This is hands-down one of the best value CPU upgrades you can make to your AMD AM5 gaming rig

Finding a worthwhile upgrade for your existing gaming PC can be an expensive business. If you want more storage space for the next big game that will cost you a pretty penny, if you want more memory AI has boned you on that front, and if you want a shiny new GPU prices have already shot up and show no signs of coming back down.

But processors, while they too are being courted by AI datacenters, are pretty safe in their desktop consumer guise. And that means there are deals to be had on CPUs. The best I’ve seen in a long while is this, the Ryzen 9 7900X for just $275 at Walmart today.

Weirdly, it’s sold and shipped via Walmart by Newegg. Which currently has the same chip on sale for $316. I’m not going to pretend to understand such shenanigans in the retail business, I’m just going to stay quiet and be happy that we’ve got such a quality chip at such a good price.

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It’s worth noting that this chip is the ‘X’ version and that means it’s the full-fat, 170 W version as opposed to the Ryzen 9 7900, which is a good 65 W processor. Just not quite as good as the 7900X and strangely a lot more expensive right now. But the thing to note here is that, thanks to AMD’s excellent Eco Mode, you don’t have to run your beefy ol’ Ryzen 9 7900X at the full power all the time if you want to save on power and the loudness.

I personally run its larger sibling, the Ryzen 9 7950X in Eco Mode pretty much permanently. It’s more than capable of keeping my powerful GPU fed with frames at that level, and won’t deafen me because my CPU cooler decides to go HAM.

The equivalent Zen 5 chip, the Ryzen 9 9900X is $329 at Walmart at the moment, but doesn’t give you a huge amount extra over this Zen 4 CPU for your money.

It’s an AM5 chip, so if you’re currently on a Ryzen 5000-series processor that will mean a platform upgrade and potentially a new DDR5 purchase (eep), but if your current gaming PC is rocking a six- or eight-core Ryzen 7000-series processor this will deliver a healthy in-place upgrade without breaking the bank. Too much.

If you’re willing to spend more, and specifically value gaming performance over everything else (this is PC Gamer, after all) then I can also recommend the Ryzen 7 7800X3D for $370 at Walmart. That’s certainly not the cheapest it’s ever been, and if you’re talking about raw processing grunt the 7900X will outperform its eight Zen 4 cores, but in games it really will deliver. But is over $100 more, so that 12-core chip really does represent the value play here.