Core i7-3960X vs Ryzen 7 1700X

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Aggregated performance score

Ryzen 7 1700X
2017
8 cores / 16 threads
10.13
+86.6%

Ryzen 7 1700X outperforms Core i7-3960X by 87% based on our aggregated benchmark results.

Primary details

Comparing Ryzen 7 1700X and Core i7-3960X processor market type (desktop or notebook), architecture, sales start time and price.

Place in performance ranking6921073
Place by popularitynot in top-100not in top-100
Cost-effectiveness evaluation16.211.31
Market segmentDesktop processorDesktop processor
SeriesAMD Ryzen 7Core i7 (Desktop)
Architecture codenameZen (2017−2020)Sandy Bridge-E (2011−2013)
Release date2 March 2017 (7 years ago)14 November 2011 (12 years ago)
Launch price (MSRP)$399$861
Current price$148 (0.4x MSRP)$301 (0.3x MSRP)

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

Performance per price, higher is better.

Ryzen 7 1700X has 1137% better value for money than i7-3960X.

Detailed specifications

Ryzen 7 1700X and Core i7-3960X basic parameters such as number of cores, number of threads, base frequency and turbo boost clock, lithography, cache size and multiplier lock state. These parameters indirectly say of CPU speed, though for more precise assessment you have to consider their test results.

Physical cores8 (Octa-Core)6 (Hexa-Core)
Threads1612
Base clock speed3.4 GHz3.3 GHz
Boost clock speed3.8 GHz3.9 GHz
L1 cache768 KB64 KB (per core)
L2 cache4096 KB256 KB (per core)
L3 cache16384 KB15 MB (shared)
Chip lithography14 nm32 nm
Die size192 mm2435 mm2
Maximum core temperatureno data67 °C
Maximum case temperature (TCase)no data67 °C
Number of transistors4,800 million2,270 million
64 bit support++
Windows 11 compatibility--
Unlocked multiplierYesYes

Compatibility

Information on Ryzen 7 1700X and Core i7-3960X compatibility with other computer components: motherboard (look for socket type), power supply unit (look for power consumption) etc. Useful when planning a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. Note that power consumption of some processors can well exceed their nominal TDP, even without overclocking. Some can even double their declared thermals given that the motherboard allows to tune the CPU power parameters.

Number of CPUs in a configuration1 (Uniprocessor)1
SocketAM4FCLGA2011
Power consumption (TDP)95 Watt130 Watt

Technologies and extensions

Technological solutions and additional instructions supported by Ryzen 7 1700X and Core i7-3960X. You'll probably need this information if you require some particular technology.

Instruction set extensionsXFR, FMA3, SSE 4.2, AVX2, SMTIntel® SSE4.2, Intel® AVX
AES-NI++
FMAFMA3no data
AVX++
Enhanced SpeedStep (EIST)no data+
Turbo Boost Technologyno data2.0
Hyper-Threading Technologyno data+
Idle Statesno data+
Thermal Monitoringno data+
Smart Responseno data+
Demand Based Switchingno data-
Statusno dataDiscontinued
XFR+no data
SenseMI+no data

Security technologies

Ryzen 7 1700X and Core i7-3960X technologies aimed at improving security, for example, by protecting against hacks.

TXTno data-
EDBno data+
Identity Protectionno data+

Virtualization technologies

Virtual machine speed-up technologies supported by Ryzen 7 1700X and Core i7-3960X are enumerated here.

AMD-V+no data
VT-dno data+
VT-xno data+
EPTno data+

Memory specs

Types, maximum amount and channel quantity of RAM supported by Ryzen 7 1700X and Core i7-3960X. Depending on the motherboard, higher memory frequencies may be supported.

Supported memory typesDDR4DDR3
Maximum memory size64 GB64 GB
Max memory channels24
Maximum memory bandwidth42.671 GB/s51.2 GB/s
ECC memory supportno data-

Peripherals

Specifications and connection of peripherals supported by Ryzen 7 1700X and Core i7-3960X.

