Phoronix has benchmarked the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X and Ryzen 9 9950X3D processors to compare their 3D V-Cache performance across Windows 11 and Ubuntu Linux. The tests evaluate how the operating systems handle the 16-core desktop CPUs amid ongoing optimizations. Hardware remained consistent across all platforms.
A few weeks ago, Phoronix conducted initial benchmarks comparing Windows 11 25H2 against Ubuntu 24.04.3 LTS and a development build of Ubuntu 25.10, using both the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X and Ryzen 9 9950X3D processors. More recently, additional tests included Windows 11 25H2 benchmarks versus Linux, along with Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL2) evaluations, to assess the impact of Linux kernel optimizations and Microsoft/AMD driver improvements on Windows.
The setup featured identical hardware for all runs: the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X and 9950X3D CPUs at stock speeds, an ASRock X870E Taichi motherboard, 2 x 16GB DDR5-6000 GSKILL memory, an AMD Radeon RX 9070 graphics card, and a 1TB Crucial T705 NVMe SSD (model CT1000T705SSD3). Windows 11 25H2 was updated with all available patches as of early September. On the Linux side, Ubuntu 24.04.3 LTS included all Stable Release Updates (SRUs) from the same period, while the Ubuntu 25.10 development build ran on the Linux 6.17 kernel for a preview of upcoming performance.
These comparisons aim to determine if one operating system provides clearer advantages for the Ryzen 9 9950X3D's 3D V-Cache technology in desktop workloads.