Question Can I use a 10th or 11th i7 with a H510 board?

[qensyd]

My current build is:

• Asus prime h510m-a motherboard
• Intel core i3 10100f CPU
• 2x8gb DDR4 RAM
• Gtx 1650 super GPU
• Thermaltake litepower 650w PSU

I'm quiet happy with this build right now, I build it in march 2022, except the GPU, I had that before, so I don't want to buy new parts yet.
I was thinking about how I would upgrade this system (like 3 years later or something).
So my thought was buying a used i7 10700k or a 11700k and some kind of GPU. I have a budget board, and the i7 is not a budget CPU, but asus said that this motherboard supports both the 10700k and the 11700k at 125watts. I watched some tests on youtube about the i7, and when they played games, even if the CPU was at 80-90% utalized, it never draw more than 110watts ( I assume that at 100%, it would hit 125watts), but when I saw other tests, like Cinebench, people said that it drew much more than 125watts. And I've read that it can draw even 205watts.
So my question is, how does the i7 draws more power than 125watts, and if I could use it with this motherboard, because I think this would be the cheapest upgrade for me in the future.

 

[dark_globe]

this quote from anandtech article perhaps explains it best:
"For any given processor, Intel will guarantee both a rated frequency to run at (known as the base frequency) for a given power, which is the rated TDP. This means that a processor like the 65W Core i7-8700, which has a base frequency of 3.2 GHz and a turbo of 4.7 GHz, is only guaranteed to be at or below 65W when the processor is running at 3.2 GHz. Intel does not guarantee any level of performance above this 3.2 GHz / 65W value."

so in real world scenario when you need your processor to operate at its maximum capability it will draw more power .
if your cooler or other parts are not sufficient to handle it than it will throttle (operate at less than 100% due to protect itself from overheating) .

your motherboard is not really designed to handle i7/i9 processors , that is what "Z" boards are for , they have much better VRM design and will generally run cooler .
if you want i7 you can perhaps get away with getting the model with locked multiplier and lower turbo frequency which will draw a bit less power than the "K" model .
even still the i3/i5 is much more reasonable choise for this motherboard .

 

[qensyd]

this quote from anandtech article perhaps explains it best:
"For any given processor, Intel will guarantee both a rated frequency to run at (known as the base frequency) for a given power, which is the rated TDP. This means that a processor like the 65W Core i7-8700, which has a base frequency of 3.2 GHz and a turbo of 4.7 GHz, is only guaranteed to be at or below 65W when the processor is running at 3.2 GHz. Intel does not guarantee any level of performance above this 3.2 GHz / 65W value."

so in real world scenario when you need your processor to operate at its maximum capability it will draw more power .
if your cooler or other parts are not sufficient to handle it than it will throttle (operate at less than 100% due to protect itself from overheating) .

your motherboard is not really designed to handle i7/i9 processors , that is what t "Z" boards are for , they have much better VRM design and will generally run cooler .
if you want i7 you can perhaps get away with getting the model with locked multiplier and lower turbo frequency which will draw a bit less power than "K" model .

Yes, I know these, but in the test I saw, the i7 ran at 4.7ghz and it drew below 125watts.

 

[dark_globe]

while gaming the i7 11700k draws between 90-130w majority of the time
(however those are "average" numbers not max. or low)
for short periods of time it can draw as much as 150-170w even while gaming in some scenarios .
in some heavy workload applications the power consumtion can rise as high as 200+watts .

if gaming is your main goal , you should be fine most of the time ,
using a good cooler will also help you .
however as i said earlier H510 line motherboards are not really well suited to run i7/i9 processors (it is the lowest chipset available after all)
(and certainly do not waste money on K models since you would not be able to overclock them anyway)
"H510" motherboards are intended to run celeron/pentium and i3 processors (i5 at most) -
the chipset lacks many features and has much weaker VRM compared to "Z" motherboards in order to cut down the cost .

 

[qensyd]

Okay, thank you for your help. I haven't decided yet, because it will happen in like 3 years, not now. So I'll see how the used market changes in my country. Now I think an i5 with a 2070-3070 would be enough (used 10. gen i5 with used 2070 would be around 320-350euros), but I'll see the prices, other cards, etc... when I'm there.