2600K vs current Intel (OC/stock)

[londiste]

I find it really amusing that they test the 7700k with 2400 and 9700k with 2666, intentional or not this is hugely biased towards the older chip.

They are testing by spec. Looking at the memory speeds on Test Setup page, I would hazard a guess that a large part of 2600K OC boost comes from memory. 1333 > 2400 is a considerable increase.

 

[GorbazTheDragon]

Test is of k series processors on z series boards with many gaming tests, if they wanted to show stock results it should have been alongside OCed ones.

I netted a few % performance just tightening up the timings on my memory... People very much underappreciate the impact the memory subsystem has on performance.

 

[R0H1T]

Well that's the point, if you remove the AVX numbers ~ the biggest gains have come from reworked caches, better memory. In fact that's the vast majority of gains since SB, period. Not to mention the "biggest change since SB" (or Haswell depending on who you ask) also features a major rejig of caches & not much else, except AVX 512

Sunny Cove core

One of the major changes in Ice Lake is the new Sunny Cove core – a core that Intel says will bring a significant improvement in IPC. This is the first new core since Skylake which was introduced nearly half a decade ago. Sunny Cove increases the cache sizes for the first time in over two decades. One of those changes is the L1 data cache size which has increased in capacity by 50% to 48 KiB. Likewise, the L2 cache has been doubled to 512 KiB. The scheduler on Sunny Cove has been further widened – 25% wider than Skylake, enabling up to 10 operations may be dispatched each cycle.

Beyond being wider and more complex, this is also the first Intel client core to introduce AVX-512. Compared to Skylake, Sunny Cove has a number of new very welcomed AVX-512 extensions which brings type orthogonality to the instruction set as well as extensions for deep learning and cryptography acceleration. It also incorporates the VNNI extension which has been designed to accelerate inference processing. One of the applications that makes use of that extension is Windows which allows the user to search their photos using AI. AI is used to identify objects and scenes that appear in the photos and makes them searchable. Beyond this, Intel offers the OpenVINO toolkit which allows developers to make use of those hardware capabilities in their software.

Ice Lake Brings A New CPU, GPU, IPU, and I/Os, To Follow By Tiger Lake Next Year

A look at Ice Lake mobile CPUs which bring a new CPU core, a new Gen11 GPU, and a new 4th Gen IPU as well the new roadmap detailed by Intel at their recent investor meeting which includes Xeon Sapphire Rapids CPUs and 7nm Xe Data Center GPGPUs for 2021.

fuse.wikichip.org

 

[londiste]

Sunny Cove? L1D is not increased by itself, wider dispatch/scheduler, an additional load/store pipe. Intel has claimed there are more changes in the frontend.

Kind of curious seeing what Intel is doing. The current state of things is that Intel has bottleneck in store, then in execution. They increase L2 cache, add a store pipe and seem to slightly boost execution units. I would suspect frontend changes have much more to do with Spectre and co than anything else. If they went into the unit design they might have squeezed out some optimizations but we will see about that.

AMD Zen is front-end bound and somewhat store-bound. That is why AMD is doing a lot of work on the frontend in Zen2. Execution units in Zen are wider than Intel's and there is need to keep them fed better. We have not seen or heard much about anything else but again, we'll see soon.

 

[John Naylor]

Unfortunately, pick a hypothesis that you want to "prove" and you can create a test protocol / game selection that proves or disproves it. Honestly, I don't think testing supports the more cores argument:

https://tpucdn.com/reviews/Intel/Core_i5_9600K/images/relative-performance-games-2560-1440.png

Sorry for the leading 0s but wanted the columns to line up for easier read. The 9900k has a 0.68% average improvement over 7600k. The 9900k beats the i5-7400 by 0.1 fps that's 0.096%

-04/04 7600k = 103.6
-04/08 7700k = 103.1
-06/06 8600k = 103.0
-06/12 8700k = 103.2
-06/06 9600k = 102.9
-08/08 9700k = 103.6
-08/16 9900k = 104.3

Granted, some games will be significantly affected but it's not the disaster many folks so desire it to be.

