Ads for CPU processors tend to focus on bigger, better, and faster – which often means focused attention on the main chip. But in August, when AMD finally released details about the Ryzen 7000, the most surprising information wasn’t about the beefy, top-of-the-line Ryzen 9 7950X. Instead, Team Red shocked everyone by saying that the humble Ryzen 5 7600X could beat Intel’s flagship Core i9-12900K.
Now that the 7600X is here, it’s clear that AMD wasn’t exaggerating. This 6-core, 12-thread chip is gaming beastly, capable of taking on rivals far above its weight class. And you can do it in several titles.
We’d say it was a clear win for AMD – except the chip is hampered by the very advances that help its brothers shine.
Ryzen 7000, resurfaced
You can read our initial Ryzen 7000 article for all the technical details of AMD’s first Zen 4 chips. (Alternatively, you can scroll through the condensed summary if you’re short on time.) But, in a nutshell, the launch chips feature substantial improvements in clock speed and performance over the Ryzen 5000, its predecessor.
OMG
These advancements are the result of several new developments for AMD. The Ryzen 7000 chips are the first at 5nm, the first to use the Zen 4 architecture, and the first to support the company’s new AM5 socket. The AM5 offers some major advancements over the long-lasting and much-loved socket AM4 platform – namely support for lightning-fast PCIe 5 components and DDR5 memory, plus a move to an LGA design that supports higher power usage (and ends the era of bent CPU pins as the LGA moves the pins to the motherboard socket).
Adam Patrick Murray/IDG
And the Ryzen 7000 definitely extends to that higher power consumption. For the 7600X, you’re looking at an expected power draw of 105 watts under load. If the chip consumes more power while increasing, its limit provided by the AM5 socket is 230W. The 5600X was rated at 65W, with a cap of 142W through its AM4 socket.
Another key new feature of the Ryzen 7000 is the integrated graphics, which will make troubleshooting your PC easier – you won’t need to have a dedicated graphics card plugged in to get a video signal. And when budget chips come out, you can save money by skipping the added expense of a discrete card for entry-level PCs.
acting
As a 6-core, 12-thread chip, the Ryzen 5 7600X is ostensibly branded as a more affordable mid-range option – a processor intended for gaming and productivity-focused use (Microsoft Office, web browsing, photo editing, etc.) CPU’s can usually flex their muscles as hard as bigger, badder processors in these areas, if not more. Let’s dive into the numbers.
A note about our data: The benchmark scores in this review were generously provided to us by our colleague Sebastian Schenzinger from our sister site, PC Welt. (You can read their Ryzen 7600X review in German.) For detailed information on the test machines used in their benchmarks, go to the end of this article.
Games
We’ll start with the unexpected battle between the Ryzen 5 7600X and the Intel Core i9-12900K. It’s a fascinating clash – at 1080p (the most popular resolution for gaming), AMD’s 7600X outperforms Team Blue’s main part in 5 out of 12 games in the PC Welt benchmark set.
To view our full-size benchmark charts, right-click (PC) or long-press (mobile) on the image and open it in a new tab or window.
Win size is uneven, however, with the Ryzen 5 7600X taking a clear lead in Shadow of the Tomb Raider and the 12900K drilling harder Cyberpunk 2077. In other games, the difference is much smaller – just percentage points. Regardless, you can still see that AMD’s claims weren’t just carefully selected marketing. Its 6-core, 12-thread processor I can hold firm against Intel’s $589 20-core, 24-thread main CPU. Of course, the story would be more incredible if the 7600X won in every benchmark, but this result is still quite a feat.
Also interesting is the performance of the 7600X compared to the gaming demon of the Ryzen 5000, the incredible Ryzen 7 5800X3D. The latter (and its sophisticated 3D V-Cache technology) stole Intel’s gaming crown at launch in April, but despite being replaced by the Ryzen 7000, it still has plenty of power in its stride. Overall, the 5800X3D outperforms the 7600X overall – an interesting fact to remember considering the 5800X3D’s retail prices have dropped to around $300 lately.
To view our full-size benchmark charts, right-click (PC) or long-press (mobile) on the image and open it in a new tab or window.
Not convinced by the Ryzen 5 7600X’s achievements? We can drop to 720p. It’s no longer a common gaming resolution, but reducing the number of pixels provides a less diluted measurement of CPU performance. Since the GPU has the easiest job at lower resolutions, it’s up to the CPU to keep up.
