Ryzen 5 1600x/1500x/1400 Reviews
TweakTown Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x review
Overclcokers Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x review
PCPer Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x Review
HardOCP Ryzen 5 1600x/1400 Review
TechRader Ryzen 5 1600x review
DigitalTrends Ryzen 1600x Review
BitTech Ryzen 5 1600x review
HotHardware Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x review
GameSpot Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x review
TrustedReviews Ryzen 1600x/1500x Review
PCGamer Ryzen 5 1600x/1500x review
Anandtech Ryzen 5 1600x Review
eTeknix Ryzen 5 1500x review
TechPowerUp Ryzen 5 1500x
Guru3D Ryzen 5 1500x/ Ryzen 5 1600x Review
Kotaku Ryzen 5 1600x/1500x Review
Hexus Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x Review
Tom's Hardware Ryzen 5 1600x review
KitGuru Ryzen 5 1600x review
HardwareCanucks Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x review
TweakTown Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x review
About a month ago, the world was introduced to AMD's comeback kid, the Ryzen R7 series of processors. I reviewed the entire lineup, but many users wanted to know about the performance and pricing of AMD's more affordable Ryzen 5 models. Today, I will look at two Ryzen 5 processors; the six-core twelve-thread Ryzen 5 1600X and the four-core eight-thread Ryzen 5 1500X. Both processors offer XFR, and both come in at much more affordable price points. If you are interested, I have already covered Ryzen's microarchitecture here and Ryzen's clock for clock performance here. The Ryzen 5 and 7 processors share the same SoC features including x16 PCI-E 3.0 for GPUs, x4 PCI-E 3.0 for M.2 devices, and other connectivity features integrated into the processor. For this review, I will use AMD's B350 chipset instead of the X370, not only because it was included in the review guide, but also because AMD feels the chipset matches the affordability of the processor. The B350 chipset takes aim at Intel's B250 chipset, and while both have their advantage and disadvantages, AMD's offers overclocking support and integrated USB 3.1 instead of extra PCI-E 3.0. Specifications The 1500X has a 65W TDP and uses two CCX in a 2+2 configuration while the 1600X uses a 3+3 configuration. Both CPUs get 16MB of L3 cache, which is shared by all cores. The 1500X has a 3.5GHz base, 3.6GHz all core boost, 3.7GHz 2-core boost, and a 3.9GHz XFR single core boost. The 1600X has a 3.6GHz base, 3.7GHz all core boost, 4.0GHz 2-core boost, and a 4.1GHz XFR. With fewer cores, AMD was able to get more frequency out of the CPU, and we will see how this impacts overall performance compared to the 1700, where frequency toppled core count. The 1500X has a 65W TDP while the 1600X has a 95W TDP. Pricing The Ryzen 5 1500X will cost $189, and the 1600X will cost $249, the Ryzen 7 1700 costs $329, so the cost savings are significant.
Overclcokers Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x review
Coming in swiftly behind its big brother we have Ryzen 5. This is AMD's offering for the more budget-minded PC user. Today we'll be looking at the hex-core 1600X and the quad-core 1500X. These CPUs both have the XFR technology we've seen from the Ryzen 7 1800X and 1700X allowing for boost speeds over their typical max. Without further adieu, on to the main show.
Specifications and Features
Looking at the specifications table below, the 1600X is a hex-core with SMT for a total of twelve threads and the 1500X is a quad-core with SMT for eight threads. This total core/thread count comes from the use of two CPU Complexes (CCX), more on this arrangement in a second. The base clock comes in at 3.6 GHz and will boost two cores (four threads) to 4.0 GHz for the 1600X and 3.5 GHz boosting to 3.7 GHz on the 1500X. The inclusion of XFR (Xtended Frequency Range) technology allows another 100 MHz (200 MHz for the 1500X) over both the base and boost clocks, when temperature allows. TDP of these two CPUs comes in at 95 W for the 1600X and 65 W for the 1500X. The cooling medium between the die and IHS is solder, instead of thermal paste as Intel has used on their Mainstream CPUs.
The question on everyone's lips regarding Ryzen 5 has been "how will AMD handle reduced core counts?" and I can tell you they will be balanced between CCX's. The Ryzen 5 1600X has two CCX's with three cores enabled on each. The Ryzen 5 1500X has two CCX's with two cores enabled on each. AMD is keeping it balanced and using their selective core disabling functionality to drop the core count.
Memory on this CPU/platform supports a total of 128 GB with the base specification of DDR4-2400 in a dual channel configuration. It does not support ECC memory.
Regarding PCI Express (PCIe) support, Ryzen offers a total of 24 lanes out of the CPU allowing good flexibility for multiple cards, PCIe-based NVMe SSDs, and other PCIe-based devices. Sixteen of the lanes are dedicated to graphics, four are dedicated to the native M.2 PCIe NVMe slot, and the last four connect to the chipset. Different chipsets will provide their own additional PCIe lanes for even more device connectivity.
Windows 10 is the officially supported platform for Ryzen. That said, there will be drivers available for use with Windows 7 and 8.1, but know there is no official support for these older operating systems.
Specifications and Features
Looking at the specifications table below, the 1600X is a hex-core with SMT for a total of twelve threads and the 1500X is a quad-core with SMT for eight threads. This total core/thread count comes from the use of two CPU Complexes (CCX), more on this arrangement in a second. The base clock comes in at 3.6 GHz and will boost two cores (four threads) to 4.0 GHz for the 1600X and 3.5 GHz boosting to 3.7 GHz on the 1500X. The inclusion of XFR (Xtended Frequency Range) technology allows another 100 MHz (200 MHz for the 1500X) over both the base and boost clocks, when temperature allows. TDP of these two CPUs comes in at 95 W for the 1600X and 65 W for the 1500X. The cooling medium between the die and IHS is solder, instead of thermal paste as Intel has used on their Mainstream CPUs.
The question on everyone's lips regarding Ryzen 5 has been "how will AMD handle reduced core counts?" and I can tell you they will be balanced between CCX's. The Ryzen 5 1600X has two CCX's with three cores enabled on each. The Ryzen 5 1500X has two CCX's with two cores enabled on each. AMD is keeping it balanced and using their selective core disabling functionality to drop the core count.
Memory on this CPU/platform supports a total of 128 GB with the base specification of DDR4-2400 in a dual channel configuration. It does not support ECC memory.
Regarding PCI Express (PCIe) support, Ryzen offers a total of 24 lanes out of the CPU allowing good flexibility for multiple cards, PCIe-based NVMe SSDs, and other PCIe-based devices. Sixteen of the lanes are dedicated to graphics, four are dedicated to the native M.2 PCIe NVMe slot, and the last four connect to the chipset. Different chipsets will provide their own additional PCIe lanes for even more device connectivity.
Windows 10 is the officially supported platform for Ryzen. That said, there will be drivers available for use with Windows 7 and 8.1, but know there is no official support for these older operating systems.
PCPer Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x Review
he real battle begins
When AMD launched the Ryzen 7 processors last month to a substantial amount of fanfare and pent up excitement, we already knew that the Ryzen 5 launch would be following close behind. While the Ryzen 7 lineup was meant to compete with the Intel Core i7 Kaby Lake and Broadwell-E products, with varying levels of success, the Ryzen 5 parts are priced to go head to head with Intel's Core i5 product line.
AMD already told us the details of the new product line including clock speeds, core counts and pricing, so there is little more to talk about other than the performance and capabilities we found from our testing of the new Ryzen 5 parts. Starting with the Ryzen 5 1600X, with 6 cores, 12 threads and a $249 price point, and going down to the Ryzen 5 1400 with 4 cores, 8 threads and a $169 price point, this is easily AMD's most aggressive move to date. The Ryzen 7 1800X at $499 was meant to choke off purchases of Intel's $1000+ parts; Ryzen 5 is attempting to offer significant value and advantage for users on a budget.
Today we have the Ryzen 5 1600X and Ryzen 5 1500X in our hands. The 1600X is a 6C/12T processor that will have a 50% core count advantage over the Core i5-7600K it is priced against but a 3x advantage in thread count because of Intel's disabling of HyperThreading on Core i5 desktop processors. The Ryzen 5 1500X has the same number of cores as the Core i5-7500 it will be pitted against, but 2x the thread count.
How does this fare for AMD? Will budget consumers finally find a solution from the company that has no caveats?
Continue reading our review of the AMD Ryzen 5 1600X and 1500X processors!!
Specifications
Though we have already seen these details from AMD's release last month, it's a good idea to go over the details once again.
Ryzen 5 1600X Ryzen 5 1600 Ryzen 5 1500X Ryzen 5 1400 Core i5-7600K Core i5-7600 Core i5-7500 Core i5-7400
Architecture Zen Zen Zen Zen Kaby Lake Kaby Lake Kaby Lake Kaby Lake
Process Tech 14nm 14nm 14nm 14nm 14nm+ 14nm+ 14nm+ 14nm
Cores/Threads 6/12 6/12 4/8 4/8 4/4 4/4 4/4 4/4
Base Clock 3.6 GHz 3.2 GHz 3.5 GHz 3.2 GHz 3.8 GHz 3.5 GHz 3.4 GHz 3.0 GHz
Turbo/Boost Clock 4.0 GHz 3.6 GHz 3.7 GHz 3.4 GHz 4.2 GHz 4.1 GHz 3.8 GHz 3.5 GHz
Cache 16MB 16MB 16MB 8MB 6MB 6MB 6MB 6MB
Memory Support DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel
TDP 95 watts 65 watts 65 watts 65 watts 91 watts 65 watts 65 watts 65 watts
Price $249 $219 $189 $169 $239 $229 $204 $189
Clearly the Ryzen 5 1600X and 1600 have a big advantage in core count and thread count over the Core i5 processors. With 6-cores and 12-threads on both of those parts, any application or workload that can take advantage of multi-threaded configuration will see an immediate advantage on the AMD hardware. With 50% more cores and 3x the thread count, programs like Handbrake and Blender will excel on Ryzen 5 over Core i5.
The Ryzen 5 1500X is priced at $189 and competes directly with the Core i5-7500 and Core i5-7400, the most interesting of which is the 7500. Both have 4 cores but only the Ryzen has SMT enabled, giving the AMD hardware an advantage in any multi-threaded capable software.
