- AMD’s Frank Azor has fired pictures at Intel’s Arrow Lake desktop CPUs
- He referred to as the Core Extremely 200S CPUs ‘horrible’ and mentioned this elevated demand for the Ryzen 9800X3D
- That larger demand has led to inventory woes, Azor claims, and stock points received’t possible ease anytime quickly
An AMD govt fired flak at Intel, calling Workforce Blue’s newest Arrow Lake desktop chips ‘horrible’ no much less.
The quote got here from a roundtable with AMD execs at CES 2025, the place our sibling website, Tom’s {Hardware}, requested concerning the ongoing scarcity of Ryzen 7 9800X3D inventory (considered one of the best CPU for gaming that you may purchase since its launch, and a processor that we gave a glowing evaluation).
AMD noticed that demand has outstripped provide – clearly sufficient – and the total quote from Frank Azor, who heads up shopper and gaming advertising and marketing at AMD, will certainly depart Intel bigwigs suitably unimpressed.
Azor advised Tom’s {Hardware}: “We knew we constructed an incredible half [in the 9800X3D]. We didn’t know the competitor [Intel] had constructed a horrible one [Arrow Lake]. So the demand has been a little bit larger than we forecasted.”
Ouch. You’ve in all probability observed that Intel’s newest Arrow Lake desktop chips, which arrived in October 2024, skilled a rocky launch, with varied issues that Workforce Blue nonetheless hasn’t totally put to mattress.
We’ll come again to Intel’s misfortunes later, however what concerning the Ryzen 9800X3D inventory scenario?
David McAfee, VP and GM of Ryzen channel enterprise at AMD, defined: “It’s loopy how a lot we’ve elevated [our monthly, quarterly output of X3D parts] over what we have been planning. I might say the demand we’ve seen for the 9800X3D and the 7800X3D has been unprecedented. So the demand has been larger than ever.”
McAfee notes that making chips takes a while – “it’s mainly 12 to 13 weeks from if you begin a wafer to if you get a product out the opposite finish of the machine” – and that the 3D V-Cache stacking course of provides complexity and is much more time consuming. That means it’s tougher to meet up with sudden spikes in demand.
The upshot? McAfee says: “I believe as we undergo the primary half of this 12 months, you’ll see us proceed to extend the output of X3D.” And the exec additional notes that sooner or later, AMD is “ramping capability to make sure we meet up with that demand for so long as clients need these X3D elements.”
It’s the Ryzen 7 X3D processors which signify a lot of the demand, you’ll be unsurprised to be taught – as the advantages of hopping as much as a Ryzen 9 X3D chip are marginal for PC players (if something, certainly, gaming efficiency could even dip). So the 9800X3D and its predecessor signify the candy spot for gaming and worth.
McAfee mentioned the workhorse 8-core X3D elements outsell Ryzen 9 X3D flavors by a large 10-to-1, all of which implies that the introduction of Ryzen 9950X3D and 9900X3D CPUs (ushered in at CES 2025) isn’t going to ease any stress on the inventory ranges of the 9800X3D.
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In brief, don’t count on the Ryzen 9800X3D to develop into extra extensively obtainable for a while but, although as we head into the second quarter of 2025, issues ought to ease and the CPU could nicely populate the cabinets in larger numbers.
Again to the flak fired by AMD at Intel, and it’s fairly harsh to make use of a time period like ‘horrible’ to explain a rival product. Is desktop Arrow Lake actually that terrible? Effectively, the launch wasn’t a catastrophe, however it was disappointing, significantly as gaming efficiency didn’t dwell as much as Intel’s guarantees attributable to a number of points.
That mentioned, Intel’s fixes – which have now been deployed for Arrow Lake, all however one closing measure – don’t assist a lot, or in any respect, at the very least in accordance with Tom’s {Hardware}’s (restricted) testing. One thing we’ll have to confirm ourselves, thoughts you, so take that with loads of warning at this stage.
At any fee, Arrow Lake desktop has been troubled because it was pushed out, there’s no denying that, and the issue is that this occurred towards a backdrop of extra critical instability points with Intel’s previous Core CPU ranges (thirteenth and 14th) on the desktop. These have been actually nasty gremlins within the works, and whereas Intel had them fastened by the tip of final 12 months, that complete episode was a very darkish cloud over 2024 for Workforce Blue – with appreciable reputational injury performed.
So, whereas that episode has nothing to do with Arrow Lake – which doesn’t undergo these instability woes – it nonetheless casts a deep shadow over Intel’s latest desktop vary and the separate points with these chips.
It’s a messy time for Intel within the CPU world, in brief, and AMD pulling no punches isn’t actually a shock. Though as we’ve mentioned, ‘horrible’ goes somewhat too far, and considerably gleefully taking part in on Intel’s different mishaps of late.
It needs to be famous that AMD will not be fully with out blemishes with its current-gen processors, as Ryzen 9000 launched to some disappointment with its generational uplift, once more significantly for gaming – although the 9800X3D has gone a good distance in the direction of addressing that. The one downside is you possibly can’t purchase the factor in the meanwhile, a scenario which isn’t about to alter, clearly.
