AUGUST 2019 PCWorld 31
In the no-surprise category, we see the
12-core Ryzen 9 3900X simply demolish the
8-core Core i9-9900K to the tune of 42
percent. With 40 percent more threads at its
disposal, we kinda expected this. Still, this is
impressive performance and to be lauded.
Perhaps more important is the single-
threaded performance of the Ryzen 9 3900X.
With a boost clock of 4.6GHz on the Ryzen 9
3900X versus the boost clock of 5GHz on the
Core i9-9900K, that gives the Intel part about an
8 percent clock advantage in pure clock speed.
well. We’ll explore this in greater depth in
another story, but for now note that running
with MCE off tends to hurt Intel CPUs more
than running with PBO off on AMD CPUs.
MODELING PERFORMANCE
Up first is the old standby of Maxon’s
Cinebench R15. This benchmark is built on
the same engine used in Maxon’s Cinema 4D
modeling and animation application. Cinema
4D is also built into Adobe’s Premiere and
After Effects applications.
No surprise: 12 cores easily outguns 8 cores,
making the Ryzen 9 3900X the easy winner here.
Ryzen 9 3900X Zen 2 (12/24)
Core i9-9900K
Coffee Lake R (8/16)
Ryzen 7 2700X
Zen+ (8/16)
Cinebench R15 nT
MCE/PBO Off
LONGER BARS INDICATE BETTER PERFORMANCE
3,123
2,026
1,846
That’s impressive single-threaded performance
for the Ryzen 9 3900X.
Ryzen 9 3900X Zen 2 (12/24)
Core i9-9900K
Coffee Lake R (8/16)
Ryzen 7 2700X
Zen+ (8/16)
Cinebench R15 nT
MCE/PBO
LONGER BARS INDICATE BETTER PERFORMANCE
213
218
177
Shifting to Cinebench R20, the Ryzen 9 3900X
pulls ahead in single-threaded performance.
Ryzen 9 3900X Zen 2 (12/24)
Core i9-9900K
Coffee Lake R (8/16)
Ryzen 7 2700X
Zen+ (8/16)
Cinebench R20 nT
MCE/PBO
LONGER BARS INDICATE BETTER PERFORMANCE
528
509
436
The Ryzen 9 3900X essentially runs the Core i9 off
the field in multi-threaded performance.
Ryzen 9 3900X Zen 2 (12/24)
Core i9-9900K
Coffee Lake R (8/16)
Ryzen 7 2700X
Zen+ (8/16)
Cinebench R20 nT
MCE/PBO Off
LONGER BARS INDICATE BETTER PERFORMANCE
7, 0 6 3
4,584
4,017