Micro Center stores around the country are looking to get rid of their remaining AMD Ryzen 5 2600X stock. For a limited three-day sale, the retailer is selling the CPU for $79.99 for in-store purchases. This is a new all-time low, beating its previous lowest price of $120. If you can get to a Micro Center store (there are only 25 in the U.S.), you have a chance to snag one of the best tech deals ever.

Introduced in 2018, the Ryzen 5 2600X is a second-generation Ryzen desktop CPU that's based on AMD's Zen microarchitecture and GlobalFoundries' 12nm manufacturing process. The processor is packed with with six cores, 12 threads and 16MB of L3 cache. 

The Ryzen 5 2600X arrives with a 3.6 GHz base clock and a respectable boost clock that tops out at 4.2 GHz. However, the Ryzen 5 2600X features an unlocked multiplier so there's headroom to squeeze even more performance out of the six-core chip. The processor fits into motherboards with AMD's AM4 CPU socket.

As far as other features go, the Ryzen 5 2600X comes with native support for dual-channel DDR4-2933 RAM kits and offers up to 16 PCIe 3.0 lanes for discrete graphics cards and four PCIe 3.0 lanes for NVMe storage.

The Ryzen 5 2600X has a 95W TDP (thermal design power). Therefore, you don't have to spend extra on a CPU cooler as AMD includes the Wraith Spire cooler with the processor. Still, we recommend investing in a decent aftermarket cooling solution if you plan to push the Ryzen 5 2600X to its limits.

If you're building a budget or mid-range gaming PC, AMD's Ryzen 5 2600X is a good choice. This processor features 6 cores and 12 threads, along with a boost clock speed of 4.1 GHz to go with its 3.6 GHz base speed. And right now, as part of the holiday tech deal season, B&H has the Ryzen 5 2600X for just $119. You also get a Wraith Spire cooler in the box.

This matches the lowest price we've ever seen for the Ryzen 5 2600X, when it dipped down to the same $119 on Cyber Monday. There is one small caveat: the product won't arrive until after Christmas. 

Although this is a last-gen CPU, there are still benefits to reap. In our AMD Ryzen 5 2600X review, we appreciated its memory and cache performance. If you’re looking to upgrade from a 1st-gen Ryzen, you can expect better boost clock speeds and lower cache and memory latencies, which all lead to gaming performance improvements. Meanwhile, the 12 threads will come in handy during typical productivity tasks. 

A Moderate Refresh

Intel announced its Core i5-9400 processors in January, but the chips only recently become available in significant quantities. The company also rolled out the rest of its Coffee Lake refresh models, six months after its initial salvo, a delay likely attributable to its ongoing 14nm production shortage.

As Intel struggles to satisfy demand for its chips, AMD has launched its Ryzen 3000-series processors. The updated Ryzen line-up employs a smaller 7nm process that should confer power and price benefits. It'll also wield the new Zen 2 microarchitecture, which is expected to boost performance while Intel remains mired in a derivative of the seven-year-old Skylake design. These chips have now taken our Best CPUs list by storm, so be sure to head there for a list of the latest leading processors. You can also see how the chips stack up in our CPU Benchmark Hierarchy.

Intel's lingering lack of 14nm capacity reverberates through every facet of the industry. To boost supply, the chip-maker decided to start selling CPUs that it would have otherwise deemed defective due to nonfunctional graphics units. As a result, we now have the F-series, which includes disabled graphics hardware, but is otherwise identical to the fully-featured Core processors we're more accustomed to.

That means the Core i5-9400F is nearly identical to the Core i5-9400. Both CPUs serve to replace the impressive Core i5-8400, which was one of the most popular Coffee Lake models. Armed with 6C/6T and a slightly higher clock rate, the 9400s yield an incremental step forward over their predecessor.

Moreover, we're finally seeing the F-series' lower price kick in. The Core i5-9400F's ~$20 discount could be compelling for mid-range gamers who don't need integrated graphics.

Core i5-9400F and Core i5-9400

From an architectural standpoint, the Core i5-9400 and -9400F are essentially the same processor as the Core i5-8400, right down to their 14nm++ process, six physical cores, support for dual-channel DDR4-2666, and 65W TDP. The CPUs also drop into an LGA 1551 interface, and they are supported by existing 300-series motherboards with up-to-date BIOSes. They're multipler-locked, unfortunately, so they include Intel's flimsy stock cooling solution.

Again, the Core i5-9400F lacks integrated graphics, which isn't an issue for gamers who already use add-in GPUs. However, we find it interesting that Intel maintains the same $182 recommended price as its standard Core i5-9400.

Relative to the Core 5-8400, Intel boosts the -9400/-9400F's base frequency and Turbo Boost clock rate by 100 MHz, which should yield slight performance benefits. The Core i5-9400 models also include new baked-in silicon mitigations for the Meltdown vulnerability, along with a combination of hardware- and software-based mitigations for the Spectre and L1TF vulnerabilities. The overhead of software-based patches applied to older processors can reach as high as 10% in certain workloads. That impact is greatly reduced on newer processors. Compared to the Core i5-8400, we didn't measure any significant speed-ups beyond what we expected. However, optimized mitigations could help deliver more of a performance uplift to enthusiasts migrating from much older platforms.  

With the launch of its Coffee Lake refresh, Intel finally switched to a solder-based thermal interface material (sTIM), improving heat transfer between its die and heat spreader. Interestingly, though, some Core i5-9400 models initially came with standard polymer-based thermal interface material (thermal grease), while others shipped with the more efficient sTIM. Intel tells us that depended on where each CPU was manufactured, though all Core i5-9400s now come with sTIM, while the locked F-series models continue to employ pTIM.

In either case, you can determine whether your CPU includes sTIM by checking its stepping. P0- and R0-stepping processors come with sTIM, while the U0 and B0 steppings utilize pTIM. Intel plans to stick with pTIM for all locked F-series models, like our U0-stepping Core i5-9400F.

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Test Setup

MEG Z390 Godlike

We're using MSI's MEG Z390 Godlike motherboard as our test platform for all Intel processors. It sells for $600, but has the power delivery subsystem to support aggressive overclocking.

MSI's motherboard imposes a 100.8 MHz base clock. We are waiting on a solution from MSI that should allow us to dial in an exact 100 MHz BCLK.

The MEG Z390 Godlike sits at the top of MSI's motherboard hierarchy. It has a decked-out 18-phase power delivery subsystem that's designed to squeeze every drop of performance out of Intel's new processors. It also comes with a few nifty accessories like an M.2 PCIe riser card and an HDMI streaming card.

Comparison Products

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VRMark, 3DMark and AotS: Escalation

VRMark, 3DMark

We aren't big fans of using synthetic benchmarks to measure performance, but 3DMark's DX11 and DX12 CPU tests provide useful insight into the amount of horsepower available to game engines.

The 3DMark DX11 and DX12 CPU tests tend to scale linearly based on core count, so the Core i5-9400F yields minor improvements over the similarly-equipped six-core -8400 of 2.76% and 1.69%, respectively. The less expensive six-core Ryzen 5 2600X provides far more performance in these tests, and it also sells for ~$5 more. That higher score is a byproduct of the Ryzen's extra threads. Just remember, though, multi-threaded performance doesn't always help, since game engines don't always scale as well as synthetic benchmarks.

In our experience, VRMark values per-core performance, which is a mixture of frequency and instructions per cycle (IPC) throughput. The benchmark lets you gauge your system's suitability for use with the HTC Vive or Oculus Rift, even if you don't currently own an HMD. UL defines a passing score as anything above 109 FPS. Intel's -9400F notches a small win over the -8400, but opens up an impressive lead over the stock Ryzen 5 2600X. Overclocking AMD's chip to 4.2 GHz allows it to nearly match the -9400F, though.

Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation

Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation is a computationally intensive title that scales well with thread count.

The Core i5-9400F takes a 1.6 FPS lead over the previous-gen -8400, but trails the Ryzen 5 2600X. Overclocking helps AMD's CPU to extend its advantage, while the Core i5-9400F languishes under its locked multiplier. 

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Dawn of War III, GTA: V, Hitman

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War III

Although the Warhammer 40,000 benchmark responds well to multi-threading, AMD's stock Ryzen 5 2600X still falls to the bottom of our chart, while the Core i5-9400F demonstrates an incremental improvement over the -8400.

Again, overclocking proves to be the differentiator that gives the 2600X a bit of extra life.

Grand Theft Auto V

Grand Theft Auto V favors Intel architectures and, more generally, multi-core designs with high clock rates.

The Core i5-9400F establishes a tangible lead over AMD's Ryzen processors, including the tuned Ryzen 7 2700X. Again, we see the -9400F's slight improvement over Intel's previous-gen -8400. 

Hitman

The Core i5-9400F tops AMD's Ryzen-based competition while tying its counterpart.

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Shadow Of War and Project CARS 2

Middle-earth: Shadow Of War

Shadow of War leans heavier on graphics resources than host processing, so we don't see much difference between the fastest and slowest CPUs. The Core i5-9400F averages 0.9 FPS less than the -8400. However, that isn't too surprising given the relatively slim difference between models. We test at 1920 x 1080, and at a high-enough resolution, most games are indeed limited by your GPU. Plan accordingly if you're running into a bottleneck.

