I'm choosing between two similarly priced builds. The first costs about $624 and uses a B550M motherboard, a Ryzen 5 3600, a used RX 6600 XT, 32GB of used DDR4, and a new Cooler Master MWE V3 Bronze 750W non-modular power supply. The second costs around $575 and uses a Ryzen 7 7500F, a Gigabyte B850M DS3H motherboard, a used RX 580, only one 16GB DDR5 stick, and the same 750W power supply. This is mainly for gaming. Is it better to get the stronger graphics card now, or choose AM5 and upgrade the GPU later?
2 Answers
For gaming today, I’d choose the AM4 build. The RX 6600 XT is dramatically faster than the RX 580, and the graphics card usually has the biggest impact on gaming performance at this level. The 32GB of dual-channel memory is also much better than running a single 16GB DDR5 stick. You can still replace the AM4 platform later, while the 6600 XT should remain useful for quite a while.
The 7500F is the stronger processor and AM5 has more future CPU options, so the second build is the better foundation. However, I would not pair it with an RX 580 and single-channel RAM unless this is only a temporary setup. Add another matching 16GB DDR5 module and plan the GPU upgrade carefully. If the GPU upgrade might be months or years away, get the AM4 system instead.
A future GPU upgrade can be cheaper than replacing the whole platform, but only if you actually have a realistic upgrade budget. Otherwise, you’re paying for a modern platform while accepting much lower performance right now.
The AM5 system does give you a better upgrade path, but you’d be spending the first part of its life with a severely limiting graphics card. If you can afford to buy a decent GPU fairly soon, AM5 makes more sense; otherwise, the AM4 build will be much more enjoyable immediately.