Gaming Performance
Before we test the integrated GPU, we installed an extreme high-end discrete graphics card for an idea of what the CPU can deliver when uncapped and then we'll get to the budget gaming stuff.
So with the brakes off, the A12-9800 was good for just 40fps in this real-time strategy title and was 18% slower than the G4560 in what is a CPU-intensive title. Moreover it was 30% slower than the Ryzen 3 1200.
This looks much worse in Battlefield 1 and these are important results to note even with the Pascal-based Titan GPU. What this means is, regardless of the graphics card used it's not possible for the A12-9800 to average more than 50fps and it will often dip into the low 40s. You guys sometimes ask how consoles with their many Jaguar cores are so much slower than budget CPUs like the Pentium G4560 – this is your answer.
Finally we have Hitman and here is another title that shows us that no matter what kind of GPU to bring to the table, the A12-9800 isn't going to allow for anywhere near 60fps on average.
Before we get to the integrated GPU stuff, here are the power consumption figures for the system fully configured. That right there shows us just how much of a truly massive step forward AMD made with the Zen architecture. The A12-9800 consumed almost as much power as the 6-core/12-thread Ryzen 5 1600X in the Excel test and we're not even stressing the GPU here.
The figures look much the same in the Cinebench R15 multi-threaded benchmarks as well where total system consumption was 121% higher than that of the Pentium G4560 and we often saw quite a lot less performance.
Here's where the A12-9800 has the Pentium G4560 beat: integrated graphics. Intel's built-in HD graphics is still a joke for the most part, especially on their more affordable CPUs. The G4560 is fine with Windows applications but is virtually useless for any kind of serious 3D rendering tasks. It averaged 14fps in Overwatch for instance while the A12-9800 managed 43fps. That said, using the lowest possible in game quality settings at 1080p, the quad-core APU didn't exactly deliver a smooth experience with regular dips below 30fps.
Installing the $70 GeForce GT 1030 improved performance on both CPUs dramatically though the G4560 did deliver a better overall experience.
The A12-9800's integrated GPU does to quite well in Rocket League and since this game uses very little CPU power the APU does quite well. The G4560 using the Intel HD graphics is still a pile of snot, though with the GeForce GT 1030 it does well.
In CS:GO the G4560 actually managed an average of 48fps using the HD graphics, though overall the experience was still pretty horrible. The A12-9800 wasn't too bad though even with a discrete GPU we still hit the same 45fps for the 1% low. The G4560 proved to be a beast with the GT 1030 installed and never dipped below 100fps.