The AMD Ryzen 5 2500X and Ryzen 3 2300X CPU Review
by Ian Cutress on February 11, 2019 11:45 AM ESTTest Bed and Setup
As per our processor testing policy, we take a premium category motherboard suitable for the socket, and equip the system with a suitable amount of memory running at the manufacturer's maximum supported frequency. This is also typically run at JEDEC subtimings where possible. It is noted that some users are not keen on this policy, stating that sometimes the maximum supported frequency is quite low, or faster memory is available at a similar price, or that the JEDEC speeds can be prohibitive for performance. While these comments make sense, ultimately very few users apply memory profiles (either XMP or other) as they require interaction with the BIOS, and most users will fall back on JEDEC supported speeds - this includes home users as well as industry who might want to shave off a cent or two from the cost or stay within the margins set by the manufacturer. Where possible, we will extend out testing to include faster memory modules either at the same time as the review or a later date.
| Test Setup | |||||
| AMD AM4 | Ryzen 5 2600 Ryzen 5 2500X Ryzen 3 2300X Ryzen 5 2400G Ryzen 3 2200G |
ROG Crosshair VI Hero MSI B350I Pro for IGP |
P1.70 | AMD Wraith RGB |
G.Skill SniperX 2x8 GB DDR4-2933 |
| AMD AM4 | Ryzen 5 1500X Ryzen 3 1300X Ryzen 3 1200 |
ROG Crosshair VI Hero |
P1.70 | AMD Wraith RGB |
G.Skill SniperX 2x8 GB DDR4-2666 |
| Intel 8th Gen | i5-8600K i5-8400 i3-8350K |
ASRock Z370 Gaming i7 |
P1.70 | TRUE Copper |
Crucial Ballistix 4x8 GB DDR4-2666 |
| Intel Kaby G | i5-8305G | Chuwi HiGame | 5.12 | Mini-PC | G.Skill SO-DIMM 2x4 GB DDR4-2400 |
| Intel 7th Gen | i5-7600K | GIGABYTE X170 ECC Extreme |
F21e | Silverstone* AR10-115XS |
G.Skill RipjawsV 2x16 GB DDR4-2400 |
| Intel 6th Gen | i5-6600K | GIGABYTE X170 ECC Extreme |
F21e | Silverstone* AR10-115XS |
G.Skill RipjawsV 2x16 GB DDR4-2133 |
| Intel 2nd Gen | i5-2500K | ASRock Z77 OC Formula |
P2.40 | TRUE Copper |
G.Skill Ares 4x4 GB DDR3-1333 |
| GPU | Sapphire RX 460 2GB (CPU Tests) MSI GTX 1080 Gaming 8G (Gaming Tests) |
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| PSU | Corsair AX860i Corsair AX1200i Silverstone SST-ST1000-P |
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| SSD | Crucial MX200 1TB | ||||
| OS | Windows 10 x64 RS3 1709 Spectre and Meltdown Patched |
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| *VRM Supplimented with SST-FHP141-VF 173 CFM fans | |||||
We must thank the following companies for kindly providing hardware for our multiple test beds. Some of this hardware is not in this test bed specifically, but is used in other testing.
| Hardware Providers | |||
| Sapphire RX 460 Nitro | MSI GTX 1080 Gaming X OC | Crucial MX200 + MX500 SSDs |
Corsair AX860i + AX1200i PSUs |
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| G.Skill RipjawsV, SniperX, FlareX |
Crucial Ballistix DDR4 |
Silverstone Coolers |
Silverstone Fans |
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Le Québécois - Monday, February 11, 2019 - link
Ian, any reason why more often than not, you seem to "skip" 1440 in your benchmarks? It's only present for a few games.Considering the GTX 1080, your best card, is always the bottleneck at 4K, as your numbers show, wouldn't it make more sense to focus more on 1440 instead?
Especially considering it's the "best" resolution on the market if you are looking for a high pixel density yet still want to run your games at a playable levels of fps.
Ian Cutress - Monday, February 11, 2019 - link
Some benchmarks are run at 1440p. Some go up to 8K. It's a mix. There's what, 10 games there? Not all of them have to conform to the same testing settings.Le Québécois - Tuesday, February 12, 2019 - link
Sorry for the confusion. I can clearly see we've got very different settings in that mix. I guess a more direct question would be: why do it this way and not with a more standardized series of test?A followup question would also be, why 8K? You are already GPU limited at 4K so your 8K result are not going to give any relevant information about those CPUs.
Sorry, I don't mean to criticized, I simply wish to understand your thought process.
MrSpadge - Monday, February 11, 2019 - link
What exactly do you want to see there that you can't see at 1080p? Differences between CPUs are going to be muddied due to approaching the GPU limit, and that's it.Le Québécois - Tuesday, February 12, 2019 - link
Well, at 1080, you can definitely see the difference between them, and exactly like you said, at 4K, it's all the same because of the GPU limitations. 1440 seems more relevant than 4K considering this. This is after all, a CPU review and most of the 4K results could be summed up by "they all perform within a few %".neblogai - Monday, February 11, 2019 - link
End of page 19: R5 2600 is really 65W TDP, not 95W.Ian Cutress - Monday, February 11, 2019 - link
Doh, a typo in all my graphs too. Should be updated.imaheadcase - Monday, February 11, 2019 - link
Im on phone on AT and truly see how terrible ads are now. AT straight up letting scam ads now being served because desperate for revenue. 😂PeachNCream - Monday, February 11, 2019 - link
Is there a point in even mentioning that give how little control they now have over advertising? Just fire up the ad blocker or visit another site and let the new owners figure it out the hard way.StevoLincolnite - Tuesday, February 12, 2019 - link
Anandtech had Maleware/Viruses infect it's userbase years ago via crappy adverts.That was the moment I got Ad-Block. And that is the moment where I will never turn it off again.