B350 Platform
Though this review is not going to have a big focus on the chipset and motherboard itself, it is worth noting at the low-cost B350 motherboards that AMD foresees being paired with the Ryzen 5 processors have a feature advantage over the Intel equivalent B250 chipset motherboards. AMD built this chipset to support overclocking in an identical manner as the X370 chipset, with the only major difference being support for a single GPU rather than dual GPUs. On the contrary, the Intel B250 motherboards do NOT support overclocking; that includes both multiplier and CPU overclocking as well as support for memory speeds over 2400 MHz.
For price equivalent motherboard and platforms, that differnce is meaningful, giving consumers more flexibility and capability in their new system with AMD.
When AMD launched the Ryzen 7 processors last month to a substantial amount of fanfare and pent up excitement, we already knew that the Ryzen 5 launch would be following close behind. While the Ryzen 7 lineup was meant to compete with the Intel Core i7 Kaby Lake and Broadwell-E products, with varying levels of success, the Ryzen 5 parts are priced to go head to head with Intel's Core i5 product line.
AMD already told us the details of the new product line including clock speeds, core counts and pricing, so there is little more to talk about other than the performance and capabilities we found from our testing of the new Ryzen 5 parts. Starting with the Ryzen 5 1600X, with 6 cores, 12 threads and a $249 price point, and going down to the Ryzen 5 1400 with 4 cores, 8 threads and a $169 price point, this is easily AMD's most aggressive move to date. The Ryzen 7 1800X at $499 was meant to choke off purchases of Intel's $1000+ parts; Ryzen 5 is attempting to offer significant value and advantage for users on a budget.
Today we have the Ryzen 5 1600X and Ryzen 5 1500X in our hands. The 1600X is a 6C/12T processor that will have a 50% core count advantage over the Core i5-7600K it is priced against but a 3x advantage in thread count because of Intel's disabling of HyperThreading on Core i5 desktop processors. The Ryzen 5 1500X has the same number of cores as the Core i5-7500 it will be pitted against, but 2x the thread count.
How does this fare for AMD? Will budget consumers finally find a solution from the company that has no caveats?
Continue reading our review of the AMD Ryzen 5 1600X and 1500X processors!!
Specifications
Though we have already seen these details from AMD's release last month, it's a good idea to go over the details once again.
Ryzen 5 1600X Ryzen 5 1600 Ryzen 5 1500X Ryzen 5 1400 Core i5-7600K Core i5-7600 Core i5-7500 Core i5-7400
Architecture Zen Zen Zen Zen Kaby Lake Kaby Lake Kaby Lake Kaby Lake
Process Tech 14nm 14nm 14nm 14nm 14nm+ 14nm+ 14nm+ 14nm
Cores/Threads 6/12 6/12 4/8 4/8 4/4 4/4 4/4 4/4
Base Clock 3.6 GHz 3.2 GHz 3.5 GHz 3.2 GHz 3.8 GHz 3.5 GHz 3.4 GHz 3.0 GHz
Turbo/Boost Clock 4.0 GHz 3.6 GHz 3.7 GHz 3.4 GHz 4.2 GHz 4.1 GHz 3.8 GHz 3.5 GHz
Cache 16MB 16MB 16MB 8MB 6MB 6MB 6MB 6MB
Memory Support DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel DDR4-2400
Dual Channel
TDP 95 watts 65 watts 65 watts 65 watts 91 watts 65 watts 65 watts 65 watts
Price $249 $219 $189 $169 $239 $229 $204 $189
Clearly the Ryzen 5 1600X and 1600 have a big advantage in core count and thread count over the Core i5 processors. With 6-cores and 12-threads on both of those parts, any application or workload that can take advantage of multi-threaded configuration will see an immediate advantage on the AMD hardware. With 50% more cores and 3x the thread count, programs like Handbrake and Blender will excel on Ryzen 5 over Core i5.
The Ryzen 5 1500X is priced at $189 and competes directly with the Core i5-7500 and Core i5-7400, the most interesting of which is the 7500. Both have 4 cores but only the Ryzen has SMT enabled, giving the AMD hardware an advantage in any multi-threaded capable software.
B350 Platform
Though this review is not going to have a big focus on the chipset and motherboard itself, it is worth noting at the low-cost B350 motherboards that AMD foresees being paired with the Ryzen 5 processors have a feature advantage over the Intel equivalent B250 chipset motherboards. AMD built this chipset to support overclocking in an identical manner as the X370 chipset, with the only major difference being support for a single GPU rather than dual GPUs. On the contrary, the Intel B250 motherboards do NOT support overclocking; that includes both multiplier and CPU overclocking as well as support for memory speeds over 2400 MHz.
For price equivalent motherboard and platforms, that differnce is meaningful, giving consumers more flexibility and capability in their new system with AMD.
HardOCP Ryzen 5 1600x/1400 Review
What is an AMD Ryzen 5?
AMD has not been exactly shy about the new Ryzen series of CPUs, and neither has HardOCP. We have had five articles and reviews outlining the Ryzen 7 if you are not up to date.
Back on March 15th, AMD gave us a big "sneak peak" into what exactly the upcoming Ryzen 5 would have in store. You can check out AMD's full slide deck here.
However, it is not hard to outline all the differences between the entire product line fairly quickly.
As you can see above the biggest differentiating factor is the difference in the number of cores. Where the Ryzen 7 family is identical in terms of architecture, and cores and threads, the Ryzen 5 has changes through the models. First and foremost are the number of cores and threads. The 1600X and 1600 have 6-Cores/12-Threads, and the 1500X and 1400 have 4-Cores/8-Threads. There are also differences in the L2 and L3 cache, with the one that should probably be highlighted the most is with the Ryzen 1400 having half the L3 cache (8MB) of the rest of all its bigger brothers (16MB).
Worth mentioning also is that the Ryzen 5 1600X PIB (Processor-in-a-Box) does not come with an included CPU cooler. The 1500X and 1600 CPUs come with an included Wraith Spire cooler, and the 1400 with the Wraith Stealth cooler as shown in this slide. I am not sure on the logic behind this, but that is not our call.
Our Ryzen 5 CPUs for Testing
The Ryzen 5 CPUs we are testing today were purchased online a couple weeks ago. The AMD review kit came with a model 1600X and 1500X. We purchased two 1600 and two 1400 processors, so our review will be a bit different than most. We did spend all last week testing our four CPUs for maximum stable overclocks under load. Today we will be sharing benchmarks and analysis with you.
We are going to be showing you our Ryzen 5 and Ryzen 7 CPUs clocked at 4GHz. This should give us a good apples-to-apples testing scenario. With our Intel CPUs we are going to be showing those at 5GHz. All these clocks reflect upper-end overclocking on retail AMD and Intel CPUs. That said, we have found 5GHz on our Intel CPUs to be much easier if those are delidded/relidded.
Below is a quick picture of both our systems as tested. The chart below outlines our hardware configurations used for all our benchmark numbers here today. Given that AMD had released AGESA microcode here recently, we have re-run all benchmark numbers with the newest UEFI and AMD chipset drivers. We also chose to use new data for Intel as well so that way we are sure we have the most up-to-date software for both AMD and Intel.
AMD has not been exactly shy about the new Ryzen series of CPUs, and neither has HardOCP. We have had five articles and reviews outlining the Ryzen 7 if you are not up to date.
Back on March 15th, AMD gave us a big "sneak peak" into what exactly the upcoming Ryzen 5 would have in store. You can check out AMD's full slide deck here.
However, it is not hard to outline all the differences between the entire product line fairly quickly.
As you can see above the biggest differentiating factor is the difference in the number of cores. Where the Ryzen 7 family is identical in terms of architecture, and cores and threads, the Ryzen 5 has changes through the models. First and foremost are the number of cores and threads. The 1600X and 1600 have 6-Cores/12-Threads, and the 1500X and 1400 have 4-Cores/8-Threads. There are also differences in the L2 and L3 cache, with the one that should probably be highlighted the most is with the Ryzen 1400 having half the L3 cache (8MB) of the rest of all its bigger brothers (16MB).
Worth mentioning also is that the Ryzen 5 1600X PIB (Processor-in-a-Box) does not come with an included CPU cooler. The 1500X and 1600 CPUs come with an included Wraith Spire cooler, and the 1400 with the Wraith Stealth cooler as shown in this slide. I am not sure on the logic behind this, but that is not our call.
Our Ryzen 5 CPUs for Testing
The Ryzen 5 CPUs we are testing today were purchased online a couple weeks ago. The AMD review kit came with a model 1600X and 1500X. We purchased two 1600 and two 1400 processors, so our review will be a bit different than most. We did spend all last week testing our four CPUs for maximum stable overclocks under load. Today we will be sharing benchmarks and analysis with you.
We are going to be showing you our Ryzen 5 and Ryzen 7 CPUs clocked at 4GHz. This should give us a good apples-to-apples testing scenario. With our Intel CPUs we are going to be showing those at 5GHz. All these clocks reflect upper-end overclocking on retail AMD and Intel CPUs. That said, we have found 5GHz on our Intel CPUs to be much easier if those are delidded/relidded.
Below is a quick picture of both our systems as tested. The chart below outlines our hardware configurations used for all our benchmark numbers here today. Given that AMD had released AGESA microcode here recently, we have re-run all benchmark numbers with the newest UEFI and AMD chipset drivers. We also chose to use new data for Intel as well so that way we are sure we have the most up-to-date software for both AMD and Intel.
TechRader Ryzen 5 1600x review
AMD has made a huge splash with Ryzen 7 by bringing a full range of affordable octo-core chips to the market, but we've been far more interested in how Ryzen 5 will elevate the mainstream computing scene. Not only are the parts even more inexpensive, you'll at the very least get four cores and unlocked overclocking potential - two things Intel typically gates behind higher-priced parts with suffixes like "HQ" and "K."
Of course, Ryzen 5 not only meets Intel's specs, but shoots well above them.
Like its bigger Ryzen 7 brother, these mid-range processors are all about packing more cores and hyperthreading. The 1600X sits at the top of the Ryzen 5 family, featuring six-cores and eight-threads with a base clock speed of 3.6GHz that punches up to a maximum of 4.0GHz. It's an impressive processor that not only beats Intel's Core i5 and i7 processors, but also manages to turn its nose up at the Broadwell-E series.
