AMD Ryzen 7 5700G Processor with Radeon Graphics Mini Review

Manufacturer: AMD AMD Ryzen 7 5700G Processor with Radeon Graphics Mini Review

A Mini-Review of a Product Formerly Known as an APU

AMD’s current high-end solution for a processor with integrated graphics is the Ryzen 7 5700G. I still call these things APUs (which stands for “Accelerated Processing Unit”), but AMD calls these “AMD Ryzen 7 5000 G-Series Desktop Processors with Radeon Graphics”, which is longer.

I finally bought a Ryzen 7 5700G myself, as we didn’t receive a sample from AMD (we have been provided with a Ryzen 7 5800X and Ryzen 9 5900X this generation), and while AMD’s list price began at $359 USD, I paid $309.99 – and have since watched the price drop as low as $249.99 USD (Micro Center in-store). Note: as I publish this prices are back up to $359 in most places. I don’t get it.

Of course graphics card prices are plummeting (almost to the point of being reasonable again), but I still think an APU can still make sense for a new build. Of course this depends on your needs, but the advantage of the 5000 Series APUs (Ryzen 7 5700G and Ryzen 5 5600G) is obviously the integrated graphics, which provides more build flexibility than any other Ryzen 5000 Series product. Remember, standard Ryzen CPUs won’t offer processor graphics until Zen 4.

So, does an the Ryzen 7 5700G APU (sorry, AMD Ryzen 7 5000 G-Series Desktop Processors with Radeon Graphics) have enough GPU horsepower to play games now, and does it have enough CPU horsepower to play games with a discrete GPU, later? These are the questions I will sort of answer in this brief review.

AMD Ryzen 7 5700G with Box

The Ryzen 7 5700G

Let’s get some specs out of the way, first. AMD lists this product as containing 8 processor cores and 16 threads, with a base clock of 3.8 GHz on the CPU cores and a TDP of 65W. The CPU cores feature AMD’s Zen 3 architecture, though they are not exactly the same as the desktop Ryzen 5000 cores, as the the Ryzen 7 5700G has half the L3 cache of the desktop parts – 16MB vs. 32MB.

AMD Ryzen 5700G Official Specs

Diving a bit deeper into these specs, we note that the code name is “Cezanne“, which means the CPU’s Zen 3 architecture has a lot more in common with last year’s mobile Ryzen 5000 side than current 5000 Series desktop SKUs.

Now for some bad news: the Radeon graphics are Vega 8 (yes, Vega), so prepare to be a bit underwhelmed by 8 Compute Units with a max frequency of up to 2 GHz. Oh, and since this is essentially a desktop version of a Ryzen 5000 mobile APU, expansion support is limited to PCIe 3.0. So much for my plan to recommend a discrete Radeon RX 6500 XT upgrade path (a PCIe 4.0 x4 product).

Limited Testing of a Limited Product

I will not pretend that I have everything on hand that I would like, such as a low-end current-gen GPU like the Radeon RX 6400 to compare this APU against. I do have a Radeon RX 6500 XT, and a GTX 1050 Ti, but as you will find in the chart below, the Ryzen 7 5700G is not even in the same league as the aforementioned modest GPUs.

A quick note on test configuration: AMD lists DDR4-3200 as the supported standard, and some reviewers have a “reference” memory speed philosophy, but I tested with DDR4-3600 (the PNY kit I recently wrote about). I probably don’t have to tell you that DDR4-3600 has become something of an unofficial standard among enthusiasts (feel free to tell me about your DDR4-3200 config in the comments), and with prices as low as they are these days for DDR4 kits I don’t see any good reason not to use the faster memory – especially considering 3600 MT/s RAM just works with any Ryzen 5000 product I’ve tested it with (including this one).

In short, any GPU comparison testing is from our standard AMD Ryzen testbed, which features a Ryzen 7 5800X, running with an 1800 MHz FCLK thanks to DDR4-3600 memory, on an ASUS ROG Crosshair VIII HERO (Wi-Fi) motherboard, BIOS 3703. The Ryzen 7 5700G was configured with the same 1800 MHz FCLK, a 16 GB kit of DDR4-3600, and plugged into an ASUS ROG Strix B550-F GAMING (Wi-Fi) motherboard, BIOS 2604.

