The best values, to our eyes, are closer to the $1,000 mark, and like above, the last-generation Threadrippers remain great values despite the sunsetting of their platform.AMD's chipsets for the current Ryzen are the X570/X470/X370 (these are the high-end ones designed for overclockers, the equivalent of Intel's Z-series chipsets), the B450/B350 (the mainstream models), and the A320 (resolutely budget-minded boards). These Chromebook laptops feature low prices and long battery lives.The motherboard supports 256GB of RAM, but let's curtail out enthusiasm by only -- only! You … Unlike Intel and the IGPs in its processors, AMD targets the best of its CPU/GPU combo chips (some of which fall under the Ryzen family; we'll get into them in the next section) as budget-friendly solutions for casual gamers.
What that means: Unless you're upgrading from a low-end chip early in a platform's lifecycle to a high-end CPU at the very end, you're not likely to gain too much from an in-place CPU upgrade on a dead-end platform.Threadripper! As its aggro name suggests, the Ryzen Threadripper is all about maximum cores and threads for the money. The Z chipsets are meant for overclockers and tweakers (paired with an unlocked CPU), the H370 is for mainstream users not intending to overclock, the B360 and B365 are more budget-level chipsets (generally found on boards with fewer features and ports), and the H310 is the most stripped-down of all.
The first two generations of Threadripper employ a single high-end chipset, the AMD X399, which supports those mentioned 64 lanes of PCI Express bandwidth with all compatible Threadripper processors. See the various Ryzen reviews for links to more.Why? The on-chip graphics aren't the equivalent of even a middling video card, but they outpace Intel's HD and UHD Graphics solutions and can manage some decent gaming if you dial down the resolution and detail settings judiciously.You'll also want to make sure the cooler is adequate, per our advice above. If you're looking for a new cooler to pair up with a new CPU, an important spec to be aware of is the chip's rated thermal design power (TDP) rating. Any cooler you are looking at should (1) be compatible with the socket type of the CPU you are installing in on, and (2) support at least the TDP rating of the chip. (The very first Core i9 chips debuted in 2017 on Intel's Core X-Series; more about them below.) (Better leave breadcrumbs.) (These kinds of on-die graphics solutions are also referred to as "integrated graphics processors," or IGPs.)
Let's de-perplex it! Among mainstream Intel Core Socket 1151 and 1200 processors, look for models with a "K" (unlocked) or "KF" (unlocked, and lacking IGP) at the end of the model numbers. Overclocking can void your CPU's warranty, and there's no guarantee that you'll gain much from it.