Having now reviewed the Ryzen 7 9700X and being utterly disappointed with the results, it's time to see if somehow the Ryzen 5 9600X is any better. It's hard to imagine this one going a different way, but the 9700X situation was so bad we'll let ourselves be delusional for a brief period, just so we can feel excited about new PC hardware again; it's been a long time.
Given we can only be positive about a dumpster fire for so long, let's quickly go over the specifications and then we'll get into the benchmark data. The 9600X, like the 7600X, is a 6-core / 12-thread processor. It can clock to 5.4 GHz, which is 100 MHz higher than the 7600X, but it still has a 32MB L3 cache.
But today we're not interested in architectural deep dives; the time for that has passed. We now want to know what the 9600X has to offer. AMD has priced it at $280, which is a 40% premium over the current asking price of the 7600X (granted, that's a really nice price for the Zen 4 part), so it's hard to imagine this will work out well in terms of value. At the current price, the 9600X could very easily be dead on arrival.
Before we get into the benchmarks, we must say it's been quite surprising to see many AMD fans, and even a lot of reviewers, gushing over the apparent power efficiency of the 9700X when compared to the 7700X. The problem with that, though, is the 7700X was never an efficient part to begin with; it ran well outside of Zen 4's efficiency window.
| AMD Ryzen 5 7600X | AMD Ryzen 5 9600X | |
| Release Date | September, 2022 | July, 2024 |
| Fabrication process | TSMC N5 FinFET (N6 FinFET I/O die) | TSMC N4 FinFET (N6 FinFET I/O die) |
| Cores / Threads | 6 / 12 | |
| Base Clock | 4.7 GHz | 3.9 GHz |
| Boost Clock | 5.3 GHz | 5.4 GHz |
| Core Config | 1 X 8 | |
| Chiplets | 1 X CCD, 1 X I/OD | |
| L3 Cache | 32 MB | |
| PCle Lanes | 28 PCle 5.0 lanes (4 of the lanes are reserved as link to the chipset) | |
| Memory Support | DDR5-5200 | DDR5-5600 |
| TDP | 105 Watt | 65 Watt |
To address this, AMD released the Ryzen 7 7700, the non-X version, which we much preferred as performance was similar, but power efficiency was much improved. If you compare the 9700X with the 7700, both 65-watt parts, the 9700X is 7% faster while using the same level of power. So that's it, Zen 5 is about 7% more power-efficient than Zen 4.
It's an improvement for sure, but it's a fairly small one, and it doesn't come anywhere near justifying the current price premium for Zen 5. And, of course, the gaming performance is very underwhelming; there's no getting around that fact.
Application Benchmarks
Here's a look at how the 9600X behaves in Cinebench. Under an all-core workload, it sustained a clock speed of 5.1 GHz with a peak operating temperature of 67°C.
Running the Cinebench multi-core test, we see that the new 9600X is 7% faster than the 7600X. It's not a massive uplift, but it's a lot better than the 2% we saw for the 9700X over the 7700X. The only issue is that much older parts, such as the Core i5-12600K, are still faster.
Now, the big gain for Zen 5 processors can be seen when measuring single-core performance in Cinebench. Here, the 9600X is 10% faster than the 7600X, which is great. But sadly, as we found with the 9700X, this didn't seem to help with gaming performance.
Power Consumption (Cinebench)
Taking a quick look at total system power consumption from the Cinebench multi-core test, we see that the 9600X also reduced power usage by 7%. So it was 7% faster while using 7% less power; that's pretty good.
7-Zip File Manager
What isn't good is the 7-Zip File Manager performance. Here, the 9600X is slightly slower than the 7600X, so going backward is less than ideal.
It's the same story when measuring decompression performance. The 9600X is 4% slower than the 7600X, so again, that's not good.
Blender Open Data
Performance in the Blender Open Data benchmark moves forward, which is a positive sign, though only by a 5% margin. That small performance uplift was only enough to see the 9600X roughly match the 12600K.
Corona 10 Benchmark
The Corona 10 Benchmark results are really surprising because here, the 9600X is 16% faster than the 7600X. That's a big performance uplift, putting the 9600X ahead of the 12600K, though it was still miles behind the 14600K. Still, great gains here, and we hope to see more of it.
Adobe Photoshop 2024
Looking at the Photoshop results, we find a mild 6% uplift for the 9600X over the 7600X, which was enough to deliver one of the best results of any desktop processor. So a good result overall, but a pretty weak uplift when compared to the part it's replacing.
Adobe Premiere Pro 2024
The gains in Premiere Pro are even worse. Here, the 9600X is offering just a 1% improvement over the 7600X, so basically the same performance, nothing to see here.
Gaming Benchmarks
Baldur's Gate 3
Sadly, it looks like the 9600X has very little to offer over the 7600X when it comes to gaming, with just a 4% improvement seen when testing with Baldur's Gate 3.
The Last of Us Part 1
In The Last of Us Part 1, we actually saw a 4% performance regression with the 9600X, dropping from the 168 fps produced by the 7600X to just 162 fps. So that's very bad.
Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty
The 9600X was also slower than the 7600X in our Cyberpunk test, trailing by a 2% margin. So another very poor result there. Also, as observed in The Last of Us Part 1, the 1% lows in Cyberpunk are much slower than expected with the 9600X, down by a 7% margin compared to the 7600X.
Hogwarts Legacy
Shockingly, the 9600X is also slower than the 7600X in Hogwarts Legacy, down 2 fps, which is a 2% reduction. Really bad gaming results so far.
