AMD Ryzen 7000 Zen 4 CPU Prices Slashed Up To 27% In China, Will The US Be Next?
AMD's Q3 earnings statement confirmed what had been rumored in the industry for weeks: sales of Zen 4 CPUs have been slow, or at least, slower than AMD would have liked. There's probably a few reasons for this, but the biggest one is surely the rather high price of entry for the AM5 platform. Not only do you need a new CPU, but PCIe 5-capable motherboards are expensive and so is the required DDR5 memory. AMD might be looking to salve that sting slightly, if recent price cuts in China are anything to go by.
According to a report from the Chinese-language site EXPReview, AMD will be dropping the prices on its Ryzen 7000 processors by as much as 27%. That discount will come on the top-end Ryzen 9 7950X, which will purportedly fall from 5499 RMB (about $760 USD) to 3999 RMB (about $550). The lower-end parts are dropping too, with the Ryzen 9 7900X falling 23% to 3299 RMB (about $450 USD), the Ryzen 7 7700X losing 23% to 2299 RMB (about $320), and the Ryzen 5 7600X being reduced some 24% to 1699 RMB (about $236).
EXPReview seems to think these price reductions will be permanent, but it seems likely to us that these changes are temporary, as 11.11 is widely celebrated as "Singles Day" in China—sort of like Valentine's Day, but for singles. It's common for folks to make lavish purchases around this time, in theory to distract themselves from their single status. For computer nerds, that surely means new parts.
It could be tempting to try and pick up a new AMD CPU from China at the reduced pricing, but it's possible these prices will find their way over to the West, too. After all, many stores are already running "Early Black Friday" sales, despite that we're still in the first week of November. Shops like Micro Center are very likely to have some absurd blowout deals on Zen 4 processors, their motherboards, and the necessary DDR5 RAM come Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
Naturally, we'll let you know about any killer deals we spot. If you see any we haven't reported on, make sure to let us know so we can share the love!
