Monstrous AMD Ryzen Threadripper 9980X tops the desktop CPU leaderboard

The AMD Ryzen Threadripper 9980X CPU is slated to arrive later this month and will be one of if not the fastest desktop processor on the market, according to the latest tests on PassMark. The 64-core, 128-thread CPU performed so well that it almost achieved the same multithread score as the recently released AMD Epyc 9575F server CPU.

Compared to the AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D, the AMD Ryzen Threadripper 9980X is three times faster, and it's twice as fast as the AMD Ryzen 9 7950X. In fact, the new AMD desktop CPU beat 1,450 other chips to gain its new title. You'd think this would put the Threadripper 9980X on the fast track to our best gaming CPU list, but that's where you might be mistaken. With high-tier performance comes a premium price tag and likely limited benefit to gamers.

Digging into the details of this new CPU, the AMD Threadripper 9980X has a clockspeed of 5.4GHz and a massive TDP of 350W. Meanwhile, each of its 64 cores will be based on the same Zen 5 architecture as other 9000 series desktop CPUs and allow for two application threads to run on each core at once, thus its ability to run 128 threads.

According to the PassMark benchmark results that you can find here, the Threadripper 9980X achieved a multithread rating of 147,481, with a single thread rating of 4,594. The single thread rating isn't the fastest out there, putting it at 37th place out of 5,257 CPUs, but it's worth bearing in mind that those 5,257 CPUs include some incredibly beefy Epyc server processors, which you wouldn't realistically use for gaming.

Overall, the upcoming Threadripper ranks as the fastest desktop CPU, and the 7th fastest against all other CPUs listed on PassMark, which is quite the achievement.

The MSRP for the Threadripper 9980X is not yet known, but we can infer from previous entries in the Threadripper series that it won't be cheap. The 64-core AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7980X, with a clock speed of 5.1GHz, was first listed for $4,999 at launch. It wouldn't be too surprising to see the 9980X go for a similar or higher price tag, which will make it much less accessible for your average PC builder. It could, however, be the perfect piece of hardware if you're planning to build the best gaming PC ever seen.

If you're looking for a great AMD CPU in the meantime, check out our AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D review to learn about what our top choice of chip can do for you. Once you have an upgrade in hand, read our guide on how to install a CPU for a comprehensive tutorial on fitting your new chip.

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