Overall and Final Verdict
As I mentioned before, with AMD refreshing CPUs across both the 5000 series and the 4000 series things can get a little complicated. The Ryzen 5 4500 falls in just below the 4600G offering an option in that range with similar performance for someone who doesn’t want to pay the extra money to also have integrated graphics. The Ryzen 5 4500 isn’t designed at all to be a crazy high-end CPU, it is just giving a small bump to the older Zen 2 architecture to fill in the price gap between the new Ryzen 3 4100 and the 4600G. Performance-wise that shows as well, the 4500 comes in the middle of the pack in almost every one of our tests that includes older CPUs. It is often competing with the I5-10600K which is impressive and it shows that even using an older architecture that it is running with the high-end first-generation Ryzen CPUs. With pricing on everything going crazy, I’m happy to see that AMD has an option for people looking for a budget build. That said being a Zen 2 CPU it does struggle in the same places that the older gen Ryzen CPUs did. Specifically in gaming. If that is your goal, the Zen 3 based Ryzen 5 5500 may be the better option for $30 more. But if you just need passable gaming performance and good mid-range performance in every other situation I do like the 4500.
Being an AM4 based CPU you have a lot of options available if you want to step up the performance even more as well. Power usage wasn’t too bad for the 65-watt TDP CPU and AMD does bundle it with their Wraith Stealth cooler which adds a little more value as well. The Ryzen 5 4500 has an MSRP of $129 and with GPU prices starting to come down we might soon be able to start building budget systems back in that $500-$600 range again and that is the sweet spot for the 4500.
Live Pricing: HERE
