Every so often there comes a processor that captures the market. It ends up being that right combination of price, cores, frequency, performance, features and compatibility when added to the right sort of motherboard that makes it fly off the shelves. The main CPU this cycle seems to be the Ryzen 5 3600, offering six high-performance Zen 2 cores and 24 lanes of PCIe 4.0 for only $199. It currently sits at #1 on the Amazon best seller list, so we put one through the paces just to see if the hype was actually real.

At $199, the AMD Ryzen 5 3600 has been one the cheapest way to get ahold of AMD’s latest Zen2 microarchitecture. In our reviews of the lead generation Ryzen products, as well as Zen2 on Threadripper, Zen2 in EPYC, and Zen2 in Renoir, this microarchitecture is pushing new performance boundaries clock-for-clock against Intel’s other desktop offerings. In fact, until the latest launch of the Ryzen 3 line of processors, the Ryzen 5 was the cheapest Zen 2 processor on the market.

(On 5/18, Amazon's price was down to $189. Newegg was $172, but sold out).

 

Competition

With six cores and twelve threads, the comparative Intel options vary between something like the Core i7-9600KF with six cores and no hyperthreading, or to the i7-9700KF with eight cores and no hyperthreading. The downside is that both of these processors are more expensive: where the Ryzen 5 3600 is $199, the i5-9600KF is $263 and the i7-9700KF is $385. Frequencies between the three are competitive, however the AMD has a TDP of 65 W, compared to 95 W, and it comes with DDR4-3200 support with 24 lanes of PCIe 4.0, rather than DDR4-2666 and 16 lanes of PCIe 3.0.

AMD Ryzen 5 3600 vs Overclockable Intel Equivalents
AMD
Ryzen 5 3600
AnandTech Intel Core
i5-9600KF
Intel Core
i7-9700KF
$199 / $189 Price $263 $385
Zen 2 Architecture Coffee Lake-R
(Skylake+++)
Coffee Lake-R
(Skylake+++)
6C / 12T Cores 6C / 6T 8C / 8T
3600 MHz Base Freq 3700 MHz 3600 MHz
4200 MHz Turbo Freq 4600 MHz 4900 MHz
65 W TDP 95 W 95 W
2 x DDR4-3200 DDR4 2x DDR4-2666 2x DDR4-2666
PCIe 4.0 x24 PCIe PCIe 3.0 x16 PCIe 3.0 x16

Just by going with these on-paper specifications, it’s not hard to see why the Ryzen 5 3600 has been so popular. Even at the $199 price point, the i5-9400F is a $182 processor with the same memory/PCIe downsides, as well as being lower in frequency, despite matching the power rating. The Ryzen 5 3600 is also an unlocked processor, for anyone that wants to overclock.

Intel has announced its newest 10th Generation processor line, however the official launch date of the processors has not been officially announced yet. Out of the processor lineup however, the closest match would be the Core i5-10500.

AMD Ryzen 5 3600 vs Intel 10th Gen
at ~$200
AMD
Ryzen 5 3600
AnandTech Intel Core
i5-10500
Intel Core
i5-10600
$199 / $189 Price $192 $213
Zen 2 Architecture Comet Lake
(Skylake++++)
Comet Lake
(Skylake++++)
6 C / 12 T Cores 6 C / 12 T 6 C / 12 T
3600 MHz Base Freq 3100 MHz 3300 MHz
4200 MHz Turbo Freq 4500 MHz 4800 MHz
65 W TDP 65 W 65 W
2x DDR4-3200 DDR4 2x DDR4-2666 2x DDR4-2666
PCIe 4.0 x24 PCIe PCIe 3.0 x16 PCIe 3.0 x16
Yes Overclockable No No
No iGPU Yes Yes

This processor matches the six cores and twelve threads, is near in price, doesn’t quite match the base frequency but does exceed in the turbo. It is 65 W, the same as AMD, and on the plus side it does have integrated graphics. But again, it is only DDR4-2666 and only has 16 PCIe 3.0 lanes, compared to AMD’s DDR4-3200 and 24 PCIe 4.0 lanes.

 

Not only this, but our recent trips to brick-and-mortar stores (before the lockdown) looking for Intel mid-range 9th processors have been relatively fruitless. Intel is still facing increased demand for its high-end silicon, and is still focusing on making those parts that command the highest margins, like the Xeons. We also understand that Intel might be staggering the exact release of some of this hardware, focusing on the 10th Gen K processors first, so it might be a while before we see the mid-range CPUs at retail.

The AMD Ryzen 3 3300X and 3100 CPU Review: A Budget Gaming Bonanza

The third angle in the competition for the Ryzen 5 3600 will be with AMD’s own hardware. Having recently launched the Ryzen 3 3300X for only $120, users will have to decide if the extra $80 is worth the two extra cores in the processor. The Ryzen 5 3600 may only be popular because of it being the cheapest Zen 2 processor on the market, and if that is the case then the Ryzen 3 3300X could easily fill that role (or the Ryzen 3 3100, at $99). We tested the Ryzen 3 3300X and Ryzen 3 3100 very recently, and that review is well worth a read.

AMD vs AMD
AMD
Ryzen 5 3600
AnandTech AMD
Ryzen 3 3300X
$199 / $189 Price $120
Zen 2 Microarchitecture Zen 2
6 C / 12 T Cores 4 C / 8 T
3600 MHz Base Freq 3800 MHz
4200 MHz Turbo Freq 4300 MHz
65 W TDP 65 W
2 x DDR4-3200 DDR4 2 x DDR4-3200
PCIe 4.0 x24 PCIe PCIe 4.0 x24

This is one area where the Ryzen 5 3600 is in a bit of an awkward position, especially with the recent announcement relating to B550.