Assetto Corsa Competizione
ACC was a good title for the 9700X, and the same is true of the 9600X. The Zen 5 architecture works well in this example, as here the 9600X was 19% faster than the 7600X. So a massive performance uplift, but we wish this was more of the norm and less of an extreme outlier.
Spider-Man Remastered
The 9600X was faster than the 7600X in Spider-Man Remastered, though only by a 3% margin, so not exactly anything to get excited about.
Homeworld 3
It's the same story in Homeworld 3. Here, the 9600X is offering a mere 3% improvement from the 7600X, that's it.
A Plague Tale: Requiem
A Plague Tale: Requiem has the typical 3% uplift for us. This saw the 9600X throughput 149 fps, whereas the 7600X was limited to 145 fps. So yeah, another very small difference there.
Counter-Strike 2
The 9700X was 10% faster than the 7700X in our Counter-Strike 2 test, but despite that, the 9600X is just 2% faster than the 7600X. We're not sure why the 9600X isn't providing similar gains to the 9700X here. We expected that it would, so yet more disappointing results.
Starfield
Speaking of disappointing, we have another game in Starfield where the 9600X is slightly slower than the 7600X, just a single frame slower, but obviously that's a disappointing result.
Horizon Forbidden West
Horizon Forbidden West provides us with another example where the 9600X manages to be slower than the 7600X, this time reducing performance by a 3% margin.
Hitman 3
We're looking at identical performance in Hitman 3 between the 9600X and 7600X, which is what we saw with the 8-core models.
Watch Dogs: Legion
Finally, we have Watch Dogs: Legion, where the 9700X is a mere 1% faster than the 7600X. So performance overall is basically identical here, with no improvement.
13 Game Average
Now here's a look at the 13-game average, and these results are discouraging. The new Zen 5-based 9600X is, wait for it, 1% faster than the 7600X across the games we tested. This is an embarrassing result for AMD and highly disappointing for PC enthusiasts. We're really not sure what else to say about this.
Power Consumption (Gaming)
Power consumption while gaming wasn't impressive either. Sure, the 9600X was 4% faster than the 7600X in Baldur's Gate 3, but it also saw a 7% increase in total system consumption.
Meanwhile, the 9600X was slower in Cyberpunk 2077 but still saw total system power consumption increase by a few percent.
Then we have The Last of Us Part 1, where the 9600X was 4% slower than the 7600X, and it only reduced total system consumption by 2%. Very disappointing results overall, and that seems to be the theme of this review.
Cost per Frame
Here's a look at the cost per frame for the relevant CPUs. As you can see, the 7600X is a value king, costing just $1.37 per frame. This makes it nearly 30% better value than the 7700X, and that means it's also nearly 30% better value than the 9600X.
The Ryzen 5 9600X is poor value priced at $280. You'd be much better off getting the 7700X, end of story.
Cost per Frame (Entire Build)
Even if you factor in the platform costs, the 9600X is still terrible, coming in at an almost 20% premium over the 7600X and more expensive than both the 7700X and 7800X3D. It's crazy to think that for just $100 more, you can get the 7800X3D.
What We Learned
So there you have it, the disappointment is strong with this one. In a nutshell, what makes the Ryzen 5 9600X a bad product is the fact that it's often slower than its predecessor and yet somehow costs 40% more. There's absolutely no reason anyone should or would buy this product; it's a complete flop.
For productivity, the Ryzen 7 7700X is much better and costs about the same amount, and for gaming, the 7600X is basically the same thing. Or for $100 more, the 7800X3D is an option.
We didn't bother including PBO data in this review. With it enabled, the data was about the same; sometimes we saw a 1-3% improvement, but overall, much the same. The PBO default setting is a complete non-event, just like the 9600X.
In our opinion, Zen 5 is quickly shaping up to be a mishap for AMD. Initially, it seemed like they thought they had a real winner on their hands, but now it's clear Zen 5 is anything but a winner. The architectural changes they made did very little for the most part. While we did see some positive examples, we saw more where performance regressed.
It seems clear now that AMD didn't evaluate the situation well enough. The only way to have any kind of success with Zen 5 would have been to increase core counts, meaning products like the 9600X should have started at 8 cores for the minimum, so at least Zen 5 would have that over Zen 4.
As many of you will know, we're not ones to focus on core count. We don't have an issue with AMD selling 6-core processors for $280 in 2024, but if they're going to do so, they need to be much faster than the models that came before. The 7600X, for example, wasn't very good at the $300 MSRP, but at $200, it's a great product. Sadly, though, the 9600X couldn't build upon that success.
The only way AMD could have made a 6-core CPU work in 2024 was to offer much more performance at a similar price, but that clearly isn't what has happened. Even if they offered the 9700X at $280, we wouldn't be that amazed, given it's barely faster than the 7700X, which can be had for $290. But that would at least be something – a bit of extra performance at a slight discount. After two years, that's not exactly exciting, but at least we're moving forward.
As it stands, no one should be entertaining the Ryzen 5 9600X at $280. It's been a great run for AMD, but this is the first time we've been truly disappointed with a new generation of Ryzen products.
Shopping Shortcuts:
- AMD Ryzen 5 9600X on Amazon
- AMD Ryzen 5 7600X on Amazon
- AMD Ryzen 7 7700 on Amazon
- AMD Ryzen 7 9700X on Amazon
- AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D on Amazon
- AMD Ryzen 9 7950X3D on Amazon
