AMD Ryzen 9 5950X
The usurper has come
AMD’s successive iterations have led to one astounding processor.
OKAY, LET’S START with what might be a bit obvious. At the time of writing, you cannot buy this processor anywhere. Not in the US, or Canada, or the UK, or Europe, or Australia—at least not at its retail price. There are a few popping up on eBay and similar sites every now and then, and some scalpers are selling them for $400+ on top of the original retail price, but outside of that, if you want the latest and greatest Ryzen processor for the price it was intended, well, you can’t.
We’ve waxed lyrical about how stocks have dwindled across the entire tech sector over these last few months, and sadly it’s the case with the 5950X. A combination of things have led to this moment. The pandemic is an obvious one, as more folk stay at home; fab time is now limited as more and more companies vie for their products to be manufactured first; then there’s the fact we’ve got a new generation of consoles taking up valuable chips, new cars with all manner of tech inside, new GPUs, and of course crypto-mining is on the uptick again as well (thanks Elon). The list is endless, but regardless of which thing has done the most in that long string of events, the outcome is the same: There isn’t any stock, and there hasn’t been since shortly after the 5000 series launched. And that’s a shame, because this processor is unlike anything we’ve seen before.