The price of 1,500 yuan is the core sweet spot for DIY installation, and it is also a battleground in the mid-range battlefield between Intel and AMD.With the launch of the Intel ArrowLake refresh series Core Ultra 5 250K Plus, competition in the mid-range CPU market has once again become fierce.

This new product, priced at US$199, directly competes with the AMD Zen5 architecture Ryzen 5 9600X.Tomshardware conducted a detailed evaluation of the two U models from multiple dimensions.I believe that after reading this, everyone will have a clearer idea of ​​​​choosing this 1,500 yuan CPU.

Looking at the core specifications first, the design ideas of the two products are completely different.The Core Ultra 5 250K Plus is based on TSMC's 3nm process and uses Intel hybrid architecture. It is equipped with 6 LionCove performance cores + 12 Skymont energy efficiency cores, for a total of 18 cores and 18 threads.The performance core has a maximum core frequency of 5.3GHz, and the energy efficiency core has a maximum core frequency of 4.6GHz. Total cache 60MB, including 30MB L3 cache, native support for DDR5-7200 memory, TDP125W,Using LGA1851 interface, compatible with 800 series motherboards. The current domestic boxed price is 1,699 yuan (the KF non-core display version is 1,599 yuan).

Ryzen 5 9600X is based on TSMC’s 4nm process and Zen5 architecture, and follows the classic 6-core 12-thread design.The maximum turbo frequency is 5.4GHz, L3 cache 32MB, native support for DDR5-5600 memory, rated TDP65W, and the official compliant 105WTDP enhanced mode. After switching, the full official warranty is still retained, and it can be enabled by just setting it in the motherboard BIOS.It adopts AM5 interface and is compatible with 600/800 series motherboards. It is currently priced at 1,349 yuan in a box in China.

Game performance is the core assessment item of mid-range CPU. During the test, the RT X5090 graphics card was used to eliminate the bottleneck and the test was completed at 1080P resolution. The geometric average of the combined game frame rates of the two CPUs is almost the same, with the Core Ultra 5 250K Plus only leading by a slight advantage of 1%. Broken down into 17 test games, it achieved lead in 11 of them.

In 3A masterpieces such as "Cyberpunk 2077", "Doom: Dark Ages", and "Starry Sky", the Core Ultra 5 250K Plus can run a frame rate of 9%-16.7%, and the 1% Low frame rate performance is also more stable, with fewer game lags.

Ryzen 5 9600X has an advantage in games such as "F12024", "Final Fantasy 14", and "Minecraft", among which "Minecraft" has a huge frame rate advantage of 30%.Surprisingly, the Core Ultra 5 250K Plus has better energy efficiency in gaming scenarios. Its average game power consumption is 82.3W, which is lower than the 86.2W of Ryzen 5 9600X. Its average temperature is 48℃, 11℃ lower than AMD, and the heat dissipation pressure is smaller.

The productivity scenario is the biggest difference between the two products.With more core threads, the Core Ultra 5 250K Plus leads the Ryzen 5 9600X in comprehensive multi-thread performance by a full 79%.The Ryzen 5 9600X data tested this time are all in the default 65W mode. After turning on the 105W mode, it can only bring about a small multi-threading performance improvement of 5%-9%. The single-core performance and game performance are almost unchanged, and it cannot narrow the core gap with the Core Ultra 5 250K Plus.

In the Cinebench 2024/2026 rendering test, the Core Ultra 5 250K Plus's performance lead was 86%-91%; in creative scenarios such as HandBrake video encoding and JPEG-XL image processing, the performance lead was up to nearly 77%, and multi-threaded image processing performance was directly doubled.

In terms of single-thread performance, the Core Ultra 5 250K Plus also maintains an overall lead of about 5%. Only in a few lightweight tasks such as audio encoding, the Ryzen 5 9600X can slightly overtake it.

At the overclocking and platform level, Core Ultra 5 250K Plus is more playable, unlocking the multiplier supports fine overclocking, and there is ample room for adjustment when paired with Z series motherboards. Ryzen 5 9600X is close to the upper frequency limit when leaving the factory, and manual overclocking has extremely low benefits, making it more suitable for PBO step-down to optimize energy efficiency.

Under full productivity scenarios, the power consumption of Ryzen 5 9600X is 71%-88% lower than that of competing products, crushing energy efficiency.In terms of platform costs,B-series motherboards on the AM5 platform can be overclocked, the entry-level model is cheaper, and support continues until 2027, so there is ample room for upgrades. The Intel LGA1851 platform is about to be replaced by new products. B series motherboards do not support CPU overclocking, and the long-term upgradeability and entry cost are not superior. 

Taken together,The Core Ultra 5 250K Plus won this matchup with a total score of 4:2. If you pursue all-round performance, install a machine that takes into account gaming and content creation, and need stronger multi-threaded performance, it is your first choice at this price point..

If you value low power consumption and long-term platform upgradeability, install mainly pure games, and don’t want to spend too much budget on the motherboard, Ryzen 5 9600X is a safer and more cost-effective choice.