AM4 socket. The two chips are also made with the same 5nm process from TSMC.

However, these two CPUs are as different as they are similar. The first big difference is that one of these is a Ryzen 7 chip, while the other is a Ryzen 9 chip. What that means is that the Ryzen 7 7800X3D is an 8-core, 16-thread CPU, while the Ryzen 9 79000X is a 12-core, 24-thread CPU. All these cores are identical cores, unlike Intel’s performance and efficiency core bifurcation. The core count difference also means there is a power consumption difference here, with the 7900X coming in with a TDP of 170W compared to the 120W of the 7800X3D.

That’s not the only major difference, though. The Ryzen 7 7800X3D is an X3D model, which means that it comes with Ryzen’s 3D V-Cache. Essentially what that means is that it comes with a chip with nothing but L3 cache on it, giving it a potential advantage in gaming. This is because games rely on cache a lot and can benefit from this extra amount.

In the case of The 7800X3D, there’s a total of 96MB of L3 cache compared to the 64MB L3 cache on the 7900X. These are the fundamental differences on paper, but let’s take a look at the real-world performance.

Performance: 7900X has more raw power, but gaming is a different story

In our AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D review, we tested it alongside the Ryzen 9 7900X. The synthetic benchmarks show the Ryzen 9 7900X beating the Ryzen 7 7800X3D, in normal mode as well as Eco Mode.

Coming to real-world gaming performance, the story is a bit different. The 7800X3D mostly either matches, or slightly outperforms the 7900X, although the performance will differ from game to game. Some games will have the 7800X3D outperform the 7900X due to the higher amount of cache, while some others may see the two perform similarly.

The Ryzen 7 7800X3D performs better in Forza Horizon 5, Hitman 3, and The Witcher 3, but barely. In any case, the performance difference in gaming remains minuscule. The 7900X will have an advantage in non-gaming tasks, however. CPU intensive tasks like file decompression show the 7900X winning, since the higher core-count is an obvious advantage if you’re stressing the CPU to get the most out of it. That’s exactly why the 7900X wins out in the synthetic benchmarks.

One thing to consider is the performance per watt. While these two chips nearly even out in gaming performance, the Ryzen 7 7800X3D consumes about 50W less power while at it. The 7800X3D wins out in the gaming performance per watt, but the 7900X will have the edge in the overall performance, especially in compute tasks, even if measured per watt.

AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D vs. Ryzen 9 7900X: Which one should you buy?

Picking between the Ryzen 7 7800X3D and the Ryzen 9 7900X is a tough one, especially since both are two of the best CPUs you can buy. No matter which one you pick, you will get good performance. However, each chip is suited for a particular kind of user.

The 7900X is the more powerful CPU of the two, and also manages to offer better value by being on discount, and thus cheaper than the 7800X3D. There have also been some safety concerns about the 7800X3D exploding in certain conditions. They’re yet to be completely investigated, but it seems prudent to avoid the risk altogether. As such, the 7900X is the CPU to pick.

Source: AMD

AMD Ryzen 9 7900X

AMD Ryzen 7900X offers the best performance in the budget right now, packing 12 Cores and 24 Threads, with great performance in gaming as well as other tasks.

The AMD Ryzen 9 7800X3D is a decent pick too. The 7800X3D is a great CPU for a gaming PC, and will do plenty well for folks that will be using their system mostly for gaming. It has a higher cost and a lower performance with non-gaming tasks. There are some safety concerns, but they likely will affect a very small percentage of users. So, if you know what you’re doing, the 7800X3D would be a good CPU to add to your gaming PC build.

AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D

AMD’s Ryzen 7 7800X3D CPU is the company’s cheapest model with 3D V-Cache and can deliver gaming performance on par or even better than that of the Ryzen 9 7950X.