Project CARS 2

Although Project CARS 2 is purportedly optimized for threading, clock rates have the greatest effect on this title's frame rates. The -9400F trails the -8400, but both processors are significantly faster than AMD's Ryzen models.

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Office and Productivity

Adobe Creative Cloud

Even though this suite has a few parallelized workloads, its final score is heavily influenced by the lightly-threaded tasks common in most desktop applications.

Although Intel processors tend to excel in lightly-threaded tasks, AMD's Ryzen 5 2600X carves out wins in both the single- and multi-threaded applications. Overclocking the Ryzen models yields nice performance improvements, too.

Web Browser

The Krakken suite evaluates JavaScript performance using audio, imaging, and cryptography workloads. Like most browser-based benchmarks, single-threaded performance reigns supreme.

The Ryzen 5 2600X proves to be pretty nimble in the Krakken JavaScript performance test, which often relies heavily on per-core performance. Meanwhile, Intel's Core i5s lead in the MotionMark and WebXPRT tests.

Productivity

The application start-up metric measures load time snappiness in word processors, GIMP, and Web browsers under warm- and cold-start conditions. Other platform-level considerations affect this test as well, including the storage subsystem. Single-core performance largely determines responsiveness. Core i5-9400F trails the previous-gen -8400 by a number small enough that it falls within our expected margin of error.

Our video conferencing suite measures performance in single- and multi-user applications that utilize the Windows Media Foundation for playback and encoding. It also performs facial detection to model real-world usage. This workload responds well based on the number of cores and threads, so AMD's Ryzen fares well. Again, we see the Core i5-9400F offering such similar performance to its counterpart that it falls within this test's margin of error.

The photo editing benchmark measures performance with Futuremark's binaries using the ImageMagick library. Common photo processing workloads also tend to be parallelized, giving Ryzen 5 models an easy lead over the Core i5-9400F and -8400. The Ryzen 5 2600X also benefits greatly from overclocking.

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Rendering, Encoding and Compression

Rendering

By and large, the Ryzen processors are better-suited for heavy rendering workloads due to their higher core counts and simultaneous multi-threading capabilities. They dominate our threaded tests, as a result.

Single-threaded workloads, regardless of their genre, are still best addressed with Intel CPUs. The Core i5-9400F demonstrates small improvements over its predecessor, but basically offers the bare minimum to count as an upgrade. We certainly wouldn't recommend this chip as an upgrade.

Encoding and Compression

Our threaded compression and decompression metrics work directly from system memory, removing storage throughput from the equation.

Like its predecessor, the Core i5-9400F falls to the bottom of our chart. This is due to a combination of relatively tame frequencies and six physical cores. In comparison, the Ryzen 5 2600X offers a tremendous amount of performance at its price point. 

y-cruncher, a single- and multi-threaded program that computes pi, is a great benchmark for measuring the effect of AVX instructions. As per usual, Intel's architectures chew through these taxing workloads with ease. The Core i5 models even beat AMD's 8C/16T Ryzen 7 2700 in a testament to the effectiveness of Intel's AVX implementation. 

The Core i5-9400F beats AMD's Ryzen 5 processors during the HandBrake x265 test, which is heavily optimized for AVX instructions. The x264 benchmark, which has a lighter distribution of AVX instructions, finds the Ryzen 5 2600X better able to leverage the advantage of its extra threads (not to mention its overclocking headroom). 

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Conclusion

Intel’s Core i5-9400 processors represent another iterative update to the Skylake architecture, yielding minor performance improvements in certain workloads. But the company's tendency to over-segment its product families, resulting in the removal of Hyper-Threading from Core i5s and a lack of overclocking, diminishes its position against a lot of AMD's Ryzen CPUs. There is now a vulnerable spot in the middle of Intel's stack that AMD will almost certainly attempt to exploit with its Ryzen 3000 series.

At least Intel has a somewhat budget-oriented offering in the form of its F-series processors, which lack integrated graphics. Although the F-series chips officially sport the same recommended prices as Intel's fully-functional models, they're a little cheaper in practice. Saving $20 on the -9400F is a big deal when it means fending off AMD’s Ryzen 5 family armed with more threads, unlocked multipliers, and beefy stock coolers.

In the chart below, we plot gaming performance with both average frame rates and a geometric mean of the 99^th percentile frame times (a good indicator of smoothness), and also plot performance vs. price in a range of productivity applications. It's worth noting that AMD's line-up is heavily discounted, while Intel's Core i5-9400F sells at a significantly lower price than the company's recommendation. As such, we’re departing from our standard practice of using official price lists. Instead, we’re using average pricing found online (temporary sales excluded). Volatility applies.

The Core i5-9400F’s 2.5%-higher clock rate offers an incredibly mundane advance over the previous-gen Core i5-8400 in games, with differences across our test suite amounting to roughly 1 FPS in both average frame rates and 99^th percentile measurements. That certainly isn’t enough to warrant a generational upgrade.

Intel's real competition comes from the Ryzen 5 2600X. AMD’s 6C/12T processor retails for ~$5 more than the -9400F, but trails by 4.2 FPS (4.8%) on average. The 2600X’s unlocked multiplier is a big advantage though, and its bundled thermal solution is robust enough for overclocking. After tuning, the Ryzen overtakes Intel's Core i5-9400F, if only slightly.

Our application testing revealed a similar trend, with the -9400F serving up small boosts compared to the -8400, yet leaving room for AMD's Ryzen 5 2600X to shine even brighter. Not surprisingly, 12 threads help chew through rendering, compression, decompression, and encoding workloads. Strong threading performance also bodes well for simultaneous gaming/streaming performance.

You can drop the AMD processors into budget-minded B-series motherboards with memory overclocking support. Conversely, you have to buy a Z-series board from Intel to enable similar functionality. Given the pricing of Z-series motherboards, they simply don't make much sense alongside multiple-locked mainstream CPUs. Forward compatibility, on the other hand, is something worth thinking about, and AMD’s pledge to support Socket AM4 socket with its new Ryzen 3000 processors looms large. Picking up a Ryzen model today leaves an upgrade path open, while Intel will almost certainly move on to a new interface next generation. 

Aside from the -9400F’s lack of integrated graphics (which the Ryzen 5 2600X doesn’t have either), Intel's newest Core i5 still offers leading gaming performance in its price range. A $20 savings is a nice addition that helps Intel stay competitive with AMD. In spite of the -9400F’s discount, though, the Ryzen 5 2600X still gives you the best blend of pricing and performance for general productivity applications. It's quite adept at gaming workloads too, making it an excellent all-rounder. Plus, AMD’s new chips are on the horizon.

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The Core i5 Doldrums

It used to be that Core i5 processors represented the best choice for mainstream users looking for value-oriented pricing, high performance, and modest power consumption. But now, fast Ryzen 5 CPUs often prove superior. Intel did increase the core count of its Coffee Lake-based Core i5s by 50 percent to grapple with AMD's first-gen Ryzen 5 chips. However, the latest round of Ryzen 5 models is even faster, particularly in threaded workloads, as you can see in our CPU Benchmark Hierarchy.

Intel's ninth-gen Core i7 and Core i9 processors come with more cores, too. Unfortunately, the Core i5-9600K we're reviewing today does not. It includes the same six cores as its predecessor, along with a price tag that lands between Ryzen 5 2600X and Ryzen 7 2700. Worse, both competing CPUs are bundled with coolers, while Intel makes you buy your own.

The story isn't all bad for Intel. It did switch to a solder-based thermal interface material between its die and heat spreader, enabling higher multi-core Turbo Boost frequencies. But those incremental improvements are hardly earth-shattering.

Choosing between a Core i5-9600K and Ryzen presents the same conundrum we've faced in the past: it depends on the type of software you run most frequently. If you're a gamer who doesn't really venture beyond 1920x1080, Intel's Core i5-9600K is the chip for you. But if a majority of your workloads are threaded in nature, including content creation and productivity, a powerful Ryzen gets you more performance at a competitive price.

AMD has also launched its Ryzen 3000-series processors. The updated Ryzen line-up employs a smaller 7nm process that should confer power and price benefits. It'll also wield the new Zen 2 microarchitecture, which is expected to boost performance while Intel remains mired in a derivative of the seven-year-old Skylake design. These chips have now taken our Best CPUs list by storm, so be sure to head there for a list of the latest leading processors.

Intel Core i5-9600K

The ~$263 Core i5-9600K lands between the $299 Ryzen 7 2700 and $225 Ryzen 5 2600X. Inexplicably, Intel raised the -9600K's price by $5 compared to its previous-gen Core i5-8600K.

Intel manufactures the -9600K on its 14nm++ process. In addition to six execution cores (without Hyper-Threading technology), the chip includes an integrated UHD 630 graphics engine, sports unlocked ratio multipliers for easy overclocking, and supports two channels of DDR4-2666 memory. Like the Core i5-8600K that preceded it, the -9600K comes equipped with 9MB of L3 cache and a 95W thermal design power rating.

Intel does dial up the -9600K's Turbo Boost frequencies quite a bit, though. Solder-based thermal interface material improves heat transfer, facilitating higher frequencies whether you're using one core or all six. A base clock rate of 3.7 GHz already represents a 100 MHz improvement over the Core i5-8600K frequency floor, and you get as much as a 300 MHz speed-up when multiple cores are utilized.

