AMD Ryzen 3 1300X Review

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Civilization VI, Battlefield 1 & Dawn of War III

Civilization VI AI Test

Quad-core processors without SMT provide the best results in Civilization VI's AI test, which measures available computational horsepower during a turn-based strategy gaming session.

Ryzen 5 1400 suffers from its mundane 3.2 GHz base clock, but its counterparts take a convincing lead over the Intel processors. A stock Ryzen 3 1300X put on a great show, though after a bit of tuning it becomes stellar.

Civilization VI Graphics Test

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The Core i3 and Pentium models struggle through Civ's graphics test, ceding the top spots to Ryzen models.

Pushing the Ryzen 3 1300X to 3.9 GHz using AMD's stock cooler proved easy, and you can see how we were rewarded. Only the Ryzen 5 chips prove quicker.

Battlefield 1 (DX11)

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We expected Intel's Core i3 to excel in DirectX 11-based benchmarks due to their higher clock rates. Unfortunately, Intel doesn't enable Turbo Boost or overclocking at these price points. A stock Ryzen 3 1300X lands averages within 1.7 FPS of the Core i3-7300. If only the -7300 had an unlocked multiplier, it might have held its ground against the 1300X at 3.9 GHz.

This isn't a hollow victory, either. The Ryzen 3 1300X provided a smoother gaming experience.

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War III

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Dawn of War III exposes a bigger delta between the stock 1300X and Core i3-7300. But again, tuning grants the lead to Ryzen.

The stock 1300X trailed Intel's -7300 in our average frame rate result. However, it also registered a 21.5ms 99th percentile measurement compared to the 7300's 21.4ms. That means they offered a very similar gaming experience, despite the 4.4 FPS delta.


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Paul Alcorn
Paul Alcorn
Editor-in-Chief

Paul Alcorn is the Editor-in-Chief for Tom's Hardware US. He also writes news and reviews on CPUs, storage, and enterprise hardware.

108 Comments Comment from the forums
  • yankeeDDL
    Wow.
    I don't remember when it was last time when we saw a review where, practically, in every chart AMD was at the top, and Intel at the bottom. It is refreshing really. Hopefully this will drive Intel to cleanup the mess it created in 5+ years of unchallenged leadership, and get its acts in order.

    I'm enjoying the moment though. With my Ryzen 5 1600 :)
    Reply
  • blackmagnum
    This is the product segment my slim wallet has been waiting for. I just hope that Intel will fight back with a price war. Now bring in the Ryzen+IGP for office gaming!
    Reply
  • SS_1__
    The only mainstream chips Intel makes worth buying are the G4560 and 7700k, AMD has the rest of the product stack.
    Reply
  • mjslakeridge
    The thing I found interesting from the review is that the disabled cores still receive power (second to last page of the review). Now we just need to figure out how to enable the "hidden" cores!
    Reply
  • bloodroses
    While I wasn't impressed with the Ryzen 5, their 7 and 3 are really putting the hurt on Intel. Good job AMD for getting back into the race. :) Let's hope they can do the same against Nvidia so true competition will finally be back.
    Reply
  • InvalidError
    19988753 said:
    Hopefully this will drive Intel to cleanup the mess it created in 5+ years of unchallenged leadership, and get its acts in order.
    There isn't a whole lot that Intel can do about it other than drop prices for a given amount of cores and threads, though you can expect Intel to hold on to premium pricing for its IPC, clock frequency and lower power advantages.

    What I'm really curious to see for the mainstream/office segment is the Ryzen-Vega APUs.
    Reply
  • madmatt30
    Amd are just absolutely smashing it this year.
    Which is a great great thing after Intel's dominance & stranglehold for the last 6 years.

    Intel price war ??
    No that's not going to happen if it hasn't already ,they're way too arrogant to ever do that.
    Reply
  • ajac09
    OH YEAH!!! AMD AMD AMD!
    Reply
  • redgarl
    One of the best CPU of the year with the 1600x. I still take my 1700x over them, but if you are under budget, there is no questions.

    Too bad their Vega card seems like another Fury. I sold my stock and wait for the first benches before rebuying it. Also, indication is that RX will cost 600-650$ and barely beating a 1080 GTX. However Vega core are going to be incridilbe with AMD APU on the laptop segment. Nvidia MXM cards are going to be a bad investment and cost a fortune while everything will be on the same chip for AMD.
    Reply
  • dudmont
    If AMD wants to grab business/oem market, they should come out with a very low end graphics card, something that costs 40$(preferably 20$) or less, that they could bundle with these Ryzen 3s and sell as a one stop solution. So long as it performed similarly to intels IGPs, and the price was competitive, their performance advantage would give them a shot at stealing sales. For them to really get market share, which is where these Ryzen 3s sit, they need to be able to offer something to more than just gamers on a budget.
    Reply