AMD's 5th SKU in the Ryzen 9000 series, the Ryzen 5 9600, has been listed for sale at a lower price than the Ryzen 5 9600X.
Scan UK Lists AMD Ryzen 5 9600 CPU at £221/$278 (with VAT), Availability is as Fast as Tomorrow
AMD's second batch of Ryzen 9000 non-X3D chips may not have several SKUs to start with, but it has certainly brought one more CPU to the family. If you remember, AMD prepared the product page for the Ryzen 5 9600 quietly. While it was an indication that the processor was soon coming to the market, AMD didn't announce its availability or launch date.
Initially, it was thought that the Ryzen 5 9600 would be available in January, but it was slightly delayed and has finally come to the shelves. As spotted by @momomo_us, the processor is now available in at least two retail stores, including one in the UK and one in another EU region.
AMD Ryzen 5 9600 can be bought right now from the UK store SCAN.CO.UK at a price of £221.99. The product is currently in stock and is ready to be shipped as soon as the next day. The processor is also available on the French store LDLC at €299.95. However, availability will only be in 15 days.
The pricing seems to be according to its specs and is slightly lower than the current MSRP of Ryzen 5 9600X. The 9600X is available for £239.99 on Scan UK and for €309.5 at LDLC. Since these prices include VAT, you can expect the price to be around $229 in the US. This is $40 cheaper than the launch MSRP of Ryzen 5 9600X but since the latter is now retailing for around $249, the price difference is around $20.
The AMD Ryzen 5 9600 is the smaller sibling of the Ryzen 5 9600X with similar specifications except for the clocks. The processor brings the same 6-core/12-thread configuration, Zen 5 architecture, L3 cache of 32 MB, and TDP of 65W. However, the base/boost clock is 3.8/5.2 GHz, which is lower than the 3.9/5.4 GHz of Ryzen 5 9600X.
Another big difference is that the Ryzen 5 9600 comes with a Wraith Stealth cooler while the X variant doesn't come with any. Therefore, the Ryzen 9600 can be a cost-effective solution for users who want to build a fast gaming/productivity build, allowing them to save money not only on the CPU but also on the cooling solution.
It's the only non-X SKU in the Ryzen 9000 series and AMD is known for releasing several non-X SKUs in its lineups. Therefore, it's safe to assume that AMD will be launching more non-X SKUs later on. As of now, AMD seems to be focusing more on the high-end parts and will be launching the Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Ryzen 9 9900X3D soon. We recently saw both of them being benchmarked in Geekbench, which indicates that the launch is very near.
