The best Intel and AMD processors for your PC

If you are looking to buy a new CPU to have a more powerful PC, most likely you have got lost among a huge collection of Intel and AMD models among those available in the market, which is why we thought that ‘by making a list of what we consider to be the best processor you can buy right now.

Our selection criteria

The wide range of processors from Intel and AMD make it difficult to choose a processor in each category without first performing a general review of each one. That is why we have decided to carry out a selection scale, which first consists of a series of elimination criteria to rule out a large number of CPUs included in the market.

• The first criteria for elimination is the number of cores, today a 4-core configuration is insufficient for the future, so all Intel and AMD processors that have a 4-core configuration have been discarded. Likewise, most applications do not take advantage of a processor capacity beyond 8 cores, so any processors that exceed this number have been excluded from our comparison.
• The second criterion is the selection of the generations of the different CPUs. On the one hand we have reduced to the Ryzen 5000 from AMD, while in the case of Intel we have chosen the eleventh generation of Intel with the exception of the Core i9-10900F because there is no CPU with over eight tenth generation cores. .
• The third selection criterion is based on the elimination of CPU models that are part of the OEM world and therefore cannot be purchased separately from conventional distribution chains at the time of writing.

Once the selection criteria have been marked, let’s see which are the best Intel and AMD processors at the moment. This is why we have separated the selection into several different sections depending on the number of cores in each processor.

The best 6-core processors from Intel and AMD

The first round is that of the total six-core CPUs, of which we have selected three representatives to compete with each other. On the Intel side we have their Intel Core i5-11600K based on the Rocket Lake architecture and the Intel Core i5-11400F based on the same architecture, while on the AMD side we have chosen the AMD Ryzen 5 5600X.

Intel Core i5-11400F

The reason we chose this processor is its excellent value for money, since we can find it in most places for less than 200 dollars. This is a six-core, 12-thread processor that boots from a base clock rate of 2.6 GHz but increases to 4.4 GHz when placed in turbo mode.

Its excellent power-to-price ratio makes it ideal for those who want to build a gaming PC or professional workstation for a very low price. Its only limit? The fact of not bringing an integrated graphics card with it, but it is something that is forgiven since it is an ideal CPU if you want a gaming PC to be able to play in Full HD or in Quad HD if you pair it with it a good graphics card.

AMD Ryzen 5 5600X processor

AMD’s six-core option is based on the Zen 3 architecture, it is a powerful processor with a base speed of 3.7 GHz and up to 4.6 GHz as the maximum clock speed. Part of the chip-built AMD Vermeer processor family, this processor does not include a built-in GPU inside and so we need one, which will be common to all AMD processors in the comparison. .

The AMD Ryzen 5600X has an advantage over its direct rival in the same price range, the Intel Core i5-11600K and that is the fact that it is built on a more advanced manufacturing node, 7nm TSMC versus 14. Intel nm. What makes the TDP of this 65W processor, so this is a section that you think is important when choosing a CPU then the Ryzen 5600X is the best option for you.

Intel Core i5-11600K processor

The third of the six-core processors we have chosen is the Intel Core-i5 11600K, a processor which is after all a version with a 125W TDP of the Core i5-11400F which also has an integrated GPU, although its limited power does not allow you to play high caliber games.

Its base clock speed is 3.9 GHz with the possibility of reaching 4.9 GHz in turbo mode, so it has higher performance than the i5-11400F, so if you are looking for a 6-core Intel processor and you have enough cash we recommend this over the Core i5-11400F.

Compared to the Ryzen 5 5600X, these are two perfectly matched processors in the vast majority of games, with some differences in games.

The best 8-core processors from Intel and AMD

8-core processors are in the upper middle range of PC processors, so obviously in the price bracket they are superior to six-core processors, but they are ideal for gaming, as most of the games they contain. are currently optimized for this number of cores and therefore you are going to see a huge improvement in games over six cores.