Of course, Ryzen 5 not only meets Intel's specs, but shoots well above them.
Like its bigger Ryzen 7 brother, these mid-range processors are all about packing more cores and hyperthreading. The 1600X sits at the top of the Ryzen 5 family, featuring six-cores and eight-threads with a base clock speed of 3.6GHz that punches up to a maximum of 4.0GHz. It's an impressive processor that not only beats Intel's Core i5 and i7 processors, but also manages to turn its nose up at the Broadwell-E series.
DigitalTrends Ryzen 1600x Review
The $250-$350 price point is growing increasingly crowded as AMD merrily rolls out Ryzen. These enthusiast level chips, used primarily in gaming systems, won't hold back a single GPU setup, and are very capable of light photo or video production work in a pinch.
The Ryzen 5 1600X stands out as the least expensive chip to ever offer more than four cores. At $250, it undercuts the Core i7-7700K by almost a hundred dollars at full price, and is only $20 more than the Core i5-7600K. As attractive as Ryzen 7 was, it's the Ryzen 5 processor line that fits in the budget of most PC enthusiasts. Can it become the people's champion?
A refresher on the architecture
The mid-range Ryzen 5 Series is the second to arrive with AMD's new Zen architecture. The red team started over from the ground up for these chips, and it really shows. The previous design, Bulldozer, set AMD back by pushing core count in exchange for per-core efficiency. With most games and demanding applications only making use of four cores, there wasn't a big incentive to take the offer.
For more information on the Zen architecture and platform, head over to our review of the flagship chip, the Ryzen 7 1800X.
Six cores, 12 threads, plenty of go
Though its 3.6GHz base clock is only slightly higher than the Ryzen 5 1500X's 3.5GHz clock, the Ryzen 5 1600X has two distinct advantages over its slightly cheaper sibling. Most notably, the Ryzen 5 1600X sports two more cores for a total of six, which brings it to support for 12 threads (two on each core). It also has a 95-watt thermal design power, as opposed to the 65-watt TDP on the 1500X. Theoretically, that thermal headroom may allow for better overall performance due to higher dynamic clock speeds.
The Ryzen 5 1600X stands out as the least expensive chip to ever offer more than four cores. At $250, it undercuts the Core i7-7700K by almost a hundred dollars at full price, and is only $20 more than the Core i5-7600K. As attractive as Ryzen 7 was, it's the Ryzen 5 processor line that fits in the budget of most PC enthusiasts. Can it become the people's champion?
A refresher on the architecture
The mid-range Ryzen 5 Series is the second to arrive with AMD's new Zen architecture. The red team started over from the ground up for these chips, and it really shows. The previous design, Bulldozer, set AMD back by pushing core count in exchange for per-core efficiency. With most games and demanding applications only making use of four cores, there wasn't a big incentive to take the offer.
For more information on the Zen architecture and platform, head over to our review of the flagship chip, the Ryzen 7 1800X.
Six cores, 12 threads, plenty of go
Though its 3.6GHz base clock is only slightly higher than the Ryzen 5 1500X's 3.5GHz clock, the Ryzen 5 1600X has two distinct advantages over its slightly cheaper sibling. Most notably, the Ryzen 5 1600X sports two more cores for a total of six, which brings it to support for 12 threads (two on each core). It also has a 95-watt thermal design power, as opposed to the 65-watt TDP on the 1500X. Theoretically, that thermal headroom may allow for better overall performance due to higher dynamic clock speeds.
BitTech Ryzen 5 1600x review
The Ryzen 7 series has certainly stirred things up a bit when it comes to multi-threaded performance, and for the most part, if you're building a rendering, editing, or streaming system that demands lots of cores and threads, AMD has the edge in terms of value and sometimes in a big way. However, the Ryzen 7 series isn't where we think Ryzen's biggest potential lays - it's in the Ryzen 5 series.
Spending over £200 on a CPU is out of reach for many, which means that you're not only priced out of overclocking an Intel CPU if you need the grunt of four cores under the hood, but even getting a four-core hyper-threaded CPU will cost a lot more than this, never mind a six- or eight-core Intel CPU. What the Ryzen 5 series represents is potentially decent multi-threaded performance with up to six cores and 12 threads for prices that would only usually net you a four-core, four-thread CPU.
At £249, the Ryzen 5 1600X is barely any more expensive than Intel's Core i5-7600K, yet it has the specifications to match the £425 Core i7-6800K, with it and the AMD CPU sporting the same core and thread counts as well as similar amounts of L3 cache. That's a near £200 saving. We're talking here about the flagship Ryzen 5 too - the 1600X - but as you can see in the table below, there are three other CPUs launching today, and if the Ryzen 7 series is anything to go by, the non X-edition CPUs, the Ryzen 5 1400 and 1600, could be even better value, especially if they overclock just as well.
CPU Cores/Threads L3 Cache TDP Base Turbo Price
Ryzen 7 1800X 8/16 16MB 95W 3.6GHz 4GHz $499/£499
Ryzen 7 1700X 8/16 16MB 95W 3.4GHz 3.8GHz $399/£399
Ryzen 7 1700 8/16 16MB 65W 3GHz 3.7GHz $329/£329
Ryzen 5 1600X 6/12 16MB 95W 3.6GHz 4GHz $249/£249
Ryzen 5 1600 6/12 16MB 95W 3.2GHz 3.6GHz £219/£219
Ryzen 5 1500X 4/8 16MB 65W 3.5GHz 3.7GHz $189/£189
Ryzen 5 1400 4/8 8MB 65W 3.2GHz 3.4GHz $169/£169
Unlike the Ryzen 7 series, the Ryzen 5 series is split in two in terms of specifications. Both 1600-series CPUs have six cores and 12 threads along with 16MB L3 cache and a 95W TDP. The Ryzen 5 1600X has a base frequency of 3.6GHz, Precision Boost frequency of 4GHz, and XFR will add another 100MHz on top of that, temperatures permitting. The Ryzen 5 1600, meanwhile, has a base frequency of 3.2GHz and Precision Boost of 3.6GHz.
AMD Ryzen 5 1600X ReviewDipping below £200/$200 sees the core/thread count drop to four/eight with the Ryzen 5 1500X and 1400, with frequencies listed above in the table. Again, the Ryzen 5 1400 could potentially be a fantastic budget CPU if it overclocks well, retailing for just £169/$169, which is even cheaper than Intel's dual-core Core i3-7350K.
Of course, a lot rests on two things: frequency and optimisation. Intel's CPUs are often clocked higher at stock speed and overclock further, so they can potentially claw back ground lost by their core/thread deficits and could still have an edge in any situations that don't fully-utilise Ryzen's additional cores and threads as a result.
Optimisation in games is going to be key for AMD too. Many Ryzen fans stuck to the argument that the Ryzen 7 series' poor performance at 1080p in some games is a moot point because potential buyers would be gaming at higher resolutions. If AMD's CPUs stopped at the Ryzen 7 series, this might hold true, but this argument simply doesn't hold true and is very narrow-minded because of course there are the the Ryzen 5 and indeed Ryzen 3 series CPUs. These will absolutely be used at 1080p, and if we're talking about high refresh rates too, you could easily see fairly powerful GPUs being used alongside them - exactly the scenario Ryzen has struggled with in some games.
Spending over £200 on a CPU is out of reach for many, which means that you're not only priced out of overclocking an Intel CPU if you need the grunt of four cores under the hood, but even getting a four-core hyper-threaded CPU will cost a lot more than this, never mind a six- or eight-core Intel CPU. What the Ryzen 5 series represents is potentially decent multi-threaded performance with up to six cores and 12 threads for prices that would only usually net you a four-core, four-thread CPU.
At £249, the Ryzen 5 1600X is barely any more expensive than Intel's Core i5-7600K, yet it has the specifications to match the £425 Core i7-6800K, with it and the AMD CPU sporting the same core and thread counts as well as similar amounts of L3 cache. That's a near £200 saving. We're talking here about the flagship Ryzen 5 too - the 1600X - but as you can see in the table below, there are three other CPUs launching today, and if the Ryzen 7 series is anything to go by, the non X-edition CPUs, the Ryzen 5 1400 and 1600, could be even better value, especially if they overclock just as well.
CPU Cores/Threads L3 Cache TDP Base Turbo Price
Ryzen 7 1800X 8/16 16MB 95W 3.6GHz 4GHz $499/£499
Ryzen 7 1700X 8/16 16MB 95W 3.4GHz 3.8GHz $399/£399
Ryzen 7 1700 8/16 16MB 65W 3GHz 3.7GHz $329/£329
Ryzen 5 1600X 6/12 16MB 95W 3.6GHz 4GHz $249/£249
Ryzen 5 1600 6/12 16MB 95W 3.2GHz 3.6GHz £219/£219
Ryzen 5 1500X 4/8 16MB 65W 3.5GHz 3.7GHz $189/£189
Ryzen 5 1400 4/8 8MB 65W 3.2GHz 3.4GHz $169/£169
Unlike the Ryzen 7 series, the Ryzen 5 series is split in two in terms of specifications. Both 1600-series CPUs have six cores and 12 threads along with 16MB L3 cache and a 95W TDP. The Ryzen 5 1600X has a base frequency of 3.6GHz, Precision Boost frequency of 4GHz, and XFR will add another 100MHz on top of that, temperatures permitting. The Ryzen 5 1600, meanwhile, has a base frequency of 3.2GHz and Precision Boost of 3.6GHz.
AMD Ryzen 5 1600X ReviewDipping below £200/$200 sees the core/thread count drop to four/eight with the Ryzen 5 1500X and 1400, with frequencies listed above in the table. Again, the Ryzen 5 1400 could potentially be a fantastic budget CPU if it overclocks well, retailing for just £169/$169, which is even cheaper than Intel's dual-core Core i3-7350K.
Of course, a lot rests on two things: frequency and optimisation. Intel's CPUs are often clocked higher at stock speed and overclock further, so they can potentially claw back ground lost by their core/thread deficits and could still have an edge in any situations that don't fully-utilise Ryzen's additional cores and threads as a result.
