The Excitement Builds: Leaked AMD Ryzen Pricing Hits The Web

I think it’s safe to say that a lot of people are seeping excitement out of their pores for AMD’s Ryzen series of processors. Fortunately for the world at large, the wait to get a chip in your hands isn’t going to be long, with the first Ryzen models expected to hit store shelves in early March, allowing AMD to make a good Q1 earnings impact.

For the past couple of months, the rumormill has been on overdrive with Ryzen news, but over the past couple of days, we’ve seen some of the juiciest information hit the Web: possible pricing. We’re not talking about one random etailer leaking a pricing list, either, but multiple.

So what’s the pricing mean for those planning to pick up Ryzen? Well, if the pricing is to be believed, AMD’s top-end Ryzen chip could sell for around the $500 USD mark. That’d be the Ryzen 7 1800X, an 8-core chip clocked at 4GHz. This is likely the same chip that AMD has used against Intel’s top-flight chips in its promoted tests over the past couple of months.

The 1700X looks to be a good candidate for the “best bang for the buck”, as it knocks 200MHz off of the 1800X’s clock speed, but looks to retain the same level of cache, and of course, the same number of cores. 200MHz loss for $100 savings? That almost seems like a no-brainer, but top-end chips always carry a bit of a premium.

What’s in question at this point is what the “X” denotes. We were told at CES that every single Ryzen chip is going to be overclockable, so it could be that the X simply means that the parts are the best of the best, and will offer the highest level of overclocking possible. With a supposed launch in early March, it won’t take much longer before we get a final answer on that.

Addendum: The folks at techPowerUp are reporting that the “X” moniker relates to AMD’s XFR, or Extended Frequency Range, which we detailed a little bit here.