A Closer Look

The Ryzen 7 2600X comes in a big cubical box characteristic of Ryzen.


AMD is including a Wraith Spire cooling solution with the 2600X. The cooler features a large cylindrical heatsink with radially projecting fins, which is ventilated by a large fan. AMD has optimized the fan for low noise.


The Ryzen 5 2600X package looks just like any other Ryzen socket AM4 processor. It comes with a soldered IHS (like 1st gen Ryzen, unlike Raven Ridge APUs and unlike Intel). AMD claims to be using a high-grade indium-alloy solder which works to lower temperatures by as much as 10°C.


AMD continues to use the AM4 socket, which means all existing Ryzen motherboards will be compatible with the new Ryzen 2000 series (after a BIOS update). The company also plans to stick to AM4 for the rest of this decade, so there's a pretty long upgrade path ahead for this platform.

AM4 still has a rectangular cooler-mount-hole layout (as opposed to the square ones on Intel LGA platforms). AMD should have switched to a square layout to make it easier to orient tower-type coolers to blow hot air out the rear of the case. Current AM4-ready tower coolers have elaborate retention module kits that let you do so. Most popular cooler vendors are either already including AM4 retention kits with their latest coolers or will send you a mounting kit for free if you want to continue using a cooler you have. You often also have to remove the plastic retention module motherboards ship with to install certain kinds of coolers.