AMD Ryzen 5 5600X Review

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600X processor has six cores and twelve threads. It fits in with the market for midrange gaming CPUs. It’s one of AMD’s finest value for money in terms of price-to-performance in 2020. It doesn’t have integrated graphics, but that’s a minor flaw in an otherwise excellent performance.

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600X Specs: The Zen 3 Midrange Pick

The AMD Zen 3 CPU is the company’s most affordable option, trailing just the  Ryzen 7 5800X with eight cores and 12 threads. The AMD Ryzen 5 5600X, like the rest of the Zen 3 lineup, is $50 more expensive than its predecessor. When examining top-end choices like the AMD Ryzen 9 5950X, the sting of price rise isn’t as noticeable. The AMD Zen 3 processor contains a single eight-core core complex (CCX), which is more powerful than the Zen 2, which had two four-core CCSs. The shift to a single CCX gives the Zen 3 Zen 5600X an advantage over the earlier Zen 2-powered AMD Ryzen 5 3600X because it is a gaming-focused CPU.

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600X desktop processor is one of the company’s most powerful to date. Unlike Intel, AMD has continued to include cooling with its midrange and low-end CPUs, with the Wraith Stealth cooler included in every box this time. With a BIOS update, prospective customers can use an AMD X570 or B550 board with the Zen 3 CPUs as of this writing.

Benchmarks:

In Cinebench R20 multi-core testing, the AMD 5600X is 19 percent faster than the 3600 and 24 percent faster than the Core i5-10600K. When it comes to single-thread performance, it outperforms even the Core i9-10900K in a single-core test. It ran at 4.4 GHz, which is significantly higher than the declared 3.7 GHz base clock frequency. This equates to a 30% performance increase over current 6-core/12-thread processors like the Ryzen 53600 and 10700K. In V-Ray rendering benchmarks, the 5600X is 30% quicker than the 3600 and only 6% slower than the 3700X.

In rendering tests with After Effects and Adobe Premiere Pro, the new Zen 3 chip handily outperforms Intel’s Core i5-10600K and Core i7-7700K processors. Zen 3’s single-thread performance has vastly improved, and we’re getting a decent idea of what this means for single-threaded applications like Photoshop.

Testing the AMD Ryzen 5 5600X: Is This the Zen 3 Sweet Spot?

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600X is the first of four Zen 3-based Ryzen processors to be released, and it is one of the most powerful in its class. For our benchmarking, we used an MSI MEG X570 Godlike AM4 motherboard with 16GB of RAM running at 3,000MHz. During all of our benchmark runs, the chip was kept cold by an NZXT Kraken Z63 280mm closed-loop liquid cooling solution. However, it still performs well enough in benchmarks versus Intel and previous-generation AMD CPUs to warrant a second look if money is tight. Gamers are more likely to be recommended than budding content creators or productivity hounds.

For gaming frame rates at 1080p, the AMD Ryzen 5 5600X CPU outperforms Intel’s Core i9-10900K and Intel’s Core i5-10600K. If you want a better mix of CPU and GPU power in 1440p or 4K gaming, it’s a possible option. The reduced price frees up funds that may be used to upgrade the graphics card or RAM without sacrificing too many frames. The AMD Ryzen 3 3300X is also a good budget choice, costing less than half as much (assuming you can locate one in stock).

Performance:

The 5600X, on the other hand, is closer to Intel’s 10700K than the 10600K, with better X264 video encoding and Cinebench R20 3D rendering results. Overall, there’s no comparison between this processor and Intel’s  10-core, 20-thread beast, which consumes substantially more power and needs a larger power supply.

A Brief Look at Overclocking and Thermals:

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600X is one of the Zen 3 launch stack’s most powerful CPUs. Its core temps never went over 74 degrees C in our testing, whether it was overclockable or not. Other, higher-core variants, such as AMD’s flagship Zen 9 5900X or the Zen 7 5800X, run a little hotter. Furthermore, we were able to obtain a constant overclock of around 20%, which is consistent with what we’ve seen thus far across the rest of the chip stack.

Pros:

• Strong output in terms of content generation and productivity. 
• In terms of gaming benchmarks, dominance is a good thing. 
• TDP is low. 
• Compatible with the AM4 socket 
• Overclocking ceiling is high.

Cons:

• No integrated graphics compared to last-gen Ryzen 5 
• Overclocking did not result in significant performance benefits.

Conclusion:

The Ryzen 3 3300X is still a great deal among gaming CPUs, but the Ryzen 5 5600X is a beast at its medium price, making it the greatest pure gaming CPU of the year.