Upgrading During the DRAM Apocalypse with AMD's $75 CPU

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One of the best-selling AMD CPUs right now – actually, one of the best-selling CPUs, period – is a processor we once recommended avoiding at all costs. When we first reviewed it three and a half years ago, the verdict was clear. Yet somehow, after all this time, it's resurfaced as a popular choice, outselling almost every other CPU on the market.

That processor is the Ryzen 5 5500, a cut-down Zen 3 chip that launched at $160, but today can be purchased for as little as $75.

But it's not just the $75 price tag that's responsible for this thing flying off shelves. Heavily contributing to its success are extreme DDR5 pricing and a lack of AM4 processor availability, as many of the more popular models are now sold out.

The situation is especially clear in markets like Australia, where the Ryzen 5 5500 is currently the cheapest AM4 processor still in stock at $129 AUD. The next step up, the Ryzen 5 5600X, comes in at $189 or nearly 50% more expensive, which is the part we would normally recommend.

The thing is, people buying the Ryzen 5 5500 don't necessarily care that the 5600X is faster, or that there are technically better value options that cost a bit more. They simply want to build the most affordable gaming PC possible so they can get into PC gaming – and that makes sense, right?

The Ryzen 5 5500 may not be particularly impressive compared to newer processors – or even other Zen 3 chips – but it is inexpensive, readily available, and compatible with DDR4 memory, which is currently much more affordable than DDR5.

So if your goal is to build a gaming PC today while spending as little as possible, have the masses landed on the right choice?

To find out, we're putting the Ryzen 5 5500 through our usual suite of benchmarks, along with real-world gameplay testing in Fortnite, Battlefield 6, and Arc Raiders, to see just how usable this unlikely bestseller really is.

"Real World" Testing

Now, the graphs you're about to see show the performance of the Ryzen 5 5500 in scenarios that are almost always CPU-limited, as we're specifically interested in CPU performance. In truth, many of these results would look the same whether we used an RTX 5060 Ti or an RTX 5090, as both GPUs are fast enough to fully saturate the 5500 at 1080p – especially when looking at our medium-quality data.

For novice PC builders, please don't focus on the fact that we used an RTX 5090 to measure the performance of the 5500. This is simply done to remove the GPU bottleneck, and as mentioned earlier, slower GPUs would deliver the same results in many of these games. Actually, you know what – let's take a look at a few graphs real quick…

Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty

Take this Cyberpunk 2077 data, for example. Using the medium preset in our in-game test, the Ryzen 5 5500 limits performance to 116 fps when paired with the RTX 5090. And before anyone cries that this isn't "real-world" and that no one would ever pair an RTX 5090 with a 5500 – calm your farm, you're missing the point.

That aside, the reality is that it really doesn't matter. The faster GPU simply ensures we're always looking at CPU performance, which is the entire goal of this content. If we had used a slower GPU, such as the RTX 5070, we would still see an average of 116 fps. In fact, the same is true for the RTX 5060 Ti, and even the RTX 4060 Ti comes in right behind at 114 fps.

The takeaway here is simple – if you're happy with a little over 100 fps in Cyberpunk 2077, using the appropriate visual quality settings for your GPU, the Ryzen 5 5500 can deliver that level of performance.

We do see a rapid decline in performance as GPU power is reduced when using the ray tracing ultra preset, but how relevant this is depends on the situation. We know most of our audience isn't going to be happy playing at well under 60 fps, so data that is heavily GPU-limited with the RTX 5060 Ti and RTX 4060 Ti isn't particularly useful when evaluating how the Ryzen 5 5500 performs.

Realistically, you simply wouldn't use these quality settings. In this case, using the RTX 5090 is more informative, as it allows us to examine CPU performance and better understand how this might translate to other CPU-demanding gaming scenarios.

Spider-Man 2

Another good example is Spider-Man 2. Using the medium settings, the Ryzen 5 5500 limits performance to 122 fps. This is a CPU-imposed limit, meaning that increasing the resolution to 1440p or 4K will not raise frame rates beyond this point. If the GPU is up to the task, performance will at best remain the same.

Looking at our test data, had we used the RTX 5070, we would have encountered the same limitation with the 5500, and the same applies to the RTX 5060 Ti. It isn't until GPU performance is reduced to the RTX 4060 Ti that we see a roughly 7% drop in performance. At that point, the results become more GPU-limited than CPU-limited – but the 4060 Ti is still a long way off the RTX 5090.

Even when using the ray tracing ultra preset, the Ryzen 5 5500 delivers the same level of performance with the RTX 5090 as it does with the RTX 5060 Ti, limiting frame rates to just shy of 60 fps.

Space Marine 2

Then we have Space Marine 2, which serves as a strong example of a CPU-demanding game – and why testing with the RTX 5090 isn't an issue when evaluating CPU performance.

As we've noted many times before, it's all about the frame rate. In this case, the Ryzen 5 5500 cannot push more than 71 fps using medium settings and 66 fps using ultra settings in our horde battle test scene.

Because of this limitation, we see identical performance with the RTX 5090 and the much weaker RTX 4060 Ti 16GB, despite the 5090 being roughly four times faster. Hopefully, this data helps clarify why using a flagship GPU to remove the GPU bottleneck is valuable for CPU testing.