Optimisation in games is going to be key for AMD too. Many Ryzen fans stuck to the argument that the Ryzen 7 series' poor performance at 1080p in some games is a moot point because potential buyers would be gaming at higher resolutions. If AMD's CPUs stopped at the Ryzen 7 series, this might hold true, but this argument simply doesn't hold true and is very narrow-minded because of course there are the the Ryzen 5 and indeed Ryzen 3 series CPUs. These will absolutely be used at 1080p, and if we're talking about high refresh rates too, you could easily see fairly powerful GPUs being used alongside them - exactly the scenario Ryzen has struggled with in some games.
HotHardware Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x review
AMD Ryzen 5 Processors Unveiled - All You Need To Know
Although it seems like it has been longer, AMD launched its Ryzen 7 family of processors based on the all-new Zen microarchitecture just a little over a month ago. Based on the level of engagement virtually all of our Ryzen-related articles have received, we have to assume all of you regulars have already seen our launched coverage of Ryzen 7. However, if you somehow missed it, it is available right here.
In our Ryzen 7 coverage, we were able to disclose a few details regarding the more mainstream targeted Ryzen 5 series of processors, but save for a few AMD provided data points, performance wasn't one of them. Until today, that is. AMD's Ryzen 5 series of processors should be available soon after you read this, and we've got the company's top 6 and 4-core versions on the test bench, the Ryzen 5 1600X and Ryzen 5 1500X.
Although it seems like it has been longer, AMD launched its Ryzen 7 family of processors based on the all-new Zen microarchitecture just a little over a month ago. Based on the level of engagement virtually all of our Ryzen-related articles have received, we have to assume all of you regulars have already seen our launched coverage of Ryzen 7. However, if you somehow missed it, it is available right here.
In our Ryzen 7 coverage, we were able to disclose a few details regarding the more mainstream targeted Ryzen 5 series of processors, but save for a few AMD provided data points, performance wasn't one of them. Until today, that is. AMD's Ryzen 5 series of processors should be available soon after you read this, and we've got the company's top 6 and 4-core versions on the test bench, the Ryzen 5 1600X and Ryzen 5 1500X.
GameSpot Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x review
AMD inserted itself back into the CPU market as a true competitor last month with the release of the Ryzen 7 line of processors. The microchip manufacturer also set its eyes on the mid-range market with the release of the Ryzen 5 line. All these CPUs are based on the Zen microarchitecture, which is AMD's strongest yet. Internally, AMD asserts that Zen outperforms its previous Excavator architecture by 52 percent in a battle of instructions per clock (IPC). In addition, Ryzen requires the new AM4 socket across all CPUs.
Here we have two SKUs of Ryzen 5 CPUs for review: the 1600X and 1500X, which retail for $249 USD and $189 USD, respectively. In terms of pricing, these CPUs are intended to compete with Intel's Core-i5 series. AMD touts Ryzen's advantage for "prosumers"--a mix of performance for professional tasks and consumer-level pricing. The Ryzen 7 1800X is positioned to compete against much more expensive Intel equivalents in video editing and image rendering tasks. If the Ryzen 5 CPUs scale accordingly, those looking for a balance of performance for productivity and gaming at a lower price should pay close attention.
Here we have two SKUs of Ryzen 5 CPUs for review: the 1600X and 1500X, which retail for $249 USD and $189 USD, respectively. In terms of pricing, these CPUs are intended to compete with Intel's Core-i5 series. AMD touts Ryzen's advantage for "prosumers"--a mix of performance for professional tasks and consumer-level pricing. The Ryzen 7 1800X is positioned to compete against much more expensive Intel equivalents in video editing and image rendering tasks. If the Ryzen 5 CPUs scale accordingly, those looking for a balance of performance for productivity and gaming at a lower price should pay close attention.
TrustedReviews Ryzen 1600x/1500x Review
WHAT ARE THE AMD RYZEN 5 1600X AND 1500X?
AMD made quite a splash with the launch of its first Ryzen CPUs. The Ryzen 7 1800X was so good it became the first AMD CPU TrustedReviews has strongly recommended in the better part of ten years. But, the 1800X and the other two Ryzen 7 processors that launched a month or so ago are all high-end products with eight cores and price tags to match. That's where the Ryzen 5 chips come in.
Launching today, the Ryzen 5 processors are available in six and quad-core configurations, and have a far lower upfront cost. This makes them ideal for more mainstream and enthusiast users who want a powerful processors but don't really need, or can't afford, the massive multi-core power of a Ryzen 7 CPU.
There are four processors that make up the Ryzen 5 lineup, two of which are quad-core and two six-core. I'll be looking at the top tier versions of each, the quad-core 1500X and the six-core 1600X.
AMD made quite a splash with the launch of its first Ryzen CPUs. The Ryzen 7 1800X was so good it became the first AMD CPU TrustedReviews has strongly recommended in the better part of ten years. But, the 1800X and the other two Ryzen 7 processors that launched a month or so ago are all high-end products with eight cores and price tags to match. That's where the Ryzen 5 chips come in.
Launching today, the Ryzen 5 processors are available in six and quad-core configurations, and have a far lower upfront cost. This makes them ideal for more mainstream and enthusiast users who want a powerful processors but don't really need, or can't afford, the massive multi-core power of a Ryzen 7 CPU.
There are four processors that make up the Ryzen 5 lineup, two of which are quad-core and two six-core. I'll be looking at the top tier versions of each, the quad-core 1500X and the six-core 1600X.
PCGamer Ryzen 5 1600x/1500x review
Last month saw the launch of AMD's new Ryzen 7 processors and the AM4 platform. I didn't score any of the CPUs at the time, in large part because giving a score on day one of a new microprocessor feels premature. And that goes double for the AM4 motherboards, as Jim and I discussed in our Ryzen state of the union address. A couple of more weeks brings more testing and maturity to AMD's platform, with most motherboards having received what might now be deemed 'final' firmware.
All of the preparatory groundwork laid by Ryzen 7 means the mainstream Ryzen 5 parts get to launch into a far more stable environment. Okay, maybe 'stable' is the wrong word-they get to launch with motherboards that are far less finnicky about memory and other peripherals. And with lower prices on the processors, the more budget minded are certainly going to think about the B350 chipset motherboards, which mostly cut down the number of USB ports and generally aren't intended for SLI or CrossFire setups.
One thing you should know before plunging into the Ryzen hardware scene is that spending a bit extra on memory could be worthwhile. I'll be looking at memory scaling more in a future article, but I did do some quick tests with DDR4-2133 (which no one really uses!) against DDR4-3200, and found the latter improved overall CPU performance by about four percent, but more importantly it improved gaming performance by seven percent. That's basically the equivalent of a 300MHz CPU overclock, thanks to better memory.
All of the preparatory groundwork laid by Ryzen 7 means the mainstream Ryzen 5 parts get to launch into a far more stable environment. Okay, maybe 'stable' is the wrong word-they get to launch with motherboards that are far less finnicky about memory and other peripherals. And with lower prices on the processors, the more budget minded are certainly going to think about the B350 chipset motherboards, which mostly cut down the number of USB ports and generally aren't intended for SLI or CrossFire setups.
One thing you should know before plunging into the Ryzen hardware scene is that spending a bit extra on memory could be worthwhile. I'll be looking at memory scaling more in a future article, but I did do some quick tests with DDR4-2133 (which no one really uses!) against DDR4-3200, and found the latter improved overall CPU performance by about four percent, but more importantly it improved gaming performance by seven percent. That's basically the equivalent of a 300MHz CPU overclock, thanks to better memory.
Anandtech Ryzen 5 1600x Review
Since the announcement of AMD's mid-range offerings, it was clear that Ryzen 5 is going to have some major advantages over its direct price competition. For $250, the top Ryzen 5 1600X gives six cores and twelve threads of AMD's latest microarchitecture. For the same price from Intel with a Core i5, you get four cores and no extra threads. Even though the Intel Core i5 based on Kaby Lake will have an instructions-per-clock advantage, it's a hard hill to climb when the competition has 50% more cores and 200% more threads. In this review, we take the Ryzen 5 1600X and see if it smashes the market wide open.
Ryzen 3, Ryzen 5, Ryzen 7 (...Ryzen 9?)
Today marks the retail availability of AMD's Ryzen 5 line of desktop processors. As the name suggests, Ryzen 5 sits between Ryzen 7, which was launched in March 2017, and Ryzen 3, to be launched in Q2 2017. The launch of Ryzen 7 last month was a return to the high-performance market for AMD, with its new x86 microarchitecture and core design built on GlobalFoundries 14nm process offering equivalent performance to Intel's high-end desktop (HEDT) parts for under half-the-cost. Ryzen 5 is a step below that HEDT market, aiming more at mainstream users on more reasonable budgets.
One of the throwbacks to the Ryzen 7 launch for AMD was that the competition in that space was invariably overpriced to begin with - having had no competition for so many years, Intel was able to dictate the price and performance ratios without losing market share. While Ryzen 7 came out fighting in that market, ultimately it was up against a two-generation old CPU design from Intel, and not the latest, due to the way that Intel staggers its design cycle between mainstream and high-end processors. Ryzen 5, on the other hand, is coming out against processors that Intel has launched this year, on their leading design.
So while Ryzen 7 undercut the HEDT market by offering the same performance (in most cases) for half the price, Ryzen 5 can't do the same. The midstream market is more price sensitive, and as a result AMD is launching Ryzen 5 at similar price points to Intel in this field. So while AMD can't compete on price, it tackles the midstream market with more cores and more threads instead. Where Intel offers four cores, AMD offers six. Where Intel offers four threads, AMD offers twelve. This has implications for performance and power, which will be a part of this review.
(I'm joking about Ryzen 9 in the title to this section. No Ryzen 9 has been announced
Ryzen 3, Ryzen 5, Ryzen 7 (...Ryzen 9?)
Today marks the retail availability of AMD's Ryzen 5 line of desktop processors. As the name suggests, Ryzen 5 sits between Ryzen 7, which was launched in March 2017, and Ryzen 3, to be launched in Q2 2017. The launch of Ryzen 7 last month was a return to the high-performance market for AMD, with its new x86 microarchitecture and core design built on GlobalFoundries 14nm process offering equivalent performance to Intel's high-end desktop (HEDT) parts for under half-the-cost. Ryzen 5 is a step below that HEDT market, aiming more at mainstream users on more reasonable budgets.
