Introduction
While the latest AMD Ryzen 5000 series processors are without a doubt AMD’s most successful and powerful Ryzen CPUs, its pricing is currently out of reach for budget-oriented gamers, To this day, the Ryzen 5 3600 remains to be the most coveted Ryzen processor despite its age as AMD has yet to fill a Ryzen 5000 series processor in the Php 10,000 to Php 12,000 price range. The recent announcement of the new Ryzen 5000 G series APUs sheds some light on our budget-oriented gamer friends as the new 5000 G series APUs are priced lower than their CPU-only counters. The Ryzen 5 5600G will be our focus for this review with its 6-core and 12-thread setup rivaling the popular Ryzen 5 3600 and Intel’s very own Core i5 11600K CPU.
AMD Zen 3 Overview
The Ryzen 5000 series processors are still under the 7-nanometer process node by TSMC but are under an all-new Zen 3 architecture. In AMD’s last press event, Lisa Su talked about the Ryzen 5000 series processors getting a 19-percent Instructions Per Clock uplift and a massive performance-per-watt efficiency. AMD did a ground-up redesign with the Zen 3 architecture to achieve a +19% IPC uplift alongside some functionality improvements over the previous Zen 2 architecture.
Achieving +19% IPC
AMD’s engineering team did remarkable work with the Zen 3 CPUs as they improved the pipeline allowing for faster fetching, reduced latency, and reduced memory and cache dependency.
The AMD Ryzen 5000 series has undergone design changes at the SoC architecture as well. Zen 2 CPUs utilized a union of two core complexes(CCX) per compute die(CCD), whereas Zen 3 processors now feature a unified CCD meaning each CCX can consist of up to 8C/16T & 32MB L3 Cache instead of Zen 2’s 4C/8T & 16MB L3 Cache per CCX. The consolidated core and cache complex on Zen allows better performance, especially on latency-sensitive workloads. The Zen 3 layout design eliminates CCX-to-CCX communication within the die and enables a direct-access pool of the 32MB L3 Cache. CPU intensive games will significantly benefit from Zen’s redesigned CCD and CCX layout
AMD Ryzen 5 5600G
AMD recently launched the Ryzen 7 5700G and Ryzen 5 5600G CPUs prior to the announcement of the AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT. These APUs feature the same core and thread count as their X counterparts but feature RX Vega 8 and RX Vega 7 CUs. The new Ryzen 7 5700G and Ryzen 5 5600G Cezanne APUs are a significant upgrade over the Zen+ Picasso models that launched last 2019. Originally, the 5700G and 5600G were limited to OEM systems alongside the Ryzen 3 5300G.
| AMD Ryzen 5000 CPUs | |||||||
| CPU | Ryzen 9 5950X | Ryzen 9 5900X | Ryzen 7 5800X | Ryzen 5 5600X | Ryzen 5 5600G | Ryzen 5 3600 | Intel Core i5 11600K |
| Cores/threads | 16/32 | 12/24 | 8/16 | 6/12 | 6/12 | 6/12 | 6/12 |
| Base clock (GHz) | 3.4 | 3.7 | 3.8 | 3.7 | 3.9 | 3.6 | 3.9 |
| Boost clock (GHz) | 4.9 | 4.8 | 4.7 | 4.6 | 4.4 | 4.2 | 4.9 |
| L2 + L3 Cache | 72MB | 70MB | 36MB | 35MB | 35MB | 35MB | 12MB |
| TDP | 105W | 105W | 105W | 65W | 65W | 65W | 125W |
| Launch Price – USD | $799 | $549 | $449 | $299 | $259 | $199 | $262 |
| PH SRP | ₱44,900 | ₱30,250.00 | ₱24,800.00 | ₱16,550.00 | ₱15,100.00 | ₱10,600.00 | ₱16,000.00 |
The AMD Ryzen 5 5600G runs at a base clock of 3.9Ghz which is 200Mhz lower than the Ryzen 5 5600X and 300Mhz faster than the Ryzen 5 3600. Its boost clock can go up to 4.4Ghz, 200Mhz faster than the Ryzen 5 3600 but also 200mhz slower than the 5600X. The RX Vega 7 CU operates at 1.7Ghz with a boost clock of 1.9GHz. Depending on the usage, the Ryzen 5 5600G’s TDP ranges from 45W to 65W.
