AMD’s Zen 5 processors are still fresh out of the oven — they were only released a little over two months ago. As they struggle to find their footing among some of the best processors, they’ve been getting discounted regularly ever since, and that certainly helps. Today’s deals bring the Ryzen 5 9600X down by nearly $50 when compared to its recommended list price.
The Ryzen 5 9600X is the most budget-friendly chip in the new lineup. It started out with a recommended price (MSRP) of $280, which is $10 less than its predecessor. That adjustment was nice to see, but the 9600X was still much pricier than the 7600X upon launch, as the Zen 4 chip received numerous price cuts since it first hit the shelves. Right now, it’s priced at $225, but I’ve seen it sell for much less.
The Ryzen 5 9600X is now available for $234 on Amazon and Newegg, as spotted by VideoCardz. Mind you, the list price is higher, but you can knock off an extra $15 with a coupon. In Amazon's case, just tick the box next to Apply $15 coupon; on Newegg , you’ll need to type in the promo code BFDDYA56 to score the extra savings. Either way, the price drops down to $234.
The Ryzen 5 9600X comes with six cores and 12 threads, a total of 38MB of combined cache, and a maximum clock speed of 5.4GHz. In our review of the CPU, we found it to be a subtle increase over its last-gen counterpart, although Zen 5 is generally much better in productivity. That’s good news for the 9600X, which may not be the go-to for gaming — that crown still belongs to the 7800X3D, though the upcoming 9800X3D may overtake it — but it’s an affordable alternative for people who want to build a PC based on the AM5 socket.
Although the Ryzen 5 9600X and the 7600X are only a few percentage points apart (depending on the benchmark), the 9600X got some extra wiggle room thanks to AMD’s thermal power design (TDP) update. The chip went up from 65 watts to 105W with a BIOS update, unlocking a lot more potential. That, combined with other updates, helped the 9600X gain a bit more of a lead over its predecessor.
With the last-gen Ryzen 5 7600X now sitting at just $10 less, there’s no reason not to take advantage of this discount and buy the newer gen version of AMD’s midrange chip. As this may not be an official AMD discount, it’s unclear how long these deals will last.
Acer’s Predator Atlas 8 finally has a US release date and price, several months after the company first showed off the handheld in May. The highlight is the Intel Arc G3 Extreme chip inside, which has been adopted by only a couple of other consoles besides the Atlas 8. This version will go on sale exclusively at Best Buy on November 1 for $1,299.99.
Acer originally said the Atlas 8 would arrive in North America in October, but left pricing open at the time. The launch came amid the ongoing DRAM crunch, which has made memory more expensive across the PC industry and complicated pricing for hardware makers.
Google DeepMind's AI world model Genie 4 can now build interactive worlds that you can explore and reshape as they run. It also generates ambient sounds, music, and dialogue that respond to your actions.
The new world model builds on Genie 3 with improved realism, more natural human movement, and better simulations of real-world physics. It could eventually help with everything from game development to training robots.
Apple has an incredible talent for making me admire its products while simultaneously questioning what on earth it's thinking with the pricing. This isn't even something as bizarre as a monitor stand, but the audacity for starting a new laptop lineup from $2,000 doesn't surprise me.
The newly announced 14-inch MacBook Pro with M6 is just the latest to showcase this. The funny thing is, I already know that it's going to be a reliable workstation. You get a powerful new 2nm M6 processor, a gorgeous Liquid Retina XDR display, and up to 24 hours of battery life. We were impressed by the M5 MacBook Air, so the high-end M6 powered MacBook Pro definitely won't let us down.