Conclusion

Final Words 

The new Ryzen 5000G series are excellent desktop processors, but only if you need to multitask and need fast threaded performance. As you have been able to see the culprit (somewhat) is gaming with a dedicated graphics card, granted we used a hugely CPU-deprived GeForce RTX 3090 here, but the deficits are clearly visible and measurable due to the L3 cache that got cut in half compared to 'regular' Ryzen. That L3 change makes sense though, AMD needs to clear space on the die for IO and integrated graphics, the compromise was nearly halving the most important shared cache.  From a performance point of view purely speaking as a desktop (work) PC, this processor series is marvelous. Super strong IPC, huge multithreaded performance, it's just not gaming (dedicated) to the extreme with the most expensive graphics cards your money can get you. We have to state it though, this is a 5000G processor, it has an IGP, and as such is intended for the folks that did not plan a dedicated graphics card. As to why else would you purchase this proc over a Ryzen 7 5800X for example?

Price and value

Gaming performance

This is the culprit for the Ryzen 5000G series, with a fast add-in graphics card that is. However, let me ask you this, why would you buy a 5700G processor with integrated graphics over say a 5800X? We don't know, so how relevant is the fact that gaming on a very high-end graphics card would a good notch slower? If else, you'd purchase Ryzen 7 5600X/5800X we assume. The G series was not designed to be a gaming processor. You can still get extremely respectable game performance with a top-notch card, however for purely speaking a gaming PC, we'd advise the normal Ryzen 5000 series as its L3 cache is double that of the Cezanne, and it makes quite the difference. 

IGP Performance

Unfortunately, our B550 motherboard suffered from a BIOS problem that prevented us from POSTING with integrated graphics. Hours before this launch we received a new board, at least we have been able to add UL results on the IGP, which did not disappoint. The CPU might be a good interim solution until prices for dedicated graphics cards come down a bit more.

So how does 2021 integrated graphics performance compare towards expensive dedicated GPUs, well, you can see above the results for that. 

DDR4 Memory

AMD is rating this processor at a 3200 MHz supported frequency, we simply inserted 64 GB of 3600 MHz DIMMs, and it just works really. Not an issue. Just be sure to check the QVL list at the website of the motherboard that you use. 

Energy efficiency

These processors are fabbed at 7nm; you may see some exceptional energy efficiency; the 65 Watts listed for the 5000G series was not necessarily something we could measure anywhere and thus remains relative; of course, that is marvelous all by itself. TDP is a rather fluent thing these days, but we did not notice any extremities. Also, keep in mind that choices in motherboard and GPU heavily will influence your total system power usage. 

Conclusion

The difference between regular Ryzen 5000 and 5000G is BIG. This G series processor does not have chiplets, comes with integrated graphics, and is only PCIe gen 3.0 compatible. For streaming, creator, or as a work PC this proc is pure gold. Realistically it also needs to be said that this is the same Cezanne die that AMD uses for Ryzen Mobile APUs like the Ryzen 9 5900HX, with a monolithic die rather than chiplet-based. As a consequence of AMD's need to fit in the Vega 8 GPU, half of the L3 cache has been eliminated, reducing the 5700G to 16MB L3. When compared to a component like the 5800X, this is likely to have a significant negative influence on specifically game performance. For gamers, we'd advise you to look into a regular Ryzen 5000 processor as they have more than twice the L3 cache, and that makes a difference with a more powerful dedicated graphics card (mid-range not so much). If you have a more mediocre graphics card, that differential thus will be much smaller. Overall, we cannot complain about this proc, it's fast and certainly competitive with what Intel has to offer. Pricing however is a thing, who's this processor really for? As for budget builds this definitely isn't applicable. The Ryzen 7 5700G, is not appropriate for low-cost setups. Maybe, depending on the configuration, the 5700G may be ideal if you're looking for a premium home theater PC setup. Right now, we believe the most likely use case is to use the 5700G's integrated graphics as an interim solution if you want to wait until the graphics card prices settle. The Ryzen 5 5600G is a 6-core variant with a clock speed of up to 4.4 GHz. The GPU has been reduced to 7 Vega compute units with a clock speed of up to 1.9 GHz and the same 16MB L3 cache and is effective for the money at 43 USD per core, that's 45 USD per core for the 5700G btw.

Yeah, the Ryzen 5 5600G / Ryzen 7 5700G is not likely to ever make sense for high-end gamers, but the reality is simply this APU isn't designed for high-end gaming. We also feel they might be a too expensive Zen 3 component relative to gaming performance. However, for all other scenarios where you might need proper even serious performance but do not need a strong GPU, they both certainly could be very viable processors. 

• Sign up to receive a notification when we publish a new article
• Or go back to Guru3D's front page.