AMD has today announced that it is delaying the launch of its new Zen 5 powered Ryzen 9000 processors for desktop PCs. Due to an unspecified fault impacting current stock, the launch has now been pushed back to August.

AMD has not clarified exactly what the fault in question here is, but through conversations with our contacts, we've learned that it does not have anything to do with memory overclocking, which is good news, as these new Ryzen 9000 processors are expected to support even faster DDR5 memory speeds, hitting the 8000MT/s mark for the first time.

Here is the full statement from AMD:

“We appreciate the excitement around Ryzen 9000 series processors. During final checks, we found the initial production units that were shipped to our channel partners did not meet our full quality expectations. Out of an abundance of caution and to maintain the highest quality experiences for every Ryzen user, we are working with our channel partners to replace the initial production units with fresh units. As a result, there will be a short delay in retail availability. The Ryzen 7 9700X and Ryzen 5 9600X processors will now go on sale on August 8th and the Ryzen 9 9950X and Ryzen 9 9900X processors will go on-sale on August 15th. We pride ourselves in providing a high-quality experience for every Ryzen user, and we look forward to our fans having a great experience with the new Ryzen 9000 series.”

AMD will be rounding up the faulty CPUs and replacing them over the next couple of weeks so that when consumers eventually get their hands on one, it will work as expected out of the box.

The Ryzen 7 9700X and Ryzen 5 9600X processors will be arriving first, on the 8th of August. The Ryzen 9 9950X and 9900X will be launching on the 15th of August. This delay does not impact AMD's other Zen 5 chips, like the upcoming Strix Point (Ryzen AI 300) processors for laptops, or the upcoming Zen 5 EPYC processors for servers and datacentres. It is unclear if this delay will have any kind of a knock-on effect on other upcoming chips, like Ryzen 9000X3D or Threadripper.

KitGuru Says: Fortunately, whatever the fault was, it was spotted before CPUs started going out to end users. Hopefully over the next week, AMD will be able to do a thorough job of rounding up the impacted CPUs and replacing them in time for the new mid-August launch date. 

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