Get the Ryzen 7 5800X for $369.99 at Ebay
First up: the 5800X is a tremendous performer in most games, thanks to the ~20% boost to single-core speeds AMD achieved with their Ryzen 5000 chips. That pushes it ahead of even Intel’s 10th-gen and 11th-gen chips in many games, ending the blue team’s long reign at the top of the gaming CPU market. There are still the odd games where Intel CPUs perform better, but my testing - and Katharine’s review of the 5800X! - show that an AMD CPU is the way to go these days.
As you’d expect from its midrange price, the 5800X comes between the budget six-core 5600X and the enthusiast twelve-core 5900X. That’s eight cores and 16 threads, and it’s the configuration I’d personally recommend for anyone looking to build a gaming PC that will be able to handle AAA games well into the future without overspending. The 5800X was originally priced a little higher than its peers, but price cuts after launch have made it a compelling option that should be more future-proof than the six-core 5600X without being as expensive as the more content creation oriented 5900X.
As well as being a bit more forward-looking, the 5800X also handles content creation tasks very well indeed. Having sixteen fast threads means things like compiling code, transcoding video or rendering 3D scenes happens very speedily indeed, and you’ll certainly notice the per-core speed difference coming from older Ryzen generations or the extra cores coming from older Intel chips.
With the Ryzen 5600X at $289, there’s still an argument to be made for the cheapest Ryzen 5000 CPU if you’re only going to be gaming. For now, most games don’t show a significant difference between the two CPUs, so you could definitely get away with the 5600X if you preferred. However, with eight cores in next-gen consoles like the Series X and PS5, I think going for an eight-core PC also makes a lot of sense.
What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
