Best Value CPU Battle: Core i5-12400 vs. Ryzen 5 5600X

I think the cost savings of the 12400 over a 5600x mean you would be wise and have the budget to throw on a cheap effective tower cooler. Then you can run at the unlocked or higher power states all the time.

I have seen tests where it doesn't really go above 90 watts and this is a perfectly reasonable figure for everyday running, considering the performance.

We are just awaiting a wider choice of good quality and cheaper end B660 boards. AMD will respond with their Zen 3 refresh and I expect that to make a difference at the 12600k and above price point , but probably nothing to beat the bang per buck of the 12400 for a while it seems. So fill your boots.
 
I's sad when most of the tech media, YT channels and press keep shilling for intel and we only have HUB and GN to rely on accurate and honest reviews.

The amount of reviews (with cherry picked tests and games) showing the 12400 beating the 5600X is disgusting at this point. Yes, the 12400 beats it at price/performance and yes, it's a very good CPU for that price (I can admit that even thou I prefer AMD, I'm not a blind fanboi), but from that to make it as a no contest winner... that's some next level shilling there.

Thanks Steve for showing how it really is, on average the 5600X is 6% faster in games vs 12400, but without PBO, that's important. So by enabling PBO the gap will widen to at least +10% (more like 15%) in favor of the 5600X.

That's all we need to know. And yes, AMD should lower prices for Zen3 across the board. Just because I like AMD does not mean I like higher prices. There's a reason why I bought my 5600X for $240 at a BF deal, I would not pay $300 for it in normal circumstances.
 
Not sure if AMD will be humbled a bit by this but I think they will: it's unlikely they let this go for almost a full year before they even have a 7600x out to compete on their new AM5 platform so they might need to just finally be f-ing reasonable and lower the 5600x and 5600g prices. We get it: intel had basically nothing to compete when those came out but now that they do they can't expect to do well at current pricing.
 
I must admit, these results are impressive, particularly considering the price range. Makes me question why you‘d chose a 12600K over the 12400 unless MT is your thing.
 
Not sure if AMD will be humbled a bit by this but I think they will: it's unlikely they let this go for almost a full year before they even have a 7600x out to compete on their new AM5 platform so they might need to just finally be f-ing reasonable and lower the 5600x and 5600g prices. We get it: intel had basically nothing to compete when those came out but now that they do they can't expect to do well at current pricing.

AMD is still selling everything they make so I believe this is why there is no price correction. Even if ADL is faster why drop prices and lower your margins when Zen 3 is still selling very very well.
 
AMD is still selling everything they make so I believe this is why there is no price correction. Even if ADL is faster why drop prices and lower your margins when Zen 3 is still selling very very well.
This.

As long as they are still selling to what is "good sales figures" for them, I think unfortunately we will not see better Zen3 prices.

Alder Lake is not selling as hot cakes. Not like Zen3 sold when it came out vs intel 10th gen, so that is why too.

Basically AL needs to sell better and Zen3 worse, enough to force AMD to lower prices. Maybe when the B and H Alder Lake motherboards actually are available to buy, maybe then AL will sell better...
 
AMD is still selling everything they make so I believe this is why there is no price correction. Even if ADL is faster why drop prices and lower your margins when Zen 3 is still selling very very well.
Alder Lake cpu in question has been out for what, 2 or 3 weeks? Affordable B660 mobos for probably just a week or two at the best of cases: it's waaaaay to early to assert these will have no impact on 5600x sales overall. As I said: in 2 months from now, 3 months for now even 6 months from now AMD sales would decrease while Alder Lake directly takes those over they can't maintain the levels when there's actual real competition now and they only announced a single new AM4 CPU, the 5800x3d or whatever and nothing below or above.

In fact, it's kind of why AMD now is suddenly interesting in having 5000 series CPUs work all the way down on all AM4 generations of mobos even launch ones: They wouldn't care if Alder Lake wasn't a threat but now they must be thinking there's some customers they could persuade to do a CPU only upgrade without the platform mostly because it would be much cheaper than full platform specially since there won't be new products to buy a brand new AM4 mobo at this point.
 
AMD is in a sweet spot right now. They will take advantage of it and keep the price a little higher.