PCIe versionn/a2.0
PCI Express lanes2040

Synthetic benchmark performance

Various benchmark results of the processors in comparison. Overall score is measured in points in 0-100 range, higher is better.


Combined synthetic benchmark score

This is our combined benchmark performance rating. We are regularly improving our combining algorithms, but if you find some perceived inconsistencies, feel free to speak up in comments section, we usually fix problems quickly.

Ryzen 7 1700X 10.13
+86.6%
i7-3960X 5.43

Ryzen 7 1700X outperforms Core i7-3960X by 87% based on our aggregated benchmark results.


Passmark

Passmark CPU Mark is a widespread benchmark, consisting of 8 different types of workload, including integer and floating point math, extended instructions, compression, encryption and physics calculation. There is also one separate single-threaded scenario measuring single-core performance.

Benchmark coverage: 68%

Ryzen 7 1700X 15670
+86.5%
i7-3960X 8401

Ryzen 7 1700X outperforms Core i7-3960X by 87% in Passmark.

GeekBench 5 Single-Core

GeekBench 5 Single-Core is a cross-platform application developed in the form of CPU tests that independently recreate certain real-world tasks with which to accurately measure performance. This version uses only a single CPU core.

Benchmark coverage: 42%

Ryzen 7 1700X 1089
+58.3%
i7-3960X 688

Ryzen 7 1700X outperforms Core i7-3960X by 58% in GeekBench 5 Single-Core.

GeekBench 5 Multi-Core

GeekBench 5 Multi-Core is a cross-platform application developed in the form of CPU tests that independently recreate certain real-world tasks with which to accurately measure performance. This version uses all available CPU cores.

Benchmark coverage: 42%

Ryzen 7 1700X 5590
+66.9%
i7-3960X 3350

Ryzen 7 1700X outperforms Core i7-3960X by 67% in GeekBench 5 Multi-Core.

Cinebench 10 32-bit single-core

Cinebench R10 is an ancient ray tracing benchmark for processors by Maxon, authors of Cinema 4D. Its single core version uses just one CPU thread to render a futuristic looking motorcycle.

Benchmark coverage: 20%

Ryzen 7 1700X 4662
i7-3960X 5014
+7.5%

Core i7-3960X outperforms Ryzen 7 1700X by 8% in Cinebench 10 32-bit single-core.

Cinebench 10 32-bit multi-core

Cinebench Release 10 Multi Core is a variant of Cinebench R10 using all the processor threads. Possible number of threads is limited by 16 in this version.

Benchmark coverage: 19%

Ryzen 7 1700X 31950
+17.5%
i7-3960X 27190

Ryzen 7 1700X outperforms Core i7-3960X by 18% in Cinebench 10 32-bit multi-core.

3DMark06 CPU

3DMark06 is a discontinued DirectX 9 benchmark suite from Futuremark. Its CPU part contains two scenarios, one dedicated to artificial intelligence pathfinding, another to game physics using PhysX package.

Benchmark coverage: 19%

Ryzen 7 1700X 9076
+9%
i7-3960X 8330

Ryzen 7 1700X outperforms Core i7-3960X by 9% in 3DMark06 CPU.

wPrime 32

wPrime 32M is a math multi-thread processor test, which calculates square roots of first 32 million integer numbers. Its result is measured in seconds, so that the less is benchmark result, the faster the processor.

Benchmark coverage: 18%

Ryzen 7 1700X 4.89
+4.7%
i7-3960X 5.12

Core i7-3960X outperforms Ryzen 7 1700X by 5% in wPrime 32.

Cinebench 11.5 64-bit multi-core

Cinebench Release 11.5 Multi Core is a variant of Cinebench R11.5 which uses all the processor threads. A maximum of 64 threads is supported in this version.

Benchmark coverage: 17%

Ryzen 7 1700X 17
+61.1%
i7-3960X 11

Ryzen 7 1700X outperforms Core i7-3960X by 61% in Cinebench 11.5 64-bit multi-core.