We didn't see the need for extreme cooling with Intel's Core i5-9600K, even during our overclocking efforts. The processor held a steady 80°C under five hours of Prime95 optimized for AVX instructions, and ~64°C during a series of non-AVX tasks. Granted, we did use a beefy Corsair H115i cranking away at full speed. But you shouldn't have any trouble cooling the processor at stock settings. Overclocking is fine with a capable closed-loop liquid cooler.

The Core i5-9600K drops into existing 300-series motherboards after a BIOS update. Most, if not all of them, should support Core i5-9600K and its power requirements quite easily, though you might want to steer away from the lowest-cost models if you plan on overclocking.

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Overclocking, Power, and Test Setup

Power Consumption

Measuring the power consumption of modern CPUs can get tricky. But as long as your 12V supply (EPS) readings, motherboard power supply sensor values, and voltage transformer losses plausibly coincide, everything should be fine. Therefore, we're reporting pure package power to avoid possible influences from our motherboard. Results from the PWM controller are very reliable if you take them as averages over a few minutes.

We conducted this round of testing in our U.S. lab, and our results are not directly comparable with numbers from the German lab used in previous reviews.

As expected, the Core i5-9600K exceeded its 95W TDP at stock settings. Remember, though: that figure only applies to the base frequency, and it doesn't reflect power consumption during Turbo Boost activity.

Regardless, the stock -9600K's 119W (under the influence of AVX-optimized code) and 62W (in a non-AVX workload) measurements didn't raise any alarms. We saw a peak of 179W during an AVX-optimized workload with the processor operating at 5 GHz, but that was about what we expected from it. 

Overclocking

We tapped Corsair's H115i v2 to test our Core i5-9600K, which gave us enough headroom to run at 5 GHz with 1.36V Vcore and Auto Load Line Calibration settings. An AVX offset wasn't needed; our sample maintained ~80°C during AVX workloads. The temperature only reached ~64°C during non-AVX workloads.

Although some Core i5-9600K CPUs reportedly run stable at up to 5.2 GHz, we aren't comfortable pushing our chip beyond the "safe" 1.35V limit.

MEG Z390 Godlike

We're using MSI's MEG Z390 Godlike as our test platform for all Intel processors. This pricey board sells for $600, but has the power delivery subsystem to support aggressive overclocking.

MSI's motherboard imposes a 100.8 MHz base clock. Its extra 0.8 MHz serves to push overclocks even harder, though our motherboard review team would probably call it cheating. Consequently, our 5.1 GHz overclock is actually 5.14 GHz. Stock frequencies aren't spared, and there is no way to adjust the BCLK down to remove MSI's self-awarded advantage. Meanwhile, we are waiting on a solution from MSI that should allow us to dial in an exact 100 MHz BCLK.

The MSI MEG Z390 Godlike sits at the top of MSI's motherboard hierarchy. It has a decked-out 18-phase power delivery subsystem that's designed to squeeze every drop of performance out of Intel's new processors. It also comes with a few nifty accessories like an M.2 PCIe riser card and an HDMI streaming card.

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VRMark, 3DMark and AotS: Escalation

VRMark, 3DMark

We aren't big fans of using synthetic benchmarks to measure performance, but 3DMark's DX11 and DX12 CPU tests provide useful insight into the amount of horsepower available to game engines.

The Core i5-9600K suffers due to its six threads. That's half of what the Ryzen 5 2600X offers to our DX11 test. AMD's stock chip beats the overclocked -9600K, then adds insult to injury with a bit of tuning. Notice that the stock -9600K demonstrates a decent boost compared to Intel's -8600K. Then, after overclocking, they end up faring similarly.

In the DX12 test, Intel's Core i5-9600K provides a slight improvement over the -8600K. Ryzen 5 2600X leads the stock -9600K, though overclocking helps extract the advantages of Intel's generally higher per-core performance.

VRMark lets you gauge your system's suitability for use with the HTC Vive or Oculus Rift, even if you don't currently own an HMD. UL defines a passing score as anything above 109 FPS. The -9600K easily beats its Ryzen competition in this lightly-threaded benchmark. 

Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation

Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation is a computationally intensive title that scales well with thread count.

The Core i5-9600K enables a few more frames per second than the -8600K, but surprisingly trails after tuning. A handful of frame time outliers obviously affected the overclocked configuration's performance.

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Civilization VI Graphics and AI, Dawn of War III

Civilization VI AI Test

Civilization VI's AI test measures CPU performance in a turn-based strategy game and tends to favor per-core performance.

The Ryzen processors trail due to their lower per-core performance, which is dependent on instruction-per-clock (IPC) throughput and frequency.

Civilization VI Graphics Test

The Core i5-9600K carves out a respectable lead in this test, which typically favors physical cores over simultaneous multi-threading.

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War III

Although the Warhammer 40,000 benchmark responds well to threading, AMD's Ryzen 5 2600X still falls to the bottom of our chart.

Because we can only include so many CPUs in our current chart template, we're substituting in a Ryzen 7 2700X for the Ryzen 7 2700. The overclocked Ryzen 7 2700X provides roughly the same performance as a tuned 2700, and it's obvious that eight cores and 16 threads pay dividends in games optimized for parallelization.

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GTA: V and Hitman

Grand Theft Auto V

Grand Theft Auto V favors Intel architectures and, more generally, multi-core designs with high clock rates.

The Core i5-9600K establishes a sizable lead over AMD's fastest processors. Strangely, though, an overclocked -9600K trails the tuned -8600K yet again.

Hitman

Intel's Core i5-9600K easily beats the Ryzen chips in spite of their thread count advantage.

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Shadow Of War and Project CARS 2

Middle-earth: Shadow Of War

Shadow of War leans heavier on graphics resources than host processing, so we don't see much difference between the fastest and slowest CPUs. We test at 1920 x 1080, and at a high-enough resolution, most games are indeed limited by your GPU. Plan accordingly if you're running into a bottleneck.

Project CARS 2

Although Project CARS 2 is purportedly optimized for threading, clock rates have the greatest effect on this title's frame rates. The test pool splits into two distinct groups with Intel processors up top and Ryzen CPUs at the bottom.

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Office and Productivity

Adobe Creative Cloud

Even though this suite has a few parallelized workloads, its final score is heavily influenced by the lightly-threaded tasks common in most desktop applications.

The Core i5-9600K clearly excels in lightly-threaded tasks, while AMD's Ryzen carves out wins in the threaded applications. Overclocking does help Intel more, though.

We see slight advances favoring Intel's -9600K over the -8600K, but it's definitely not worth upgrading from the latter to the former.

Web Browser

The Krakken suite evaluates JavaScript performance using audio, imaging, and cryptography workloads. Like most browser-based benchmarks, single-threaded performance reigns supreme.

The stock Core i5-9600K leverages its relatively high clock rates to outperform the Ryzen processors.

Productivity

The application start-up metric measures load time snappiness in word processors, GIMP, and Web browsers under warm- and cold-start conditions. Other platform-level considerations affect this test as well, including the storage subsystem. Single-core performance largely determines responsiveness, so Intel's processors form a predictable hierarchy based on their frequencies.

Our video conferencing suite measures performance in single- and multi-user applications that utilize the Windows Media Foundation for playback and encoding. It also performs facial detection to model real-world usage. This workload responds well to available resources, so AMD's Ryzen family fares well. For example, the Ryzen 5 2600X takes a commanding lead over the Core i5-9600K. Even a Ryzen 7 2700 and its relatively low base clock rate ekes past the overclocked -9600K.

The photo editing benchmark measures performance with Futuremark's binaries using the ImageMagick library. Common photo processing workloads also tend to be parallelized, giving the Ryzen 7 2700 and Ryzen 5 2600X an easy advantage over Intel's Core i5-9600K. Also bear in mind that an overclocked Ryzen 7 2700 and 2700X offer similar performance.

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Rendering, Encoding and Compression

Rendering

AMD's Ryzen 7 2700 shows the value of eight cores armed with simultaneous multi-threading technology through our parallelized rendering workloads.

The Core i5-9600K trails its comparably-priced competition from AMD, and it only offers a small step forward versus the previous-gen Core i5-8600K.

Single-threaded workloads, regardless of software type, are still dominated by Intel's capable architectures.

Encoding & Compression

Our threaded compression and decompression metrics work directly from system memory, removing storage throughput from the equation. The Ryzen 7 2700 and Ryzen 5 2600X are competitive in the compression test, but really stretch their legs during our decompression workload.

y-cruncher, a single- and multi-threaded program that computes pi, is a great benchmark for measuring the effect of AVX instructions. Intel processors have no trouble establishing a lead in this kind of test.

The Core i5-9600K beats AMD's Ryzen 7 2700 and Ryzen 5 2600X in our HandBrake x265 metric, which is heavily optimized for AVX instructions. That changes during the H.264 benchmark, which sees the Core i5-9600K trail a stock Ryzen 5 2600X. Intel needs a 5 GHz overclock to overtake the stock Ryzen 7 2700.

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Conclusion

Intel’s ninth-gen Core i5-9600K is so similar to the eighth-gen Core i5-8600K that it does little to change the family’s competitive position against AMD's Ryzen line-up. Similar to the original Coffee Lake model, Core i5-9600K gives you six physical cores without Hyper-Threading technology, plus 9MB of L3 cache in a similar 95W package. The company does throw in slightly faster base and multi-core Turbo Boost frequencies, enabled through the use of solder-based thermal interface material to help with heat.

