Intel Core i7-8700K Review: The New Gaming King

[Julio Franco]

Intel is hitting back with its eighth-generation Core series, which counters Ryzen with cores, lots of cores. On hand today we have the Core i7-8700K, based on Intel's new "Coffee Lake" architecture, it is designed to operate no slower than 3.7 GHz, with turbo boost taking it as high as 4.7 GHz.

Read the full article here.

https://www.techspot.com/review/1497-intel-core-i7-8700k/

 

[oldikes]

Awesome review. Funny what intel is capable of putting out when the competition delivers.
Hopefully the i5 series offers good value as well. the overclocking potential seems absolutely bonkers. its slightly vague - did you delid the 8700k? might wanna reword that a bit for clarity.it seems mostly clear you didn't but I dont like to make too many assumptions

(It hurts to pay intel compliments but I think I did it without any permanent damage to myself).

 

[yRaz]

I'm honestly not that impressed. It's marginally better, but it doesn't seem like you're really getting anything more than bragging rights for your money. There is overclocking, but you have to factor in motherboard cost, too. Once you add that in you're looking at a $100-140 price difference.

 

[amstech]

I soooo wanted to see the overclocked 5.2GHz gaming benchmarks.
Not trying to nitpick Steve you know I love you like a wet dog in a lightning storm.

 

[Kenrick]

One thing good going to intel is that out of the box they perform what they should - no more waiting for software optimizations and patches that one day developers wil be lazy to patch unless forums will get attention by tech sites. Anyway, the i5 should be promising and then the budget i3. hopefully, the coffee lake is my next upgrade. As always, its the motherboard that I need to find a deal. Ryzen did a good job in shaking up intel's dominance.

 

[yeeeeman]

Let me summarize it for you:
- 8700K is the new out of the box performance king, indeed, but if you already have 7700K or 6700K for that matter you can simply raise frequencies to 8700K ones and you get same performance, so nothing special.
- For computing, you have to be blind to buy 8700K over R7 1700. R7 1700 is as fast or even faster in computing tasks and it has quite a headroom to overclock till 4Ghz, whereas 8700K is already pushed to over 4.5Ghz in stock form. The big difference is in price of CPU (300$ for AMD and 360$ for Intel) and also the platform costs are lower with AMD.
In the end, lets not forget that everything we see from Intel now is because AMD forced them to do so, with Ryzen lineup. I think AMD is worth the credit and the money, since now their products are not inferior from a performance/consumption standpoint compared to competition anymore.

 

[richcz3]

Gaming wise - Not so impressed. I already have a i7-7700K. The 8700K is either marginally faster or slower than the 7700K in gaming. What's odd is that the gaming benchmarks are only at 1080P and 720P? The price differential between the 7700K and 8700K is about $40 dollars. In that way, the 8700K is a Go, if you're pro Intel and haven't upgraded in a while. Otherwise, this isn't an over the top performance gainer.

 

[OcelotRex]

In the end, lets not forget that everything we see from Intel now is because AMD forced them to do so, with Ryzen lineup. I think AMD is worth the credit and the money, since now their products are not inferior from a performance/consumption standpoint compared to competition anymore.

Interesting logic since Intel's dominance forced AMD to finally release a product that cannot compete in performance with ST and gaming only on MT and price.

The above sentence is not my opinion but merely an attempt to show that rationalizing like yours really solves anything and means nothing.

 

[LeroN]

As I understand the tests in low resolutions was an condition from Intel to get 8700k. I'm checking other IT websites to find 4k and still nothing. LOL

 

[OcelotRex]

Nice review. Any chance we can see a i7-8700 versus i5-8600k OC'ed comparison?

 

[trajan2050]

Looks good.

 

[amstech]

Let me summarize it for you:
- 8700K is the new out of the box performance king, indeed, but if you already have 7700K or 6700K for that matter you can simply raise frequencies to 8700K ones and you get same performance, so nothing special.

Man your a whip, where did you go to college?

it has quite a headroom to overclock till 4Ghz,

My i7 930 from 8 intel chip generations and 7 years ago runs at 4.0GHz 24/7.
4GHz is not impressive at all... what is impressive is how well Ryzen competes with Intel at inferior clockspeeds. That is a world shaker.

whereas 8700K is already pushed to over 4.5Ghz in stock form.

Stock max turbo on the 8700K is 4.7GHz.
https://ark.intel.com/products/126684/Intel-Core-i7-8700K-Processor-12M-Cache-up-to-4_70-GHz

Its ability to run a 5.2GHz 24/7 will make it the new gaming king considering its wiping the floor with the competition at stock clocks. I was really hoping the author would have included those benchmarks.

In the end, lets not forget that everything we see from Intel now is because AMD forced them to do so

I wouldn't quite go that far.

with Ryzen lineup. I think AMD is worth the credit and the money, since now their products are not inferior from a performance/consumption standpoint compared to competition anymore.

Agree 100%.
Ryzen is very impressive, games well and is priced right.
But if you want the best gaming CPU with 5.0GHz + clockspeeds, your getting Intel.

Gaming wise - Not so impressed. I already have a i7-7700K. The 8700K is either marginally faster or slower than the 7700K in gaming. .

No, its faster.
But comparing this chip as an upgrade from a 7700K is asinine.