There’s an included Wraith Stealth cooler for the retail variant of the AMD Ryzen 5 5600G. Frankly, if you plan to use the Ryzen 5 5600G together with its iGPU, investing in an aftermarket cooler is a must in order to yield lower temps thus getting more FPS and better framerate stability.
Benchmark Setup and Methodology
Gadget Pilipinas’ testing philosophy is to provide detail-oriented results as accurately as possible that our readers can replicate our tests given that these conditions are met. Different benchmarking apps and sequences are used depending on the component or device being tested.
| AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review Test Bench Specs | ||||||
| CPU | Intel Core i7 11900K | Intel Core i5 11600K | AMD Ryzen 9 5950X | AMD Ryzen 7 5800X | AMD Ryzen 5 5600G | AMD Ryzen 5 3600 |
| COOLER | Corsair H100i RGB PRO XT 240mm AIO – Noctua NT-H2 Thermal Paste | |||||
| MOTHERBOARD | ASUS ROG Strix Z590-E Gaming Motherboard | ASUS ROG Crosshair VIII Hero (Wi-Fi) | ||||
| MEMORY | Tforce XTREEM ARGB 16GB(2x8GB) 3600Mhz DDR4 | |||||
| GPU | Palit RTX 3080 Gaming Pro OC | |||||
| STORAGE | WD Black SN850 2TB SSD | |||||
| POWERSUPPLY | ThermalTake ToughPower 1200w Platinum | |||||
| OPERATING SYSTEM | Windows 10 Pro Build 2404 | |||||
| DISPLAY | Lenovo Legion Y27Q Gaming Monitor | |||||
We use CapFrameX 1.6.2 as our FPS capture and analysis tool for all our gaming benchmarks. The latest build version of Windows 10 and WHQL certified drivers are used for our benchmarks. Readings such as temperatures and power draw are recorded using HWMonitor, HWInfo64, and other relevant software for cross-checking.
Our benchmark list and methodology may change in the future, depending on the industry trend.
AMD Ryzen 5 5600G CPU Benchmarks
SuperPI 32M
SuperPI is a single-threaded benchmark application that lets the CPU calculate Pi(π) to the nth digit. In this benchmark, we selected the Pi calculation to 32M, the highest available for the app.
wPrime 1024M
wPrime is a benchmark tool similar to SuperPI, but the former takes on finding prime numbers using Newton’s Method. The benchmark is set to calculate 1024 million prime numbers, and the performance is measured according to calculation time.
AIDA64 Memory Benchmark
AIDA64 is a very popular and powerful monitoring tool, as well as a benchmarking application. AIDA64 is commonly used to stress test CPUs, especially testing if an overclock is stable. We used AIDA64’s Memory Benchmark to measure the data transfer bandwidth of the system memory.
GeekBench 5
Geekbench is a multi-platform benchmark used to gauge CPU performance and compare them across Windows, Mac, and Mobile. Geekbench 5 is the latest version and doesn’t rely on memory than the previous Geekbench 4, making it a great tool to measure both single-core and multi-core CPU performance.
CINEBENCH R20
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review Cinebench R20 Benchmark
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review Cinebench R23 Benchmark
Maxon’s Cinebench benchmark is one of the most iconic benchmark applications used by reviewers and enthusiasts. The latest Cinebench R20 uses the latest rendering architectures, including Intel’s Embree ray tracing technology and other advanced features from AMD and Intel that allow users to render the same scene on the same hard. Cinebench R20 uses a larger and more complex testing scene than Cinebench R20 by about 8x computational power and requires 4x the memory.
GOOGLE OCTANE 2.0
Google Octane 2.0 is a benchmark that measures a Javascript engine’s performance by running multiple tests representing different use cases of JavaScript applications. While Google Octane is retired and no longer maintained, it is still a good representation of today’s dynamic, interactive web applications. Our Google Octane 2.0 is run on Microsoft’s latest Chromium-based Edge browser.
