A
MD’s 6-core Ryzen CPUs have long
been among our favourites thanks to
the their excellent all-round multi-
threaded performance and affordability. This
has been borne out in sales too, with them
outselling every other desktop CPU in recent
times. In fact, the Ryzen 5 3600’s predecessor
was the most popular CPU bought via etailers
during the end of 2018 and into 2019.
The Ryzen 5 3600 has a lot to live up to,
then, but the 7nm Zen 2 architecture has
helped it to offer a lot more across the board,
especially in games. Even better, its launch
price of nearly £200 has been cut to under
£160, meaning it massively undercuts the
Core i5-9600K and now competes with the
Core i5-9400 and Core i5-9500.AMD RYZEN 5
3600 /£157 inc VAT
SUPPLIER cclonline.comAs with all of AMD’s
Zen 2 CPUs, the Ryzen 5
3600 offers Simultaneous
Multithreading, so unlike
Intel’s current Core i5 and
Core i7 desktop CPUs, it packs an extra punch
in multi-threaded tasks. In this instance, it
gives you the ability to process 12 threads at
once via its six cores. It has a hefty 32MB L3
cache and, as indicated by the lack of an X
at the end of its name, it has a TDP rating of
just 65W compared to 95W for the Ryzen
5 3600X. However, it boosts to just 4.2GHz
compared to the latter’s 4.4GHz. We also
saw an all-core boost frequency of just under
4GHz, but the X-edition CPU sat at 4.1GHz, so
it’s a little quicker all round.
One of the best reasons to buy previous
iterations of this CPU was that, thanks to an
unlocked multiplier, overclocking it was easy
and rewarding. With a 4.2GHz peak boost
clock, any frequency above this figure will offer
gains to both peak single- and all-core boost
frequencies. Plumbing in 1.425V to allow our
CPU to stretch its legs, we hit 4.25GHz, which
added 50MHz to the single-core boost and just
over 250MHz to the all-core boost.
However, while that’s faster than the
Ryzen 5 3600X’s all-core boost, the latter
has a stock peak boost of 4.4GHz, meaning it
retains more of a lead over its non X-edition
sibling than the Ryzen 5 2600X did afteroverclocking. Even so, the fact that you can add
to the peak and all-core boost with a manual
overclock means it’s one of the few 3rd-gen
Ryzen CPUs to benefit in both areas from a
manual overclock.
With a system score of 185,659, the Ryzen 5
3600 easily outstrips the Core i5-9600K, Core
i5-9400F and Core i3-9350K in RealBench.
Even applying massive overclocks to those
K-series CPUs didn’t see them match the
3600’s stock speed scores. Once overclocked,
the AMD CPU extended its lead to 207,899 with
a similar story playing out in Adobe Premiere Pro
and Cinebench. On the other hand, our game
tests revealed performance that was noticeably
slower than most Intel CPUs and overclocking
only yielded small gains where even the Core
i3-9350K was faster, albeit by less than 10 per
cent in both titles.Conclusion
For the money, the Ryzen 5 3600 is an
excellent all-rounder and while it’s a
little slower in some games than Intel’s
equivalents, it more than makes up for this
with massive multi-threaded performance.
If you dabble in content creation as well as
gaming and have a budget of around £150,
it’s a no-brainer.SPEC
Base frequency 3.6GHz
Turbo frequency 4.2GHz
Core Zen 2
Manufacturing process 7nm
Number of cores 6 x physical (12 threads)
IGP None
Simultaneous Multithreading Ye s
Cache 32MB L3 cache, 3MB L2 cache
Memory controller Dual-channel
DDR4, up to 3200MHz
Packaging AMD Socket AM4
Thermal design power (TDP) 65W
Features Precision Boost 2, Precision Boost
Overdrive, FMA3, F16C, SHA, BMI / BMI1 + BMI2,
AVX2, AVX, AES, SSE4a, SSE4, SSE3, SSE2, SSEVERDICT
A huge amount faster than its predecessor
and the new benchmark for a sub-£200
FLAT WHITE all-rounder.
+ Great all-rounder
+ Excellent multi-
threaded performance
+ Good valueFLAT TYRE- Slower than Intel
CPUs in some games - Cheaper Ryzen 7 2700
is sometimes faster
when overclocked - Little overclocking
headroom
PERFORMANCE
33 / 50FEATURES
13 / 15OVERALL SCORE
80 %
VALUE
34 / 35c
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PR
OVE
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A
MD’s 6-core Ryzen CPUs have long
been among our favourites thanks to
the their excellent all-round multi-
threaded performance and affordability. This
has been borne out in sales too, with them
outselling every other desktop CPU in recent
times. In fact, the Ryzen 5 3600’s predecessor
was the most popular CPU bought via etailers
during the end of 2018 and into 2019.
