If it’s too good to be true, it probably isn’t. AMD’s third-gen Ryzen 3000 lineup offers truly unbeatable value compared to similar Intel offerings. The Ryzen 5 3600 is such a strong contender that I’d just recommend it out of hand for any gaming rig, period. AMD’s made sure that the Ryzen 5 is well-stocked, but the higher-end Ryzen parts are still experiencing a major supply shortage. The Ryzen 7 3700X and Ryzen 9 3900X are in such short supply that prices remain well over MSRP.
The 3700X shortage is the most acute, with the part going for sale on Amazon for nearly as much as the 3800X. This essentially eliminates its value proposition, since the 3800X is just a 3700X that’s been binned to run at higher clock speeds out of the box.
Meanwhile, the 3900X is going for sale for as much as $750 with some online retailers. This actually makes the Intel Core i9-9900K a good value high-end CPU, something I never, ever thought I’d say in my life.
The folks over at Tom’s Hardware speculate that the shortage might be intentional, a way for AMD to upsell customers on their premium 3800X and to extract more value from high rollers who can’t wait to get their hands on the 3900X. There’s logic to this argument since the Ryzen 5 3600, the main volume part, hasn’t gone out of stock anywhere and is selling at very reasonable prices.
We’ll keep you posted on this and whether or not prices for the 3700X and 3900X come down to reasonable levels.
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