 

[oldikes]

Gaming wise - Not so impressed. I already have a i7-7700K. The 8700K is either marginally faster or slower than the 7700K in gaming. What's odd is that the gaming benchmarks are only at 1080P and 720P? The price differential between the 7700K and 8700K is about $40 dollars. In that way, the 8700K is a Go, if you're pro Intel and haven't upgraded in a while. Otherwise, this isn't an over the top performance gainer.

this is how the CPU market is going to be. There was only an exception with ryzen because of how terrible the FX series has been competitively for years. I think this is a very decent improvement without a die shrink- 50% more cores and notably higher OC potential. This isnt for people with the previous gen to upgrade from, no CPU really should be.

 

[Kibaruk]

Oh boy, I just came in here to see fanboys dreams crushed

I was not disappointed, although I expected more of em good ol amd lovers.

PS: Disclaimer, I do like Ryzen.

 

[SymphonyX7]

I think we have to factor in the cost of the Z370 motherboards into the cost of these new Coffee Lake processors. Considering a cheap Z370 mobo costs twice as much as a cheap B350 mobo, the total system cost of Coffee Lake becomes noticeably more pronounced especially when compared to the Ryzen 1700 and 1600. The 8700K makes a lot of sense for those with top of the line GPUs and high refresh monitors, but otherwise its value still falls short of what can be achieved by a Ryzen 1600 or 1700 system for less money. The 8700K certainly does not belong in any budget builds.

Although unlikely to be paired with, I'd like to see how the 8700K performs in gaming using a GTX 1060 and 1070.

 

[Daithi]

As I understand the tests in low resolutions was an condition from Intel to get 8700k. I'm checking other IT websites to find 4k and still nothing. LOL

Techpowerup has 4k benchmarks, but it's redundant since you're more GPU bound at higher resolutions, I'm not entirely sure why this has to be explained every time there's a cpu benchmark.

To save you a few clicks, performance for the most part was equivalent to the G4560.

 

[meric]

AMD better hurry on zen+ and zen+ better be VERY fast

 

[GreenNova343]

As I understand the tests in low resolutions was an condition from Intel to get 8700k. I'm checking other IT websites to find 4k and still nothing. LOL

Techpowerup has 4k benchmarks, but it's redundant since you're more GPU bound at higher resolutions, I'm not entirely sure why this has to be explained every time there's a cpu benchmark.

To save you a few clicks, performance for the most part was equivalent to the G4560.

Yes, you beat me to that. Time & time again, it comes up in every CPU test -- & not just here, the same thing happens over at Tom's Hardware as well.

I think we have to factor in the cost of the Z370 motherboards into the cost of these new Coffee Lake processors. Considering a cheap Z370 mobo costs twice as much as a cheap B350 mobo, the total system cost of Coffee Lake becomes noticeably more pronounced especially when compared to the Ryzen 1700 and 1600. The 8700K makes a lot of sense for those with top of the line GPUs and high refresh monitors, but otherwise its value still falls short of what can be achieved by a Ryzen 1600 or 1700 system for less money. The 8700K certainly does not belong in any budget builds.

Although unlikely to be paired with, I'd like to see how the 8700K performs in gaming using a GTX 1060 and 1070.

Well, it'll probably have very similar performance to the i7-7700K & Ryzen CPUs, as (depending on the resolution) you're going to be even more GPU-bound with either card.

 

[senketsu]

After so many years of blah, sure lots happening hardware wise now.
Interesting, but makes my wallet unhappy, guess I'll have to learn how to make do with my i7-6700K, Z-170, Sansung 960 Pro NVMe, and GTX 1080ti for web browsing, playing minecraft and e-mail...sigh

 

[dirtyferret]

Hopefully everyone runs out and picks up a 8700k, then I can pick up a cheap 7700k

 

[EEatGDL]

"Since then we've seen eight major architectural updates and four die shrinks spanning a decade."

1. Nehalem
2. Sandy Bridge
3. Haswell
4. Skylake

Depressing when you think that HSW and SKL are further improvements over Sandy, even more depressing when you realize we've been getting strong quad-cores over a decade.

 

[Larsenex]

Love the article. I have now changed my mind. I was going to rebuild with an I9 and now due to this article I am going to use the 8700K.

When is the release date for these chips and their attendant motherboards?

Does Techspot have a cooling recommendation?

 

[Larsenex]

Gaming wise - Not so impressed. I already have a i7-7700K. The 8700K is either marginally faster or slower than the 7700K in gaming. What's odd is that the gaming benchmarks are only at 1080P and 720P? The price differential between the 7700K and 8700K is about $40 dollars. In that way, the 8700K is a Go, if you're pro Intel and haven't upgraded in a while. Otherwise, this isn't an over the top performance gainer.

^^ I currently have a 4 core I5 3570K This chip would be a huge upgrade for me if I build a new system next year.

 

[brkbeatjunkie]

Those of you saying the 6700k and 7700k could match up with its performance simply by raising the clock speed. That argument is moot since the 8700k can be just as easily overclocked.

 

[dirtyferret]

TPU reviewed the 8700k, 8600k, and 8400. Just a little nugget I dug out of the 8400 review.

For gaming, things are different. Here, the i5-8400 breezes past all AMD Ryzens thanks to its high per-thread performance and the boost clock of 4.0 GHz. I find it surprising that there is very little difference between the i5-8400, i5-8600K, and i7-8700K in gaming, even at the highly CPU-limited scenario of 720p. This suggests that today's games see limited gains from more than four cores. It is good news for gamers on a budget because a Core i5-8400 will be completely sufficient to not bottleneck even the fastest graphics cards.

https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Intel/Core_i5_8400/19.html