AUGUST 2019 PCWorld 13globe. While Ryzen 3000’s hoopla is certainly
less than Windows 95’s was, it’s also fairly
unusual for any CPU or GPU on this side of the
millennium.
“It has been many years since I can
remember consumers waiting in line for a PC
component. I have seen it for shrink-wrapped
PC games and even a Windows OS but not for a
processor or graphics card,” said analyst Patrick
Moorhead of Moor Insights and Strategy.
Moorhead cautions that you shouldn’t
read too much into the lines, but it is certainly
a good sign.
“There’s more than long lines as an
indicator to real sales but it certainly does
reflect the amount of hype for a desktop part,”
Moorhead said. “I do believe if AMD can
deliver volumes and Intel doesn’t change itsworth it. AMD’s Ryzen 3000
series is made up of the first
consumer x86 CPUs built on a
7nm process. To celebrate
the company soundly beating
Intel to a smaller process
node, AMD released the 7nm
Ryzen chips on the 7th day of
the 7th month.
The lines weren’t just at
Micro Center either. Several
people posted pictures of
long lines for Ryzen 3000
from around the world, and
in conditions that would
make many people just give
up. At Tokyo’s famous Akihabara electronics
district, for example, buyers waited in the rain
to buy Ryzen CPUs.
You may want to dismiss the relevance of
the fans lining up but it’s a testament to the
excitement AMD has built up around its latest
CPU launch.
These days, outside of block buster
movies or the chance to mob a Walmart on
Black Friday, consumers hardly turn out at all.
Even iPhone buyers rarely stage the camp out
routine anymore, instead buying the phones
online or making appointments to pick them
up instead.
And on the PC, it’s probably not a scene
seen since the 1990s, when Microsoft’s
Windows 95 launch caused much hype and
long lines (go.pcworld.com/lw95) round the
PC builders lined up outside of multiple Micro Center’s Minneapolis
store for a chance to buy AMD’s much hyped 7nm Ryzen 3000 CPUs
on July 7th at 6 a.m.