A few days ago we've reported that the AMD Ryzen 9 3950X 16-core part has been delayed and pushed back towards November. The news was made official by AMD. To date, however, there has been no word given as to what the reason is behind the delay. We did ask, but there was no answer to that question.

Logic assumes that AMD is facing the boost issues it had with the previous Ryzen processors. Something that is fixed with the new AGESA 1.0.0.3 ABBA Firmware btw. Is the same issue affecting the Ryzen 9 3950X 16-core processor? As it turns out, production at TSMC is not an issue as Digitimes found out. However, they have a source that claims that AMD has problems 'reaching unsatisfactory clock speeds' with the sixteen core part. That source would be an employee active in the motherboard maker industry.

The Ryzen 9 3950X 16-core processor has been advertised with the fastest single-core bin boost at 4.7 GHz, its base frequency is an admirable 3.5 GHz. For them to be able to reach advertised clock frequencies on their many-core part (16c/32t) AMD likely made it a bit complicated for themselves, as it is the fastest boosting product, it has the most cores and it has two 8-core processor dies. To reach the advertised boost frequency of that impressive 4.7 GHz on a single core AMD has to bin all dies, gauntlet sort them for the best units if you will. 

We have no doubt that AMD will be able to out the product at advertised performance, but what volume will be available in November remains an open question.

AMD delayed Ryzen 9 3950X launch due to unsatisfactory clock speeds?