As with 1080p, you’ll see similar trends in chip performance between the 7600X and 12900K (including the same uneven variance between individual games), although the percentage differences will increase. The same goes for the 7600X and 5800X3D.
Production
Outside of gaming, you’ll often use a processor like the Ryzen 5 7600X for light photo editing and infrequent encoding of game captures or a shredded home video. Impressively, the Ryzen 5 7600X sings in Adobe Photoshop – it even outperforms the Core i9-12900K by a small amount.
Sebastian Schenzinger/PC Welt
Move on to tasks like video editing, encoding and rendering, and the Core i9-12900K advances, as you’d expect – these multithreaded tasks take full advantage of the 12900K’s greater number of cores and threads, making it suitable for loads heavy work.
Sebastian Schenzinger/PC Welt
Sebastian Schenzinger/PC Welt
The fairest match is against the Intel Core i5-12600K, the 7600X’s comparable rival. You can expect similar performance in programs like Davinci Resolve, Premiere Pro, and Handbrake, although the chips swap first place depending on the program. Incidentally, in Premiere Pro, the 12600K might be the real winner, even if the 7600X wins in raw performance. Since Adobe uses Intel’s QuickSync technology, which uses the chips’ integrated graphics to speed things up, it can give Team Blue a considerable performance advantage. If you look at our Ryzen 9 7950X review, the 7950X is outperformed by the 12900K in Premiere by nearly 20%. If for some reason you end up working in Premiere Pro, the time saved with an Intel chip can significantly affect how much you can get done in a day, especially when working on a side project or labor of love.
Sebastian Schenzinger/PC Welt
Sebastian Schenzinger/PC Welt
In these types of tasks, the 7600X also often performs very close to the Ryzen 7 5800X and 5800X3D. It’s particularly impressive given that these chips launched at much higher list prices ($150 more) than the 7600X.
final thoughts
AMD’s Ryzen 5 7600X is clearly an excellent processor. But it has a big problem, which is the cost.
Everything is more expensive these days, including CPUs. Two generations ago, the 3600X was $250, while the 8-core, 16-thread 3700X was $329. With the 7600X, you’re still paying more for fewer cores.
Some people, like my colleague Gordon Mah Ung, would argue that this is the entry fee for a badass new technology – especially since AMD delivers top-notch performance. (Just like with the Ryzen 5000.) That’s a fair point, but other core components are still more expensive as well. DDR5 memory is still about twice as expensive as DDR4 memory and an AM5 motherboard with full PCIe 5 support for graphics cards and storage carry a premium. These features help the 7950X and 7900X beat benchmarks and help future-proof the AM5 motherboard platform, but also increase the budget needed for a mid-range gaming build.
MSI
Of course, you don’t have to go the extra mile with future-proofing on a mid-tier system. And since you’re unlikely not to, there’s not much to stop you from considering reasonable alternatives.
Get the Ryzen 7 5800X3D. As we saw earlier, it outperforms the 7600X in gaming. You can also find many affordable options for DDR4 memory and AM4 motherboards. With the 5800X3D being sold semi-regularly lately, it comes out at roughly the same expense as a 7600X. (As of this writing, you could get a 5800X3D for $365 on sale at Newegg.) DDR5 support.
Intel
There’s also Intel’s 13th-gen Raptor Lake to consider, which will launch on October 20th. Team Blue says its upcoming chips will be up to 24% faster than the 12th-gen Alder Lake in games. A $319 Core i5-13600K could end up supplanting the 7600X as the best CPU for mid-range gaming. For added appeal, the company has also revamped its support for DDR4 or DDR5 memory, making it even possible to buy a low-cost DDR4 motherboard for RAM.
And for people with a longer horizon, more Ryzen 7000 processors are on their way. While AMD hasn’t announced its future plans for the Ryzen 7000, a less expensive Ryzen 5 7600 or similarly priced Ryzen 7 7700 will likely join the lineup in the future. DDR5 memory will continue to drop in price as well.
In short, the Ryzen 5 7600X screams, but it’s still not a must-have chip for midrange game builds. Budgets and value matter – even more than incredible performance.
Ryzen 5 7600X Test Machine Information
PCWorld
PCWorld
