AMD Athlon 200GE 3.2 GHz

[W1zzard]

AMD is bringing back their Athlon brand with the Athlon 200GE, featuring two cores and four threads. With a price of only $60 for the reviewed processor, this is the cheapest option to join the Ryzen+Vega game and a clear winner when it comes to price/performance.

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[Liquid Cool]

I'd strongly echo Wizzard's recommendation on memory. For my Ryzen 3 2200G, it really started to wake up when you hit 2666MHz.

It was quite nice to see my little chip "at least in the same neighborhood" as the GT 1030 and it's bigger brother(Ryzen 5 2400G).

That's enough price/performance for me...until I get a graphics card....

Thanks for the review W1z, I enjoyed reading it.

,

Liquid Cool

 

[Basard]

According to the charts, it looks like a solid 4k gaming CPU for its price.

 

[Frick]

€62 ... which I thought was too much because the Pentium G5600 was way better but then I saw that the Pentium is >€100, which is just retarded.

This is quite good then actually. G4560 dethroned!

 

[GeorgeMan]

Actualy gaming performance with 1080Ti is bad because of the pci-e x4 limitation
Nice review, thank you very much!

 

[Dante Uchiha]

@W1zzard - It would be interesting see a power consumption test without an off-board video card.

 

[W1zzard]

@W1zzard - It would be interesting see a power consumption test without an off-board video card.

Just subtract 10 W

 

[randomUser]

€62 ... which I thought was too much because the Pentium G5600 was way better but then I saw that the Pentium is >€100, which is just retarded.

This is quite good then actually. G4560 dethroned!

Don't be fooled by a bad choice of testable CPUs.
G5600 is "top" of the line.
G5400 has only 200MHz lower clocks (3.7Ghz) and was priced at 56 Eur (bought it before price hike).

If you look through all the graphs again, you will notice, that G4560 (Clocked at 3.5GHz) is better than athlon in almost all of the tests.
So 3.7GHz means, that G5400 will beat athlon in every test.

200GE currently costs 56 Eur. It if wasn't for the production shortage on Intels side, G5400 would cost the same as 200GE, and that means for the same price, you do get a better CPU and graphics are not that much behind the 200GE

 

[Salty_sandwich]

interesting result in relative performance between the quad core Ryzen 3 1200 using four real cores vs 2 and hyper threaded.

 

[ArbitraryAffection]

Great review thanks Wizzard.

I just ordered one of these to replace the A6-9500 in my HTPC (which was originally used to flash a bios haha). It should be a really nice upgrade for the HTPC.

That said I really think AMD dropped the ball with lack of overclocking on this. at 3.2 GHz it is running slower than all(?) of the Pentium 2/4 CPUs and as a result is going to be slower. I think pricing is perfect if the CPU is unlocked. 3.7GHz+ on this and it is much more competitive against the Coffee Lake Pentiums at their MSRP's. (I know they are overpriced now due to 14nm+ shortages). GPU is better but you are not going to be gaming on this CPU IMO.

Either way I already had the AM4 motherboard so it was a no brainer for a low cost HTPC processor.

 

[randomUser]

Just subtract 10 W

Power consumption seems to be very high for 200GE.

Just for reference:
1. ITX case with integrated 250W TFX PSU
ITX H310 board with M.2 drive
1x8GB DDR4 value RAM
Wifi ON
LAN OFF
Passive cooling
G5400 CPU
Power consumption ~15W idle

2. Mid-tower with beQuiet Pure Power 400W PSU
Same ITX board
2x16GB value RAM
Wifi ON
LAN Off
Passive cooling
G5400 CPU
Power consumption ~21W idle

EDIT: Power measured with wattmeter at the socket.

HWMonitor shows CPU package consuming around 0.8-1.2W on idle.

 

[TheLostSwede]

@W1zzard what's a Cire i3-8300?

Sorry, but imho, this doesn't deserve a highly recommended award. AMD messed up here by limiting the memory frequency and locking the multiplier. It's a slow turd as it is and it's not that cheap. Either they should've upped the clock speed, or not limited user overclocking to make this the least bit interesting.
Maybe I'm just "elitist" or something here, but this is not something I would waste money on, not for myself, not for someone else.

 

[newtekie1]

Sees like a good processor for those who just need a computer and don't really care about performance, a great CPU for grandma's computer.

 

[GoldenX]

So the Pentium is a 16% better while costing 66% more.
Nice little chip, too bad it's locked. Is still the perfect HTPC, with sucha low price, and better than any embedded Atom.

 

[Vya Domus]

Too bad it's locked. And it's a dual-core...

It if wasn't for the production shortage on Intels side, G5400 would cost the same as 200GE

Highly doubt that, I never saw even the G4560 at MSRP.

 

[catulitechup]

Great review

Sadly amd dont put more frecuency, at 3.5ghz or more will be more interesting

High tdp in tests

 

[Assimilator]

Power consumption seems to be very high for 200GE.

In particular, the idle power is not great:

All the Vega APUs have relatively poor energy efficiency when "idle". @W1zzard is this maybe a driver issue, would you consider taking it up with AMD?

 

[ShurikN]

It's ok, but nothing spectacular. If it was clocked at around 3.5GHz with this pricing, it would have been great.

 

[W1zzard]

All the Vega APUs have relatively poor energy efficiency when "idle"

The biggest part of that is not that CPU but the other components like motherboards and the GTX 1080 Ti (10 W in idle, for all systems).

The higher power draw compared to the non-APU Ryzens is because of the integrated graphics

 

[phill]

Liked the review, but as the review mentioned, for a basic light task PC it's perfect. Something for the children to do college work on or surf the net.. Not sure I'd like it for gaming on for 720P or something, but if it's locked and unable to overclock, then it's limiting itself to its ordinance.. (I hope I've spelt that right!)

Bring back the AMD Thunderbird days

 

[Supercrit]

If only it could support turbo that would sweeten the deal quite a bit.

 

[Divide Overflow]

Kinda feels sad having my image of AMD's Athlon diluted by such a low tier part.

 

[GoldenX]

Kinda feels sad having my image of AMD's Athlon diluted by such a low tier part.

The AM1 Athlons were worse, like the Atom Pentiums.

 

[kastriot]

If this cpu would sell together with nano atx custom mobo with soldered 4/8GB RAM @100$ it would be great value, but ofc that will never happen

 

[R0H1T]

This chip could've killed everything under $100 if it was unlocked. But I guess AMD needs to sell 2200g & 2400g as well.