In the chart below, we plot gaming performance using average frame rates and a geometric mean of the 99^th percentile frame times (a good indicator of smoothness), which we then convert into a frame-per-second measurement. Bear in mind that we tested with a Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 at 1920 x 1080 to alleviate graphics-imposed bottlenecks. Differences between our test subjects shrink at higher resolutions.

The Core i5-9600K is the fastest gaming chip in its price range. But the performance advantage you get over an overclocked Ryzen 7 2700 or Ryzen 5 2600X might not justify spending extra money or sacrificing performance in other tasks. We know from experience that Intel's Core processors dominate when it comes to Web browsing, gaming, and office apps. But the Core i5-9600K isn't as competitive in heavily-threaded benchmarks like ones that involve rendering.

AMD's $299 Ryzen 7 2700 comes with a bundled cooler. That gives it a leg up on the ~$270 Core i5-9600K, which doesn't include a thermal solution. In both cases, you'll want something beefy sitting on top of the heat spreader for a shot at an aggressive overclock. You also get eight cores and 16 threads from the Ryzen. But it really needs tuning in order to keep up. Taking a small step down, the $225 Ryzen 5 2600X costs less than the Core i5-9600K and, again, comes with a heat sink/fan. However, you lose some performance in lightly-threaded tasks in exchange for a lower price tag.

Intel's ninth-gen Core CPUs add the benefit of solder-based thermal interface material. Aside from enabling higher multi-core Turbo Boost bins, the improved heat transfer didn't seem to do much for our tuning efforts. Maybe our sample is simply sub-par. But we think it's more plausible that Intel already squeezed most of the headroom out of this chip and its 14nm process. Fortunately, even a modest air cooler is fine for stock operation. The Core i5-9600K's relatively tame power draw is a good fit for mainstream motherboards. Just remember that you need a Z-series platform in order to overclock.

Choosing between a Core i5-9600K and Ryzen presents the same conundrum we've faced in the past: it depends on the type of software you run most frequently. If you're a gamer who doesn't really venture beyond 1920x1080, Intel's Core i5-9600K is the chip for you. But if a majority of your workloads are threaded in nature, including content creation and productivity, a powerful Ryzen gets you more performance at a competitive price.

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Summer temperatures are sizzling, and so are the deals on AMD's second-generation Ryzen 5 processor. Today, Newegg has the AMD Ryzen 5 2600X desktop processor for an all time low of $144.99 using the code EMCTCVW22 at checkout. Newegg also throws in a three-month Xbox Game Pass for free with the purchase. That’s $114.56 off the $259.55 MSRP, although the CPU is currently on sale at Amazon for $149.99.

• Get the AMD Ryzen 5 2600X for $144.99.

The Ryzen 5 2600X features six cores and 12 threads, a frequency of 4.2 GHz and 19MB of combined cache. You also won't have to shop for a CPU cooler, as the chip comes with the Wraith Spire Cooler. 

Is This CPU Deal For You? 

In our Ryzen 5 2600X review, we praised its lower cache and memory latencies and more sophisticated multi-core boosts. In addition, the extra threads were helpful for both gaming and everyday productivity tasks. Be sure to check out the benchmarks for an in-depth look at this processor.

If you're still not sure if this is the processor for you, take a look at our CPU hierarchy to see where this chip ranks. You can also find our top recommendations on our Best Gaming CPUs and Best Productivity CPUs pages and shopping tips and guidelines in our CPU buying guide. 

AMD released the new Ryzen 3000-series processors on Sunday night, but those who don’t need the latest and greatest can now pick up the previous generation Ryzen 5 2600X with Wraith Spire Cooler for $160. With only a week left before Prime Day, Amazon looks to be clearing out its stock of the previous generation processors. This current price is 38% off the $259.55 MSRP and also matches Amazon’s all time low for the Ryzen 5 2600X. 

• Get the AMD Ryzen 5 2600X for $160.

The Ryzen 5 2600X features 6 Cores/12 threads, a frequency of 4.2 and 19MB of combined cache. Its max temperature is 95°C and includes Wraith Spire Cooler. 

We praised the Ryzen 5 2600X for its lower cache and memory latencies,  more sophisticated multi-core boosts, and felt that the extra threads were helpful for both gaming and everyday productivity. 

Ryzen 5 2600 Hits All-Time Low

The Ryzen 5 2600 has hit an all time low of $140 with a Wraith cooler. It's also a 6C/12T processor, but as we said on our review, the extra $20 (even in this sale) can get you the 2600X more overclocking headroom

• Get the AMD Ryzen 5 2600 for $140.

Ryzen 7 2700X Gets Cheaper

AMD's Ryzen 7 2700X with Wraith Prism LED cooler is selling for $254.99 on Amazon, its lowest selling price yet. 

• Get the AMD Ryzen 7 2700X for $254.99

We praised this 8C/16T processor's value, memory and cache performance and power over the 1800X.

Not sure what processor is right for you? Be sure to check out our CPU buying guide and our Best CPU picks for 2019 for insights, reviews and recommendations.  

AMD has launched two limited edition "Ryzen MAX" processor bundles for this holiday season. The California-based chipmaker is offering the bundles with its Ryzen 5 2600X hexa-core processor and Ryzen 7 2700 octa-core processor.

The normal Ryzen 5 2600X comes with the Wraith Spire CPU cooler, while the Ryzen 7 2700 is sold with the Wraith Spire LED CPU cooler. The new Ryzen 5 2600X MAX (YD260XBCAFMAX) and Ryzen 7 2700 MAX (YD2700BBAFMAX) bundles come with the more beefy Wraith Max cooler.

The Wraith Max cooler is rated for up to 200W of heat dissipation, which will allow consumers to take full advantage of AMD's XFR2 (Extended Frequency Range 2) technology and provides more headroom for overclocking. As a result, consumers don't have to shell out extra money to pick up an aftermarket heatsink.

UK computer hardware retailer Scan Computers sells the non-MAX versions of the Ryzen 5 2600X and Ryzen 7 2700 for £199.99 and £270.49, respectively. The MAX versions have been listed for £221.99 and £285.49, which is only a £22 difference in the case of the Ryzen 5 2600X and a mere £15 for the Ryzen 7 2700. The new MAX bundles are a pretty good deal considering that the Wraith Max cooler alone sells for £50.72 at Amazon UK.

AMD tells us that the MAX CPU bundles will show up at Newegg, Amazon, and Microcenter soon. We'll follow up with more information about the pricing as it becomes available.

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Six Cores and 65W for $200

AMD's Ryzen 5 2600 boasts six cores and the ability to execute two threads per core, just like the company's pricier Ryzen 5 2600X. But the 2600 operates at lower base and boost frequencies than the X-class model (after all, it's supposed to be $30 cheaper). Don't let the dialed-back performance bother you too much though; the 2600 does employ higher clock rates than AMD's previous-gen Ryzen 5 1600. Plus, it features a familiar unlocked ratio multiplier for overclocking. Rest assured that the 2600 is faster than anything AMD has ever sold for $200.

It's only a shame that, instead of the 95W cooler AMD bundled with Ryzen 5 1600, the 2600 comes with a 65W Wraith Stealth heat sink/fan combination. Although the attractive thermal solution is fine for stock frequencies, it definitely limits the new chip's overclocking potential. Value-seekers looking to match Ryzen 5 2600X through a bit of tweaking are bound to be disappointed.

To make matters worse for Ryzen 5 2600, the 2600X was selling at a discount when we wrote this, shrinking the gap between the two chips to $20. For that small premium, you get more stock performance from the 2600X and a beefier 95W cooler to match its TDP. If you aren't chasing low power, we think the Ryzen 5 2600X is a worthwhile step up.

Then again, Ryzen 5 2600 remains a compelling option, for anyone building in a compact case where heat is a primary concern. One of the best cpus for desktop applications at press time, It comes packed with all of architectural improvements inherent to AMD's Zen+ design, including higher mutli-core boost frequencies than the previous generation, lower memory latency, and GlobalFoundries' 12nm manufacturing process (read our Ryzen 7 2700X review for additional details).

All 2000-series Ryzen CPUs are compatible with motherboards sporting new X470 or older 300-series chipsets. You can even overclock the new processors on value-oriented B-series platforms. While lower-cost 400-series chipsets aren't available yet, we're counting on them to offer a more affordable option for enthusiasts looking to tune 2000-series Ryzen CPUs.

Ryzen 5 2600 supports up to DDR4-2933 memory. Just be aware that you'll only get those data rates with single-rank modules installed in a maximum of two slots. Even then, it takes a motherboard with six PCB layers to operate at 2933 MT/s stably.

Like all 2000-series models, the Ryzen 5 2600 also comes with StorMI Technology, which is a software-based tiering solution that blends the low price and high capacity of hard drives with the speed of an SSD, 3D XPoint, or even up to 2GB of RAM.

Precision Boost 2 And XFR2

AMD's previous-gen Ryzen processors included Precision Boost functionality that set higher frequencies under lightly-threaded workloads. They also introduced an eXtended Frequency Range (XFR) feature, which allowed higher clock rates when it was determined that your cooling solution had thermal headroom to spare.

