Custom PC – October 2019

Far Cry 5 was anothernightanddayincrease,with
the minimum frame rate rising from 69fpsto91fps,
all while consuming over 50W less under load.Sadly,
overclocking yielded little extra performance,andthe
150MHz maximum frequency deficit comparedwiththe
stock speed boost saw slower numbers inCinebench’s
single-threaded test, as well as our imageeditingtest.
Compared with the Core i5-9600K, theRyzen 5
3600X was more than a match at stock speed,outdoing
the Intel CPU in every Realbench test by hugemargins.
It was a similar situation in Cinebench whereit even
battered the Intel CPU in the single-threadedtest.
At stock speed, the AMD CPU was only slightlyadriftinFar
Cry 5, although the Intel CPU edged out a bigger lead once
overclocked to 4.9GHz. This still wasn’t enough to get close
to the Ryzen 5 3600X in Cinebench’s multi-threaded test,
or our heavily multi-threaded video encoding test though.

Inthesetests,theAMDCPUhelda sizeablelead,although

onceoverclocked,theCorei5-9600Kis a littlequickerinour

imageeditingtestandCinebench’ssingle-threadedtest.

Conclusion

UnlessyoumassivelyoverclocktheCorei5-9600K,Intel’s

offeringis simplynomatchfortheRyzen5 3600X,which

wasnearlyasfastinFarCry5 andheldmassiveleadsin

everyothertest.Theonlydownsideis overclocking,withthe

AMDCPUbarelyabletobetteritsstockspeedall-coreboost,

leadingtosingle-threadedbenchmarksbeingnoticeably

slowerthantheIntelchip,thankstotheAMDCPU’smaximum

frequencybeingwellbelowitspeakstockspeedboost.

Asa result,the3600Xis definitelya CPUthatwill

respondbettertoPrecisionBoostOverdrivethanmanual

overclocking.Fora puregamingsystem,theIntelCPUcan

bea littlefasterinsometitlesonceoverclocked,butassoon

asyoustepoutsidegames,theRyzen5 3600Xtramplesall

overit, whileit completelydestroystheRyzen5 2600Xtoo.

TheRyzen5 3600Xis a potentall-rounderforthecash.

ANTONYLEATHER

VERDICT

A superb multi-purpose CPU and a worthy successor to

the Ryzen 5 2600X.

RAGEAGAINST

THEMACHINE

+ Excellentvalue

+ Significantlyfaster

than2600X

+ Power-frugal

RAGEQUIT

• OverclockedIntel
  CPUsfasterin
  somegames


• Littleoverclocking
  headroom

OVERALLSCORE

89 %

PERFORMANCE

41 / 50

FEATURES

15 / 15

VALUE

33 / 35

BENCHMARK RESULTS

GIMPIMAGEEDITING

0 20,000 40,000 60,000 80,000

AMDRyzen 5 3600X 63,14263,194

AMDRyzen 5 2600X 51,016 51,352

IntelCorei5-9600K 56,112 65,458

HANDBRAKEH.264VIDEOENCODING

0 150,000 300,000 450,000 600,000

AMDRyzen 5 3600X

AMDRyzen 5 2600X 424,790 435,531

IntelCorei5-9600K 352,153 402,470

484,128 488,907

HEAVYMULTITASKING

0 100,000 200,000 300,000 400,000

AMDRyzen 5 3600X

AMDRyzen 5 2600X 192,315 203,161

IntelCorei5-9600K 203,830 219,130

245,696 247,663

Stockspeed Overclocked

SYSTEMSCORE

0 100,000 200,000 300,000 400,000

AMDRyzen 5 3600X

AMDRyzen 5 2600X 173,016 178,496

IntelCorei5-9600K 159,009 177,750

202,642 205,913

Stockspeedmin Stockspeedavg

Overclockedmin Overclockedavg

1,920x1,080,Ultrasettings

FARCRY 5

0 40 80 120 160

86fps 110fps

AMDRyzen 5 3600X 91fps 117fps

AMDRyzen 5 2600X 69fps 92fps

74fps 95fps

IntelCorei5-9600K 91fps 122fps

99fps 133fps

CINEBENCHR20SINGLETHREADED

0 150 300 450 600

AMDRyzen 5 3600X

AMDRyzen 5 2600X 425 432

Intel Core i5-9600K 463 516

492501

Stockspeed Overclocked

SYSTEMSCORE

0 1,000 2,000 3,000 4,000

AMDRyzen 5 3600X

AMDRyzen 5 2600X 3,053 3,165

Intel Core i5-9600K 2,559 2,909

3,705 3,856

TOTALSYSTEMPOWERCONSUMPTIONSTOCKSPEED

0 100 200 300 400

105w 203w

AMDRyzen 5 3600X 103w 190w

AMDRyzen 5 2600X 110w 241w

115w 266w

Intel Core i5-9600K 96w 203w

95w 242w

Stockspeedidle Stockspeedload

Overclocked idle Overclocked load

Lower is better