V-RAY
V-Ray Benchmark is a stand-alone version V-Ray developed by Chaos Group. It is designed to test the CPU and GPU by rendering sample scenes at a fixed amount of time. V-Ray is a plug-in mostly utilized by 3D computer graphics software applications mainly for industrial design, product design, architecture, film, and video game production. V-Ray is not limited to 64-threads as it supports multi and mega-threading.
HWBOT x265
HWBOT x265, developed by Czech overclocker Havli, is a multi-threaded application that takes advantage of modern CPU instruction sets with support for older CPUs. HWBOT x265 benchmark uses the x265/HEVC encoder that renders a video in 1080p or 4K resolution.
HANDBRAKE
Handbrake is a top-rated open-source video conversion software that is used by professionals, enthusiasts, and even reviewers as a reference point mainly because of its wide variety of media codecs. The rise of streaming and blogging makes video content, both encoding, and transcoding important for these people, regardless if they’re seasoned professionals or just starting out. Handbrake also takes advantage of AVX-512 and OpenCL to accelerate certain types of media codecs. Our Handbrake benchmark converts a 500MB MP4 video to H.264 to measure the processor’s performance.
BLENDER
Blender is a widely used, free, opensource 3D creation suite. It supports the whole 3D pipeline process from modeling, rigging, animation, simulation, rendering, and even motion tracking. Blender has become a standard for CPU benchmarks with the BMW27 and Classroom scene most used. This prompted the company to release Blender Open Data Benchmark in 2018, a benchmark-specific version which allows users to run a preset benchmark and share the results online similar to 3D Mark.
CORONA RENDERER
Corona Renderer is an unbiased photorealistic render available for Autodesk 3Ds Max, Maxon Cinema 4D, and as a stand-alone application. Its popularity, similar to Blender, led Chaos Group to develop a benchmark version of the app which runs using Corona Renderer 1.3. Workstation systems, especially CPUs, can utilize Corona Benchmark as up to 72 threads can be used in the benchmark, making it very suitable for CPUs with various price segments.
PCMark10
From the same developers of the popular game benchmarking tool 3DMark, PCMark 10 is a benchmarking app for measure a whole PC’s performance. It covers a wide variety of tests to reflect common tasks performed in a modern workplace. We selected PCMark 10’s extended benchmark and reported both the overall score and Digital Content Creation Score.
AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Gaming Benchmarks
3DMARK
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review 3DMark Firestrike Benchmark
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review 3DMark Port Royal Benchmark
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review 3DMark TimeSpy Benchmark
3DMark is the go-to benchmark for gamers because of the ability to share and compare results online. We used Time Spy DirectX 12 benchmark and Fire Strike DirectX 11 benchmark to gauge the CPU’s performance using different APIs.
DOTA 2
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review DOTA 2 Benchmark 1080p
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review DOTA 2 Benchmark 1440p
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review DOTA 2 Benchmark 4k
Most gamers play at least one of the following free-to-play titles: League of Legends, CS: GO, Dota 2, and/or Fortnite. Dota 2 is a good representation of the F2P titles as it is the most demanding game in the spectrum. The benchmark will give you an idea of the laptop’s relative performance on other lesser demanding titles. Our benchmark sequence is based on a replay of OG vs. Liquid in the TI9 grand finals from the team fight that happened from 28:30 to 29:30.
Far Cry 5
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review Far Cry 5 Benchmark 1080p
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review Far Cry 5 Benchmark 1440p
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review Far Cry 5 Benchmark 4k
FarCry 5 is an FPS game published by Ubisoft and uses the Dunia engine. It heavily relies on and takes advantage of DirectX 11 to render a realistic environment that makes it taxing to both the CPU and GPU.
Rainbow Six Siege
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review R6S Benchmark 1080p
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review R6S Benchmark 1440p
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Review R6S Benchmark 4k
Rainbow Six Seige is one of the few popular AAA games that’s still popular in 2019 due to its competitive gameplay mechanics. R6S uses the AnvilNext game engine, which is developed by the game’s publisher, Ubisoft. As of writing, Rainbow Six Siege is currently the most popular Tom Clancy title beating out Wildlands, Breakpoint and even, Division 2.
