Gaming Performance Cont.
In order to test gaming performance properly and really get a good feel for it, and cover all the bases for the big picture, we decided to test 1080p, 1440p, and 4K resolutions, all three resolutions to see from top to bottom how these CPUs affect performance games. For testing, we are using an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Ti Founders Edition video card. Since we are testing all 3 resolutions, it’ll be a good mix to see where the CPU matters and where it doesn’t.
All the graphs below are not sorted, they are not sorted from fastest to slowest as in previous graphs, instead, they are simply labeled in groups by platform, from fastest CPU to least fastest CPU. As you look at performance, try to look down the column of the resolution, to see which one is faster than the other, to help your eyes see which one is faster.
Cyberpunk 2077
Cyberpunk 2077 is notoriously demanding, and as such at 4K we are most certainly GPU bound. Even at 1440p, we are GPU bound, but there is a little positioning happening. The 7600X is a few FPS faster than the 5600X at 1440p, but note the Alder Lake CPUs are a few FPS faster than the 7600X at 1440p. At 1080p we really see the difference. The 7600X is only 7% faster than the 5600X, while the Alder Lake CPUs, including the 12600K is a bit faster than the 7600X.
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 is a notoriously CPU-driven game, and you can see that above with the performance being so close in each resolution. We are using the latest patch in the game, and DX12 is enabled. The first thing that you can clearly see is how much faster the new Zen 4 CPUs are in this game. The Ryzen 5 7600X and 7900X simply blow away every CPU here, including all the Alder Lake CPUs.
Firstly, Alder Lake is superior in performance over the Ryzen 5000 series, they offer a lot of performance, and the Ryzen 7 58003D is also a champion in this game. But as much as Alder Lake improved performance over the Ryzen 5000 series, the new Ryzen 7000 CPUs blow away Alder Lake in this game. They just truly allow the best experience at every resolution, 4K included.
We have included Crysis Remastered because this game is also very CPU-driven. At 4K, we can see it is not so much, but at 1440p and below it is. The Ryzen 5 7600X is 4% faster than the 5600X at 1440p and 16% faster at 1080p, which is quite a big uplift. The best CPU here is the 5800X3D, this game loves that Cache. Also, note that the Core i5-12600K beats the 7600X at 1440p, but the 7600X beats it at 1080p.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
We decided to throw in an older game, which we used to use for GPU benchmarks quite a bit because this game was used in AMD marketing for performance, it was in one of their graphs for gaming performance. We thought it would be good to have some validated tests done so you can validate their results as well and compare against it. But this game actually turned out to be quite good for the 1080p results. At 4K it’s GPU bound, and also at 1440p. At 1080p though we can see the Ryzen 5 7600X is 17% faster than the Ryzen 5 5600X, so that is quite large. We can also see the 7600X beating the Core i5-12600K quite a bit here as well, and is closer to 12900K performance. The Ryzen 7 5800X3D is doing really well here as well.
Discussion (13 replies)
Join Discussion →My opinion. If you're currently on Zen2+ or Zen3 on anything less than a 5800X3D, and all you do is game, then the 5800X3D is the best bang for the buck upgrade. That CPU is a gaming powerhouse.
I kind of have mixed feelings about these mid-tier Zen4 CPU's. At least from a gaming perspective. It would cost significantly more to build a 7600X system, for inarguably less gaming performance, than it would be to build a cheaper 5800X3D system. Especially with AMD saying they were going to continue development of X3D AM4 parts.
They kind of put themselves in a tough situation with their product stack.
Yes, for gaming, I agree.
The question one has to ask is what is their intention and use case. What workloads will they need? If all you do is gaming on the PC, then you have your answer. However, if you do much more, or throw other certain kinds of workloads at the CPU, then perhaps there is value. It depends on your needs.
Yar, tough sell to migrate from AM4 to AM5 currently (though if I was building new I'd for sure go AM5).
Looking forward to see how the 7000X3D's perform, but think I won't be migrating until the second revisions come out.
It's nice to see that these lower cost 6C/12T chips can still keep up in gaming, at least if you aren't trying to do TOO much in the background (like encode streams)
I bet these will find their way into a lot of decent gaming machines.
I'm betting they won't find their way in to much of anything until cheaper X670 boards come out, or B-series is released. The value isn't quite there yet. Especially with DDR5 costs, PSU and cooling requirements.
Yep, I think the single chip B650/E will be the way to go. All those extra USB and PCIe connections on the expensive X670/E will be limited by the bridge between the 2 chipsets.
B650 + 7_00X3D will be the best early AM5 for gaming.
If you game at 4k you are better off getting a 5600X.
BTW thanks a lot for using settings one would actually use for gaming. Not Low/mid 720p/1080p settings like many reviews out there.
I think both have value.
Using minimum settings and low resolution you see the potential performance a CPU might have if you have a really fast GPU.
This is valuable for theoretical comparisons and to get an idea how "future proof" the CPU is.
Benchmarking a CPU at real world settings is easier to understand for those who don't get the fact that they will in all likelihood be GPU limited, and helps minimize the arguing over irrelevant performance differences no one will ever actually experience in their CPU due to this GPU limitation.
Honestly, if I had to pick just one, I'd pick the CPU benchmark at minimum settings and low resolution. Using that and GPU benchmarks I can project what my performance will be in almost any combination of hardware. if I only have the latter, I can only really predict how it will perform in that one CPU/GPU combination.
So yeah. I like to see both, but if I had to pick just one, I'd pick the "everything graphical at minimum settings and resolution using an overkill top end GPU" just to try to isolate the CPU performance, because that is honestly more useful.
If I have that CPU isolated data I can look at a CPU benchmark and at a GPU benchmark separately and just pick the minimum framerate of the two, and know that is likely a reasonable prediction of how they will perform together. This is of much greater value to me than real world benchmarks on a system with a GPU I may or may not ever use.
I also see value in both results, low rez, and high rez, for both reasons. That's why I include 1080p, 1440p, and 4K, I think it's all relevant, and important to see scaling between resolutions, comparing CPUs. I'm rather excited about the fact that we represent that, that way anyone reading can hone in on the resolution they take value from, and make up their own mind. I think it gives an overall bigger picture of CPU performance, and I'm very happy people get value out of that in our reviews.
More than the resolution, my issue is low settings. Normally I see cpu benches even at 720p low and those exacerbate the impact of the mobo/cpu.
I recall asking Kyle at several times to do hi-res/high settings on the CPU/Mobo reviews as it would reflect a more real world scenario (which was policy). Never happened.
Thankfully you got all my bases covered.
That's why you look at both the GPU and CPU reviews, and - if you have CPU reviews run at low settings, and GPU reviews with overkill CPU/Platform to avoid it being the limiting factor - you can just take the minimum framerates of each review, and use that as a pretty reasonable predictor of what the combination of that CPU and GPU will look like.
The theory is to make the component under review the bottleneck to see what it is truly capable of so you can understand that particular component, rather than having the results confounded with the system as a whole.
Or just give the reader all the info you can in each review and let them decide what's important to them :p
I'll never argue against more information :p