As if I wasn't already struggling with Arrow Lake's price, AMD is having a big sale on its most recent 9000-series CPUs

pcgamer.com:

AMD Ryzen 7 9700X | 8 cores | 16 threads | Zen 5 | 5.5 GHz boost | AM5 socket | $359$311.99 at Newegg (save $47.01)
Eight speedy cores for not a huge amount of cash. Well, it is a lot of money but in processor terms you're at least getting solid performance and lots of computational performance for your buck. The 3D V-Cache chips are better for pure gaming than this, but they're a lot more money. Just make sure to use the code BFDDYA55 for the full discount.

Intel had a decent day yesterday. The chip firm announced it actually beat its earnings guidance, which means shareholders are a little better off than they expected. Though that's only a drop of positivity for a select few in a bucket of mostly bad. Intel has had a rocky year, and while Lunar Lake was a surprising success, its desktop Arrow Lake chips are a bit of a damp squib.

What's making matters worse is how increasingly affordable AMD's current CPU lineup is right now.

Here are the prices for the Ryzen 9000-series over at Newegg:

For the sake of comparison, you can pick up Intel's Core Ultra 9 285K for $630 on Newegg. Well, you could, if it was in stock. Low stock around a chip launch is pretty normal, but reports suggest there's very little Arrow Lake stock to go around. You can actually pick up the Core Ultra 5 245K for $319, at least.

I wouldn't, though. The 245K doesn't beat out the 9600X in our testing, and the AMD chip is 26% cheaper. There are also savings to be had in terms of your choice of motherboard. The most affordable Z890 motherboard for Arrow Lake on Newegg right now is $190, or $180 with a rebate. Whereas the most affordable AM5 motherboard for the 9000-series is $76. I don't recommend buying the most basic board for a shiny new 9000-series chip but you could get something new and relatively decent for $115. That's the sort of saving you can either put back in your pocket or to bump up to a better processor.

I won't labor this point too much, as my colleague Jacob has already gone into