The Ryzen 5 3600 is a popular mid-range processor, meaning that it should be paired with a good mid-range motherboard. For the longest time, that was the B450 motherboard line, with an expectation of a possible upgrade to Ryzen 4000 later this year or next year. Unfortuantely AMD has stated that it will be locking the possible CPUs on B450 to Ryzen 3000 and below, meaning that the highest processor that a B450 owner can use is the Ryzen 9 3950X.

As is perhaps understandable, B450 owners with mid-range CPUs looking for an upgrade path are not too happy. With the announcement of B550 offering an upgrade path, there will be a lot of potential mid-range customers now waiting for the B550 motherboards to come to market.

The AMD X570 Motherboard Overview: Over 35+ Motherboards Analyzed

For those that have some money burning a hole in the pocket, X570 is always an option, with the cheapest boards available being around $150. We have performed a large round-up of all the X570 boards in the market, with specific one-off reviews for some of the more impressive models. I suspect however that potential Ryzen 5 3600 customers might be waiting for a good $120 B550 board, should one come to market.

This Review

At the request of a number of our readers, we sourced the Ryzen 5 3600 to put it through its paces in our updated test suite. Based on the responses on social media, it looks like potential Ryzen 5 3600 customers are into gaming and/or workflow on reasonably priced systems, so we’ll tackle both areas.

In our review, there are two key comparisons to look out for:

  • Ryzen 5 3600 vs Ryzen 3 3300X
  • Ryzen 5 3600 vs Core i5-8400 / 9400

Unfortunately we don’t have an i5-9400F for comparison, however the i5-8400 is basically the same chip by 100 MHz, with the same memory support and microarchitecture design. To make the graphs easier to understand, we've listed the results as 8400/9400. If we get a 9400 or 9400F in for testing, we will update the graphs as necessary.

Turbo, Power, and Latency
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  • Sonik7x - Monday, May 18, 2020 - link

    Would be nice to see 1440p benchmarks across all games, also would be nice to see a comparison against an i7-5930K running which is also a 6c/12T CPU
  • ET - Monday, May 18, 2020 - link

    Would be even nicer to see newer games. Anandtech reviews seem to be stuck in 2018, both for games and for apps, and that makes them a lot less relevant a read than they could be.
  • Dolda2000 - Monday, May 18, 2020 - link

    You exaggerate. The point of a benchmark suite can't really be to contain the specific workload you're going to put on the CPU (since that's extremely unlikely to be the case anyway), but to be representative of typical workloads, and I think the application selection here is quite adequate for that. In comparison, I find it much more important to have more comparison data in the Bench database. There may be a stronger case to be made for games, but I find even that slightly doubtful.
  • MASSAMKULABOX - Saturday, May 23, 2020 - link

    Not only that , but slightly older games are much more stable and have most of the performance ironed out. New games are getting patches and downloads all the time, which often affect perfomance. I want to see "E" versions I.e 35/45w
  • ThreeDee912 - Monday, May 18, 2020 - link

    They already mentioned in the 3300X review they'll be going back and adding in new games like Borderlands 3 and Gears Tactics: https://www.anandtech.com/show/15774/the-amd-ryzen...
  • flyingpants265 - Monday, May 18, 2020 - link

    I haven't used AnandTech benchmarks for years. They don't use enough CPUs/GPUs, they never include enough results from the previous generations, which is the most important thing when considering upgrades and $ value.

    Also, the "bench" tool does not include enough tests or hardware.
  • jabber - Tuesday, May 19, 2020 - link

    Yeah nothing annoys me more than Tech Site benchmarks that only compare the new stuff to hardware than came out 6 months before it. If I see say a new GPU tested I want to see how it compares to my RX480 (that a lot of us will be looking to upgrade this year) than just a 5700XT.
  • johnthacker - Tuesday, May 19, 2020 - link

    Eh, nothing annoys me more than Tech Site benchmarks that only compare the new stuff to other new stuff. If I have an existing GPU or CPU and I'm not sure if it's worth it for me to upgrade or stick with what I've got, I want to see how something new compares to my existing hardware so I can know whether it's worth upgrading or whether I might as well wait.
  • Pewzor - Monday, May 18, 2020 - link

    I mean Gamer's Nexus uses old games as well.
  • Crazyeyeskillah - Tuesday, May 19, 2020 - link

    Just to make this crystal clear, the reason they HAVE to use older games is because all of the PAST data has been run using those games. Most review sites only get sample hardware for a week or less to run the tests then return it in the mail. You literally wouldn't have anything to compare the data to if you only ran tests on the latest and greatest games and benchmarks.

    When I see people making this complaint I understand that they are new to computers and just want them to understand that there is a reason why benchmarks are limited. Most hardware review sites don't make any money, or if they do, it's enough to pay one or MAYBE two staff members (poorly.) Ad revenue is garbage due to add blockers on all your browsers, and legitimate sites that don't spam blickbaity rumors as news are shutting down. Just look what happened to Hardocp.com, one of the last true honest review sites.

    The idea that hardware sites all have stockpiles of every system imaginable and the thousands of hours it would take to constantly setup and run all the new games and benchmarks is pretty comical.

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