If you’re reading reviews for the 3600X, you’re probably wondering if the slight performance over the 3600 is with the slight bump in price.

The answer is YES!

Unlike the previous generations of Ryzen CPUs, where the performance improvements of the X models could be matched by a mild OC to the base models, and almost no difference between the two with much a more aggressive OCs—the X models of the 3000 line scale proportionately with OC, so the X will always perform better than the base model under the same conditions.

That said, manual overclocking is basically pointless with these 3000 series CPUs, because they’re designed to run as fast and hard as possible, given the available voltage and thermal headroom—which is much more like a GPU than a traditional CPU. That ... More

If you’re reading reviews for the 3600X, you’re probably wondering if the slight performance over the 3600 is with the slight bump in price.

The answer is YES!

Unlike the previous generations of Ryzen CPUs, where the performance improvements of the X models could be matched by a mild OC to the base models, and almost no difference between the two with much a more aggressive OCs—the X models of the 3000 line scale proportionately with OC, so the X will always perform better than the base model under the same conditions.

That said, manual overclocking is basically pointless with these 3000 series CPUs, because they’re designed to run as fast and hard as possible, given the available voltage and thermal headroom—which is much more like a GPU than a traditional CPU. That means more cooling = more performance, which makes the upgraded CPU cooler that comes with the X model even more enticing for anyone on a budget.

For anyone spending money on an aftermarket air cooler or AIO, the stock cooler won’t matter to you anyway—but for folks that don’t care about noise of the stock cooler, and wanna save a few bucks, it’s a nice bonus.

With all the bundle deals that MicroCenter offers on CPUs and Motherboard combos, the price difference is only around $20-30, which made it an even easier choice for me.

Again, not to discourage anyone from overclocking—but unless you plan on spending a ton for high end cooling solutions, and don’t mind voiding your warranty for those extra 2-3% in performance gains, there isn’t much of a point in doing more than enabling XMP on these new Ryzen systems, because you could’ve gotten those gains with stock settings if you simply lower the CPU temperature.

If you’re price sensitive enough that the added cost of the X is enough to make you consider the lower priced base model, but still care enough about performance that you want to OC the base model until it matches the X—you’re simply shifting the cost from the CPU to a cooler, and spending the same amount. The only problem with that, is that if you would’ve bought the X, you could have the same performance (of a custom cooled, OC’d base model) right out of the gate (without an OC) and if you waited until you could afford to upgrade the cooler on it at a later date, then you’d get even better performance.

The only downside to the stock cooler is that it’s a bit loud when you crank up the speeds for better performance, but if you play with headphones and know how to setup a noise gate on your mic—the noise isn’t a noticeable issue.

(Maybe I’m a weirdo, but I’ve never seen noise as an issue that’s even worth considering when performance is concerned—that’d be like complaining about the engine and exhaust noise of a Dodge Hellcat like it was a problem!) Less