One of the throwbacks to the Ryzen 7 launch for AMD was that the competition in that space was invariably overpriced to begin with - having had no competition for so many years, Intel was able to dictate the price and performance ratios without losing market share. While Ryzen 7 came out fighting in that market, ultimately it was up against a two-generation old CPU design from Intel, and not the latest, due to the way that Intel staggers its design cycle between mainstream and high-end processors. Ryzen 5, on the other hand, is coming out against processors that Intel has launched this year, on their leading design.
So while Ryzen 7 undercut the HEDT market by offering the same performance (in most cases) for half the price, Ryzen 5 can't do the same. The midstream market is more price sensitive, and as a result AMD is launching Ryzen 5 at similar price points to Intel in this field. So while AMD can't compete on price, it tackles the midstream market with more cores and more threads instead. Where Intel offers four cores, AMD offers six. Where Intel offers four threads, AMD offers twelve. This has implications for performance and power, which will be a part of this review.
(I'm joking about Ryzen 9 in the title to this section. No Ryzen 9 has been announced
eTeknix Ryzen 5 1500x review
Following on from our coverage of the Ryzen R7 series of 8-core, 16-thread processors, the Ryzen R7 1700, Ryzen R7 1700X, and the Ryzen R7 1800X, we kick things off today with a look at the more affordable Ryzen R5 series! The R7's have been a huge hit for AMD, with many of our readers reporting their new AM4 system builds, and I myself invested in the 1700X for my own system. The R5 are designed to be a bit more mainstream than the R7 series, offering 4 and 6 core variants, with 8 and 12 threads respectively, while also offering a much lower price point.
The R5 1500X costs just $189 (US) at launch, which should be around £150 here in the UK. That's pretty cheap for a quad-core processor with 8-threads and is on par with what you would currently pay for a dual-core Intel Kaby Lake i3, such as the i3-7350K. Of course, AMD has their targets set on more expensive Intel processors, and the R5 series is pretty much pegged to be an affordable alternative to the Core i5 K-series of processors thanks to the quad-core 8-thread design. Also, let's not forget that all Ryzen processors are unlocked, allowing for overclocking on all B350 and X370 series motherboards
Number of CPU Cores: 4
Number of Threads: 8
Base Clock Speed: 3.5GHz
Max Turbo Core Speed: 3.7GHz
Unlocked: Yes
Package: AM4
Default TDP / TDP: 65W
Check out our review of the R5 1600X here!
Important notes for this review!
Our previous reviews of the R7 were conducted at launch, with launch BIOS and the 16GB Crucial Ballistix Sport XT (2 x 8GB) DDR4 2666MHz memory kits Running at 2400MHz due to BIOS issues. They were also conducted on the MSI X370 Titanium motherboard. Today's R5 testing will be using a much faster memory kit on the more affordable B350 chipset motherboards as they're a more natural fit for these mid-range processors but may get a boost in performance due to faster memory speeds, which are vital for Ryzen to reach its full potential. We are looking into retesting our R7 series in an upcoming feature to reflect the updates to BIOS, games, memory compatibility, etc, in the near future.
The R5 1500X costs just $189 (US) at launch, which should be around £150 here in the UK. That's pretty cheap for a quad-core processor with 8-threads and is on par with what you would currently pay for a dual-core Intel Kaby Lake i3, such as the i3-7350K. Of course, AMD has their targets set on more expensive Intel processors, and the R5 series is pretty much pegged to be an affordable alternative to the Core i5 K-series of processors thanks to the quad-core 8-thread design. Also, let's not forget that all Ryzen processors are unlocked, allowing for overclocking on all B350 and X370 series motherboards
Number of CPU Cores: 4
Number of Threads: 8
Base Clock Speed: 3.5GHz
Max Turbo Core Speed: 3.7GHz
Unlocked: Yes
Package: AM4
Default TDP / TDP: 65W
Check out our review of the R5 1600X here!
Important notes for this review!
Our previous reviews of the R7 were conducted at launch, with launch BIOS and the 16GB Crucial Ballistix Sport XT (2 x 8GB) DDR4 2666MHz memory kits Running at 2400MHz due to BIOS issues. They were also conducted on the MSI X370 Titanium motherboard. Today's R5 testing will be using a much faster memory kit on the more affordable B350 chipset motherboards as they're a more natural fit for these mid-range processors but may get a boost in performance due to faster memory speeds, which are vital for Ryzen to reach its full potential. We are looking into retesting our R7 series in an upcoming feature to reflect the updates to BIOS, games, memory compatibility, etc, in the near future.
TechPowerUp Ryzen 5 1500x
AMD is back in the desktop CPU game with its Ryzen family of processors, thanks to successes with per-core performance and energy-efficiency improvements brought about by its "Zen" micro-architecture. The company launched its Ryzen processor family with the top-end Ryzen 7 series, which consists of eight-core models that start at $329, going all the way up to $499. These chips do manage to make you think twice before choosing an Intel Core i7-7700K quad-core chip, and make the Core i7 "Broadwell-E" series look terrible, all the way up to the $1,199 i7-6900K. Ahead of Summer 2017, when PC gamers hit the stores for hardware upgrades, AMD is launching a new line of Ryzen processors at price points targeting them, with the new Ryzen 5 series.
The Ryzen 5 series from AMD competes with the entire spectrum of Intel's Core i5 quad-core "Kaby Lake" series, at prices ranging from $169 to $249. This puts Intel's high-volume Core i5-7600K and value-oriented i5-7400 in its crosshairs. Carved out of the same 14 nm "Summit Ridge" silicon as the eight-core Ryzen 7 series, the Ryzen 5 series consists of six-core and quad-core SKUs, which are further bolstered by SMT (simultaneous multi-threading) and unlocked base-clock multipliers across the board. SMT (and its Intel-implementation, HyperThreading) is something quad-core Core i5 parts lack, and unlocked multipliers is reserved only for the i5-7600K quad-core and the $189 i3-7350K dual-core. What's more, the six-core Ryzen 5 parts feature a staggering 16 MB of L3 cache (compared to the paltry 6 MB of the price-comparable Core i5 quad-core parts), and the quad-core parts feature a decent 8 MB. Given AMD has made significant strides in improving per-core performance and the software ecosystem finally taking advantage of more than 4 logical CPUs, the Ryzen 5 series looks extremely exciting on paper.
While the Ryzen 5 series is led by the $249 six-core Ryzen 5 1600X, which AMD claims will compete with not just the price-matched Core i5-7600K, but also punch above its weight against the $329 Core i7-7700K in some tests, a more exciting part with implications in particular for the PC-gaming crowd is the quad-core Ryzen 5 1500X. This chip is priced at $189, a price at which Intel is selling the overclocker-friendly dual-core i3-7350K and its slowest quad-core i5-7400 part. With the i3-7350K, Intel is hoping that two highly clocked "Kaby Lake" cores with HyperThreading make for a sufficiently fast gaming-PC processor. The Core i5-7400 gives you four cores, but no HyperThreading and clock speeds of 3.00 GHz, with 3.50 GHz Turbo Boost speeds. The Ryzen 5 1500X, in comparison, gives you not just four cores, but also SMT, enabling 8 logical CPUs (something you'd have to shell out upwards of $300 on the Intel lineup for), 8 MB of L3 cache, and clock speeds of 3.50 GHz with 3.70 GHz TurboCore frequency, and the XFR (extended frequency range) feature enabling higher automated overclocks, depending on the efficacy of your CPU cooling.
The Ryzen 5 series from AMD competes with the entire spectrum of Intel's Core i5 quad-core "Kaby Lake" series, at prices ranging from $169 to $249. This puts Intel's high-volume Core i5-7600K and value-oriented i5-7400 in its crosshairs. Carved out of the same 14 nm "Summit Ridge" silicon as the eight-core Ryzen 7 series, the Ryzen 5 series consists of six-core and quad-core SKUs, which are further bolstered by SMT (simultaneous multi-threading) and unlocked base-clock multipliers across the board. SMT (and its Intel-implementation, HyperThreading) is something quad-core Core i5 parts lack, and unlocked multipliers is reserved only for the i5-7600K quad-core and the $189 i3-7350K dual-core. What's more, the six-core Ryzen 5 parts feature a staggering 16 MB of L3 cache (compared to the paltry 6 MB of the price-comparable Core i5 quad-core parts), and the quad-core parts feature a decent 8 MB. Given AMD has made significant strides in improving per-core performance and the software ecosystem finally taking advantage of more than 4 logical CPUs, the Ryzen 5 series looks extremely exciting on paper.
While the Ryzen 5 series is led by the $249 six-core Ryzen 5 1600X, which AMD claims will compete with not just the price-matched Core i5-7600K, but also punch above its weight against the $329 Core i7-7700K in some tests, a more exciting part with implications in particular for the PC-gaming crowd is the quad-core Ryzen 5 1500X. This chip is priced at $189, a price at which Intel is selling the overclocker-friendly dual-core i3-7350K and its slowest quad-core i5-7400 part. With the i3-7350K, Intel is hoping that two highly clocked "Kaby Lake" cores with HyperThreading make for a sufficiently fast gaming-PC processor. The Core i5-7400 gives you four cores, but no HyperThreading and clock speeds of 3.00 GHz, with 3.50 GHz Turbo Boost speeds. The Ryzen 5 1500X, in comparison, gives you not just four cores, but also SMT, enabling 8 logical CPUs (something you'd have to shell out upwards of $300 on the Intel lineup for), 8 MB of L3 cache, and clock speeds of 3.50 GHz with 3.70 GHz TurboCore frequency, and the XFR (extended frequency range) feature enabling higher automated overclocks, depending on the efficacy of your CPU cooling.
Guru3D Ryzen 5 1500x/ Ryzen 5 1600x Review
We review Ryzen 5 in this article. AMD submitted two processor samples, the quad-core 1500X and six-core processor 1600X. The new processors will be close in relative performance compared to Intel's Core i5 series. AMD however is going in with one leg stretched as they offer that six-core part at 249 USD and the quad-core processor at 189 USD.