 

[mastershake575]

It's kind of cool to see stuff from 8 years ago keeping up fairly well, unlike the early 2000's where something from 1999 would be completely out of steam by 2003.

The 2013 consoles using a lowend laptop CPU helped the 2600k age like wine.

The 2600k is at least 3x faster than the consoles CPU which helped it age good (in 2019 it can still run games at very high settings with a mid tier GPU or higher, not bad)

Also, compare this with a eight year old P4 single core with HT back when Sandy Bridge was launched in 2011.

The Sandy Bridge is still pretty good for its age today, the P4 was pretty slow eight years ago..

It all show hows what happened with Moores law, lack of competition, 10 nm fail, laptops and phones being more popular, and the need for faster CPU's slowing down among average consumers.
A 4 year old computer today can be pretty good today, but in 2003 it was so last millenium..

The main reason why it's still a good CPU today is because games are running on engines that are being programmed to run on a CPU literally a fraction as fast (consoles jaguar CPU).

That wasn't the case in 2005/2006 when the next gen consoles basically made the pentium 4 obsolete ( current gen consoles did the opposite and made the 2600k look like gold)

Very nice read, and provides confirmation that we're well past the 4 core era for gaming,

Huge exaggeration to be honest

Until the next generation of consoles/game engines come out, we won't be past the 4 core era (they can still meet the needs of 90% of users)

 

[MrGRiMv25]

The 2013 consoles using a lowend laptop CPU helped the 2600k age like wine.

The 2600k is at least 3x faster than the consoles CPU which helped it age good (in 2019 it can still run games at very high settings with a mid tier GPU or higher, not bad)

Good point haha. Another thing I suppose is that at least they gave the current console-gen a bigger chunk of RAM to play with this time round, that helped us to not have to put up with the blurry textures from the PS3/360 days.

 

[Vayra86]

Huge exaggeration to be honest

Until the next generation of consoles/game engines come out, we won't be past the 4 core era (they can still meet the needs of 90% of users)

They can if you look backwards. If you look at the new games that are popular, many of those require a beefy quad with HT (8T - not just 4C) or benefit a huge lot from 6 cores or up. We see lots of i5 systems running into stuttery behavior now on new releases, quite simply because 4 threads get completely booked. The cause is exactly the same as why SB aged so well. Consoles pack more cores for quite some time now, and games get designed around it from the get go. Add some Denuvo on top and it gets even better

In other words, recommending quad core CPUs for a new gaming rig today, is not exactly sound advice. So in that sense yes, quad core era is over.

 

[dirtyferret]

Overclocked intel quad core still beats ryzen in most games even with "stuttering", which I'm willing to bet 80% of people looking at reviews don't pay attention to. I'm not saying go out and buy one but their is entire legion of i5/i3 quad owners out there that laugh like hyenas every time they get the latest AAA title and fire it up @ 60FPS.

Intel i3-8350K Review & Overclocking vs. i5-8400, R5 1600 | GamersNexus

stub Coffee Lake returns to the bench for its third review, with benchmarks now focusing on the Intel i3-8350K unlocked 4C/4T CPU. The 8350K (on Amazon here) essentially usurps the market of the previous i5-7600K, but is potentially squelched by CFL brethren i5-8400 CPUs, planting the 8350K in...

www.gamersnexus.net

 

[mastershake575]

In other words, recommending quad core CPUs for a new gaming rig today, is not exactly sound advice.

Nobody is saying go buy them today but that doesn't negate that there still fully capable of doing what they need to do (they don't sell quad core i5s anymore but previous owners aren't screwed or obsolete or struggling).

You can't say where well past it when it meets the needs of 90% of users and games are being run on CPU's literally a fraction as fast...... (until the next gen consoles come out it will still give good performance).

Saying "it's towards the end of it's life" or "still very capable but showing some signs of weakness in certain scenarios" is reality. Not "oh it's well past it's expiration date"

You say the average joe isn't getting recommend quad cores today but flip the scenario. Give the average joe a quad i5 with a gtx 2060 and lets see how many of them run to the store in the next 2 years to upgrade it.......