Cyberpunk 2077
Cyberpunk 2077 is arguably the most hyped game of 2020. Developed by CD Projekt Red, the dystopian open-world, action-adventure RPG sports is one of the most demanding titles to date. Cyberpunk 2077 also supports three Ray Tracing settings as well as DLSS which makes the game a great tool to measure Ray tracing performance for both AMD and Nvidia graphics cards.
Horizon Zero Dawn
Horizon Zero Dawn is one of the most popular console-port RPG developed by Guerilla Games and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Horizon Zero Dawn is a multi-award-winning action RPG and its popularity resulted in an exclusive Complete Edition game bundle in Steam.
Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey
Assassin’s Creed Odyssey is the latest franchise installment from Ubisoft. It’s by far the most popular and stable Assassin’s Creed title since AC IV: Black Flag. It uses the AnvilNext 2.0 game engine, an updated version of Rainbow Six Siege’s game engine, and uses the DirectX 12 API.
F1 2020
F1 2020 is the official video game of the 2020 Formula 1 and Formula 2 championships developed by Codemasters. F1 2020 is the twelfth installment in the franchise and uses the Ego Engine 3.0. F1 2020 is a good representation of racing games thanks to its realistic graphics and fairly demanding spec requirements.
GOD FALL
God Fall, developed by Counterplay Games is an action RPG that was one of the first titles to support Vulkan Ray Tracing making it a great addition to our benchmark suite. Godfall is running on Unreal Engine 4. As of writing, Ray Tracing on Godfall is currently exclusive to AMD 6000 series video cards.
AMD Ryzen 5 5600G Temps and Power Draw
Despite having an integrated graphics card, the Ryzen 5 5600G yields the coolest temps at 69.4°C which is considerably cooler than the 5800X which is also built on the 7-nanometer process and the same core-count Ryzen 5 3600. Do note that the integrated RX Vega 7 CUs were not used so expect to have slightly higher temperatures when you game on the Ryzen 5 5600G using its integrated graphics.
The AMD Ryzen 5 5600G draws around 9-watts less than the Ryzen 5 5600G thanks to the efficiency brought upon by the 7-nanometer process. Again, do note that the 5600G might consume more power especially when its integrated graphics are used.
Conclusion
The AMD Ryzen 5 5600G performs around 10% better than the two-year-old Ryzen 5 3600 but it’s almost 50% more expensive as well. At Php 15,100 price tag, the Ryzen 5 5600G is Php 1,500 less than the Ryzen 5 5600X which has double the L3 Cache and has 200 Mhz higher core clocks. Moreover, you’ll also lose PCI-E 4.0 support as the 5600has only 24 lanes of PCI-E 3.0 – though it may not matter today, getting a Gen 4 SSD in the near future where prices have stabilized is something you should’ve considered the moment you bought the Ryzen 5 5600G. APUs or Processors with integrated graphics in retrospect have always been considered only for gamers who couldn’t afford even the most entry-level graphics card. But with the Ryzen 5000 G series processors, their timing couldn’t have been better as these APUs are what gamers currently need considering the ongoing graphics card mining hype and global silicon shortage. That said, for the extra Php 4,000 over the Ryzen 5 3600, the AMD Ryzen 5 5600G offers more CPU performance and an integrated graphics card that serves as a band-aid to the ongoing GPU crisis as it can get you through gaming with E-Sports titles or even older AAA titles granted the obvious loss in graphics quality. Nonetheless, the Ryzen 5 5600G is a viable 1080p gaming processor with integrated graphics for those who are holding their GPU purchase until the shortage is over. Needless to say for those who don’t have GPU budget issues, the 5600X is still the obvious choice.
Grant is a Financial Management graduate from UST. His passion for gadgets and tech crossed him over in the industry where he could apply his knowledge as an enthusiast and in-depth analytic skills as a Finance Major. His passion allows him to earn at the same time help Gadget Pilipinas' readers in making smart, value-based decisions and purchases with his reviews and guides.