The new SKUs are not clocked slow either, the Ryzen 5 1600X six-core processor is clocked as fast as its bigger eight-core brother at a 3.6 GHz base clock and 4.0 GHz Turbo. The quad-core 1500X on its end has a base frequency at 3.5 GHz and 3.7 on that Turbo. Now, before we get into detail, under the hood (that would be a euphemism for heat-spreader) these processors are ALL 8-core parts (physically). Yet they have been sorted and reconfigured. That quad-core in reality is the 8-core part yet set up and enabled in a 2+2 fashion, thus each out of the two 4-core clusters (CCXs) has 2 cores enabled. For the six-core parts that means per 4-core cluster (CCX) one core is disabled and that means these processors are set up in a 3+3 fashion. Other than that, again these are physically the 8-core Summit Ridge parts. That also invokes corresponding caches, TDPs and yes, these processors are all threaded and multiplier unlocked as well. The 1600X will have a 95W TDP, the 1500X sits at 65 Watts. According to AMD, Ryzen 5 1600X will be competing with the Intel Core i5 7600K and the Ryzen 5 1500X is attacking the price and performance bracket of the Core i5 7500.
Before we start-up the review, there has been a lot of chatter on the web on 1080p game performance, CCX interlink latency and bandwidth and/or clock frequencies being responsible and so on. The fact is that week after week Ryzen processor performance has been increasing thanks to BIOS updates and software optimizations. Pair it with good and reasonably fast memory (say 2933 MHz) and you will have a kick-ass value processor. Many of you have been following the news on memory latency. A new BIOS (AGESA 1004 based firmware) update ensures better performance and takes a notch of memory latency. We have been testing with this update and can confirm a drop in that memory latency and thus the overall performance. We'll show you that later on in the article.
Ryzen 5 processors offer more value, as such we have been testing and benchmarking these parts based on nothing more than a very affordable Gigabyte B350 motherboard with that AGESA 1004 updated BIOS. Combined with some good memory the performance is there. From this day on we will also test Ryzen at 2933 MHZ or, if the platform supports it, 3200 MHz as yes, the symbiosis in-between Ryzen and higher-frequency memory is a very important factor to weigh in to your purchasing decisions.
The new SKUs are not clocked slow either, the Ryzen 5 1600X six-core processor is clocked as fast as its bigger eight-core brother at a 3.6 GHz base clock and 4.0 GHz Turbo. The quad-core 1500X on its end has a base frequency at 3.5 GHz and 3.7 on that Turbo. Now, before we get into detail, under the hood (that would be a euphemism for heat-spreader) these processors are ALL 8-core parts (physically). Yet they have been sorted and reconfigured. That quad-core in reality is the 8-core part yet set up and enabled in a 2+2 fashion, thus each out of the two 4-core clusters (CCXs) has 2 cores enabled. For the six-core parts that means per 4-core cluster (CCX) one core is disabled and that means these processors are set up in a 3+3 fashion. Other than that, again these are physically the 8-core Summit Ridge parts. That also invokes corresponding caches, TDPs and yes, these processors are all threaded and multiplier unlocked as well. The 1600X will have a 95W TDP, the 1500X sits at 65 Watts. According to AMD, Ryzen 5 1600X will be competing with the Intel Core i5 7600K and the Ryzen 5 1500X is attacking the price and performance bracket of the Core i5 7500.
Before we start-up the review, there has been a lot of chatter on the web on 1080p game performance, CCX interlink latency and bandwidth and/or clock frequencies being responsible and so on. The fact is that week after week Ryzen processor performance has been increasing thanks to BIOS updates and software optimizations. Pair it with good and reasonably fast memory (say 2933 MHz) and you will have a kick-ass value processor. Many of you have been following the news on memory latency. A new BIOS (AGESA 1004 based firmware) update ensures better performance and takes a notch of memory latency. We have been testing with this update and can confirm a drop in that memory latency and thus the overall performance. We'll show you that later on in the article.
Ryzen 5 processors offer more value, as such we have been testing and benchmarking these parts based on nothing more than a very affordable Gigabyte B350 motherboard with that AGESA 1004 updated BIOS. Combined with some good memory the performance is there. From this day on we will also test Ryzen at 2933 MHZ or, if the platform supports it, 3200 MHz as yes, the symbiosis in-between Ryzen and higher-frequency memory is a very important factor to weigh in to your purchasing decisions.
Kotaku Ryzen 5 1600x/1500x Review
After years of anticipating their release, it's hard for me to believe that AMD's Zen-based Ryzen CPUs only arrived a month ago. Frankly, I've never seen so much drama unfold so quickly in the tech community - what an exciting time to be a PC enthusiast!
As we begin to recover from the roller coaster ride that was Ryzen 7, we now have Ryzen 5 to address. Getting the ball rolling, AMD has announced four models in its more affordable series, including a pair of six-core CPUs as well as two quad-core models.
The 1600X is configured similarly to the Core i7-6800K and stands as the flagship of AMD's Ryzen 5 family, boasting six cores and 12 threads with a base clock frequency of 3.6GHz and a boost speed of up to 4GHz. Like all Ryzen CPUs, the 1600X is unlocked, but we wouldn't necessarily expect to squeeze much more out of the stock settings given what we've seen from Ryzen 7.
As we begin to recover from the roller coaster ride that was Ryzen 7, we now have Ryzen 5 to address. Getting the ball rolling, AMD has announced four models in its more affordable series, including a pair of six-core CPUs as well as two quad-core models.
The 1600X is configured similarly to the Core i7-6800K and stands as the flagship of AMD's Ryzen 5 family, boasting six cores and 12 threads with a base clock frequency of 3.6GHz and a boost speed of up to 4GHz. Like all Ryzen CPUs, the 1600X is unlocked, but we wouldn't necessarily expect to squeeze much more out of the stock settings given what we've seen from Ryzen 7.
Hexus Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x Review
The first half of 2017 is proving to be an interesting one for AMD. There's promise of next-generation RX Vega graphics coming to a PC in May or June, bringing much-needed competition to the high-end space, and AMD already has a trio of Ryzen eight-core CPUs out in the wild. Excelling in multi-core activity and offering a better bang for buck than Intel, premium Ryzen CPUs have been disruptive.
Yet the real CPU push arrives with Ryzen 5, launched today in 1400, 1500X, 1600 and 1600X flavours. A key difference between these chips and the range toppers is the marketing choice to split Ryzen 5 into four- and six-core models.
Ryzen 5 1400 and 1500X both use the established four-core, eight-thread architecture common on mainstream Intel chips. As we already know that all Ryzen chips are unlocked, the pair are split on base and boost frequencies, with R5 1400 chiming in at 3.2GHz base and 3.4GHz boost while 1500X increases this to 3.5GHz and 3.7GHz, respectively.
The XFR 'ultra-boost' clock is interesting insofar as it's poor on the 1400 but, at 200MHz, the highest of any Ryzen chip for the 1500X. It seems sensible to spend the extra $20 to avail yourself of guaranteed faster speeds and higher single-core potential. Both chips have a restrained 65W TDP, making them eminently suitable for small-form-factor PCs.
Ryzen 5 1600 and 1600X offer a middle ground between the top and bottom of the range by offering six cores and 12 threads, thus harnessing a core count that Intel doesn't currently play in. In other respects, R5 1600X is the same chip as the head honcho 1800X that we have reviewed recently, albeit at half the price.
AMD has confirmed that all Ryzen 5 CPUs are Ryzen 7 chips that have been symmetrically disabled, so 3+3 across two CCXes for the six-core part, and 2+2 across the same two CCXes for the four-core part. This means they use a much larger die than would be absolutely necessary, one that taps into the full 16MB gamut of L3 cache for all but the R5 1400, so it will be interesting to see if the Ryzen 5 1400/1500X ever move over to a single-CCX die. This is wholly AMD's manufacturing and costing concern, however.
Ryzen 5 chips are cut from the same eight-core cloth as Ryzen 7
All but the R5 1600X arrive at retail with coolers in the box. You may have heard of AMD releasing a slew of new heatsinks alongside the Ryzen launch, so the R5 1400 gets the Wraith Stealth while R5 1500X and R5 1600 receive the beefier Spire.
We'd argue it is far more important for AMD's continued bottom line to ensure that Ryzen 5 is successful against a host of Intel chips - each company will undoubtedly sell more of these than $300-plus models. With that in mind, here is how the Ryzen 5 quartet line up against the price-equivalent chips from Intel's current Kaby Lake stable.
AMD offers more threads at each price point, replicating what Ryzen 7 has done at the higher end of the spectrum. Gaming performance is still up in the air, especially as each chip is using SMT, so let's get right to the benchmarks.
Yet the real CPU push arrives with Ryzen 5, launched today in 1400, 1500X, 1600 and 1600X flavours. A key difference between these chips and the range toppers is the marketing choice to split Ryzen 5 into four- and six-core models.
Ryzen 5 1400 and 1500X both use the established four-core, eight-thread architecture common on mainstream Intel chips. As we already know that all Ryzen chips are unlocked, the pair are split on base and boost frequencies, with R5 1400 chiming in at 3.2GHz base and 3.4GHz boost while 1500X increases this to 3.5GHz and 3.7GHz, respectively.
The XFR 'ultra-boost' clock is interesting insofar as it's poor on the 1400 but, at 200MHz, the highest of any Ryzen chip for the 1500X. It seems sensible to spend the extra $20 to avail yourself of guaranteed faster speeds and higher single-core potential. Both chips have a restrained 65W TDP, making them eminently suitable for small-form-factor PCs.
Ryzen 5 1600 and 1600X offer a middle ground between the top and bottom of the range by offering six cores and 12 threads, thus harnessing a core count that Intel doesn't currently play in. In other respects, R5 1600X is the same chip as the head honcho 1800X that we have reviewed recently, albeit at half the price.
AMD has confirmed that all Ryzen 5 CPUs are Ryzen 7 chips that have been symmetrically disabled, so 3+3 across two CCXes for the six-core part, and 2+2 across the same two CCXes for the four-core part. This means they use a much larger die than would be absolutely necessary, one that taps into the full 16MB gamut of L3 cache for all but the R5 1400, so it will be interesting to see if the Ryzen 5 1400/1500X ever move over to a single-CCX die. This is wholly AMD's manufacturing and costing concern, however.
Ryzen 5 chips are cut from the same eight-core cloth as Ryzen 7
All but the R5 1600X arrive at retail with coolers in the box. You may have heard of AMD releasing a slew of new heatsinks alongside the Ryzen launch, so the R5 1400 gets the Wraith Stealth while R5 1500X and R5 1600 receive the beefier Spire.