The new Precision Boost 2 (PB2) and XFR2 algorithms improve performance in threaded workloads by raising the frequency of any number of cores. AMD doesn't share a list of specific multi-core PB2 and XFR2 bins because the opportunistic algorithms accelerate to different clock rates based on temperature, current, and load. However, we collected our measurements on a motherboard with solid voltage regulation circuitry and a good cooler (two requirements for optimal frequencies).

The Ryzen 5 2600 offers a nice performance boost over AMD's previous-gen models. However, it cannot match Ryzen 5 2600X. Compared to that CPU, the 2600 loses 350 MHz with all of its cores utilized. The difference between both models narrows in tasks that use anywhere from one to four cores.

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Overclocking

So far, all of the Ryzen 2000-series CPUs we've tested offer similar overclocking capabilities, albeit with slightly different voltage requirements. We pushed AMD's Ryzen 5 2600 to 4.2 GHz using 1.4V Vcore, 1.2V SoC, and automatic Loadline Calibration (LLC) settings. The bundled heat sink and fan are capable enough if you're only gunning for a moderate overclock. However, it struggled to maintain 4 GHz at 95°C. If you want to match our best effort, top the 2600 with a capable closed-loop liquid cooler.

Like the other Ryzen 2000-series CPUs we've reviewed, we overclocked this platform's memory (DDR4-3466 at 14-14-14-34 timings) with minimal effort.

Precision Boost Overdrive

AMD isn't giving us much detail about its Precision Boost Overdrive feature, though we know it increases maximum boost voltage and boost duration. Nevertheless, we know that Precision Boost Overdrive is an AMD-sanctioned feature. Because this is a standard capability for Ryzen 2000-series processors, we leave it enabled. Conversely, we disable the Multi-Core Enhancement BIOS option found in many Intel-based motherboards because it overclocks beyond the company's specifications.

MSI X470 Gaming M7 AC

Our MSI X470 Gaming M7 AC has a PCI Express 3.0 slot with a x16 link, a slot with a x8 connection, and another PCI Express 2.0 slot with a four-lane link for graphics cards. Its four RAM slots support DDR4-2933 and scale quite a bit higher through overclocking.

The motherboard also provides two M.2 slots with PCIe connectivity. The I/O panel has a USB 3.1 Type C connector. The USB 3.1 and USB 3.1 Gen 2 ports support fast charging for smartphones and tablets. If RGB is your thing, MSI has you covered. The integrated RGB Mystic lighting allows customizable effects with several software-controlled zones.

Comparison Products

Test Systems

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VRMark & 3DMark

While synthetic benchmarks scale well with increased host computing resources, those gains don't always translate to real-world gaming performance. Rather, these benchmarks give us a solid measure of theoretical horsepower available to game engines.

UL's VRMark gauges the system's ability to power leading VR HMDs, and much like many modern game titles, VR tends to favor per-core performance, so frequency and instructions per clock throughput reign supreme.

A stock Ryzen 5 2600 represents a solid improvement over the previous-gen Ryzen 5 1600. Moreover, tuning pushed it in front of Intel's Core i5-8400. 

We didn't expect record-breaking performance in the DX12 and DX11 CPU tests due to Ryzen 5 1600's six cores. But its ability to execute 12 threads concurrently proves advantageous against Intel's hexa-core Core i5 processors in certain workloads. While Core i7-8700K with Hyper-Threading beat the 2600, Ryzen 5's extra threads cut through those benchmarks better than the comparably-priced Core i5-8400.

Overclocking helped as well, placing the Ryzen 5 2600 on more competitive footing in both CPU tests.

Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation

Ryzen 5 2600 outperformed the Core i5-8600K and -8400 at stock settings. However, all three CPUs delivered similar 99th percentile frame rates, suggesting similar smoothness. Moreover, the Ryzen 5 2600 demonstrated almost identical performance to Ryzen 5 2600X once we took the time to tune it.

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Civilization VI AI Test

Civilization's AI test measures performance in a turn-based strategy game and tends to favor per-core performance.

A recent game update added several new features to Civilization VI, but it also invalidated our previous benchmark results. Average turn times increased marginally, and we noticed a few changes to overall hierarchy. This test continues to favor Intel's architectures.

Considering the relatively narrow differences between processors, Ryzen 5 1600 lagged the rest of the field by a significant margin. But Ryzen 5 2600 helped rectify the situation at stock settings, going so far as to beat AMD's Ryzen 5 1600X.

Civilization VI Graphics Test

Ryzen 5 2600 averaged almost 7 FPS higher than the previous-gen 1600 thanks to optimized multi-core boost frequencies and lower memory latency. Again, our overclocked Ryzen 5 2600 even beat the tuned 2600X. Meanwhile, Core i5-8400 reminded us that it's plenty fast, despite a locked ratio multiplier preventing meaningful overclocking.

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War III

The overclocked Ryzen 5 2600 only trailed Core i7-8700K by 2 FPS, which is impressive given the -8700K's $160-higher price tag. Meanwhile, a stock Ryzen 5 2600 beat the Ryzen 5 1600 by an average of 10.4 FPS, quantifying AMD's generational improvements.

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Far Cry Primal

Far Cry Primal showed Intel's CPU line-up leading again. Interestingly, Ryzen 5 and Core i5 beat Ryzen 7 and Core i7, telling us that this title doesn't benefit from simultaneous multi-threading, but rather is penalized by the technology.

Grand Theft Auto V

Grand Theft Auto V favors Intel architectures and, more generally, multi-core designs with high clock rates.

After overclocking, the Ryzen 5 2600 beat Intel's Core i5-8400. At stock settings, though, a lower base frequency caused the chip to trail many of our other test platforms.

Hitman

A few months ago, Hitman received an update that imposed a 90 FPS performance ceiling, limiting its utility as a benchmark. Fortunately for us, IO Interactive recently did away with that cap. So, we retested all of the CPUs in our pool.

The benchmark results clearly split between Intel Core (up top) and AMD Ryzen (down below) CPUs. Nevertheless, an overclocked Ryzen 5 2600 achieved similar performance as the tuned 2600X. 

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Middle-earth: Shadow Of War

Middle-earth: Shadow of War doesn't scale as well as some of our other benchmarks, and it certainly isn't as sensitive to IPC throughput and clock rate as Shadow of Mordor. This serves as a reminder that most games respond better to faster graphics cards. CPUs don't play as large of a role in determining game performance.

As we can see, though, slower processors can bottleneck graphics cards if the combination isn't balanced well. Ryzen 5 1600 found a spot at the bottom of our results, while AMD's newer Ryzen 5 2600 demonstrated a nice little step up in the benchmark results.

Project CARS 2

Ryzen 5 2600 offers impressive performance, given its $200 price point. But it couldn't quite catch Intel's Core i5-8400 in Project CARS 2, even after overclocking.

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Adobe Creative Cloud

Ryzen 5 2600 delivered an incredible performance boost compared to its predecessor in our Adobe Creative Cloud suite. With that said, Intel's CPUs still lead through most of these lightly-threaded applications. We also saw larger performance differences between the stock and overclocked Ryzen 5 2600 compared to the 2600X, mostly due to the 2600's lower stock frequencies and similar overclocking limit shared between most Ryzen 2000-series models.

In the end, a stock Ryzen 5 2600 beat Intel's Core i5-8400 and AMD's Ryzen 7 2700 in the overall score. That's impressive for such a value-oriented chip.

Web Browser

The Meltdown and Spectre patches imposed performance penalties on Intel's CPUs in our web browser tests. However, they still lead through these lightly-threaded tests.

AMD's Ryzen 5 2600 easily beat the stock Ryzen 5 1600, which took a last-place finish among the models we benchmarked. As expected, overclocking helped put Ryzen 5 2600 on par with the more expensive Ryzen 5 2600X.

Productivity

The application start-up metric measures load time snappiness in word processors, GIMP, and Web browsers under warm- and cold-start conditions. Other platform-level considerations affect this test as well, including the storage subsystem. Intel's snappy performance in these lightly-threaded apps put its Core CPUs ahead of the competing Ryzen chips.

Our video conferencing suite measures performance in single- and multi-user applications that utilize the Windows Media Foundation for playback and encoding. It also performs facial detection to model real-world usage. Cores and threads benefit this workload greatly, so Ryzen 5 2600's six cores naturally fared well.

The photo editing benchmark measures performance with Futuremark's binaries using the ImageMagick library. Common photo processing workloads also tend to be parallelized, so Ryzen 5 easily beat the Core i5 models.

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Rendering

AMD's Ryzen 5 2600 at stock settings outperformed the Ryzen 5 1600, but generally lagged the rest of the field in rendering workloads emphasizing single-core performance.

Switching to heavily-threaded benchmarks helped Ryzen 5 2600 redeem itself, particularly after we overclocked it. Again, the Ryzen 5 2600X operates at higher clock rates out of the box, so it didn't pick up as much performance after tuning.

Encoding & Compression

LAME is a quintessential single-threaded workload that typically illustrates Intel's per-clock advantage. The overclocked Ryzen 5 2600 was plenty competitive in this workload though, beating Intel's stock Core i7-8700K.

Our threaded compression and decompression tests work directly from system memory, removing storage throughput from the equation. Ryzen 5 2600 landed where we expected it to; the CPU's advances over Ryzen 5 1600 are largely related to improved memory performance.