Cinebench 15 64-bit multi-core

Cinebench Release 15 Multi Core is a variant of Cinebench R15 which uses all the processor threads.

Benchmark coverage: 15%

Ryzen 7 1700X 1537
+32.7%
i7-3960X 1158

Ryzen 7 1700X outperforms Core i7-3960X by 33% in Cinebench 15 64-bit multi-core.

Cinebench 15 64-bit single-core

Cinebench R15 (standing for Release 15) is a benchmark made by Maxon, authors of Cinema 4D. It was superseded by later versions of Cinebench, which use more modern variants of Cinema 4D engine. The Single Core version (sometimes called Single-Thread) only uses a single processor thread to render a room full of reflective spheres and light sources.

Benchmark coverage: 15%

Ryzen 7 1700X 154
i7-3960X 159
+3.2%

Core i7-3960X outperforms Ryzen 7 1700X by 3% in Cinebench 15 64-bit single-core.

Cinebench 11.5 64-bit single-core

Cinebench R11.5 is an old benchmark by Maxon, authors of Cinema 4D. It was superseded by later versions of Cinebench, which use more modern variants of Cinema 4D engine. The Single Core version loads a single thread with ray tracing to render a glossy room full of crystal spheres and light sources.

Benchmark coverage: 14%

Ryzen 7 1700X 1.73
+13.8%
i7-3960X 1.52

Ryzen 7 1700X outperforms Core i7-3960X by 14% in Cinebench 11.5 64-bit single-core.

TrueCrypt AES

TrueCrypt is a discontinued piece of software that was widely used for on-the-fly-encryption of disk partitions, now superseded by VeraCrypt. It contains several embedded performance tests, one of them being TrueCrypt AES, which measures data encryption speed using AES algorithm. Result is encryption speed in gigabytes per second.

Benchmark coverage: 13%

Ryzen 7 1700X 9
+72.1%
i7-3960X 5.2

Ryzen 7 1700X outperforms Core i7-3960X by 72% in TrueCrypt AES.

WinRAR 4.0

WinRAR 4.0 is an outdated version of a popular file archiver. It contains an internal speed test, using 'Best' setting of RAR compression on large chunks of randomly generated data. Its results are measured in kilobytes per second.

Benchmark coverage: 13%

Ryzen 7 1700X 3728
i7-3960X 4205
+12.8%

Core i7-3960X outperforms Ryzen 7 1700X by 13% in WinRAR 4.0.

x264 encoding pass 1

x264 version 4.0 is a video encoding benchmark uses MPEG 4 x264 compression method to compress a sample HD (720p) video. Pass 1 is a faster variant that produces a constant bit rate output file. Its result is measured in frames per second, which means how many frames of the source video file were encoded per second.  

Benchmark coverage: 13%

Ryzen 7 1700X 180
+4%
i7-3960X 173

Ryzen 7 1700X outperforms Core i7-3960X by 4% in x264 encoding pass 1.

x264 encoding pass 2

x264 Pass 2 is a slower variant of x264 video compression that produces a variable bit rate output file, which results in better quality since the higher bit rate is used when it is needed more. Benchmark result is still measured in frames per second.  

Benchmark coverage: 13%

Ryzen 7 1700X 90
+64.3%
i7-3960X 55

Ryzen 7 1700X outperforms Core i7-3960X by 64% in x264 encoding pass 2.

Gaming performance

Pros & cons summary


Performance score 10.13 5.43
Recency 2 March 2017 14 November 2011
Physical cores 8 6
Threads 16 12
Cost $399 $861
Chip lithography 14 nm 32 nm
Power consumption (TDP) 95 Watt 130 Watt

The Ryzen 7 1700X is our recommended choice as it beats the Core i7-3960X in performance tests.


Should you still have questions on choice between Ryzen 7 1700X and Core i7-3960X, ask them in Comments section, and we shall answer.

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AMD Ryzen 7 1700X
Ryzen 7 1700X
Intel Core i7-3960X
Core i7-3960X

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