AMDRyzen 5 4500 6-Core, 12-Thread Unlocked Desktop Processor with Wraith Stealth Cooler

I found myself in need of upgrading a Core i5 2500K to allow my daughter to play Fortnite with my son and I. I paired this Ryzen 5 4500 with a Gigabyte B450M DS3H WIFI board and 16GB of TForce DDR4, and completed the build with an Antec 520W power supply, a 500GB SSD, and a Radeon RX 6600 that I had sitting in the parts bin.I already had Windows 11 installed on the drive and it booted right up. I installed the appropriate drivers and then used CPU-z to run a stress test. Under 100% load using the included Wraith Stealth cooler, the max temp I saw was 85C. Since I run a Ryzen 9 7900x on my main rig, I am more than comfortable with Ryzen's ability to handle heat, and 85C is perfectly acceptable in my book. Despite running hot, the fan was nice and quiet the entire time. This was under stock settings - no tuning to the fan curve. During the stress test, the max wattage use by the CPU was right around 58. Right now while idling it is pulling 10 watts and sitting at 40C.The only game I have installed right now is Fortnite. On Epic presets, 1080p, using the RX 6600, I was getting 40-55 FPS (which I consider perfectly playable on a budget-level system). On High presets I consistently pulled 60-70 FPS. I would get a little stuttering here and there, which I suspect is memory-bandwidth-related. In all fairness I haven't even opened the BIOS to tune any settings. GPU usage was at 100% and CPU was at maybe 75%-80%. I consider that a pretty efficient pairing, though you could possibly bump up to something like a 6750 XT to get a little more performance without the CPU becoming a bottleneck. In any case, this is sufficient performance for 1080p gaming on most modern titles running at higher settings (without raytracing of course). I'll be doing some additional benchmarks as I finish up the 100+GB downloads, and if there are any changes to my opinion I'll update this review.There are definitely faster processors, some of which don't cost a whole lot more than this. But since my goal was to build a viable system that paired well with my existing hardware, this really hit the sweet spot in terms of price and performance.

Great performance and quality. The AM4 socket is highly compatible, and there are upgrades from this. with 6 good cores and great thermal resistance as well as price this is a good CPU for a midrange build

Great budget CPU works with a 970 and can do most things a person would need (upgrading to a 2070 and can still work)

Nice budget cpuDoesn’t get to high in temperaturesRuns nice in Gpu heavy games not so much in CPU heavy gamesThis works with AM4 supportEasy to install but do be warned you could get locked out of system when upgrading CPU’s but a quick tutorial could help fix that issueComes with additional items like a cpu fan and thermal paste already applied on the cpu fan.

The Ryzen 5 4500 is one of the best budget cpus for gaming and daily use. Price to performance is extremely hard to beat especially as you can find this currently under 80$ AMD is consistently both the best performance and price to performance leader in the CPU market and especially to those willing to stick with an older platform like AM4. I also love for my customers that they get an easy to understand upgrade path that often allows them to maintain as much of their hardware as possible. If your goal is a sub 500-600$ new parts PC this is the CPU for you!

Works as it should.

I bought this on sale for $80 and it replaced my r5 1600x and the performance jump was great. I mostly did it so I could use more CPU intensive programs. Works well without getting hot when using am air cooler.

Best for gaming espec if OC to 4.0 ghz