Intel has a new 6 core CPU, the i5-11600K,
but how does it compare against the Ryzen 5 5600X? I’ve tested both processors in games
and applications to show you the differences and help you decide which is worth it.
Both are 6 core 12 thread parts. The Ryzen chip has much more cache, however the Intel chip is
able to reach higher clock speeds. The Intel i5 is also cheaper, you can find updated prices linked
below in the description, so it’s going to be very interesting to see how these two stack up.
Both processors were tested in the same system, however I’ve had to change the
motherboard between Intel and AMD, otherwise all other components are the same as listed here.
Although the 5600X does come with a cooler in the box, the 11600K does not. I’ve tested
both with my Fractal S36 AIO and Noctua NT-H2 thermal paste for comparable results.
I’ve tested both CPUs at stock without power limits, no MCE or Precision boost overdrive,
and with the following manual all core overclocks applied. These are
by no means finely tuned overclocks, results will of course vary based on silicon lottery.
Alright so with all of that in mind we’ll start out with application tests followed
by things like power draw and thermals afterwards,
then the game benchmarks and then finally cost per frame to find out which is better value.
Starting out with Cinebench R23 I’ve got the stock results down the bottom
and overclocked results above. At first glance there doesn’t appear
to be big differences. At stock the 11600K is just 1% higher in terms of
single core score, while the 5600X has a similar lead when it comes to multicore.
I’ve also tested the older Cinebench R20 as a lot of people still use it
so you can compare my results, and similar deal here too. The single
core scores on the Intel i5 are very similar regardless of running stock or overclocked,
because the 4.9GHz all core overclock is the same as its 4.9GHz single core turbo boost. The
overclock on the 5600X makes a bigger difference to single threaded performance compared to stock.
I’ve tested Blender with the BMW and Classroom benchmarks. This is a heavily threaded test,
and like Cinebench the 5600X seems to be slightly ahead in the longer classroom test,
however the i5 was slightly faster in the shorter BMW test.
The V-Ray benchmark is another core heavy rendering workload. Again the
differences aren’t that big, however the 5600X was consistently ahead in this multicore test,
regardless of whether or not the chips were running stock or with my overclocks.
The Corona benchmark also uses the processor to render out a scene, and again the Ryzen 5 5600X
was completing the task faster here, though once both are overclocked the gap is smaller.
This is only the second time I’ve tested Linux kernel compilation
as it’s a new test I’ve recently added. It seems to be multithreaded,
however unlike most of the other multicore applications tested the Intel
i5 was around three seconds ahead, so not a major gap, but winning’s winning.
Handbrake was used to convert one of my 4K laptop review videos to 1080p.
Again like most others tested, the 5600X was a little faster in this test. We’re
only saving around 20 seconds with AMD, which is 3% faster at both stock or overclocked.
Adobe Premiere was tested with the Puget Systems benchmark tool, and this tests things like video
exporting, live playback and more. The scores were extremely close together here, one of the
smallest differences out of all applications I’ve tested. The 5600X was just ever so slightly ahead.
Adobe Photoshop was also tested with the Puget Systems benchmark tool. It’s still
a win for the Ryzen processor, however the gaps are a little bigger this time around,
granted not by much, and the gap is smaller once both have the overclocks applied.
I’ve used 7-Zip to test compression and decompression speeds, and this
is an area where AMD has traditionally beat Intel, and that’s not changing here. These
are some of the biggest differences out of all workloads tested in favor of the 5600X.
AES encryption and decryption speed didn’t really change with the overclocks,
however the Intel i5 was around 12% faster than the Ryzen 5 in this test,
the biggest win for the 11600K out of all applications I’ve measured.
Microsoft Excel on the other hand was the biggest win for the Ryzen processor. This
test seems to favor higher cache, which is probably why the 5600X has such a higher lead,
it’s got 3 times as much L3 cache compared to the i5.
Like other tests, the i5 was scoring higher in single core tests with Geekbench. Again
like other tests, despite this the Ryzen 5 was a little ahead when it came to multicore score.
Here’s how Intel’s new 11th gen 11600K compares against AMD’s Ryzen 5 5600X
processor. The 5600X was ahead in most of these workloads, most of which are multithreaded,
it seems that the Ryzen chip is generally better here. The Intel chip on the other
hand was typically scoring better in single threaded workloads, though it had some small
wins in multicore tests including Blender BMW and kernel compilation. Ryzen seems to
dominate in compression, decompression and Excel, while Intel dominates encryption and decryption.
Here’s how the results change with both manually overclocked on all cores. Many of the multicore
tests edge slightly in favor of Intel here. The 5600X is still faster in the majority, however
it would appear that with both overclocked to these levels the i5 is able to see more benefit.
This makes sense when looking at the clockspeeds reported by hardware info
with the Blender test running. At stock the i5 is 130MHz higher, but once both are overclocked
the gap increases to a larger 200MHz, so we’re expecting more gains from the Intel overclock.
Here’s how total system power draw from the wall looks with the same blender classroom
benchmark running, a heavy multicore test. The i5 was using far more power,
despite actually completing this specific task slower than Ryzen.
At stock the i5 system is using 63% more wattage to perform 2% slower in this test.
More power generally equals more heat. Now the i5 was a little warmer at stock,
however once both are overclocked the 5600X was slightly warmer,
of course assuming the way both platforms report temperature to software is comparable.
Let’s get into the gaming tests next, I’ve tested 8 games at 1080p,
1440p and 4K resolutions on both processors.
Cyberpunk 2077 was tested in little china with the street kid life path. I’ve got 1080p down
the bottom, 1440p in the middle, and 4K up top. There’s basically no difference in terms
of average FPS regardless of the resolution, just zero to two frames change. The biggest difference
was seen in the 1% low at 1080p with the i5 coming out ahead, but it’s just a 3% lead.
