The unlocked hex-core i5-8600K from Intel’s latest Coffee Lake generation of processors is the new flagship of the i5 series, succeeding the Kaby Lake quad-core i5-7600K. The 8th generation of processors brings the largest performance uplift since Sandy Bridge by adding more cores at each of the i3, i5 and i7 product lines. Like the other Coffee Lake processors, the i5-8600K is built upon optimized 14nm architecture, marginally improved upon from Kaby Lake and Skylake. The 8600K has a 95W TDP and a nominal stock clock of 3.6 GHz, which boosts to 4.1 GHz for all six cores, 4.2 GHz for dual/quad and 4.3 GHz for single core. Early benchmarks put the i5-8600K’s effective speed 15% ahead of the i5-7600K. A 50% increase in multi-core speed is explained by two additional cores and thanks to the quad-core clock bump from 4 GHz on the 7600K to 4.2 GHz on the 8600K there is also an additional 5% performance boost across all workloads. All Coffee Lake processors require a 300-series chipset, making a straight CPU upgrade unfeasible despite sharing the same socket as their Z270 predecessors. Even though most games still use less than 4 cores simultaneously, the i5-8600K is a great choice for gamers but for $80 less, the 8350K which is
faster than last years 7600K and only marginally weaker for gaming than the 8600K is certainly well worth considering as well. [Oct '17CPUPro]
The 8 core, 16 thread 1900X is the third and entry-level processor from AMD’s Threadripper series of high-end desktop (HEDT) processors. The 1900X is based on AMD’s 14nm Zen architecture and features 20MB of cache (16MB of which is L3) and quad channel DDR4, which is twice as many channels as in the Ryzen 7 series. It has a base clock of 3.8GHz increasing to a boost of 4.0 GHz and has an additional short-term boost of 0.2 GHz when thermals allow. Most impressively, the 1900X features 64 PCIe lanes which is the same of number of lanes in the nearly twice as expensive Ryzen Threadripper flagship, the 1950X. This facilitates the simultaneous high speed PCIe connection of up to seven different graphics or storage peripherals. By comparison, Intel’s similarly priced 8 core, 16 thread i7-7820X which, even though it has an 11% effective speed advantage over the 1900X, only has 28 PCIe lanes (down from 44 lanes as recently seen in the recent i9-7900X). Both upgrade options may require new, and not inexpensive motherboards, the 7820X requires an X299 (Basin Falls) chipset and the 1900X utilizes the premium X399 motherboard. Despite the considerable price tags attached to the CPUs and motherboards, never before has HEDT processing been so affordable. [Oct '17CPUPro]
We calculate effective speed which measures real world performance for typical users. Effective speed is adjusted by current prices to yield a value for money rating. Our calculated values are checked against thousands of individual user ratings. The customizable table below combines these factors to bring you the definitive list of top CPUs. [CPUPro]
Welcome to our PC speed test tool. UserBenchmark will test your PC and compare the results to other users with the same components. You can quickly size up your PC, identify hardware problems and explore the best value for money upgrades.