8700k vs 8600k

[BRY4N]

Hey guys,
So I decided to build a new gaming PC, and right now I am on the edge between the new Coffee Lake CPUs, the i5 8600k and the i7 8700k. Since I dont work in any graphical programs, such as Blender, I was wondering if the more expensive CPU would make any difference at all, because the only thing Im gonna be doing on this PC, is gaming or working in a DAW (FL Studio). I also have a 144hz monitor, so framerate really does matter for me. I think, that if I didnt have the monitor, I wouldnt even hesitate to buy the 8600k or I wouldnt even buy a new pc at all. At the moment, Ive got a GTX970 graphics card, but Im planning to upgrade when the Volta GPUs will have been released. So I am looking for a futureproof CPU, that will last me years, as the technology advances exponentialy. I am not sure though, if any game would benefit from the doubled thread count on the 8700k. Ive seen many benchmarks and in most of them, the 8600k competes the 8700k, but in some cases, in more open areas, the 8700k had a significantly higher frame rate. The only reason I created this thread is, that I would like to hear the opinions of people who already bought one of these coffee lake CPUs or even both of them. Payin the extra buck isnt really a problem for me, but I really wanna know if it makes any sense in my case.
P.S. It would be great to save some cash, because in the country, that I live in, I could get an 8600k with an NZXT Kraken x62 water cooler for the 8700k price.

Still looking forwards to hear your opinions though ;-)

 

[connerweatherly17]

Hey guys,
So I decided to build a new gaming PC, and right now I am on the edge between the new Coffee Lake CPUs, the i5 8600k and the i7 8700k. Since I dont work in any graphical programs, such as Blender, I was wondering if the more expensive CPU would make any difference at all, because the only thing Im gonna be doing on this PC, is gaming or working in a DAW (FL Studio). I also have a 144hz monitor, so framerate really does matter for me. I think, that if I didnt have the monitor, I wouldnt even hesitate to buy the 8600k or I wouldnt even buy a new pc at all. At the moment, Ive got a GTX970 graphics card, but Im planning to upgrade when the Volta GPUs will have been released. So I am looking for a futureproof CPU, that will last me years, as the technology advances exponentialy. I am not sure though, if any game would benefit from the doubled thread count on the 8700k. Ive seen many benchmarks and in most of them, the 8600k competes the 8700k, but in some cases, in more open areas, the 8700k had a significantly higher frame rate. The only reason I created this thread is, that I would like to hear the opinions of people who already bought one of these coffee lake CPUs or even both of them. Payin the extra buck isnt really a problem for me, but I really wanna know if it makes any sense in my case.
P.S. It would be great to save some cash, because in the country, that I live in, I could get an 8600k with an NZXT Kraken x62 water cooler for the 8700k price.

Still looking forwards to hear your opinions though ;-)

In my opinion, if you wanted a future proof PC I would go with the 8700k, the double thread count would be useful in case you ever decide to do any content creation or if any programs come out that would benefit from the threads, if you knew 100% that you would do nothing but gamin with this computer then do the 8600k, but I would spend the extra and get the 8700k

 

[BRY4N]

Hey guys,
So I decided to build a new gaming PC, and right now I am on the edge between the new Coffee Lake CPUs, the i5 8600k and the i7 8700k. Since I dont work in any graphical programs, such as Blender, I was wondering if the more expensive CPU would make any difference at all, because the only thing Im gonna be doing on this PC, is gaming or working in a DAW (FL Studio). I also have a 144hz monitor, so framerate really does matter for me. I think, that if I didnt have the monitor, I wouldnt even hesitate to buy the 8600k or I wouldnt even buy a new pc at all. At the moment, Ive got a GTX970 graphics card, but Im planning to upgrade when the Volta GPUs will have been released. So I am looking for a futureproof CPU, that will last me years, as the technology advances exponentialy. I am not sure though, if any game would benefit from the doubled thread count on the 8700k. Ive seen many benchmarks and in most of them, the 8600k competes the 8700k, but in some cases, in more open areas, the 8700k had a significantly higher frame rate. The only reason I created this thread is, that I would like to hear the opinions of people who already bought one of these coffee lake CPUs or even both of them. Payin the extra buck isnt really a problem for me, but I really wanna know if it makes any sense in my case.
P.S. It would be great to save some cash, because in the country, that I live in, I could get an 8600k with an NZXT Kraken x62 water cooler for the 8700k price.

Still looking forwards to hear your opinions though ;-)

In my opinion, if you wanted a future proof PC I would go with the 8700k, the double thread count would be useful in case you ever decide to do any content creation or if any programs come out that would benefit from the threads, if you knew 100% that you would do nothing but gamin with this computer then do the 8600k, but I would spend the extra and get the 8700k

 

[geofelt]

On a top end build, the extra $100 price premium for an 8700K will be worth it to many.
But, for gaming, 6 threads will be just as effective as 12 for almost all games from the benchmarks I have seen.
Here is one:
https://www.techspot.com/review/1445-core-i7-7800x-vs-7700k/
You are likely to get overclocks in the 5.0 range from either cpu.