The x264 HandBrake tests went Intel's way, particularly after we overclocked the Core CPUs. However, the company's multiplier-locked Core i5-8400 couldn't muster enough performance to beat a stock Ryzen 5 2600. Intel's propensity for over-segmenting its portfolio once again proves costly against AMD's more enthusiast-friendly alternatives. Incidentally, Core i5-8400 was much more competitive in the x265 test, which makes greater use of AVX instructions that play well to Intel's architecture.

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Final Analysis

Much like AMD's attractive Ryzen 5 2600X, the Ryzen 5 2600 proves to be a well-rounded processor that sports many of the same selling points. It's a little bit slower right out of the box, but the 2600 also costs less and boasts a 30W-lower TDP. Similar to the Ryzen 7 2700X versus Ryzen 7 2700 story, you trade a bit of speed for a slightly lower price and a little less heat. They're different tools optimized for different applications. It just so happens that most enthusiasts favor higher benchmark results over a $20 savings or a bit less power consumption.

In that vein, the charts below plot performance using average frame rates and a geometric mean of the 99^th percentile frame times, which we then convert into a FPS measurement. We also include price-to-performance charts that get split up to include CPUs-only and extra platform costs. For the models that don't come with a bundled cooler, we add an extra $25 for a basic heat sink. We also add $20 if overclocking requires a more expensive motherboard (as is the case for Z370).

As our benchmark results suggested, Ryzen 5 2600's overclocked gaming performance is very competitive with a tuned Ryzen 5 2600X, both complemented by GeForce GTX 1080. The 2600 also fares well against Intel's Core i5-8600K, which doesn't come with a thermal solution, requires a Z-series motherboard for overclocking, and still sells for almost $70 more than the AMD chip. If you plan on overclocking, the Core i5-8600K does provide higher frame rates than any other Ryzen 5/Core i5 CPUs. But as you push higher resolutions and more demanding detail settings, the differences between processors shrink.

Intel's Core i5-8400, the least-expensive model we tested, is an impressive alternative for gaming. Like the Ryzen 5 2600, it comes with a bundled cooler and drops into value-oriented motherboards. As a result, it's priced somewhat similarly. The Core i5-8400 is our favorite choice for gamers on a budget. Although AMD's Ryzen 5 2600 can be faster after overclocking, you'll have to buy a bigger thermal solution to get there.

While we favor the Core i5-8400 for entertainment, AMD's Ryzen 5 2600 earns its praise in our application suite. Intel does maintain a performance advantage in lightly-threaded tasks. But the Ryzen chip is still competitive across those workloads. Moreover, Ryzen 5 2600's ability to execute 12 threads concurrently helps propel it to victory in more heavily-threaded benchmarks. If you do a lot of video and image processing, rendering, or game streaming, Ryzen 5 2600 should be at the top of your list in this price range.

With its Ryzen 2000-series, AMD eliminated much of our justification for stepping down to non-X models. The Ryzen 5 2600 we tested today isn't much cheaper, and it doesn't have a monopoly on bundled heat sink/fan combos. Some enthusiasts will favor the lower-end chip's 65W TDP. However, we'd rather spend an extra $20 on a Ryzen 5 2600X, deal with the 95W TDP, and enjoy its additional performance. After all, overclocking the 2600 to compensate for its lower base and boost frequencies requires splurging on a bigger thermal solution. Otherwise, you'll find yourself stuck around 4 GHz.

On the bright side, Ryzen 5 2600 is a big step up compared to the previous-generation Ryzen 5 1600. Its 6C/12T configuration at 65W is crazy-impressive for compact/low-power workstations, and we have to love all of the avaialable compute performance at a $200 price point.

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Ryzen To The Mainstream

AMD's 2000-series Ryzen CPUs are already available, challenging the Coffee Lake-based Core line-up from Intel. As we found in our Ryzen 7 2700X review, a host of improvements made possible by 12nm manufacturing, such as higher frequencies and Precision Boost 2, add more performance in threaded apps. Meanwhile, lower system memory and cache latencies augment AMD's showing in lightly-threaded apps like games. Unlocked multipliers, backward compatibility with older Socket AM4 motherboards, a beefy bundled cooler, and a $330 price tag combine to leave us impressed. The Ryzen 7 2700X offers a great alternative to Intel's Core i7-8700K, which costs more, doesn't come with a thermal solution, and drops into more expensive motherboards (at least if you want to overclock).

Similarly, Ryzen 5 2600X targets Intel's enthusiast-oriented Core i5-8600K, leveraging similar advancements and a more attractive $230 price tag. As we'll see, it's even faster than the first-gen flagship Ryzen 7 1800X in many workloads.

But First, Spectre Variant 2

Unfortunately, due to a lack of communication from AMD, we weren't told that the company had rolled its Spectre Variant 2 patch into shipping X470 platforms. As a result, our Ryzen 7 2700X launch day coverage didn't include Intel CPUs tested with their corresponding patches. Today's review does, however, feature results generated on Intel-based systems with the latest Spectre microcode updates.

Ryzen 5 2600X

Ryzen 2000-series processors, otherwise known by their Pinnacle Ridge code name, are based on the same basic Zen core design as previous-gen models (though AMD now uses Zen+ nomenclature to reference the architecture's various improvements). The CPUs still utilize a dual-CCX configuration, tied together with Infinity Fabric, yielding eight physical cores. The flagship Ryzen 7 2700X comes with all eight of its cores active. For Ryzen 5 2600X, AMD turns two off, creating a six-core, 12-thread configuration with an unlocked ratio multiplier.

As mentioned, Ryzen 5 2600X sells for $230, replacing the $220 Ryzen 5 1600X. It slots into the gap between Core i5-8600K and the Core i5-8400, forcing the chip to contend with Intel's recently-announced Core i5-8600. While we don't have that model in our lab yet, we do have the two nearest Coffee Lake-based competitors in today's benchmark charts.

What do you get, performance-wise, for the extra $10? Ryzen 5 2600X sports the same 3.6 GHz base clock rate and a slightly higher 4.2 GHz Precision Boost 2 frequency (+200 MHz) than 1600X. That might seem minor, but as our benchmarks show, the gains are quite pronounced in threaded workloads. Like its predecessor, the 2600X also features 16MB of L3 cache and a 95W TDP.

Although AMD didn't include thermal solutions with its original Ryzen X-series processors, the company does bundle coolers with its pricier models now. On one hand, it's nice that the 95W Wraith Spire cooler neatly matches the 2600X's thermal design power. On the other, we're not expecting much overclocking headroom from the combination.

Ryzen 5 2600X can drop into either new X470 or older 300-series motherboards. As usual, AMD allows you to overclock on value-minded B-series boards, too. And even though 400-series B-models aren't available yet, they'll undoubtedly offer a lower-priced alternative for overclocking.

Officially, the Ryzen 5 2600X supports up to DDR4-2933 memory, just like Ryzen 7 2700X. This trumps Coffee Lake's Intel-specified DDR4-2666 ceiling (with a few caveats). AMD also sticks with Indium solder between Ryzen 5's die and heat spreader, improving thermal transfer performance. And as we mentioned in our Ryzen 7 2700X review, these new CPUs also include StorMI Technology, which is a software-based tiering solution that blends the low price and high capacity of a hard drive with the speed of an SSD, 3D XPoint (including Intel's Optane parts), or even up to 2GB of RAM.

Precision Boost 2 and XFR2

In a nutshell, AMD is leveraging GlobalFoundries' 12nm process to enhance its design, rather than shrink it. The enhancements offer higher performance or lower power consumption at any given frequency, giving AMD headroom for other improvements.

The company's previous-gen Ryzen processors have Precision Boost, which is similar to Intel's Turbo Boost technology, and eXtended Frequency Range (XFR), capable of delivering a frequency uplift when your cooling solution has thermal headroom to spare.

The new Precision Boost 2 (PB2) and XFR2 algorithms improve performance in threaded workloads by raising the frequency of any number of cores. AMD doesn't share a list of specific multi-core Precision Boost 2 and XFR2 bins because the opportunistic algorithms accelerate to different clock rates based on temperature, current, and load.

AMD gave us a graph of the PB2 frequencies for Ryzen 7 2700X, but we followed up with our own measurements to compare the current and previous-gen Ryzen 5 models. As you can see, Ryzen 5 2600X offers more robust multi-core frequencies than its predecessor, and our Ryzen 7 2700X measurements largely mirror AMD's. We tested both CPUs with AMD's Precision Boost Overdrive active. The Ryzen 7 2700X does have a higher TDP rating that some older motherboards may struggle with, so PB2 performance will vary based upon the power delivery subsystem.

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Patching Up, Overclocking & Test Setup

Patching Up

The Spectre and Meltdown security vulnerabilities impose overhead that affect performance, but it's the Spectre Variant 2 patches that incur the largest penalties. We've been waiting for AMD and Intel to release their respective updates, leveling the playing field. AMD gave no indication in its press material that the X470 motherboards used in our Ryzen 7 2700X review already had Spectre 2 mitigations built-in. But hours before launch, we learned that the patches were present. At that point, we didn't have enough time to test with Intel's corresponding microcode.

In our 2700X review, the test rigs included Meltdown And Spectre Variant 1 mitigations. Spectre Variant 2 requires both motherboard firmware/microcode and operating system patches, though. We had already installed the operating system updates for Variant 2 on our Intel-based platforms, so we only lacked the fourth and final piece: new microcode.