From my experience people tend to be slow to understand which is the best cpu of the moment. They normally distrust the "latest - brandNew" cpu, instead they trust the cpu which they know was the right choose just the period ahead. Just a minority of the buyers tend to follow reviews like this one in techspot.

This is why in my humble opinion Amd will kept the prices higher than we expected and probably will do that for another while... till people start to realize that the "trend" is changing ( Amd will notice their and intel sales are slightly changing and by then reduce the price)
 
That's all we need to know. And yes, AMD should lower prices for Zen3 across the board. Just because I like AMD does not mean I like higher prices. There's a reason why I bought my 5600X for $240 at a BF deal, I would not pay $300 for it in normal circumstances.

The other obvious missing part of this review: the 5600g at under $250 offers a much more competitive picture! the performance hit is also much ;lower than the 8-core 65w part (plus twice the igp performance!)

You really get the impression that this is another early "paid-preview" from Intel
 
The other obvious missing part of this review: the 5600g at under $250 offers a much more competitive picture! the performance hit is also much ;lower than the 8-coore 65w part (plus twice the igp performance!)

You really get the impression that this is another early "paid-preview" from Intel
Wouldn't go as far as that last statement. It's just a generalized overall disdain from all reviewers for the vega integrated graphics: They just never consider them a factor even now that it basically beats the 1030s and 550s of the GPU world clean off and that there is no low end options AT ALL for budget consumers.

That's the real budget battle if you ask me: an APU based system can still be put together for about 400 or 500 if your stretch your cash and from there on it jumps all the way up to rigs that are at least double the budget at 1000-1200 range simply because of inflated gpu prices.

I think reviewers, yes including hardware unboxed/techspot guys here, just don't want to even consider APUs as a viable gaming platform in and of itself because they go "Well, it can't run Cyberpunk 2077 at at least 1080p 30 FPS that means it's useless for gaming" while ignoring 30 years of PC gaming backlog that works perfectly fine on those 5600g chips.
 
Last edited:
The other obvious missing part of this review: the 5600g at under $250 offers a much more competitive picture! the performance hit is also much ;lower than the 8-core 65w part (plus twice the igp performance!)

You really get the impression that this is another early "paid-preview" from Intel
Not only that they at HUB constantly declare that they do not accept payments and they never will that influence their editorial view, but based on their entire history sooo many times pointing the issues and flaws of all products that had issues, from Intel to nvidia to AMD and all the others in-between - it's not even a debate about this being "another early "paid-preview" from Intel". It's NOT.

That being said, I'm not sure how a 5600G at about $250 being actually beaten for real by the 12400(f) while being much cheaper too, would actually make this any better... On the contrary, it would make it worse for AMD.

At least the 5600X still has better performance overall, so it has that as a plus. A 5600G would be both more expensive and have less performance than a 12400(f), with the only caveat that it has integrated graphics. They are difference kinds of processors though (CPU vs APU), so maybe that is also another reason why you don't see them tested one vs the other, yet. Remember the 12400(f) is brand new, so give it some time before judging and accusing for no reason...
 
My once mighty 9900K, is being matched by a $180 budget upstart.

The Unreal Tournament taunt, 'HUMILIATION' is ringing in my ears :)
I'm still on 9900k and not planning any upgrade soon! maybe the Gpu to 3080ti, 4000 series
 
Summary conclusion:

"When compared to the 5600X, the i5-12400 was on average ~6% slower and 8% slower than the 12600K."

6% to 8% slower...

 
Intel are basically dominating AMD when it comes to value for money at this point. You are stupid if you pick a 5600X over a 12400.

If AMD had not massively ramped up their pricing with the 5000 series they would still be competitive. The 3600 sold for $150-$200. Or roughly the same as this 12400 part. But AMD got greedy and practically doubled the price for the 5600X.
 
I'm just happy to see cheaper options again. The impression for a while was you had to spend $300 minimum which is never a good look for the PC.
 
Last edited:
The other obvious missing part of this review: the 5600g at under $250 offers a much more competitive picture! the performance hit is also much ;lower than the 8-core 65w part (plus twice the igp performance!)

You really get the impression that this is another early "paid-preview" from Intel
This is a head to head for gamers using dGPU's...
5600G is a bad buy for that use case.
 
