AMD’s Budget Ryzen 3 3100 and 3300X CPUs Can Hit All-Core Overclocks of 4.6 and 4.4 GHz, Respectively

[Tsing]

Image: AMD



AMD’s Zen 2 architecture has turned out to be a particular boon for its budget CPU line. According to recent Time Spy benchmarks spotted by _rogame, a Ryzen 3 3100 processor can reach an all-core overclock of 4.6 GHz. That’s pretty impressive for a $99 chip. Likewise, its bigger brother – the Ryzen 3 3300X, which costs just $20 more ($120) – can hit 4.4 GHz on all cores.



The Ryzen 3 3100 overclock was performed on an ASRock X570 Pro4 motherboard with 16 GB of Corsair DDR4-3200 RAM, while the Ryzen 3 3300X overclock utilized an ASUS TUF B450M-PRO GAMING with 16 GB of Kingston DDR4 RAM running at 3,798 MHz. It isn’t clear what cooling solutions were used, but being budget CPUs, it’s safe to assume...

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[Grimlakin]

It isn’t clear what cooling solutions were used, but being budget CPUs, it’s safe to assume that a traditional air cooler was used (maybe the stock Wraith, even).

What... you don't recall the celeron overclocking back in the 00's? People were doing all sorts of tips and tricks to draw out as many MHZ as they could. Peltier Coolers with elaborate insulation wasn't exactly uncommon. Now you see some good clocks out of some AMD chips (and I hope it's on air!) and you want to throw out the statement that they are probably running on air because they are cheap chips?

I mean a statement like... "If anyone knows what the setup was for these systems please contact us. It would be amazing if they got these numbers on a Wraith cooler!".

Youtubers, reviewers, and others are the ones generating the numbers right now and I've never seen youtubers NOT at least do watercooling with an AIO, or use their custom built and chilled loop water cooling rigs from their 'test bed' just straight swapped to see what they can get out of one of these CPU's.

I mean.. I'm not angry or anything. Just caught me off guard to claim that with history in the industry.

 

[Tsing]

Perhaps I should have put more thought into that statement (4.6 GHz is a huge leap over 3.9 GHz), but exotic cooling didn't even enter my mind based on the hardware chosen.

 

[David_Schroth]

I mean.. I'm not angry or anything. Just caught me off guard to claim that with history in the industry.

Could use some more news posters if you like being underpaid for your time ;-).

You could also read it as - well, they probably used crap cooling, may be able to get more from better cooling.

 

[Dan_D]

4.6GHz is a healthy overclock for any Ryzen 3000 series cores. It's hard to say if these were using anything exotic as far as cooling goes. These have much lower core density than other Ryzen 3000 series CPU's, so with a good chiplet, I could see this happening on good air or an AIO. That said, Ryzen past the low 4.0GHz range starts requiring a great deal of voltage to achieve higher clocks. The architecture's efficiency starts to drop off the more you increase clocks.

Thing about reviews like this, as a reviewer your setup is built for general use. These CPU's not being high end doesn't preclude their possibility to have been used with higher end cooling. If your trying to put a CPU through it's paces and find out what it's truly capable of on the bench, you aren't going to strap a Wraith Spire on there and leave yourself and your readers to wonder if it was the cooling that held back the potential of the CPU. If I can push these things on water and my temps are insanely low, I can tell you that you'll be fine on good air or AIO cooling. If my temps are still rather high on water, I know the AIO or high end air cooling might be borderline or simply not cut it.

I can then go back with an air cooler later to confirm my findings if I really want to be thorough. If I had them on my bench, they'd have been cooled with a 360mm radiator and an Alphacool Eiseblock. That's what's on my bench and it's the same cooling I used for every CPU I have reviewed from AMD on socket AM4. It's what I used for all Ryzen 1000 and 2000 series CPU's as well when doing motherboard reviews. On the Intel side, I used the same hardware for everything in between a Core i5 2500K and the Core i9 10980XE. I only changed water blocks out on the setup based on what I've needed.

In other words, I do not agree with the idea that these were cooled on some crappy cooling because they were cheap CPU's. It's quite likely that these were cooled using a high end AIO at the very least. More than likely, a full custom loop or some sort was used on the bench if the people looking at these have been reviewing CPU's for awhile. Their testing setup is probably like mine or like Kyle's was at HardOCP. Now, the numbers do indicate that these were not likely cooled with phase change or LN2 or anything. But decent or high end water cooling? I'd almost bet on it. If they were cooled with a crappy included air cooler, I'd be immensely surprised.