AMD may not abandon AM4 just yet, as it appears that more refreshed 5000 series chips are on their way

AMD may have cracked the lid on the AM5 platform with Ryzen 9000 series processors like the Ryzen 9 995X, but the company seems determined to produce more AM4 CPUs as well. That's great news, and I'm all for it. I say, milk AM4 to the fullest.

The two new chips are headed to the now-two-generations-out 5000-series. AMD is reportedly launching two new Ryzen 5 CPUs, the Ryzen 5 5600T & 5600XT. After momomo mentioned the 5600T, VideoCardz noticed the CPUs appearing on the pages of various motherboard manufacturers.

AMD has been producing 5000-series processors for a long time. The Ryzen 5 5600X3D was released in 2023 (limited to MicroCenter) and the Ryzen 7 and Ryzen 9 models were released in 2024. A Ryzen 7 and Ryzen 8 5900XT were also launched at the beginning of the year. Oh, and there's a possible Ryzen 5 5500X3D. But we haven’t heard much about that since August.

Originally, and officially, the 'T" suffix was supposed to mean a low-power processor. However, that seems to have changed over time. The 5900XT has the same TDP of the 5900X but is more powerful due to its more cores. The 'T' suffix seems to indicate a newer version of the non-T version. Or maybe AMD has run out of names.

According to Asus' listing for these CPUs, the specs should be comparable to the non-refreshed version of the 5000 series CPUs:

This doesn't say much. The 5600XT may have a higher base clock than the 5600X but boost clocks matter more for gaming. The 5800XT has a 100 MHz boost clock higher than the 5800X, and this would differentiate the 5600T/ 5600XT with their non-refreshed equivalents.

Price is another factor that would make them stand out. AMD could bring out two new 6-core processors from the 5000-series with slightly faster boost clocks, and lower prices. This would be a huge win for PC builders who are on a tight budget. These are also likely to be used by some system designers in place of older parts.

You can get a Ryzen 5- 5600X at Amazon for $128. This is still a reasonable price for a gaming chip. It's not the best gaming processor on the market but it does the job. Imagine if you were able to reduce the price by $10-15, add 100 MHz to the base clock , andthe booster clock, while maintaining a 65 W TDP. This CPU would be an excellent budget upgrade for older AM4 systems.

It's all speculation. We don't have an official confirmation of these CPUs, let alone their final specifications. These speculations are not unreasonable if you look at previous 5000-series updates. We'll have to wait and watch.