Intel core i7 7800x vs 7700k
Core i7-7800X vs. 7700K, 6 or 4 Cores for Gaming?
By Steven Walton on July 12, 2017
Although we consider AMD's Ryzen 5 1600 to be the sweet spot for folks building a new high-end gaming rig, many of you interested in going Intel have been wondering whether it makes more sense to buy the Core i7-7700K or the new 7800X?
We presume the reason why so many are asking this question is that the Core i7-7800X costs just ~$70 more and with that you get two extra cores, but also access to Intel's latest desktop platform. There are other cost considerations to make, but we'll discuss those later.
Before we jump straight to the comparison benchmarks, let's have a quick look at what the two Intel CPUs have to offer on paper.
| Intel Core i7-7800X | Intel Core i7-7700K | |
| Cores / Threads | 6 / 12 | 4 / 8 |
| Base Frequency | 3.5 GHz | 4.2 GHz |
| Boost Frequency | 4.0 GHz | 4.5 GHz |
| TurboMax Frequency | 4.0 GHz | 4.5 GHz |
| L2 Cache | 6 MB | 1 MB |
| L3 Cache | 8.25 MB | 8 MB |
| PCIe Lanes | 28 | 16 |
| Memory Configuration | Quad-Channel | Dual-Channel |
| Max Memory Support | DDR4-2400 | DDR4-2400 |
| TDP | 140 W | 91 W |
| Socket | LGA 2066 | LGA 1151 |
| MSRP | $390 | $340 |
The 7700K has a clear clock speed advantage out of the box, though I will also be overclocking both CPUs for full testing purposes.
Besides the obvious core count, perhaps the biggest difference between these models is their cache design. The 7800X has 6x more L2 cache but about the same amount of L3 cache. Of course, the 7800X also packs 50% more cores and with that the TDP has been increased by a little over 50%.
We have tested 30 games, all of which were played on the GeForce GTX 1080 Ti. The 7800X was configured with 32GB of DDR4-3200 in quad-channel while the 7700K was armed with 16GB of dual-channel memory. We tested both processors at stock settings as well as overclocked -- the 7700K was set at a relatively easy to achieve 4.9GHz, while the 7800X was at 4.7GHz.
On with the results...
First up we have World of Tanks, not a particularly demanding game but I'm pretty much throwing everything we normally test with at these CPUs. Here we see out of the box the 7700K is 9% faster than the 7800X -- not a huge margin, though it was surprising to find that when overclocked the 6-core CPU still couldn't match the 7700K. This isn't a CPU intensive game anyway and since we are pushing over 100fps at all times, the margins are somewhat irrelevant.
Grand Theft Auto V is often used for testing CPU performance and here we find some unexpected results. Comparing the minimum result we see that the 7700K is a massive 30% faster than the 7800X, overclocking reduced that margin to 18% but still, given there is just a 4% difference in clock speed once overclocked this is a huge win for the quad-core CPU.
Again even overclocked the 7800X is still slower than the stock 7700K, 10% slower in fact when comparing the minimum frame rate.
Since this is a popular title right now I thought why not throw it into the mix. If you're playing with a dual-core or a lower-end quad-core and things aren't going well don't bother spending big by investing in the 7800X. You'll see almost 30% more performance when using the 7700K according to my testing.
The Witcher 3 is often talked about as being a CPU intensive game and to a degree it is. That said the 7700K is more than capable of getting the most out of the 1080 Ti in this title and here we see much the same performance across the board.