Overclocked intel quad core still beats ryzen in most games even with "stuttering", which I'm willing to bet 80% of people looking at reviews don't pay attention to. I'm not saying go out and buy one but their is entire legion of i5/i3 quad owners out there that laugh like hyenas every time they get the latest AAA title and fire it up @ 60FPS.

Exactly this. The problem is most people who post on a PC hardware board are enthusiast and don't look at it from just an average joe practicality point of view. There views tend to lean more elitist

Reality is even a quad core i5 with a current mid tier graphics card is plenty for gaming and general office work (both GPU and CPU will be at least 3x faster than whats in the consoles and most games even today are running on modified engines from 3-4 years ago).

 

[Rahnak]

Reality is even a quad core i5 with a current mid tier graphics card is plenty for gaming and general office work (both GPU and CPU will be at least 3x faster than whats in the consoles and most games even today are running on modified engines from 3-4 years ago).

If you're playing older games or you don't mind stuttering, sure. For the more modern, especially open world games, it falls behind 6+ core CPUs.

 

[dirtyferret]

If you're playing older games or you don't mind stuttering, sure. For the more modern, especially open world games, it falls behind 6+ core CPUs.

You mean like GTA 5 and destiny 2?

 

[mastershake575]

If you're playing older games or you don't mind stuttering, sure. For the more modern, especially open world games, it falls behind 6+ core CPUs.

Falls behind in what exactly ?

The technology is so far advanced from both the game engines and the power of the consoles that 90% of users can accomplish there task without any issues. People keep saying falling behind when in reality it's basically "oh you might only get high settings instead of very high" or "if you had a 6 core you could get over 100FPS average instead of only 80" (your borderline nitpicking the average joe at that point).

It's like saying Nissan is falling behind because there luxury models only do low 300hp while lexus and BMW do over 400. Low 300hp is plenty for most drivers and it's only behind the competition versus being behind on the masses needs

You mean like GTA 5 and destiny 2?

Both of which my dad runs on his 7 year old i5 and 6 year old 290x at high settings or better

 

[Mussels]

still got my golden 2500k in the shed as a memento, its taken a LONG time for their era to be over

look how close the 2600k and 7700k are together, in the OP's benchmarks :/ (talking OC'd, ofc. stocks a bit behind)

 

[Rahnak]

You mean like GTA 5 and destiny 2?

No, I don't. GTA5 is over 6 years old now and destiny 2 is not open world. AC:O, Far Cry 5 is what I had in mind.

Falls behind in what exactly ?

Smoothness. You may still get pretty high frames, but when it drops it drops hard. Personally I'd take smooth 60 over 80 with stutter.

When I say 4C I mean 4C/4T like the i5s of old, not 4C/8T, just to be clear.

Same reason why Steve from GNs, for example, no longer recommends i5s for gaming. 8C (or at the very least 8T) has become the sweet spot for gaming.

 

[Vayra86]

Nobody is saying go buy them today but that doesn't negate that there still fully capable of doing what they need to do (they don't sell quad core i5s anymore but previous owners aren't screwed or obsolete or struggling).

You can't say where well past it when it meets the needs of 90% of users and games are being run on CPU's literally a fraction as fast...... (until the next gen consoles come out it will still give good performance).

Saying "it's towards the end of it's life" or "still very capable but showing some signs of weakness in certain scenarios" is reality. Not "oh it's well past it's expiration date"

You say the average joe isn't getting recommend quad cores today but flip the scenario. Give the average joe a quad i5 with a gtx 2060 and lets see how many of them run to the store in the next 2 years to upgrade it.......

Exactly this. The problem is most people who post on a PC hardware board are enthusiast and don't look at it from just an average joe practicality point of view. There views tend to lean more elitist

Reality is even a quad core i5 with a current mid tier graphics card is plenty for gaming and general office work (both GPU and CPU will be at least 3x faster than whats in the consoles and most games even today are running on modified engines from 3-4 years ago).

You mean like GTA 5 and destiny 2?

Exactly. Thanks for proving my point.

GTA V released Sept 2013.
Destiny 2 released Sept 2017.