There are two options for applying this microcode. One is a Windows KB that allows the operating system to load microcode during boot-up. The other is a motherboard firmware update. We used the Windows KB to install patches on our Z270-based platform, providing a true measure of pre- and post-patch performance.

Faster processors suffer less from the Spectre Variant 2 updates. This creates a conundrum for us and our Z370-based platform. In previous reviews, we noticed that Intel's Core i7-8700 was consistently faster than the more expensive Core i7-8700K on MSI and Gigabyte motherboards. We disclosed this during our launch coverage. The issue becomes relevant today because MSI's latest firmware update, which also includes the Spectre Variant 2 microcode, fixes most of the performance disparities we observed. As we suspected, the problem seems attributable to the Core i7-8700K. It's now faster in several games, performing the way we originally expected. So, on this motherboard, we're using new firmware instead of the Windows-based patch since it fixes our Core i7-8700K issues. That means our Coffee Lake-based CPUs don't correctly reflect pre- and post-patch performance. Instead, allow those results to serve as a general indication of competitive deltas.

In any case, with the exception of our AMD X370-based motherboards, all of the platforms in today's review are fully patched. The company hasn't given us a time frame for securing its previous-gen chipsets, but you can bet that we'll follow up with benchmark results once a Spectre Variant 2 patch becomes available.

Overclocking

We ran our gaming and application tests in the U.S. lab, while power/thermal measurements were collected in our German lab.

In the U.S. lab, we paired our Ryzen 5 2600X with Corsair's H115i cooler for overclocking. This allowed us to maintain a 4.2 GHz all-core frequency at 1.3875V Vcore, 1.2V SoC voltage, and default Load Line Calibration settings. These are the same settings used on the Ryzen 7 2700X, albeit with a slight 0.009V Vcore boost to ensure stability.

First-gen Ryzen processors don't have much memory overclocking headroom, so we're still testing tuned X370 platforms at DDR4-3200. The X470 chipset is remarkably stable at higher data rates with both 2000-series Ryzen CPUs installed. So, we settled on DDR4-3466 with 14-14-14-34 timings. We also ran our overclocked Intel processors at DDR4-3466.

Precision Boost Overdrive

AMD hasn't shared much information on this pending feature, which increases the maximum boost voltage and boost duration. We attempted to disable Precision Boost Overdrive as we tested for our Ryzen 7 2700X review, but didn't observe a performance difference one way or the other. Now we know the feature wasn't toggling correctly due to an issue with the board. Instead, it remained enabled throughout our benchmarking.

Precision Boost Overdrive is an AMD-sanctioned feature, unlike the multi-core enhancements you often find in Intel-based motherboards. Because this is a standard capability for Ryzen 2000-series processors, we leave it enabled.

MSI X470 Gaming M7 AC

Our MSI X470 Gaming M7 AC has a PCI Express 3.0 slot with a x16 link, a slot with a x8 connection, and another PCI Express 2.0 slot with a four-lane link for graphics cards. Its four RAM slots support DDR4-2933 and can scale up quite a bit higher through overclocking.

The motherboard also provides two M.2 slots with PCIe connectivity. The I/O panel has a USB 3.1 Type C connector. The USB 3.1 and USB 3.1 Gen 2 support fast charging for smartphones and tablets. If RGB is your thing, MSI has you covered. The integrated RGB Mystic lighting allows customizable effects with several software-controlled zones.

Comparison Products

Test Systems

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VRMark, 3DMark & AotS: Escalation

VRMark & 3DMark

These are busy charts with the addition of our retested Intel platforms, including the Spectre Variant 2 microcode patches. At stock settings, the Ryzen 5 2600X outperforms its overclocked predecessor across the board, which is especially meaningful in the lightly-threaded VRMark workload. Overclocking yields significant gains in synthetic gaming benchmarks, which don't necessarily translate to the rest of our benchmark suite.

Several of the patched Intel processors do lose performance compared to before the updates. This is particularly apparent in VRMark on Intel's Core i7-8700K, while other tests reflect minimal regression. Meanwhile, the Core i5-8400 and -8600K give us mixed results. Core i7-7700K is a more representative measure of pre- and post-patch performance, and it takes a healthy dive in VRMark as well (verified several times by removing and reinstalling the OS-based Spectre patch).

Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation

Ryzen 5 2600X is clearly superior to its predecessor in threaded titles. After all, the stock 2600X beats an overclocked 1600X. Those gains propel the Ryzen 5 up the chart, where it matches a stock Core i7-8700K.

Flip over to the album's next slide, which includes Intel CPUs before and after we patched their platforms. The Core i7-7700K loses a few frames per second in our retest, falling outside of this consistent benchmark's margin of error. Aside from the Core i5-8400's gains, which remind us that firmware updates sometimes fine-tune performance, too, most of the Intel CPUs land within the run-to-run variance we expect to see. 

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Civilization VI Graphics & AI, Dawn of War III

Civilization VI AI Test

The Ryzen 5 2600X represents a nice step forward for AMD, particularly since Intel's processors typically lead in this test due to their per-core performance advantage.

A few of the processors exhibit slight regressions post-patch, but nothing outside of the variances we'd expect.  

Civilization VI Graphics Test

An overclocked Ryzen 5 2600X beats the stock Ryzen 7 2700X, which should excite value-seekers.

Then again, Intel's Core i5-8400 slips past the tuned Ryzen 5 in this test, yielding better performance at a lower price (and despite a locked ratio multiplier).

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War III

Dawn of War finds the tuned Coffee Lake-based CPUs at the top of our chart. Even the fastest Ryzen (overclocked, no less) lands behind a stock Core i7-7700K.

Interestingly, the Coffee Lake CPUs enjoy slight gains after we patch them, while Core i7-7700K doesn't change much.  

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Far Cry Primal, GTA: V & Hitman

Far Cry Primal

Ryzen 5 2600X nearly matches Intel's Core i7-8700K at stock clock rates. But tuning propels the chip ahead of an overclocked Ryzen 7 2700X and into contention with Core i5-8600K at 4.9 GHz. Clearly, this title responds well to physical core count, favoring platforms without SMT enabled.

Grand Theft Auto V

It's no surprise to see Intel's processors dominate our Grand Theft Auto V charts. An overclocked Ryzen 5 2600X essentially ties the stock Core i7-7700K, while Core i5-8400 stands out again for its higher performance and lower price point.

The post-patch Core i7-8700K averages 9 FPS-higher in GTA V. This is one of the games where -8700K historically lagged the slower Core i7-8700, so it looks like motherboard firmware fixed a few issues. We also see an improvement from the Core i5-8400.

Hitman

A recent update added a frame rate cap to Hitman, causing most of our configurations to reflect a graphics bottleneck. It's no surprise, then, that an overclocked Ryzen 5 2600X nearly matches the fastest Intel CPUs.

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Shadow Of War & Project CARS 2

Middle-earth: Shadow Of War

Ryzen 5 2600X beats the overclocked Ryzen 7 1800X, and tuning propels it to within 0.5 FPS of the fastest CPU.

Intel's Core i5-8400 is less expensive and tends to outperform the 2600X in many games, but the 2600X does lead in this one. Aside from the Core i5-8400, we observe lower average frame rates from the post-patch Intel processors, though the variances only amount to one or two frames per second.

Project CARS 2

Ryzen 5 2600X delivers a commendable performance in Project CARS 2, but it lags the less expensive Core i5-8400.

Aside from the Core i7-8700K's and i5-8400's performance gains, we don't significant variations related to Spectre mitigations.

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Office & Productivity

Adobe Creative Cloud

The stock Ryzen 5 2600X trails most of AMD's first-gen Ryzen CPUs, notably lagging behind the previous-gen Ryzen 5 1600X. We reran this benchmark several times to verify its results, and the outcome is repeatable. But given the performance observed in other tests, PCMark's Creative Cloud component may be an outlier.

Although we didn't see much performance variation from the patches in our game testing, that changes drastically in our Adobe Creative Cloud suite. Every Intel processor's overall score takes a significant haircut (the Core i7-8700K drops ~9%, while the Core i5-8400 drops ~10%).

Web Browser

The Krakken suite tests JavaScript performance using several workloads, including audio, imaging, and cryptography.

AMD's processors typically lag Intel's in Web browser benchmarks due to their lower per-core performance. The Ryzen 5 2600X is competitive with Intel's Core i5-8400 in this test. But as we noted in our Ryzen 7 2700X review, overclocking actually results in lower scores during lightly-threaded tasks. That's a bit more surprising in this case because, as we pointed out on the first page, Ryzen 5 2600X sustains up to 4.2 GHz on a single core, which is the same frequency as our all-core overclock. XFR2 contributes an extra boost during sporadic workloads though, and that's likely what we're seeing here.

The MotionMark benchmarks, which emphasize graphics performance (rather than JavaScript), are also sensitive to CPU clock rates. Ryzen 5 2600X isn't as competitive compared to the Intel models, reminding us that AMD still lags what it comes to IPC throughput.

Again, we see performance regressions from Intel's processors in these workloads, which we measured with a Spectre-patched version of Firefox.  

Productivity

The application start-up metric measures load time snappiness in word processors, GIMP, and Web browsers under warm- and cold-start conditions. Other platform-level considerations affect this test as well, including the storage subsystem. Initially, we thought that'd be bad news for Intel's CPUs. After all, the security mitigations have an intense impact on I/O operations. Surprisingly, though, we actually recorded higher results from the Intel-based platforms. Meanwhile, the Ryzen 5 2600X beats AMD's first-gen Ryzen CPUs, but trails the Core i5-8400.

