If you're gaming and creating content on an AM4 system this $375 Ryzen 9 5950X is the perfect drop-in upgrade

AMD Ryzen 9 5950X | 16 cores | 32 threads | 4.9 GHz boost | 64MB L3 | 105 W TDP | AM4 socket | <a href=«https://click.linksynergy.com/deeplink?id=HlvbvYZP82I&mid=44583&u1=hawk-custom-tracking&murl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newegg.com%2Famd-ryzen-9-5950x%2Fp%2FN82E16819113663» data-link-merchant=«newegg.com»" target="_blank">$799 $375.23 at Newegg (save $423.77 with promo code STDDR933)
Yes it's a last-gen CPU from AMD, and it's not the <a href=«https://www.pcgamer.com/best-cpu-for-gaming/» data-link-merchant=«pcgamer.com»" data-link-merchant=«newegg.com»" target="_blank">best gaming processor you can buy, but this is an absurdly low price for 32 threads of Zen 3 processing capability. It still performs mighty well and if you do content creation alongside gaming, it's a great upgrade for an AM4 system.

Price check: <a href=«https://target.georiot.com/Proxy.ashx?tsid=8432&GR_URL=https%3A%2F%2Famazon.com%2FAMD-Ryzen-5950X-32-Thread-Processor%2Fdp%2FB0815Y8J9N%2F%3Ftag%3Dhawk-future-20%26ascsubtag%3Dhawk-custom-tracking-20» data-link-merchant=«Amazon US»" data-link-merchant=«pcgamer.com»" data-link-merchant=«newegg.com»" target="_blank">Amazon $375.26

While AMD's 3D V-cache models garner all the headlines and praise from gamers, it's worth remembering that before they came along, the most powerful Ryzen CPU you could slap into a desktop PC was the 5950X.

Underneath the big heat spreader, there are three chiplets—two CCDs (Core Complex Dies) handling all the compute work and another managing the RAM, PCIe lanes, and other tasks. Each CCD houses eight Zen 3 cores, 16 threads, for a total of 16 cores, 32 threads. The whole CPU can boost up to 4.9 GHz and while that's not as high as the latest generation of AMD processors, it's still more than fast enough. As we found when we reviewed it, the 5950X isn't slow by any measure.

Unlike Intel's CPUs with lots of cores, the 5950X's are all identical and Windows doesn't need to use a sophisticated thread manager to make the best use of it.