Next Page Tomb Raider, Ashes of the Singularity, Far Cry, The Division Article Index- Intel vs. Intel
- Tomb Raider, Ashes of the Singularity, Far Cry, The Division
- Hitman, Quantum Break, Overwatch, Doom
- Warhammer, Mirror's Edge, F1 2016, Deus Ex
- Battlefield 1, Mafia III, Gears of War 4, Titanfall 2
- Civilization VI, Dishonored 2, Resident Evil 7
- For Honor, Ghost Recon, Mass Effect, Dawn of War III
- Watch Dogs 2, Prey, Dirt 4
- Power Consumption & The Verdict
www.techspot.com
Intel Core i7-7700K vs i7-7800X
| Gaming 98% | Desktop 95% | Workstation 87% |
| Gaming 95% | Desktop 96% | Workstation 70% |
| Effective Speed Effective CPU Speed | 97.9 % | +3% | 94.7 % |
| SC Mixed Avg. Single Core Mixed Speed | 124 Pts | 135 Pts | Slightly faster single-core speed.+9% | |||
| QC Mixed Avg. Quad Core Mixed Speed | 477 Pts | +4% | 460 Pts | |||
| MC Mixed Avg. Multi Core Mixed Speed | 985 Pts | Much faster multi-core speed.+39% | 711 Pts |
| SC Mixed OC Single Core Mixed Speed | 144 Pts | 152 Pts | Slightly faster OC single-core speed.+6% | |||
| QC Mixed OC Quad Core Mixed Speed | 563 Pts | +1% | 555 Pts | |||
| MC Mixed OC Multi Core Mixed Speed | 1140 Pts | Much faster OC multi-core speed.+41% | 811 Pts |
Market Share
Based on 15,121,417 CPUs tested.| Market Share Market Share (trailing 30 days) | 0.09 % | 1.81 % | Insanely higher market share.+1,911% | |||
| Value Value For Money | 90.3 % | Slightly better value.+6% | 84.9 % | |||
| User Rating UBM User Rating | 60 % | 128 % | Hugely more popular.+113% | |||
| Price Price (score) | $362 | Slightly cheaper.+7% | $390 |
| Launch Date Launch Date | Q2'17 | Q1'17 | ||||
| Cache Cache | 8.25 MB L3 | 8 MB | ||||
| Instruction Set Extensions Instruction Set Extensions | SSE4.1/4.2, AVX 2.0, AVX-512 | SSE4.1/4.2, AVX 2.0 | ||||
| Recommended Price Recommended Customer Price | $383.00 - $389.00 | $339.00 - $350.00 | ||||
| Thermal Solution Specification Thermal Solution Specification | PCG 2017X | PCG 2015D (130W) | ||||
| Max Memory Size Max Memory Size (dependent on memory type) | 128 GB | 64 GB | ||||
| Memory Types Memory Types | DDR4-2400 | DDR4-2133/2400, DDR3L-1333/1600 @ 1.35V | ||||
| Memory Channels Max # of Memory Channels | 4 | 2 | ||||
| Max # of PCI Express Lanes Max # of PCI Express Lanes | 28 | 16 | ||||
| More specs » | More specs » |
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The Core i7-7700K is Intel’s flagship Kaby Lake based CPU which is reported to have the same IPC as its predecessor, Skylake. Comparing the 7700K and 6700K shows that both average effective speed and peak overclocked speed are up by 7%. Most of the increase in average effective speed is explained by the 5% boost in base clocks from 4.0 to 4.2 GHz. The improved peak lab speed is attributable to a combination of better overclocking capacity and improvements in Intel’s speedshift technology which make the 7700K slightly more responsive. Kaby Lake also has marginally better HD 630 integrated graphics. The i7-7700K is priced similarly to the i7-6700K so for top end gaming and workstation builds, the 7700K is the clear choice for 2017. AMD’s Ryzen will release later this year so things could change at that time. [Jan '17 CPUPro]
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Group Test Results
- Best user rated - User sentiment trumps benchmarks for this comparison.
- Best value for money - Value for money is based on real world performance.
- Fastest real world speed - Real World Speed measures performance for typical consumers.
Welcome to our freeware 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 upgrades.
UserBenchmark of the month
Gaming Desktop Workstation CPU GPU SSD HDD RAM USBHow it works
- - Download and run UserBenchMark.
- - CPU tests include: integer, floating and string.
- - GPU tests include: six 3D game simulations.
- - Drive tests include: read, write, sustained write and mixed IO.
- - RAM tests include: single/multi core bandwidth and latency.
- - Reports are generated and presented on userbenchmark.com.
- - Identify the strongest components in your PC.
- - See speed test results from other users.
- - Compare your components to the current market leaders.
- - Explore your best upgrade options with a virtual PC build.
- - Compare your in-game FPS to other users with your hardware.
- - Share your opinion by voting.