With that covered, let's move on to the next set of testing…

Test System Specs

Please note that we have labeled the Ryzen 5 5500 on the graphs as using DDR4 memory. This isn't because DDR4 is an optional configuration. The 5500 only supports DDR4 memory. We simply wanted to make it clear that this is the only Ryzen 5 processor on the graph using DDR4. In contrast, the Core i5-12400F is available in both DDR4 and DDR5 configurations.

The main CPU we want to compare the 5500 against in this review is the Ryzen 5 7500F, as it is, in our opinion, the best-value CPU currently available and would be our recommendation – if DDR5 pricing wasn't so distorted right now.

With that disclaimer out of the way, let's get into the data.


CPU Motherboard Memory	AMD Ryzen 9000 AMD Ryzen 7000	Gigabyte X670E Aorus Master [BIOS F38e] G.Skill Trident Z5 RGB 32GB DDR5-6000 CL30-38-38-96
	AMD Ryzen 5000	MSI MPG X570S Carbon MAX WiFi [BIOS 7D52v1D1] G.Skill Trident Z Neo RGB 32GB DDR4-3600 CL14-15-15-35
	Intel Core Ultra	Asus ROG Maximus Z890 Hero [BIOS 2201] G.Skill Trident Z5 CK 32GB DDR5-8200 CL40-52-52-131 CUDIMM
	Intel Core 12th & 14th	MSI MPG Z790 Carbon WiFi [BIOS 7D89v1H] G.Skill Trident Z5 RGB 32GB DDR5-6000 CL30-38-38-96
	Intel Core 12th & 14th	MSI MAG Z790 Tomahawk [BIOS 7D91v1D2] G.Skill Trident Z Neo RGB 32GB DDR4-3600 CL14-15-15-35
Graphics Card	Asus ROG Astral RTX 5090 OC Edition
Power Supply	Kolink Regulator Gold ATX 3.0 1200W
Storage	TeamGroup T-Force Cardea A440 M.2 PCIe Gen4 NVMe SSD 4TB
Display Driver	GeForce Game Ready Driver 581.42 WHQL

Benchmarks

Cinebench 2024

Before diving into the gaming benchmarks, here's a quick look at multi-core performance. Using Cinebench's multi-core test, we can see that the Ryzen 5 5500 isn't exactly the snappiest 6-core, 12-thread processor available. In fact, the newer 7600X is a little over 50% faster.

Single-core performance is also quite weak. While it isn't dramatically slower than the 5800X3D – since both are Zen 3 processors – the 5500 has significantly less L3 cache, which holds it back.

7-Zip File Manager

In compression workloads, the 5800X3D is around 24% faster than the 5500, while modern 6-core processors like the 9600X are more than 40% faster.

Somewhat surprisingly, when it comes to decompression performance, the 5500 isn't dramatically slower than Intel's latest budget offering, the Core Ultra 5 225, which was just 4% faster in this test.

Shader Compilation

Here's a look at shader compilation performance. As expected based on the Cinebench results, the Ryzen 5 5500 isn't particularly strong in this area.

Shader compilation takes almost 60% longer than the 7500F in The Last of Us Part 1, just over 40% longer in Stalker 2, and 38% longer in Marvel Rivals. Thankfully, most games allow you to play while shaders are compiling, the experience may just be a bit janky during that process.

Gaming Benchmarks

Rainbow Six Siege X

Frame rate performance in Rainbow Six Siege X is adequate. In-game performance is lower than the benchmark results, but when compared to the Core i5-12400F, the Ryzen 5 5500 isn't far behind. In this example, the Core i5 processor was only 8% faster. That said, the Ryzen 5 7500F delivers around 60% higher performance.

Marvel Rivals

Next up is Marvel Rivals, and this testing is highly representative of actual in-game performance. With that in mind, the Ryzen 5 5500 delivers just over 100 fps using the medium settings and just under 90 fps with the ultra settings. That's very playable performance and, in this case, quite similar to the Core i5-12400F when the Intel processor is paired with DDR4 memory.

The fact that the 7500F is nearly 50% faster isn't particularly relevant for those focused on building the most affordable gaming PC possible.

Assassin's Creed Shadows

Not all games are CPU demanding – even when using a processor like the Ryzen 5 5500, which is multiple generations old and was considered entry-level even when new.

A good example of this is Assassin's Creed Shadows, where the 5500 performs roughly on par with parts such as the 9600X and 14600K. So if you were using a more modest GPU, like the RTX 5060, performance would be identical even with something like the 9800X3D, as frame rates would be heavily GPU-limited.

Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered

Moving on to Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered, this is another example where the Ryzen 5 5500 is noticeably slower than the value king, the 7500F, but given current economic conditions, this likely won't matter to most gamers.

Using the medium settings, the 7500F was 40% faster, which is clearly a significant uplift. That said, the 5500 still averaged 124 fps with 1% lows of 84 fps – highly playable and certainly an enjoyable experience.

Even with the more demanding very high settings, the 5500 was able to deliver playable performance. While the 1% lows did dip slightly, the overall experience remained smooth and comparable to the Core i5-12400F when using DDR4 memory.