We'd argue it is far more important for AMD's continued bottom line to ensure that Ryzen 5 is successful against a host of Intel chips - each company will undoubtedly sell more of these than $300-plus models. With that in mind, here is how the Ryzen 5 quartet line up against the price-equivalent chips from Intel's current Kaby Lake stable.
AMD offers more threads at each price point, replicating what Ryzen 7 has done at the higher end of the spectrum. Gaming performance is still up in the air, especially as each chip is using SMT, so let's get right to the benchmarks.
Tom's Hardware Ryzen 5 1600x review
The Ryzen 5 family shifts focus to enthusiasts and gaming with a quartet of six- and four-core models that line up against Intel's LGA 1151-based incumbents.
AMD began its assault on the high-end desktop with Ryzen 7. And while the 7-series introduced disruptive pricing and impressive performance to heavily threaded workstation apps (especially compared to Intel's Broadwell-E-based Core i7s), its 8C/16T configuration isn't fully utilized by most mainstream software, including games. Lower than expected frame rates, especially at lower resolutions, had many in the technology press wondering where the architecture was coming up short. But even if Ryzen 5 has the same issue, lower prices and a persistent core count advantage should set AMD up to battle fiercely on more mainstream platforms.
Similar to Ryzen 7, the Ryzen 5 processors lack on-die GPUs. This means they're destined to drop into PCs with discrete graphics cards, making them well-suited for the gaming market. AMD devotes all of the die's transistors to cores, cache, connectivity, and communications, allowing Ryzen 5 to tackle Core i5 and Core i7 with more host processing resources.
The $249 Ryzen 5 1600X is ambitiously aligned with Intel's Core i5-7600K. It comes with six SMT-enabled cores able to operate on as many as 12 threads in parallel. Like the flagship Ryzen 7 1800X, AMD's 95W 1600X features 16MB of L3 cache, a 3.6 GHz base clock rate, and a 4 GHz boost frequency. It includes the same dual-core 4.1 GHz eXtended Frequency Range setting that automatically activates if your thermal solution is beefy enough. And XFR also contributes to an all-core 3.7 GHz boost level for heavily-threaded workloads.
Intel's 91W Core i5-7600K, which only has four physical cores and 6MB of last-level cache, appears anemic by comparison. However, much of the Kaby Lake architecture's strength comes from excellent per-core performance. This is incredibly important in software that can't fully utilize multi-core configurations. Ryzen's IPC throughput lags Intel's by ~10%, even after the massive gains attributable to the Zen design. As a result, Kaby Lake maintains a per-core, per-clock advantage.
AMD began its assault on the high-end desktop with Ryzen 7. And while the 7-series introduced disruptive pricing and impressive performance to heavily threaded workstation apps (especially compared to Intel's Broadwell-E-based Core i7s), its 8C/16T configuration isn't fully utilized by most mainstream software, including games. Lower than expected frame rates, especially at lower resolutions, had many in the technology press wondering where the architecture was coming up short. But even if Ryzen 5 has the same issue, lower prices and a persistent core count advantage should set AMD up to battle fiercely on more mainstream platforms.
Similar to Ryzen 7, the Ryzen 5 processors lack on-die GPUs. This means they're destined to drop into PCs with discrete graphics cards, making them well-suited for the gaming market. AMD devotes all of the die's transistors to cores, cache, connectivity, and communications, allowing Ryzen 5 to tackle Core i5 and Core i7 with more host processing resources.
The $249 Ryzen 5 1600X is ambitiously aligned with Intel's Core i5-7600K. It comes with six SMT-enabled cores able to operate on as many as 12 threads in parallel. Like the flagship Ryzen 7 1800X, AMD's 95W 1600X features 16MB of L3 cache, a 3.6 GHz base clock rate, and a 4 GHz boost frequency. It includes the same dual-core 4.1 GHz eXtended Frequency Range setting that automatically activates if your thermal solution is beefy enough. And XFR also contributes to an all-core 3.7 GHz boost level for heavily-threaded workloads.
Intel's 91W Core i5-7600K, which only has four physical cores and 6MB of last-level cache, appears anemic by comparison. However, much of the Kaby Lake architecture's strength comes from excellent per-core performance. This is incredibly important in software that can't fully utilize multi-core configurations. Ryzen's IPC throughput lags Intel's by ~10%, even after the massive gains attributable to the Zen design. As a result, Kaby Lake maintains a per-core, per-clock advantage.
KitGuru Ryzen 5 1600x review
Enthusiasts have pinned hope on AMD's eagerly-anticipated Ryzen 5 line-up as a set of processors that can offer competitive performance at an affordable, mid-range price point. The price range in question is currently dominated by Intel's quad-core Core i5 CPUs that do not feature Hyper-Threading and only get an unlocked multiplier for the highest-end option.
AMD is taking the fight to Intel's $242 multiplier-unlocked 3.8-4.2GHz Core i5-7600K 4C4T processor with a 6C12T Ryzen 5 1600X clocked at 3.6-4.0GHz and retailing for $249. With overclocking the Core i5-7600K to 4.8GHz+ being a known simple procedure, can AMD's Ryzen 5 1600X leverage its 50% increase in cores and three-times as many threads to compete against the current mid-range champion?
The six-core, twelve-thread 1600X comes in as AMD's Ryzen 5 flagship. Sporting a clock speed of 3.6-4.0GHz using Precision Boost, with up to 4.1GHz under Extended Frequency Range (XFR) conditions, the six-core part is essentially three quarters of a Ryzen 7 1800X. That point holds true for several of the metrics. However, the TDP is still rated at 95W and the twin CPU Complex (CCX) design means that the 1600X retains its full slab of 16MB shared L3 cache. L2 cache tips the scales at the same 512KB per core for all Ryzen processors thus far, giving this six-core part a 3MB capacity.
On the topic of the dual CCX design, AMD is deploying Ryzen 5 six-core parts as 3+3 layouts. This means that one CPU core per CCX is disabled before joining the pair of complexes together by AMD's Infinity Fabric. A 3+3 design should achieve the highest level of balance and it helps to ensure part consistency; opting for 3+3 as well as 4+2 layouts would have introduced manufacturing and performance variations between supposedly identical Ryzen 5 six-core processors. Utilisation of the CCXs in a 3-core capacity may also allow AMD to put defunct Ryzen 7 silicon to effective use. 14nm FinFET manufacturing is not cheap and the less silicon put in the bin, the better.
Of course, there's also the other side of the argument that suggests AMD is manually disabling a single core on the CCXs to achieve market segmentation. If this is true, we could see a return to the good old days of core unlocking on AMD CPUs but we do not know if this will be the case (or if it's even possible).
To say that AM4 is a flexible platform would be an understatement. Like all other Ryzen processors, the Ryzen 5 1600X can be dropped into an AM4 motherboard with no less than five different chipset types. Three of those - the enthusiast X370, mainstream B350, and SFF X300 - support overclocking with Ryzen's unlocked core multiplier. By comparison, Intel forces you onto its Z270 chipset for overclocking support (and high-speed memory, for that matter) with LGA 1151 CPUs and those boards come with a ~£100 starting price.
The logical partner for Ryzen 5 is a B350 chipset motherboard. Compared to the high-end (read: expensive) enthusiast-geared X370 motherboards found partnered with Ryzen 7, B350 forces you to give up PCIe bifurcation thus blocking multi-GPU CrossFire and SLI support, as well as a small number of USB 3.0, SATA 6Gbps, and PCIe 2.0 lanes.
You'll also have to accept the lower quality power delivery solution that vendors tend to create on their B350 motherboards that hover around a £100 sweet-spot. By comparison, £100 gets you an entry-level Intel Z270 motherboard that is short on frills but utilises the feature-rich 200-series chipset. B350 AM4 motherboards start at around £80. £80 for Intel gets you a non-overclockable H270 or B250 chipset offering.
AMD is taking the fight to Intel's $242 multiplier-unlocked 3.8-4.2GHz Core i5-7600K 4C4T processor with a 6C12T Ryzen 5 1600X clocked at 3.6-4.0GHz and retailing for $249. With overclocking the Core i5-7600K to 4.8GHz+ being a known simple procedure, can AMD's Ryzen 5 1600X leverage its 50% increase in cores and three-times as many threads to compete against the current mid-range champion?
The six-core, twelve-thread 1600X comes in as AMD's Ryzen 5 flagship. Sporting a clock speed of 3.6-4.0GHz using Precision Boost, with up to 4.1GHz under Extended Frequency Range (XFR) conditions, the six-core part is essentially three quarters of a Ryzen 7 1800X. That point holds true for several of the metrics. However, the TDP is still rated at 95W and the twin CPU Complex (CCX) design means that the 1600X retains its full slab of 16MB shared L3 cache. L2 cache tips the scales at the same 512KB per core for all Ryzen processors thus far, giving this six-core part a 3MB capacity.
On the topic of the dual CCX design, AMD is deploying Ryzen 5 six-core parts as 3+3 layouts. This means that one CPU core per CCX is disabled before joining the pair of complexes together by AMD's Infinity Fabric. A 3+3 design should achieve the highest level of balance and it helps to ensure part consistency; opting for 3+3 as well as 4+2 layouts would have introduced manufacturing and performance variations between supposedly identical Ryzen 5 six-core processors. Utilisation of the CCXs in a 3-core capacity may also allow AMD to put defunct Ryzen 7 silicon to effective use. 14nm FinFET manufacturing is not cheap and the less silicon put in the bin, the better.
Of course, there's also the other side of the argument that suggests AMD is manually disabling a single core on the CCXs to achieve market segmentation. If this is true, we could see a return to the good old days of core unlocking on AMD CPUs but we do not know if this will be the case (or if it's even possible).
To say that AM4 is a flexible platform would be an understatement. Like all other Ryzen processors, the Ryzen 5 1600X can be dropped into an AM4 motherboard with no less than five different chipset types. Three of those - the enthusiast X370, mainstream B350, and SFF X300 - support overclocking with Ryzen's unlocked core multiplier. By comparison, Intel forces you onto its Z270 chipset for overclocking support (and high-speed memory, for that matter) with LGA 1151 CPUs and those boards come with a ~£100 starting price.