So these are the options that you will have to choose if you want to have a gaming PC to play at Quad HD and 4K resolutions. And so the perfect pairs for high-end graphics cards from AMD and NVIDIA, as a six-core setup can put an RTX 3080 or RX 6800 XT in a performance bottleneck in gaming.

Our selection ? In this case we have only selected 2 CPUs, on the one hand the Intel Core i7-11700K and on the other hand the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X. Which are even in terms of performance and time, to the point that in some games the Intel model wins and in others the AMD model.

Intel Core i7-11700K processor

The Intel Core i7-11700K, like the rest of the Intel processors we’ve covered in this list, is based on Intel’s Rocket Lake architecture. We chose the i7-11700K model over other 8-core models because it has the best power / price ratio of all.

It is true that the 11900K is in numbers a much better processor, the 11700K is generally 200 dollars cheaper, which allows us to be able to have much better equipment around it and therefore we are talking about better performance for the same price. .

We are facing a processor with a base clock frequency of 3.6 GHz, but with the possibility of reaching 5 GHz as the maximum speed. Its TDP is 125W, but it has a lower power consumption mode which sets the base clock speed to 3.1 GHz and reduces power consumption to 95 W.

AMD Ryzen 7 5800X processor

The representative of AMD’s 8-core architecture is the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X, which like the AMD Ryzen 5600X we have already discussed is based on its Zen 3 architecture. This processor has clock speed base and a turbo speed of, being the most powerful of the 8-core AMD Ryzen 5000. Its base clock speed is 3.8 GHz, but it can reach 4.7 GHz if the speed is increased to a single core and to 4.5 GHz if the clock speed is temporarily increased on all cores. .

The AMD Ryzen 5000 generally has the same external design as the Ryzen 3000, unsurprisingly they use the same central IO Die, so the mechanisms for accessing RAM, DDR4 and peripherals are the same as the Ryzen 3000. All this because they use the same type of socket, AM4. Either way, the IO Die of the Ryzen 5000 has been improved, allowing higher clock speeds in RAM than in the Ryzen 5000 compared to the Ryzen 3000.

Beyond the 8 cores

Our third category of processors is the one that goes beyond 8 cores, with which in the case of Intel we have to go back a generation and bet on a model of the tenth generation, since Intel in the case of Rocket Lake -S decided not to go beyond 8 cores. That’s why we chose the Intel Core i9-10900KF and its ten cores.

If we look at AMD’s side, our bet is the 12-core processor, the AMD Ryzen 9 5900X, also from the Ryzen 5000 family based on Zen 3.

10-core Intel Core i9-10900KF processor

In this case, we are faced with a ten-core processor based on the Comet Lake architecture, so the performance at the same clock speed and core-to-core is somewhat lower than the rest of the models we have. discussed previously, but its multithreading performance is superior with its ten cores which allow it to run up to 20 threads of execution.

The base clock speed of this processor is 3.7 GHz with the possibility of reaching a maximum clock speed of 5.2 GHz thanks to Intel Turbo Boost technology 3.0. As for memory support, its controller is designed for DDR-2933 memory, and while it can support faster memory, it won’t take advantage of its bandwidth.

Its only negative point? It is the lack of support for PCI Express 4.0.

AMD Ryzen 9 5900X 12-core processor

The AMD Ryzen 9 5900X is a 12-core, 24-thread processor, technically it’s like taking two CCD chips from an AMD RX 5600X into a single processor. So it’s the only AMD dual chiplet CPU you’ll see in the entire comparison.

Its base clock speed? 3.7 GHz with the capacity to reach 4.8 GHz, with a 64MB L3 cache, 32MB in each of the CCD Chiplets. With a consumption of 105 watts. It is the most powerful processor that we have talked about in this article, not only because of its powerful 12-core configuration, but also because of the use of the Zen 3 architecture, which also implies that it is the most expensive of all, and because So it’s ideal if you want to mount a high-powered gaming PC, so we recommend pairing it with a high-end GPU.

With that, we end our list of the best Intel and AMD processors around, we hope this list has been helpful to you when choosing a new processor for your PC.