Okay, so I finally took the AMD plunge after years of Intel loyalty. The Ryzen 5 5600GT? Absolute game-changer for my budget rebuild!

The stock cooler surprised me – came with pre-applied thermal paste (though I wiped it for my favorite brand because… well, I’m extra like that). Booted up flawlessly on my A520M board without BIOS updates. *chef’s kiss*

Integrated graphics saved me when my GPU decided to take a coffee break mid-game. My kid tested Fortnite on just the Radeon graphics and… playable! Not esports-ready, but for email/office use? Overkill in the best way.

Pro tip: Mount the cooler with the AMD logo facing AWAY from RAM slots. Learned that the hard way when wrestling with DIMMs at 2AM.

Upgraded an old bricked system for under $350 reusing parts. Now it handles my VM lab like a champ while sipping power. Would buy again just for those ‘wait, this was HOW cheap?!’ moments.