On another note re: cooling:
The key to good cooling is to buy a case with sufficient intake airflow.
Two front 120/140mm fans at least.
If your case has 160mm available for a tower type air cooler, you will be OK on cooling with a good cooler like a Noctua NH-D15s.
Here are noctua's specs, 8600K is a 95w tdp processor.
http://noctua.at/en/tdp-guide

My canned rant on liquid cooling:
------------------------start of rant-------------------
You buy a liquid cooler to be able to extract an extra multiplier or two out of your OC.
How much do you really need?
I do not much like all in one liquid coolers when a good air cooler like a Noctua or phanteks can do the job just as well.
A liquid cooler will be expensive, noisy, less reliable, and will not cool any better
in a well ventilated case.
Liquid cooling is really air cooling, it just puts the heat exchange in a different place.
The orientation of the radiator will cause a problem.
If you orient it to take in cool air from the outside, you will cool the cpu better, but the hot air then circulates inside the case heating up the graphics card and motherboard.
If you orient it to exhaust(which I think is better) , then your cpu cooling will be less effective because it uses pre heated case air.
And... I have read too many tales of woe when a liquid cooler leaks.
google "H100 leak"
I would support an AIO cooler only in a space restricted case.
-----------------------end of rant--------------------------

Your pc will be quieter, more reliable, and will be cooled equally well with a decent air cooler.

 

[BRY4N]

You made a good point here. I am a bit concerned though, that because of the higher thread count and from what Ive heard, the 8700k cant get to as high clocks as the 8600k, because it just gets too hot. In both cases though, Im gonna be using a water cooler. Another thing that worries me is delidding, because I heard, that it could make your CPU even more unstable, when overclocked, plus you lose the warranty when you delid a processor. That is a dumb move from Intel. When you sell a CPU that has an unlocked multiplier, you expect people to overclock it and then why would you even put that crappy thermal paste that intel puts on them? I dont really get that.

 

[geofelt]

Well, I agree, that intel should have offered a better lid process on a premium cpu.
When overclocking, first realize that how well you can do will be determined by your luck in getting a good chip.
From what I read, 5.0 should be likely on anything you buy.
Temperature comes from running at high vcore. The vcore you need to be stable is determined by your multiplier and the quality of your chip.

I am ambivalent about delidding.
If you want to go that route, look at silicon lottery and have it professionally done with a warranty.
https://siliconlottery.com/collections/coffeelake
When they get supply and have done some binning, you will get a better idea of what 8600K and 8700K is capable of.
They have binned some I3-8350K quad chips with these results:
as of 10/16/2017
What % of I3-8350K chips can oc
at a agressive vcore of 1.4 and delidded
4.8 96%
4.9 82%
5.0 50%
5.1 27%
5.2 14%

Ultimately, though, how much more than 4.8 does anyone need for gaming? A Great graphics card will be more important.
I would spend extra budget for graphics more than for a cooler.

 

[marko55]

At the end of the day, both CPUs should perform great even at 2K+ 144Hz gaming. The reason you'll see slightly higher frame rates with the 8700K vs the 8700 isn't likely because of the higher thread count, its simply because of higher base & boost clocks. When watching those comparisons though, don't get to caught up in the difference, focus on the actual frame rates. For example: Who cares if one gets 170 and the other gets 190FPS. 170FPS is WAY MORE than enough, so its all good.

Both CPUs are gonna rock games now and for the next few years with 6 cores. Note that hyperthreading isn't really gonna provide a ton of benefit to games because two threads running on one core are both still sucking off the same core's max clock & power. This is why CPUs with higher clock rates (think Intel vs AMD) always achieve higher frame rates, because of higher IPC on each core. So don't get hung up on needing hyperthreading.

So, if you can afford it and you wanna go top end, 8700K it is. If you still want a rockin system for gaming, 8700. If you think you'l dive in to content creation, streaming, or other stuff that can utilize more CPU threads, I'd spring for the 8700K. Better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it....

 

[Eximo]

Delidding making a cpu unstable? Not sure how. Lower temperatures are good for CPU stability. (Not to mention peace of mind)

One might argue that since you should then be able to overclock further it becomes less stable. That would have been just as true before, except you might have hit a temperature wall first.

All the reviews I have seen show about a 150W draw with an i7-8700k at 4.7Ghz, which was tied to the whole MCE conundrum. (More or less accidental factory overclock from some of the board vendors, forced all cores to the same frequency) That is pretty typical of overclocked CPUs in the LGA115x sockets. Those that managed 4.9Ghz were really pushing it, and required the best cooling. I don't recall seeing the wattage numbers from those runs. But some of them were delidded.

Honestly, performance is fine without overclocking though, so id you don't want to delid or go with a heavy duty cooling solution it will be just fine.

 

[BRY4N]

Delidding making a cpu unstable? Not sure how. Lower temperatures are good for CPU stability. (Not to mention peace of mind)

One might argue that since you should then be able to overclock further it becomes less stable. That would have been just as true before, except you might have hit a temperature wall first.

All the reviews I have seen show about a 150W draw with an i7-8700k at 4.7Ghz, which was tied to the whole MCE conundrum. (More or less accidental factory overclock from some of the board vendors, forced all cores to the same frequency) That is pretty typical of overclocked CPUs in the LGA115x sockets. Those that managed 4.9Ghz were really pushing it, and required the best cooling. I don't recall seeing the wattage numbers from those runs. But some of them were delidded.

Honestly, performance is fine without overclocking though, so id you don't want to delid or go with a heavy duty cooling solution it will be just fine.

I meant that if you screw up the delidding, then the processor could become unstable and you could damage it.