AMD is currently giving out samples to various testers around the world with a review that will go on live on Feb. 28. The chip maker has already announced the March 2 launch date with 17 different models of SKUs to complete the lineup. Moreover, European retailers have begun pre-orders and have even leaked out some prices like €319 or $338 for the Ryzen 7 1700X.

On Feb. 28, the CPU market will finally see what the Zen architecture can do and may confirm what earlier reports and leaked benchmark results have shown. The full AMD Ryzen CPU lineup that will be launched on March 2 includes 17 different models of SKUs with price ranging from $128 to $499. The full roster has five 8-core 16-thread chips, four 6-core 12-thread models, four quad-core 8-thread chips and four quad-core 4-thread models. All models have the overclocking feature since each Ryzen chip has a fully unlocked clock multiplier that enables easy overclocking, Wccftech reported.

Moreover, AMD will offer the Black Editions, which features the Clever Extended Frequency Range Technology of AMD. This is also known as the XFR, which is responsible for overclocking the AMD Ryzen chips. The feature allows the CPUs to go beyond the default turbo clock speed if permitted by the current thermal environment.

There will be two Black Editions 8-core chips, one Black Edition 6-core and two Black Edition 4-core CPUs. It appears that AMD has bundled the Black Edition with the highest performing cooler for one particular thing, which is for "automatic overclocking." The more efficient cooler results in a higher automatic overclocking of the AMD Ryzen CPU. For this purpose, AMD will throw in the box the high-end coolers along with the Black Edition 95W Ryzen CPUs that includes the Ryzen 7 1800X, 1700X and Ryzen 5 1600X.

The latest benchmark using PassMark has given an optimistic report when the 3.4GHz AMD Ryzen 7 1700X octa-core chips were pitted against Intel's i7-6900K processor under a range of resources-intensive tasks. In some particular tests, the AMD chip scored higher even though its total overall core is 9 percent lower. The same result was seen when the AMD CPU was pitted against the Core i7-5960X, which has an overall core that is 4 percent higher. The review at the end of the month may confirm these results as sources say that there will be 6 different models that will be tested.

Weeks ahead of the launch, European retailers have already begun pre-orders with the Belgian centralpoint.be posting three of the top-end AMD Ryzen CPUs. The retailer listed the Ryzen 7 1700 at €319 or $380, the 1700X at €389 or $412, and the 1800X at €519 or $550. These prices vary slightly from earlier reports while a Thailander retailer pegged much higher prices and also featured the box art, which could just be press renderings, Hot Hardware has learned.

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Topics AMD Ryzen, AMD, Gpu, Overclocking