The Ryzen 5 3600 has a lot to live up to,
then, but the 7nm Zen 2 architecture has
helped it to offer a lot more across the board,
especially in games. Even better, its launch
price of nearly £200 has been cut to under
£160, meaning it massively undercuts the
Core i5-9600K and now competes with the
Core i5-9400 and Core i5-9500.
AMD RYZEN 5
3600 /£157inc VAT
SUPPLIER cclonline.comAs with all of AMD’s
Zen 2 CPUs, the Ryzen 5
3600 offers Simultaneous
Multithreading, so unlike
Intel’s current Core i5 and
Core i7 desktop CPUs, it packs an extra punch
in multi-threaded tasks. In this instance, it
gives you the ability to process 12 threads at
once via its six cores. It has a hefty 32MB L3
cache and, as indicated by the lack of an X
at the end of its name, it has a TDP rating of
just 65W compared to 95W for the Ryzen
5 3600X. However, it boosts to just 4.2GHz
compared to the latter’s 4.4GHz. We also
saw an all-core boost frequency of just under
4GHz, but the X-edition CPU sat at 4.1GHz, so
it’s a little quicker all round.
One of the best reasons to buy previous
iterations of this CPU was that, thanks to an
unlocked multiplier, overclocking it was easy
and rewarding. With a 4.2GHz peak boost
clock, any frequency above this figure will offer
gains to both peak single- and all-core boost
frequencies. Plumbing in 1.425V to allow our
CPU to stretch its legs, we hit 4.25GHz, which
added 50MHz to the single-core boost and just
over 250MHz to the all-core boost.
However, while that’s faster than the
Ryzen 5 3600X’s all-core boost, the latter
has a stock peak boost of 4.4GHz, meaning it
retains more of a lead over its non X-edition
sibling than the Ryzen 5 2600X did afteroverclocking. Even so, the fact that you can add
to the peak and all-core boost with a manual
overclock means it’s one of the few 3rd-gen
Ryzen CPUs to benefit in both areas from a
manual overclock.
With a system score of 185,659, the Ryzen 5
3600 easily outstrips the Core i5-9600K, Core
i5-9400F and Core i3-9350K in RealBench.
Even applying massive overclocks to those
K-series CPUs didn’t see them match the
3600’s stock speed scores. Once overclocked,
the AMD CPU extended its lead to 207,899 with
a similar story playing out in Adobe Premiere Pro
and Cinebench. On the other hand, our game
tests revealed performance that was noticeably
slower than most Intel CPUs and overclocking
only yielded small gains where even the Core
i3-9350K was faster, albeit by less than 10 per
cent in both titles.Conclusion
For the money, the Ryzen 5 3600 is an
excellent all-rounder and while it’s a
little slower in some games than Intel’s
equivalents, it more than makes up for this
with massive multi-threaded performance.
If you dabble in content creation as well as
gaming and have a budget of around £150,
it’s a no-brainer.SPEC
Base frequency 3.6GHz
Turbo frequency 4.2GHz
Core Zen 2
Manufacturing process 7nm
Number of cores 6 x physical (12 threads)
IGP None
Simultaneous Multithreading Ye s
Cache 32MB L3 cache, 3MB L2 cache
Memory controller Dual-channel
DDR4, up to 3200MHz
Packaging AMD Socket AM4
Thermal design power (TDP) 65W
Features Precision Boost 2, Precision Boost
Overdrive, FMA3, F16C, SHA, BMI / BMI1 + BMI2,
AVX2, AVX, AES, SSE4a, SSE4, SSE3, SSE2, SSEVERDICT
A huge amount faster than its predecessor
and the new benchmark for a sub-£200
FLAT WHITE all-rounder.
+ Great all-rounder
+ Excellent multi-
threaded performance
+ Good valueFLAT TYRE- Slower than Intel
CPUs in some games - Cheaper Ryzen 7 2700
is sometimes faster
when overclocked - Little overclocking
headroom
PERFORMANCE
33 / 50FEATURES
13 / 15OVERALLSCORE
80 %
VALUE
34 / 35cc
uuss
tommPP
CCA
P
PR
OVE
D