AMD Ryzen 7 5700G HWINFO64

First, a couple of standard 3DMark tests:

AMD Ryzen 7 5700G 3DM Fire Strike Chart
AMD Ryzen 7 5700G 3DMark Time Spy Chart

Things tighten up a bit at the bottom of the chart in Time Spy, a 2560×1440 test, but it’s not a pretty picture overall. A GeForce GTX 1050 Ti is pretty old at this point, and is quite a bit faster. But the 1050 Ti pales in comparison to AMD’s Radeon RX 6500 XT. Wow. I did test the discrete GPUs in our standard Ryzen 7 5800X system, and that is a significantly faster CPU, but I am only showing the GPU score here.

Now for two very sad little charts:

AMD Ryzen 7 5700G Far Cry 5 1080 Low Chart
AMD Ryzen 7 5700G Cyberpunk 1080 Low Chart

These are but two games, and in Cyberpunk 2077 the Vega 8 graphics were better than expected, but still. No more of this. I would have at least like to have tested a Radeon RX 6400 to make this somewhat interesting, but alas.

No matter how you test it, the Vega graphics in the Ryzen 7 5700G are not fast. If you are stuck paying the full $359 USD price for this APU I would strongly recommend a $199 Radeon RX 6500 XT plus any CPU you like with the remaining $160, instead. If you can get one for $249 – $269, then maybe it makes sense.

But this is just the 3D gaming perspective. The CPU is pretty good, and here are a handful of sad little charts to demonstrate this:

Performance isn’t too far off the other Ryzen 7 CPUs tested, but without a desktop Ryzen 7 5700X (and perhaps a Ryzen 5 5600X) this isn’t very useful info. Maybe we can salvage this CPU performance section somewhat. Remember that question about discrete GPU performance with this APU? Will it hold you back when you eventually upgrade to a fast graphics card?

To demonstrate CPU scaling I selected our trusty NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti FE card, and compared the AMD Ryzen 7 CPUs with the same two games as earlier:

AMD Ryzen 7 5700G Far Cry 5 1080 CPU Chart
AMD Ryzen 7 5700G Cyberpunk 1080 CPU Chart

Clearly, the combination of lower clocks and less L3 cache is not helping the Ryzen 7 5700G in discrete gaming with a fast GPU. I also considered the APU’s PCIe 3.0 limitation, though this is a x16 card so it should be pretty minimal.

Final Thoughts

For productivity and light (and I mean very light) gaming, the Ryzen 7 5700G is fine. It’s not exciting, it’s not RDNA 2, but it works. But I’ll say this again, because I think it’s worth repeating: at its $359 list price the Ryzen 7 5700G doesn’t make any sense for gaming when you can buy the much faster RX 6500 XT at $199, and pair that with a halfway decent CPU (one example is a Core i5-11400F at $149, and a Ryzen 5 5600 isn’t much more), and be spending about the same amount, in total.

Consider this: the Ryzen 5 3400G launched over two years ago at $149, and offered Vega 11 graphics (as in 11 CUs; 3 more than the Vega 8 found in the 5700G). This Ryzen 7 5700G provides very good CPU cores, of course, and the the GPU clocks are a lot higher now, but it’s still Vega 8. VEGA. What more is there to say? Well, probably a lot but this is a “mini-review” so I’ll stop now.

Review Disclosures

This is what we consider the responsible disclosure of our review policies and procedures.

How Product Was Obtained

The product was purchased by the author for the purpose of this review.

Company Involvement

AMD had no control over the content of the review and was not consulted prior to publication.

PC Perspective Compensation

Neither PC Perspective nor any of its staff were paid or compensated in any way by AMD for this review.

Advertising Disclosure

AMD has not purchased advertising at PC Perspective during the past twelve months.

Affiliate Links

If this article contains affiliate links to online retailers, PC Perspective may receive compensation for purchases through those links.

