AMD Ryzen 9 7950X & Ryzen 7 7700X ‘Zen 4’ Review

1. Ryzen 7000 - Introducing Zen 4 and AM52. A Closer Look - AMD's Zen 4 Architecture3. A Closer Look - The AM5 Platform4. Testing Methodology5. Operating Clocks6. CPU Tests: Blender & Cinebench7. CPU Tests: Handbrake & 7-Zip8. Memory Tests: Memory Bandwidth and Latency9. Synthetic Gaming: 3DMark10. Gaming 1080p: ACV, BL3, F1 202111. Gaming 1080p: FC6, Hitman 3, SotTR, WDL12. Gaming 1080p - Relative Performance Summary13. Gaming 1440p - ACV, BL3, F1 2021, FC614. Gaming 1440p - Hitman 3, SotTR, WDL15. Gaming 1440p - Relative Performance Summary16. Technical: Power Draw17. Technical: Temperatures18. Overclocking19. Perf. Per Watt and £20. Zen 4 vs Zen 3 - Clock-for-Clock Comparison21. RDNA 2 Integrated GPU22. Closing Thoughts23. View All Pages

Handbrake H264

The Ryzen 9 7950X is once again top-dog in our Handbrake H264 test. We see a 26% performance lead versus the Core i9-12900K. And compared to its 5950X predecessor, the 7950X is 35% quicker. They are outstanding results!

The Ryzen 7 7700X is far more competitive versus its price contenders in this test. Now, its performance is within touching distance of the Core i7-12700K and Ryzen 9 5900X. Though it is worth confirming that both of the 7700X’s competitors are technically faster by a small margin.

Handbrake H265

H265 video conversion sees the 7950X present another huge win, with a 19% uplift versus the Core i9-12900K. And now we see the architectural improvements of Zen 4 present the Ryzen 7 7700X with a healthy lead versus the Core i7-12700K and Ryzen 9 5900X.

7-Zip Compression and Decompression

As is the trend at this point, the Ryzen 9 7950X tops our chart by a mile in 7-Zip’s workloads. Compression performance for the Zen 4 16-core is 38% higher than the 12900K and 29% better than the 5950X.

The Ryzen 7 7700X also does well in the compression test when bolstered by the high bandwidth of DDR5 memory. AMD’s new Zen 4 eight-core provides a performance result that matches the 12-core Ryzen 9 5900X, whilst also outperforming the Core i7-12700K.

As always, AMD’s Zen architecture is very strong with decompression performance in 7-Zip. The 7950X is a ludicrous 84% higher performance than the Core i9-12900K, and it outperforms the Zen 3 5950X by a solid 24%, too.

This same architectural proficiency for 7-Zip’s decompression workload boosts the Ryzen 7 7700X to a score that almost matches the Core i9-12900K. This makes it significantly faster than the Core i7-12700K competitor, though it is well behind the performance level of its 12-core Zen 3 contender.

Become a Patron!