I think reviewers, yes including hardware unboxed/techspot guys here, just don't want to even consider APUs as a viable gaming platform in and of itself because they go "Well, it can't run Cyberpunk 2077 at at least 1080p 30 FPS that means it's useless for gaming" while ignoring 30 years of PC gaming backlog that works perfectly fine on those 5600g chips.
Is anyone even playing Cyberpunk right now ? Looking at Steam‘s game stat that doesn‘t appear to be the case (they did have a very large number of players after launch).

Checking the same stats, the majority of the top games should actually run pretty well using a modern Ryzen APU at 1080p.
 
Intel are basically dominating AMD when it comes to value for money at this point. You are stupid if you pick a 5600X over a 12400.

If AMD had not massively ramped up their pricing with the 5000 series they would still be competitive. The 3600 sold for $150-$200. Or roughly the same as this 12400 part. But AMD got greedy and practically doubled the price for the 5600X.

If you're building a new system. Then it's 12400 all the way, same as when I built my 8400 system.

But if you already have a B450 Mobo or better and a Zen, Zen+, or low end Zen 2 and a decent GPU, then the 5600X is a better choice.

And AMD is still selling tons of 5600X so there's no reason for them to drop prices yet. Once everyone buys B660 + 12400 and stops with the 5600X, finally they'll be forced to drop prices, but there's no market pressure yet to do so.
 
Is anyone even playing Cyberpunk right now ? Looking at Steam‘s game stat that doesn‘t appear to be the case (they did have a very large number of players after launch).

Checking the same stats, the majority of the top games should actually run pretty well using a modern Ryzen APU at 1080p.
There's a tiny bit of interest in 2077 modding but it's basically on vegetative state for closing in on a year at this point. Maybe if the promised DLC could have resolved some of the issues regarding lack of content on the game it could make a bit of a comeback but I honestly don't think it will.

And yes I currently have been running an APU only rig for several months (As a proof of concept since I do own a working 1070 gpu) and the only game I wasn't able to get to work so far was Saints Row 2 and that's because it's so old the steam version is mostly broken for well, everybody.

Other than that haven't skipped a beat most games work really well without issues at 1080p and I can even add in higher textures and some settings that could be considered "heavy" for not having a GPU since using Freesync really helps in having a smooth experience if you can stay between 40 and 60 fps instead of aiming to be locked at 60 constantly you can aim a bit lower and still have a perfectly ok experience.
 
OK, I'm one of the few playing CP2077 right now but I waited for it to go to $30 on GOG because I'm cheap. I do play it on a dGPU but am also using an iGPU to play a number of games as well. I started PC gaming on an iGPU and while owning gaming rigs now, do iGPU gaming pretty frequently as my gaming PC fails to follow me around to various sites.
 
If you're building a new system. Then it's 12400 all the way, same as when I built my 8400 system.

But if you already have a B450 Mobo or better and a Zen, Zen+, or low end Zen 2 and a decent GPU, then the 5600X is a better choice.

And AMD is still selling tons of 5600X so there's no reason for them to drop prices yet. Once everyone buys B660 + 12400 and stops with the 5600X, finally they'll be forced to drop prices, but there's no market pressure yet to do so.
If you have a B450 board then you likely have a 2000 series CPU or higher. In which case it doesn’t really make sense to drop $300 on a 5600X. That 2000 series part should be fine and if it’s not then you probably bought the wrong CPU in the first place. If AMD hadn’t massively ramped up pricing and the 5600X was $200 then it would make far more sense.

OK, I'm one of the few playing CP2077 right now but I waited for it to go to $30 on GOG because I'm cheap. I do play it on a dGPU but am also using an iGPU to play a number of games as well. I started PC gaming on an iGPU and while owning gaming rigs now, do iGPU gaming pretty frequently as my gaming PC fails to follow me around to various sites.
Cyberpunk has actually got quite a high player count considering the hate it received, how long it’s been out and that it’s a single player game. There was even an article on here about it;


I think it’s a great game, the best story style game I’ve seen over the last year. And I’m playing at 30fps! It received an unfair amount of hate. Far more games were worse on launch and nothing was done about it. Remember Skyrim? 16fps on the PS3? That never changed and the game was near unplayable in the beginning with all the bugs. I remember I had a save where all the NPCs would spawn high in the air and fall to their death as soon as the world loaded! I had a lot of fun tbh.
 
Back