Red Dead Redemption 2 was tested with the games benchmark tool.
This time the 5600X was reaching 8% higher average FPS at 1080p. It was also a little
ahead at 1440p, then at 4K the i5 was just a little more than a frame ahead,
so far less of a difference as the processor typically matters less at higher resolution.
Assassin’s Creed Valhalla was also tested with the games benchmark, but this time the
i5 took the lead at 1080p, granted it’s just a couple of FPS so nothing serious.
Many of the other differences are between half a frame to two FPS,
so not likely something you’re probably going to notice when actually playing.
Watch Dogs Legion was also tested with the games benchmark so you should be
able to perform the same test in a reproducible manner if you want
to compare with what I’ve got. The i5 was again a little ahead,
though again, it’s such a small difference it’s not going to be something you notice in practice.
Control was tested running through the same part of the game on both systems multiple times.
Again just small differences, though the 5600X was generally ahead in most cases, but yeah again
I feel like I’m repeating myself but these aren’t anything you’re going to notice in a blind test.
CS:GO is an esports title where differences in frame rate might actually matter more, which is
why I decided to test this older game. The 5600X had the largest gain out of all 8 games tested
here, reaching 21% higher average FPS at 1080p, granted with the i5 still producing nearly 600 FPS
it’s hard to say how much of an edge that’s really going to give you. 1% low was 14% higher though,
with the 5600X otherwise ahead of the i5 at all resolutions.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider was tested with the game's benchmark. As a last
gen game this modern hardware is able to get us 100 FPS at 4K even with the highest
setting preset. Both were the same at 4K, the 5600X was just 4 FPS ahead at 1440p,
and the 5600X is just 5% faster in average FPS at 1080p.
Battlefield V was tested in campaign mode. The difference in average FPS was only minor
with a little lead from the i5 at all three resolutions, however there’s a much larger
difference seen in the 1% lows at 1080p and 1440p. At 1080p the i5 was reaching 10% higher 1% lows,
increasing to 19% at 1440p. For some reason the 1% low actually gets higher at 1440p
on the i5, a behavior I’ve noted in this test in some other CPU comparisons.
When comparing all 8 games tested at 1080p, the 11600K was 3% slower than the 5600X.
The results aren’t too different in either direction for the most part,
however if we treat CS:GO as an outlier then the 11600K is instead just 1% slower,
but I could easily see this changing in either direction with more game tests.
I’ve kept the X-Axis the same so we can see how things change when we step the resolution up to
1440p. The results get closer together, and the 11600K is now just one and a half percent
slower on average, however should you wish to not include our esports title in this testing,
then it’s less than a percent slower, margin of error stuff.
Things get even closer together at the higher 4K resolution,
as the difference in processor matters less here. Again without CS:GO the 11600K is just
0.1% slower, so they’re basically the same once averaging out the games.
Maybe if we’re lucky hardware unboxed will do a big 5 billion game comparison!
This appears to be a welcome improvement from Intel considering that the 5600X was around 15%
faster in a similar selection of games at 1080p compared to the last gen i5-10600K,
but it all comes down to price.
When we factor in price, at the moment the 11600K is offering better value,
with some caveats. I’ve got the 5600X highlighted in red, with the $300
MSRP down the bottom, however right now the cheapest price on Newegg is $350
and yes it’s actually in stock. The 11600K is currently on Newegg for $270, again links for
updated prices in the description. I’ve also added a $40 Hyper 212 Evo cooler for a total of $310.
Even when factoring in the cooler cost the 11600K is offering better value than the 5600X,
however if the 5600X was actually available at MSRP then things would be different.
There’s also the KF version of the i5 which is cheaper if you don’t need integrated graphics,
however at the time of making the video I could only find Intel’s 1000 quantity price.
For gaming today, both the 5600X and 11600K are quite close together,
with a little edge to the Ryzen chip in my selection of games. Honestly outside of CS:GO,
I doubt there are differences you would actually notice though.
The 5600X was also ahead in most of the productivity workloads earlier,
despite Intel reclaiming the lead in single core tests. Most of the
tests I run are multithreaded, and the 5600X was generally doing better there.
At the end of the day, I think it’s pretty difficult to go too wrong with either of these.
The average differences in both gaming and productivity are pretty small,
so like I said it all comes down to pricing and availability.
Right now today on Newegg, the 11600K is cheaper, even when factoring in extra
money to add a cooler. Both platforms are also essentially end of life, at least in
the sense that we’re not getting future CPUs that we can put into the same motherboards.
This means the only upgrades to consider would be processors that already exist that support
the same platform, so 16 core 5950X on the AMD side and either 10 core 10900K or 8 core 11900K
for Intel. Though as I recently showed in this comparison here, the 10900K is generally worth
considering over the newer 11900K, and given the 5950X can generally beat the 10900K in
both productivity and gaming, I’d argue that the AM4 platform would give you more upgradeability
in future. You know, assuming the 16 core 5950X is ever cheap some day, but I digress.
It’s worth noting that AMD has had difficulty keeping the 5600X in stock since launch,
although to be fair, over the last few weeks this has been less of an issue. Hopefully that
continues or Intel might simply win just by being the only one having product on shelves.
I’m also going to compare the new 11600K against the older 10600K for last generation
in a future comparison, so there are plenty more CPU comparisons on the way,
make sure you’re subscribed so you don’t miss them. Otherwise for now you can check
out some of my other CPU comparison videos over here, or come over and
join us in Discord and get behind the scenes videos by supporting the channel on Patreon.