Video News

About The Author

Sebastian Peak

Editor-in-Chief at PC Perspective. Writer of computer stuff, vintage PC nerd, and full-time dad. Still in search of the perfect smartphone. In his nonexistent spare time Sebastian's hobbies include hi-fi audio, guitars, and road bikes. Currently investigating time travel.

14 Comments

  1. Operandi

    I’m constantly looking these beefy AMD APUs as upgrade for my passively cooled NUC HTPC. The i3 8300 with Iris graphics really struggles with even some indie games and emulation at 4K res and this would absolutely smoke that. The problem with going with anything much more powerful than NUC class hardware has been cooling and noise but I see Akasa has mITX “Maxwell Pro” chassis that can deal with 65 watts passively. Kinda tempting…

    Reply
  2. Dave

    An incredibly stupid article. Its an igpu so compare it to another igpu. If you compared it to a comparable intel igpu that would be worth reading.

    Reply
    • Sebastian Peak

      There is no comparable Intel iGPU. I based the article on value, since $359 can buy a significantly better gaming setup for someone using a Radeon RX 6500 XT and a ~$160 CPU.

      Reply
      • VB

        What’s wrong with the Intel Iris XE 96EU? That’s approx 1.7tflops vs the 2.1tflops in the 5700G Surely that’s comparable, within 20% of its tflops however we all know from one manufacturer to the next tflops aren’t a like for like comparison. The 3090ti has way more tflops than the 6950XT however in some titles the 6950xt smokes it.

        Reply
    • Barmertom

      On point!

      Reply
    • Isaac Johnson

      Calm down, Karen, your refund is on its way.

      Reply
  3. BigTed

    I’ve put together a couple of 5600g systems for work. Paired with 16gb of ram and stuffed into an Asrock X300 chassis, they make for good little productivity boxes. They don’t break a sweat for some light Photoshop and Premiere work. Plus they are VESA mounted to the back of monitors.

    Fraction of the price of a “proper” NUC too.

    Reply
    • Sebastian Peak

      Naturally I left out the most important application of such a product, which is simply to provide a CPU and graphics on one package which can be easily implemented in a small enclosure with basic cooling. HOWEVER, even the 5600G is a hard sell for me considering the $259 price tag. I’d much rather get a 6-core Intel CPU for around $150 at that point, particularly as the Vega iGPU will not be useful in Adobe applications as the CPU cores will offer much better performance than trying to GPU accelerate anything on those. At some point AMD needs to drop the prices on these things back to the very sensible level they were previously, when the highest Ryzen with Radeon Graphics SKU was $149.

      Reply
      • BigTed

        Totally agree on the price front. These CPUs were borne at a time of totally crazy market conditions where you could sell anything you make. I did manage to get a good deal on the 5600g last autumn though.

        Also, AMD could do with a 4 core a la 3200g / 3400g. I built a couple of mini office PCs around that CPU and they were only £80 a pop. I guess they’ll address that with Zen 4.

        Reply
  4. ASK

    well writted

    Reply
  5. ASK

    well written

    Reply
  6. Broke NOOB

    I know this is a dumb question but, since (for about a year now) I already own the HP Pavilion PC with AMD Ryzen 7 5700G with Radeon Graphics and 16g RAM, is it possible to drop a better GPU in without doing a total rebuild of my PC? I guess what I am asking is, will this APU support another GPU?

    Reply
    • Jeremy Hellstrom

      Big questions are PSU and space. If you don’t have a six or eight pin PCIe power connector your options are somewhat limited. You should measure out the space you have to install a GPU as well, some of those HPs have ducting in them which can get in the way.

      Reply
  7. peter j connell

    APUs are monolithic & so have a better 7nm mem controller. 4k ram is ~a given… all important for integrated graphics (test rig was 3600). Of course its not a good gamer, but for all else, its tempting to skip the pain in the ass, expensive gpu.

    Reply

Leave a reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Latest Podcasts

Archive & Timeline

Previous 12 months
Explore: All The Years!