So again - if you intend to play new games and not have it be a problematic experience, its the end of the quad era. Therefore, recommending a new CPU as an i5 quad, or even a quad with HT given the recent developments on Intel, is not good advice. This is not an optimization problem either - once you get a new game with updated engine (AC:O is among a few other recent, and somewhat less recent examples) you will find a mere quadcore noticeably struggles from time to time. Stutter - an immersion breaker.

Sorry, but it is what it is. Nothing elitist about it and bad advice with meh parts to cut cost is nothing new either; it will still be given, and the end result is a rig with subpar gaming performance; but also one that is unable to handle any sort of GPU upgrade down the line. When you do some more gaming you realize that is not a cost effective way to do PC gaming When you're talking about an RTX 2060, you're talking about a pretty big amount of GPU performance (enough to max out 1080p and then some), and it needs a fast CPU or the balance is off.

I stand by what I said earlier. That statement didn't make all those old SB's and Haswells obsolete overnight or anything.. relax. But at the same time, get with the program. Tech progresses and this is a shift we've waited for quite some time now, and it happened.

 

[dirtyferret]

No, I don't. GTA5 is over 6 years old now and destiny 2 is not open world. AC:O, Far Cry 5 is what I had in mind.


Smoothness. You may still get pretty high frames, but when it drops it drops hard. Personally I'd take smooth 60 over 80 with stutter.

When I say 4C I mean 4C/4T like the i5s of old, not 4C/8T, just to be clear.

Same reason why Steve from GNs, for example, no longer recommends i5s for gaming. 8C (or at the very least 8T) has become the sweet spot for gaming.

Lol Intel $300+ CPUs are the sweet spot for gaming? Before you post and embarrass yourself with your lack of knowledge perhaps you should learn a thing or two. OC 8600/9600k match your sweet spot performance for $100/less.

Intel Core i5-9600K Review

The Core i5-9600K may not have the core-count increases of its higher-priced siblings, but it received a healthy frequency bump over its predecessor, coupled with hardware patches to some vulnerabilities. We already proved that the i7-9700K is the best gaming CPU by Intel. Can the humble Core i5...

www.techpowerup.com

 

[Rahnak]

Lol Intel $300+ CPUs are the sweet spot for gaming? Before you post and embarrass yourself with your lack of knowledge perhaps you should learn a thing or two. OC 8600/9600k match your sweet spot performance for $100/less.

Intel Core i5-9600K Review

The Core i5-9600K may not have the core-count increases of its higher-priced siblings, but it received a healthy frequency bump over its predecessor, coupled with hardware patches to some vulnerabilities. We already proved that the i7-9700K is the best gaming CPU by Intel. Can the humble Core i5...

www.techpowerup.com

I suggest you re-read my post. And while you're at it, Vayra's post as well. TPUs review deals with average fps which is all nice and well but it doesn't show you minimum fps. Go look at reviews that do, like Gamers Nexus (spoiler alert, they don't recommend the 9600K for gaming).

Now if you don't care about stuttering and just want those high fps then by all means, the i5 is the choice for you (or if don't play open world games, since those are the ones pushing CPUs the hardest right now).

TL;DR: Some newer games need more than 6 threads to run smoothly without dropping frames. Not that hard to understand.

 

[dirtyferret]

I suggest you re-read my post. And while you're at it, Vayra's post as well. TPUs review deals with average fps which is all nice and well but it doesn't show you minimum fps. Go look at reviews that do, like Gamers Nexus (spoiler alert, they don't recommend the 9600K for gaming).

Now if you don't care about stuttering and just want those high fps then by all means, the i5 is the choice for you (or if don't play open world games, since those are the ones pushing CPUs the hardest right now).

TL;DR: Some newer games need more than 6 threads to run smoothly without dropping frames. Not that hard to understand.

Lol wrong again!