cpu.userbenchmark.com
UserBenchmark: Intel Core i7-7700 vs i7-7800X
| Gaming 98% | Desktop 95% | Workstation 87% |
| Gaming 82% | Desktop 83% | Workstation 61% |
| Effective Speed Effective CPU Speed | 97.9 % | Faster effective speed.+19% | 82.1 % |
| SC Mixed Avg. Single Core Mixed Speed | 124 Pts | Slightly faster single-core speed.+7% | 116 Pts | |||
| QC Mixed Avg. Quad Core Mixed Speed | 477 Pts | Faster quad-core speed.+20% | 399 Pts | |||
| MC Mixed Avg. Multi Core Mixed Speed | 985 Pts | Much faster multi-core speed.+57% | 626 Pts |
| SC Mixed OC Single Core Mixed Speed | 144 Pts | Slightly faster OC single-core speed.+12% | 128 Pts | |||
| QC Mixed OC Quad Core Mixed Speed | 563 Pts | Faster OC quad-core speed.+18% | 477 Pts | |||
| MC Mixed OC Multi Core Mixed Speed | 1140 Pts | Much faster OC multi-core speed.+69% | 673 Pts |
Market Share
Based on 15,121,417 CPUs tested.| Market Share Market Share (trailing 30 days) | 0.09 % | 0.87 % | Hugely higher market share.+867% | |||
| Value Value For Money | 90.3 % | Slightly better value.+14% | 79.3 % | |||
| User Rating UBM User Rating | 60 % | 63 % | +5% | |||
| Price Price (score) | $362 | $320 | Slightly cheaper.+12% |
| Launch Date Launch Date | Q2'17 | Q1'17 | ||||
| Cache Cache | 8.25 MB L3 | 8 MB | ||||
| Instruction Set Extensions Instruction Set Extensions | SSE4.1/4.2, AVX 2.0, AVX-512 | SSE4.1/4.2, AVX 2.0 | ||||
| Recommended Price Recommended Customer Price | $383.00 - $389.00 | $303.00 - $312.00 | ||||
| Thermal Solution Specification Thermal Solution Specification | PCG 2017X | PCG 2015C (65W) | ||||
| Max Memory Size Max Memory Size (dependent on memory type) | 128 GB | 64 GB | ||||
| Memory Types Memory Types | DDR4-2400 | DDR4-2133/2400, DDR3L-1333/1600 @ 1.35V | ||||
| Memory Channels Max # of Memory Channels | 4 | 2 | ||||
| Max # of PCI Express Lanes Max # of PCI Express Lanes | 28 | 16 | ||||
| More specs » | More specs » |
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
Group Test Results
- Best user rated - User sentiment trumps benchmarks for this comparison.
- Best value for money - Value for money is based on real world performance.
- Fastest real world speed - Real World Speed measures performance for typical consumers.
Welcome to our freeware 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 upgrades.
UserBenchmark of the month
Gaming Desktop Workstation CPU GPU SSD HDD RAM USBHow it works
- - Download and run UserBenchMark.
- - CPU tests include: integer, floating and string.
- - GPU tests include: six 3D game simulations.
- - Drive tests include: read, write, sustained write and mixed IO.
- - RAM tests include: single/multi core bandwidth and latency.
- - Reports are generated and presented on userbenchmark.com.
- - Identify the strongest components in your PC.
- - See speed test results from other users.
- - Compare your components to the current market leaders.
- - Explore your best upgrade options with a virtual PC build.
- - Compare your in-game FPS to other users with your hardware.
- - Share your opinion by voting.
cpu.userbenchmark.com
Core i7-7800X vs. 7700K, 6 or 4 Cores for Gaming?
By Steven Walton on July 12, 2017
The section used to test Rise of the Tomb Raider features varied environments, out in the open the frame rates are quite low while indoors we see much higher frame rates. What is important to note here is overclocking made little difference to the 7800X's performance, while I suspect the 7700K was able to max out the 1080 Ti. Again the 7700K was the superior processor in this title, offering just shy of 20% more performance.
I decided to test Ashes of the Singularity maxed out which was a bit of a mistake as the GTX 1080 Ti became the primary bottleneck. That said, with well over 60 fps at all times, that’s certainly more than you need for this intense real-time strategy game.
Now these results are interesting for a few reasons. First of all the 6-core CPU gets absolutely blasted by the slightly higher clocked quad-core. You might be thinking these results don't look right and I'm with you on that one.
I triple checked the numbers though and they are indeed accurate. Interestingly this is reminiscent of what we saw when comparing the, the 8-core Ryzen 7 1800X for example was much much slower than the 7700K. In fact, given what I'm seeing here, the 1800X might actually be faster than the overclocked 7800X in this title so that's something I'm keen to check out soon.
The Division is a game that we have found to be GPU bound in the past but as I said this is a 30 game comparison so we threw it in to see if anything unusual is going on here. As you can see, there isn't...
Next Page Hitman, Quantum Break, Overwatch, Doom Article Index- Intel vs. Intel
- Tomb Raider, Ashes of the Singularity, Far Cry, The Division
- Hitman, Quantum Break, Overwatch, Doom
- Warhammer, Mirror's Edge, F1 2016, Deus Ex
- Battlefield 1, Mafia III, Gears of War 4, Titanfall 2
- Civilization VI, Dishonored 2, Resident Evil 7
- For Honor, Ghost Recon, Mass Effect, Dawn of War III
- Watch Dogs 2, Prey, Dirt 4
- Power Consumption & The Verdict
www.techspot.com
