The Intel Core i5-7600K (91W) Review: The More Amenable Mainstream Performer
by Ian Cutress on January 3, 2017 12:01 PM ESTOffice Performance
The dynamics of CPU Turbo modes, both Intel and AMD, can cause concern during environments with a variable threaded workload. There is also an added issue of the motherboard remaining consistent, depending on how the motherboard manufacturer wants to add in their own boosting technologies over the ones that Intel would prefer they used. In order to remain consistent, we implement an OS-level unique high performance mode on all the CPUs we test which should override any motherboard manufacturer performance mode.
All of our benchmark results can also be found in our benchmark engine, Bench.
Dolphin Benchmark: link
Many emulators are often bound by single thread CPU performance, and general reports tended to suggest that Haswell provided a significant boost to emulator performance. This benchmark runs a Wii program that raytraces a complex 3D scene inside the Dolphin Wii emulator. Performance on this benchmark is a good proxy of the speed of Dolphin CPU emulation, which is an intensive single core task using most aspects of a CPU. Results are given in minutes, where the Wii itself scores 17.53 minutes.
Since a big uptick in emulator performance with Sandy Bridge, the Intel processor line has had a good run in Dolphin and that continues with Kaby Lake. This is shown with the Core i7-7600K coming above the i7-6700K and i7-4790K, both former leaders in this benchmark.
WinRAR 5.0.1: link
Our WinRAR test from 2013 is updated to the latest version of WinRAR at the start of 2014. We compress a set of 2867 files across 320 folders totaling 1.52 GB in size – 95% of these files are small typical website files, and the rest (90% of the size) are small 30 second 720p videos.
WinRAR is more geared towards a variable threaded environment but also memory speed. In the last of ‘which benchmarks benefit from hyperthreads’, WinRAR is in – almost every Core i5 takes a back seat to all the Core i7 parts. We see performance jumps moving from i3 to i5, and a smaller one from i5 to i7, but in the case of WinRAR it’s quite obvious that threads matter here.
3D Particle Movement v2
3DPM is a self-penned benchmark, taking basic 3D movement algorithms used in Brownian Motion simulations and testing them for speed. High floating point performance, MHz and IPC wins the day. This is the second variant of this benchmark, fixing for false sharing in the first version, and lending itself to better multithreaded performance.
3DPMv2 is still new, so we don’t have too many results for it so far – even to go and say that Kaby Lake is the only set of i5 processors it has been run on. 3DPMv2, like WinRAR, likes hyperthreads as well, so we see the Core i7-6700T sit above the i5-7600K despite the frequency difference. In a benchmark like this, the older AMD FX processors come into play and the FX-8370 knocks on the door of the i5.
SYSMark 2014
Engineered by BAPco (to which Intel is a consortium member), this set of tests are designed to be an office/data/media/financial range of tests using common well-known CAD, image editing, web browsing and other tools to put out a score, where a score of 1000 is attributed to an old Core i3 using a mechanical harddrive. Here we report the overall score, however the test breakdowns can be found in Bench.
Because SYSMark is a variety of tests that rely on response and throughput, the Core i5-7600K hits a good score in the middle of most of the previous generation extreme processors but also gives a good 5% on the previous generation i5-6600K.
Web Benchmarks
On the lower end processors, general usability is a big factor of experience, especially as we move into the HTML5 era of web browsing. For our web benchmarks, we take well known tests with Chrome as installed by SYSMark as a consistent browser.
Mozilla Kraken 1.1
Google Octane v2
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Chaitanya - Tuesday, January 3, 2017 - link
Probably the most useless upgrade in recent years for PC users.Sabresiberian - Tuesday, January 3, 2017 - link
1) This is only an optimization of an existing architecture, and2) Anyone knowledgeable will almost always recommend skipping at least one architectural generation and, especially considering the slow improvements over the last 5 years, at least 2 generations. Which means if you are in a use-case scenario that can take advantage of the increased CPU performance you shouldn't be thinking "upgrade" unless you are running Sandy Bridge or earlier.
(The obvious exception that breaks the rule here is Zen, which will offer a huge performance increase over Bulldozer.)
Shadow7037932 - Wednesday, January 4, 2017 - link
>(The obvious exception that breaks the rule here is Zen, which will offer a huge performance increase over Bulldozer.)How about we wait until it's actually released? Remember what happened with the original Phenom?
silverblue - Wednesday, January 4, 2017 - link
I don't think it's unreasonable to get excited about Zen, at least in terms of AMD's current product lines. Potentially massively optimised benchmarks aside, at least they tested Ryzen engineering samples against Intel's more expensive offerings in public without resorting to slides containing unsubstantiated performance claims. In fact, the only thing I can see in print is the "40% faster than Excavator" claim. If the Canard PC leaks aren't fake, there's every chance that AMD have achieved this, and possibly exceeded it.You mentioned Phenom, so let's take a trip down memory lane:
Phenom: "40% faster than Core 2 Quad at the same clock speed"
Reality: Up to 40% slower per clock after the TLB bug; needed Phenom II to really close the gap.
Bulldozer: "50% faster than the i7 950"
Reality: In what test? Even the 8350 couldn't boast this.
I don't see Ryzen being the gaming top dog - remember, current productivity and gaming demos have been against slower clocked CPUs with double the cores of your garden variety, highly clocked i5 and i7 - but I don't think it's unreasonable to expect that it'll bury the FX series. IMHO, of course.
boozed - Friday, January 6, 2017 - link
I think the problem is that if Skylake wasn't enough of a performance improvement to upgrade, neither is Kaby Lake.Murloc - Tuesday, January 3, 2017 - link
is it?I'm running a nehalem, if I was upgrading now I'd appreciate the lower power consumption and the HEVC hardware support.
willis936 - Wednesday, January 4, 2017 - link
Was HEVC hardware not present on the 6x00 series?Shadow7037932 - Wednesday, January 4, 2017 - link
He said Nehalem, which is the i7 920 and the like.close - Wednesday, January 4, 2017 - link
@Shadow7037932, can you name one good reason why he should update his Nehalem to a Kaby Lake K part that didn't exist one and a half years ago with Skylake?I'll put it another way: If someone passed on a Skylake upgrade last year why exactly would they pay the same price to get a pre-overclocked Skylake (aka Kaby Lake) this year? Why did the user suffer through an extra ~18 months of really aging hardware just to buy what's basically the same CPU at the same price today?
Since these 2 generations share architecture and fabrication process there's no reason to expect consistently better OC on the 7 series. So the 300MHz should be within reach for any K part and any user.
MonkeyPaw - Tuesday, January 3, 2017 - link
Looks like it is the best 14nm Intel architecture you can buy. Still, it seems like if you're in the market now, you might as well wait to see if Ryzen will be a compelling option. If nothing else it might help drive some of these prices down.