Here gamers Nexus clearly recommending the 8600k over the 8700k in gaming. Even the site you mention don't agree with you! Lol

Intel i5-8600K Review & Overclocking vs. 8400, 8700K, & More | GamersNexus

stub Intel’s 8600K CPU changes the story significantly for the company’s i5 lineup. When AMD’s R5 CPUs launched, we noted that the i5-7600K 4C/4T CPU had a “fading grasp,” highlighting that the R5 1600(X) achieved close enough gaming performance while offering greater versatility. The gap...

www.gamersnexus.net

And you shared a link about the "best" gaming CPU not the "sweet spot" (your words) so nice try at trying to change the subject as not to look like you have no clue to what you are talking about.

 

[Rahnak]

Here gamers Nexus clearly recommending the 8600k over the 8700k in gaming. Even the site you mention don't agree with you! Lol

Strange that you linked me the TPU review for the 9600k but then for the GN's review you opted for the 8600k. Here's the link for the 9600k, give it a read, but here's the last paragraph:

The i5 remains hard to justify, even with its two-core increase. Intel remains the best option for gaming-only builds in the i7 class, but struggles to prove consistent value in the i5 class. That’s a problem – if the value is inconsistent, it is sometimes better to opt for a more consistent (if sometimes weaker) alternative, if only because the experience is then predictable.

And you shared a link about the "best" gaming CPU not the "sweet spot" (your words) so nice try at trying to change the subject as not to look like you have no clue to what you are talking about.

I didn't share any links? Nor did I make any claims about the best gaming CPU. What I did say is that from this point onward, the best gaming experience (in my opinion and in general for people that enjoy open world games) is found on 8 core CPUs or at the very least 8 thread CPUs. I haven't changed the subject.

 

[dirtyferret]

Strange that you linked me the TPU review for the 9600k but then for the GN's review you opted for the 8600k. Here's the link for the 9600k, give it a read, but here's the last paragraph:




I didn't share any links? Nor did I make any claims about the best gaming CPU. What I did say is that from this point onward, the best gaming experience (in my opinion and in general for people that enjoy open world games) is found on 8 core CPUs or at the very least 8 thread CPUs. I haven't changed the subject.

Lol you just stated at the start of your post that you shared a link.

Look I get it, you tried to pass off opinion and hyperbole as fact. You got caught and embarrassed and now you trying to back track and change the subject as not to look foolish from the exact web site you linked to.

 

[Rahnak]

Lol you just stated at the start of your post that you shared a link.

Look I get it, you tried to pass off opinion and hyperbole as fact. You got caught and embarrassed and now you trying to back track and change the subject as not to look foolish from the exact web site you linked to.

I didn’t share any links dude, don’t know what else to tell ya.

Funny how you’re avoiding that 9600k review

 

[dirtyferret]

I didn’t share any links dude, don’t know what else to tell ya.

Funny how you’re avoiding that 9600k review

9600k is overpriced not underperforming. It's your only thread to hang on which is why you avoid it's performance at all cost.

Check and mate. Your opinion has been wrong on every attempt and you still avoid the sweet spot argument you started and lost.

TPU review of the 9600k, the very web site you are posting on proves you wrong

• Practically same gaming performance as i7-9700K and i9-9900K at any resolution

Intel Core i5-9600K Review

The Core i5-9600K may not have the core-count increases of its higher-priced siblings, but it received a healthy frequency bump over its predecessor, coupled with hardware patches to some vulnerabilities. We already proved that the i7-9700K is the best gaming CPU by Intel. Can the humble Core i5...

www.techpowerup.com

 

[Rahnak]

Seriously? Do you have some sort of comprehension problems?

TPU’s review only shows average FPS.
I’m talking about minimum FPS.
GamersNexus review of the 9600k mentions this and therefore doesn’t recommend it for gaming.

I guess some people only see what they want to see.

 

[dirtyferret]

Seriously? Do you have some sort of comprehension problems?

TPU’s review only shows average FPS.
I’m talking about minimum FPS.
GamersNexus review of the 9600k mentions this and therefore doesn’t recommend it for gaming.

I guess some people only see what they want to see.

You mean the exact same web site that stated there was no difference from the 8600k to 8700k that proved you wrong? Yep not a single web site agrees with you but keep digging that hole refusing to accept a single fact.