Our video conferencing workload measures performance in single- and multi-user applications that utilize the Windows Media Foundation for playback and encoding. It also performs facial detection to model real-world usage. Ryzen processors perform well in this test, joining an overclocked Core i7-8700K at the top of the chart. At stock settings, the Ryzen 5 2600X handily dispatches Intel's Core i5-8400.

The photo editing benchmark measures performance with Futuremark's binaries using the ImageMagick library. Common photo processing workloads also tend to be parallelized, so Ryzen 7 2700X naturally takes a lead. The Ryzen 5 2600X performs well given its price point. And the Intel CPUs all take a hit after we get them patched.

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Rendering, Encoding & Compression

Rendering

Threaded rendering workloads favor Ryzen's SMT-enabled cores. Ryzen 5 2600X slots in right where we'd expect it to land, while Intel's processors suffer slight performance hits after installing the Spectre mitigation patches. 

Encoding & Compression

LAME is the quintessential example of a single-threaded workload, normally favoring Intel's per-core performance advantage. AMD's 2000-series Ryzen CPUs go a long way in closing the gap by offering better per-core performance than their predecessors.

Our threaded compression and decompression tests adsorb data directly from system memory, removing storage from the equation. The Ryzen 5 2600X fares well during the test, easily beating Intel's Core i5-8400 and -8600K. Given Windows' new dual page table addressing structure that prevents Meltdown-based attacks, we expected more performance overhead after the patches. However, the company's latest processors have a PCID (Post-Context Identifiers) feature that accelerates page table translations. As a result, older Core CPUs without the PCID feature are likely affected more than the ones we're testing. 

There's a larger delta between Intel and AMD processors during our HandBrake x265 test compared to the x264 benchmark due to its heavier distribution of AVX instructions. The 2600X slots in where we'd expect given its six cores with SMT technology.

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Final Analysis

AMD’s Ryzen 5 2600X isn’t quite as impressive as the higher-end Ryzen 7 2700X, but it does offer a solid mixture of performance and value that's well-suited to many different workloads. Whereas professionals might be more interested in the 2700X's eight cores, gamers on a budget will want to check out the 2600X. After all, saving money on other system components is critical at a time when you're certain to pay a premium for discrete graphics.

In the chart below, we plot gaming performance with both average frame rates and a geometric mean of the 99^th percentile frame times (a good indicator of smoothness), which we then convert into a frame-per-second measurement. We also have price-to-performance charts that get split up to include CPUs-only and extra platform costs. For the models that don't come with a bundled cooler, we add $25 for a basic heat sink. We also add $20 if overclocking requires a more expensive motherboard (as is the case for Z370). The Intel test results reflect our patched configurations.

Games show the Ryzen 5 2600X offering a universal improvement over AMD's previous-gen Ryzen 5 1600X. Unfortunately, we see limited gains from overclocking, though that's just as well given this family's meager headroom. More important is that Ryzen 5 2600X beats the Ryzen 7 1800X throughout our suite.

Intel's Core i5-8600K is also in the 2600X’s crosshairs; AMD takes aim with a significantly lower price, a bundled thermal solution, and compatibility with less expensive motherboards. If you're not worried about overclocking, though, the Core i5-8400 is an even better buy for gaming. It offers nearly the same performance as the 2600X at a ~$50 discount. The i5-8400 drops into value-oriented B-series motherboards and comes with a stock cooler/fan, too.

Although we're big fans of the Core i5-8400 for entertainment, Ryzen 5 2600X is a smarter all-around value when it has the change to stretch its six cores and 12 threads. The processor distances itself from the i5-8400 in our rendering, encoding, compression, and decompression apps. It even challenges the eight-core Ryzen 7 1700X in several tests, particularly after tuning. That highlights the improvements borne of the Ryzen 2000-series’ enhanced multi-core boost algorithms and lower memory/cache latency.

Like all of AMD’s processors, the Ryzen 5 2600X comes with an unlocked ratio multiplier. AMD is pushing the frequency/voltage curve to its limits, so we didn’t experience massive gains in some mundane workloads. However, we did see more of a benefit with the 2600X in heavily-threaded tasks compared to the Ryzen 7 2700X. That’s largely due to the 2600X’s lower multi-core boost frequencies.

We wish AMD was ready with its B450-series motherboards at launch time. But you can still pair the Ryzen 5 2600X with a capable 300-series model.

The Spectre patches did take some wind out of Intel’s sails in many of our application tests, but the impact varies by application. In most cases, the regressions aren’t severe enough to change our recommendations. Still, it's always disappointing to observe performance stepping backward. Luckily for Intel, gaming wasn't affected much.

Intel beefed up its Coffee Lake-based Core i5s by adding 50% more cores. Up against the Ryzen 5 1600X, we couldn't help but acknowledge Intel's great performance and generally better compatibility with existing games. This time, however, AMD brings the heat in our benchmarks, while most of its optimization-oriented issues are ancient history. If gaming is your only concern, save some cash and pick up a Core i5-8400. But we think you’ll be happier with the Ryzen 5 2600X, which has more resources to handle general desktop workloads with ease.

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Big Box, Little Box

AMD's so-called "2nd Gen Ryzen" CPUs--and some accompanying components--have landed in our labs. We can’t discuss test results quite yet, but we gathered together some photos to tide you over until we can talk testing and the full spate of features. AMD sent us the pair of black and silver boxes you see here, one labeled with an AMD logo, the other with the now-familiar Ryzen branding. Wonder what's inside? The answer is just a click away.

Inside the Silver Ryzen Box

Here we have the six-core/12-thread Ryzen 5 2600X (with a base clock of 3.6GHz, and a maximum stock clock of 4.2GHz), as well as the new top-end mainstream Ryzen chip, the Ryzen 7 2700X. The latter chip ships with the new, RGB-emblazoned Wraith Prism cooler, and is an eight-core/16-thread part with a base clock of 3.7GHz and a top stock clock of 4.3GHz.

Ryzen 7 2700X & Ryzen 2600X, Front & Center

From above, we don't notice anything really new with these chips. They look like previous Ryzens, and they don't feel substantially heavier or lighter. And there are no riddles to removing the outer packaging of cardboard and plastic.

On the Flip Side

The new Ryzens also don't look different from behind. Pins run from one side to the other--be careful not to bend them! And remember that if you plan on dropping one of these new AM4-socket silicon slices into an older AM4 motherboard, you'll first need to update your BIOS to support AMD's new chips.

The Ryzen World Gets More Colorful

Here we have the new Wraith Prism cooler that comes boxed with the Ryzen 7 2700X. AMD has incorporated trendy, Christmas-tree-like RGB lighting here. We suspect that it looks a whole lot better when lit up, but we aren't allowed to show it plugged in yet. Stay tuned!

The Return of Mr. Clamp

It's a pity that AMD's new top-end Wraith Prism cooler incorporates the old fiddly suspension and annoying retaining-clip mounting mechanism. We much prefer the four screws of the Wraith Spire (which now is included with the Ryzen 5 2600X). Sure, you needed to break out a tool to attach that cooler, but installation is easier, and once it's on, it's as stable as a rock.

Not So Cool to Look At, But Probably Cool Enough for a Six-Core CPU

As noted on the previous slide, the Ryzen 5 2600X comes with a more basic Wraith Spire cooler in the box. No RGB lights here, but the simple screw connection promises a problem-free (and safer-for-your-fingers) installation. Again, the Wraith Spire lacks blinking lights, but we don't mind stepping over to the dark side...of cooling.

Copper on the Bottom

While it isn't flashy, the Wraith Spire that ships with the Ryzen 5 2600X has many inner strengths. Copper instead of aluminum on the CPU makes for better cooling. (Well, it should make for better cooling, but we can't talk about that aspect of things quite yet.)

A Memory Step Up?

And on to the RAM that AMD included in the larger black box (along with a couple of motherboards that we'll get to in a moment). When Ryzen initially launched last year, it had problems with higher memory clocks. But AMD included a G.Skill DDR4 3400 kit with our review samples this time. The camouflage patterns here are a matter of taste. We suppose they could look nice in a white-themed build.

Motherboard One: MSI X470 Gaming M7 AC

As for motherboards, AMD sent a couple of new models our way. With the X470 Gaming M7 AC board, it seems MSI wants to supply a relatively affordable entry into the new world of X470. We'll report later whether it will also withstand all our load tests--but not today.

Motherboard Two: Asus ROG Crosshair VII Hero X470 Wi-Fi

Only the motherboard manufacturers know why boards have funny names. But despite its puzzlingly complex moniker, the Asus ROG Crosshair VII Hero X470 Wi-Fi certainly looks nice (as does the MSI board from the last slide). For the time being, we can only show and not tell, though. Stay tuned for much more about 2nd Gen Ryzen and its accompanying chipsets and motherboards soon.

But we can add one more important detail: The Ryzen 7 2700X is priced at $329, and the Ryzen 5 2600X slices off $100 (and two cores) for a $229 suggested price. If you've heard enough already and are ready to buy, pre-orders should be available by the time you read this. AMD says its new 2nd Gen Ryzen chips will be on shelves and available April 19th.