AMD Ryzen 5 5600X3D Review: New Mid-Range Gaming Champ Is a Micro Center Exclusive

95% of the 5800X3D’s gaming performance for 20% less cash

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Ryzen 5 5600X3D
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AMD Ryzen 5 5600X3D Power Consumption and Efficiency

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.

52 Comments Comment from the forums
  • -Fran-
    Should we start calling the X3D parts "game accelerators"? Heh.

    Thanks for the benchies as well!

    Quite the good value for a platform that, quite simply, refuses to die. If there's people that has access to the 5600X3D and was trying to hold out for AM5, well, this CPU may just give them a few more years of not needing an upgrade at all? Maybe?

    It also makes a compelling argument for a cheap new budget build, but I would still spend the few extra macarroons and get the R5-7600 in AM5 and wait for later AM5 CPUs.

    Regards.
    Reply
  • King_V
    Welp, last year (February), I succumbed to a great deal and made an hour-long drive to Micro Center to upgrade from a Haswell system to a 5600X with A520M motherboard.

    It's seen less use than I had originally planned.

    That all said, had I been a little more patient, and realized at the time that I wouldn't be having that much use, this combo would definitely have been where I said "let me plan my drive to Micro Center," and with the price of SSDs going down, probably wouldn't have cost me much more than my current system.

    Still, I don't regret my 5600X.
    Reply
  • healthy Pro-teen
    At least for non-US users, 5700X provides comparable performance if you don't have a 4090/4080 or such (probably step up to AM5 if you spend that much on GPUs). I think AMD doesn't have enough cut down 5800X3D dies to justify a global launch.
    Reply
  • Co BIY
    oofdragon said:
    Just to remember, they are not making these chips but recycling defective 5800X3D, so the exclusivety is due to really having little to sell.

    From the article: "sources close to the matter tell us these chips were “purpose-built” to be launched as Ryzen 5 5600X3D parts. As such, they aren’t made of defective Ryzen 7 5800X3D processors."

    I wonder if the design tools and processes that allow for flexible SOCs and such are also allowing much more flexibility in processor production.

    With the RTX 4060 that this class of chips is most likely going to be paired with I doubt there is any observable difference in performance between any of the chips. (this would be a worthwhile test).
    Reply
  • Amdlova
    Interesting how q cache can eat too many watts... it's a no go for me.
    Reply
  • Avro Arrow
    healthy Pro-teen said:
    At least for non-US users, 5700X provides comparable performance if you don't have a 4090/4080 or such (probably step up to AM5 if you spend that much on GPUs). I think AMD doesn't have enough cut down 5800X3D dies to justify a global launch.
    Looking at the performance available, they were stupid not to produce it in the first place. I said the same thing about their lack of an R5-7600X3D.
    Reply
  • TJ Hooker
    Co BIY said:
    I wonder if the design tools and processes that allow for flexible SOCs and such are also allowing much more flexibility in processor production.
    X3D chips are just normal CCDs (core chiplet dice) with a separate SRAM die added on top. I would imagine they've had the capability to produce them as lower core count products since day one, in the same way they produce lower core count non-X3D parts (as they use the same CCDs).
    Reply
  • TJ Hooker
    Avro Arrow said:
    Looking at the performance available, they were stupid not to produce it in the first place. I said the same thing about their lack of an R5-7600X3D.
    I'm guessing it comes down to margins. So long as yields are good, making an 8 core CPU doesn't really cost them any more than a 6 core CPU, but they can charge more for it. At that point it doesn't make sense to release the 6 core part so long as you're still selling all the 8 core parts you can make reasonably quickly.

    Edit: Although I guess the same could be said about non-X3D 8 vs 6 core chips as well. I'm not sure why it made sense to release 6 and 8 core simultaneously for non-X3D, but not for X3D. I still suspect they did so as a result of business considerations though, rather than not understanding that 6 core X3D CPUs would be viable products.
    Reply
  • Dr3ams
    In a few years or so an unboxed 5600X3D will be a collectors item, sold on Ebay for a disgusting amount of money.
    Reply
  • Elusive Ruse
    AMD can't stop winning.
    Reply