The logical partner for Ryzen 5 is a B350 chipset motherboard. Compared to the high-end (read: expensive) enthusiast-geared X370 motherboards found partnered with Ryzen 7, B350 forces you to give up PCIe bifurcation thus blocking multi-GPU CrossFire and SLI support, as well as a small number of USB 3.0, SATA 6Gbps, and PCIe 2.0 lanes.
You'll also have to accept the lower quality power delivery solution that vendors tend to create on their B350 motherboards that hover around a £100 sweet-spot. By comparison, £100 gets you an entry-level Intel Z270 motherboard that is short on frills but utilises the feature-rich 200-series chipset. B350 AM4 motherboards start at around £80. £80 for Intel gets you a non-overclockable H270 or B250 chipset offering.
HardwareCanucks Ryzen 5 1500x/1600x review
There I was last Monday, about four weeks after AMD's successful Ryzen 7 launch and not that long after the first true details of Ryzen 5 were allowed to filter through and a package arrived from AMD. Inside was a pair of processors, the 1600X and 1500X. I was even more excited to review this dynamic duo than any of the other CPUs which have passed through these labs in the last four or so years.
Now make no mistake about it; Ryzen 7 had me giddy with anticipation since it represented a return to competitiveness for the company which originally produced the CPU in my first DIY system. But Ryzen 5 and the processors under its umbrella are something else entirely. Whereas even something like the competitive Ryzen 7 1700X will be unobtanium for many, the more affordable chips in the 5-series lineup will be what the rest of us can afford.
Even though I already covered the Ryzen 5 processors' relative positioning against their Intel competitors, let's reiterate for a moment since some of you may not have read our initial preview. Starting at the very bottom of the lineup is the $170 Ryzen 5 1400. Equipped with a quartet of physical cores and eight threads, it will be running straight up against the unlocked dual core, quad thread i3-7350K. In previous generations AMD's intent was to fight Intel's clock speed or IPC domination by offering more processing threads and nothing has changed with Ryzen.
Move a bit further down-market and we come to the Ryzen 5 1500X, one of the highlights in this particular review. At $189 it slides into the very narrow space between the i5-7400 and i5-7500 while offering something neither Intel processor does: an unlocked multiplier and eight threads.
The $250 Ryzen 5 1600X and $220 1600 are pretty unique processors. Even though they cost about as much as the i5-7600K and i5-7600 respectively, both offer six cores, twelve threads and some very appealing performance metrics. AMD isn't quite expecting these to compete against the i7-7700 series (and that says a lot about Ryzen 5's positioning) but they nonetheless represent a significant monetary savings over even the lowest-tier Ryzen 7.
Looking beyond pricing towards the raw specifications shows some interesting elements of these new Ryzen 5 products. First and foremost the 1600X may "only" have 6 cores but its internal clocks match those of a $499 1800X. While the extra threads on the higher end Ryzen CPU may help it win some heavily multithreaded benchmarks, frequencies alone may allow its more affordable stablemate to compete in games. One thing to note about the 1600X is that its single thread XFR rate goes to a maximum of 4.1GHz, much like the 1800X.
The 1600 is more of an outlier than anything else and we are sure to see it become a darling in the system integrator space due to its TDP of just 65W. Due to substantially lower speeds, it will likely be less appealing for DIYers who want a drop-in solution that will maximize performance per dollar.
The Ryzen 5 1500X represents the transition point with AMD's lineup to a quad core layout. There was a lot of care put into its frequencies to insure higher end Ryzen offerings didn't have their toes stepped on but base / boost rates of 3.5GHz and 3.7GHz respectively aren't anything to turn your nose up at either. The 1500X also happens to be the only processor in the AMD lineup thus far that has an additional 200MHz of XFR headroom. Those numbers are actually very close to the 3.4GHz / 3.8GHz i5-7500 as well.
Rounding out the Ryzen 5 lineup is the lowly 1400, a chip that will surely be destined for emerging markets. Even though it is just $20 less expensive than its sibling, both frequencies and cache allocation has been cut quite drastically.
AMD has taken a pretty interesting approach when it comes to designing their lower-end processors. If you have already read our deep dive, you will know the Zen architecture's foundational building block is the highly modularized CCX or Core Complex. Each CCX houses a quartet of physical cores, 64K L1 I-cache, 64K L1 D-cache, 512KB dedicated L2 cache per core, and 8MB L3 cache shared across all cores. That means in order to create an 8-core part like Ryzen 7, AMD added a pair of CCX's to a common die and allows them to communicate with one another via a high level on-chip network called the Infinity Fabric.
The Ryzen 5 processors -even the quad core parts like the 1500X- all use the exact same 8-core layout as Ryzen 7 but cut down the physical cores equally across CCX's. For example, the 1600X uses a 3+3 layout while the 1500X and 1400 have a 2+2 implementation. Since each core has an associative L2 Cache block, that section of the chip scales in a linear fashion as well, whereas the shared L3 cache remains a constant 16MB throughout the lineup. The only exception to this is the Ryzen 5 1400 which also gets a portion of its shared cache chopped off.
Adding a bit more value to this equation is the inclusion of a Wraith Spire cooler with the 1600 and 1500X. Remember, this is a non-RGB version of the cooler so if you are expecting some sexy lighting effects you'll be let down. Meanwhile the 1400 will receive a more basic but still quite capable Wraith stealth heatsink.
While the Ryzen launches haven't been without their fair share of controversy and missteps, AMD has understandably high hopes for the Ryzen 5 lineup. Whereas Ryzen 7 will act as a type of halo product with plenty of appeal for professionals and prossumers alike, these new more affordable processors are meant to be their volume movers. Not only will that put them in direct contention against Intel's newer Kaby Lake microarchitecture but AMD needs competitive mid and lower-tier offerings if they have any hope of long-term success. With that in mind, a lot is riding on this launch.
Now make no mistake about it; Ryzen 7 had me giddy with anticipation since it represented a return to competitiveness for the company which originally produced the CPU in my first DIY system. But Ryzen 5 and the processors under its umbrella are something else entirely. Whereas even something like the competitive Ryzen 7 1700X will be unobtanium for many, the more affordable chips in the 5-series lineup will be what the rest of us can afford.
Even though I already covered the Ryzen 5 processors' relative positioning against their Intel competitors, let's reiterate for a moment since some of you may not have read our initial preview. Starting at the very bottom of the lineup is the $170 Ryzen 5 1400. Equipped with a quartet of physical cores and eight threads, it will be running straight up against the unlocked dual core, quad thread i3-7350K. In previous generations AMD's intent was to fight Intel's clock speed or IPC domination by offering more processing threads and nothing has changed with Ryzen.
Move a bit further down-market and we come to the Ryzen 5 1500X, one of the highlights in this particular review. At $189 it slides into the very narrow space between the i5-7400 and i5-7500 while offering something neither Intel processor does: an unlocked multiplier and eight threads.
The $250 Ryzen 5 1600X and $220 1600 are pretty unique processors. Even though they cost about as much as the i5-7600K and i5-7600 respectively, both offer six cores, twelve threads and some very appealing performance metrics. AMD isn't quite expecting these to compete against the i7-7700 series (and that says a lot about Ryzen 5's positioning) but they nonetheless represent a significant monetary savings over even the lowest-tier Ryzen 7.
Looking beyond pricing towards the raw specifications shows some interesting elements of these new Ryzen 5 products. First and foremost the 1600X may "only" have 6 cores but its internal clocks match those of a $499 1800X. While the extra threads on the higher end Ryzen CPU may help it win some heavily multithreaded benchmarks, frequencies alone may allow its more affordable stablemate to compete in games. One thing to note about the 1600X is that its single thread XFR rate goes to a maximum of 4.1GHz, much like the 1800X.
The 1600 is more of an outlier than anything else and we are sure to see it become a darling in the system integrator space due to its TDP of just 65W. Due to substantially lower speeds, it will likely be less appealing for DIYers who want a drop-in solution that will maximize performance per dollar.
The Ryzen 5 1500X represents the transition point with AMD's lineup to a quad core layout. There was a lot of care put into its frequencies to insure higher end Ryzen offerings didn't have their toes stepped on but base / boost rates of 3.5GHz and 3.7GHz respectively aren't anything to turn your nose up at either. The 1500X also happens to be the only processor in the AMD lineup thus far that has an additional 200MHz of XFR headroom. Those numbers are actually very close to the 3.4GHz / 3.8GHz i5-7500 as well.
Rounding out the Ryzen 5 lineup is the lowly 1400, a chip that will surely be destined for emerging markets. Even though it is just $20 less expensive than its sibling, both frequencies and cache allocation has been cut quite drastically.
AMD has taken a pretty interesting approach when it comes to designing their lower-end processors. If you have already read our deep dive, you will know the Zen architecture's foundational building block is the highly modularized CCX or Core Complex. Each CCX houses a quartet of physical cores, 64K L1 I-cache, 64K L1 D-cache, 512KB dedicated L2 cache per core, and 8MB L3 cache shared across all cores. That means in order to create an 8-core part like Ryzen 7, AMD added a pair of CCX's to a common die and allows them to communicate with one another via a high level on-chip network called the Infinity Fabric.
The Ryzen 5 processors -even the quad core parts like the 1500X- all use the exact same 8-core layout as Ryzen 7 but cut down the physical cores equally across CCX's. For example, the 1600X uses a 3+3 layout while the 1500X and 1400 have a 2+2 implementation. Since each core has an associative L2 Cache block, that section of the chip scales in a linear fashion as well, whereas the shared L3 cache remains a constant 16MB throughout the lineup. The only exception to this is the Ryzen 5 1400 which also gets a portion of its shared cache chopped off.
Adding a bit more value to this equation is the inclusion of a Wraith Spire cooler with the 1600 and 1500X. Remember, this is a non-RGB version of the cooler so if you are expecting some sexy lighting effects you'll be let down. Meanwhile the 1400 will receive a more basic but still quite capable Wraith stealth heatsink.
While the Ryzen launches haven't been without their fair share of controversy and missteps, AMD has understandably high hopes for the Ryzen 5 lineup. Whereas Ryzen 7 will act as a type of halo product with plenty of appeal for professionals and prossumers alike, these new more affordable processors are meant to be their volume movers. Not only will that put them in direct contention against Intel's newer Kaby Lake microarchitecture but AMD needs competitive mid and lower-tier offerings if they have any hope of long-term success. With that in mind, a lot is riding on this launch.
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