- Nov 13, 2014
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- 4,510
Hi guys. What do you think about this guys review. What should I make out of it and should I just buy both and finally find out for my self the thruth. Only critical thinking and solid arguments please no fanboys from either side.
Okay, some people may not like what I have to say but it is what it is. Only last week (19/09/14), I built my new intel rig (4790K and Asus Z97WS motherboard), although it took me two days to get the bloody thing working. I will come back to this later. It was with a heavy heart that I decided to 'upgrade' my trusty and reliable AMD FX9590 and Asus Crosshair V Formula Z rig. In fact, I have not seen a new AM3+ motherboard since September 2012 when Asus released the then new Formula Z. I did not want to 'upgrade' to intel but felt it would be wise to do so (in a monetary sense at least) since my phone conversation with the AMD tech support advisor confirmed that the current AMD road map has no plans to release any more new AM3+ motherboards for 2014/15.
I decided to sell my current AMD rig whilst I can get good money for it, rather than wait till March 2016 when the new gen K12/X86/ARM hybrid cpu's will be released by AMD alongside the new AM4 platform. If I keep my current rig, it would sell for a pittance in March 2016 and I would lose a lot of money. Only a few days ago I sold my FX9590 for £150 and my Formula Z for £120 (total £270).
I was initially going to go for the X99 platform and the 5930K but after looking at benchmarks against the new 4790K 'Devils canyon' (odd name for a cpu!), I could not justify the exorbitant price tag of the X99 platform. Since I plan to use intel only for the interim, it also made sense not to spend so much money. I opted for the Asus Z97WS motherboard as it offers quad SLI/Xfire support, with the first two cards running at x16 in pcie3 configuration (I have a pair of Sapphire TRIX R9-290's in Xfire). However, there is a great deal of contention stating dual pcie3 x16 does not offer any significant performance improvement. After reading various intel fanboy reviews, I was looking forward to a substantial improvement in benchmarks and gaming performance.
Long story short, I have been building pc's since March 2007 and prior to migrating to AMD with the advent of FX8150 in September 2011, I have owned 6 intel rigs (but I ditched intel for personal and ethical reasons). So building a new (intel) platform is not an issue for me. The only new components in my new rig was the 4790K and Z97WS. However, once all of the hardware had been installed and upon first boot, I kept getting 'fatal error' and 'chassis intrude' messages as well as a secondary message 'please check your build'. I dismantled and carefully rebuilt my system. I eventually managed to resolve the problems but it took two days of systematic trouble shooting. People always say that AMD is not as fast as intel and in general, that may be the case BUT nobody ever talks about reliability and stability. In the last 3 years, I have built quite a few AMD rigs for friends and family and not once have the AMD rigs given me any trouble (even my old Athlon was a damn sight more stable than my 'Pentium 3 netburst' which used to crash like a cancer patient all the time).
Please note, that the L3 batch of 4790K cpu's are known to have overheating issues even when at idle and thus require high performance AIO liquid coolers. The L4 batch were released with extra transistors to better handle the heat and improved TIM. You can easily find out if your 4790K is either L3 or L4 batch by looking at the label on the box. It will clearly say Batch:L3 (or L4) and then a series of numbers. Fortunately, I received a Batch L4 cpu (hence good thermals).
Anyways, all sorted now. Installed OS and other software, yet there are other issues I am noticing. For instance, some games via Origin and Steam are no longer working on this new intel platform (eg - crysis1, mass effect 1&3 and BF3. Also, BF4 stays on a loop and then crashes. This did not happen on my FX9590 rig). I have also been running some benchmarks and to be honest I am quite disappointed with the results. In some synthetic benchmarks (such as performance passmark), the 4790K does score highly against the FX9590 (5304 versus 3836.5). Also see -
Unigine valley (4176 versus 3178)
Firestrike Extreme (8034 versus 7562)
The above three tests were done at stock clocks for both cpu's. I am still in the process of running more benchmarks but come on intel, do you honestly think I am going to use my 'high end' pc just to run synthetic benchmarks all day?. Synthetic benchmarks aside I am far more interested to see how the 4790k would perform in real life tasks such as video editing and gaming (my two main areas). I rendered a 7.8GB video with the 4790K and it finished the project in 17m17s. I had previously rendered the same video with my trusty FX9590 and it completed the project in 17m12s. I was very surprised, since according to all of the intel fanboy reviews (which btw, are supposed to be unbiased but clearly transpired not to be the case) I should have seen much better results with the 4790K. I decided to compile two different videos. So I opted for my two biggest video files. The first was 43.3GB and the 4790K took 31m52s to complete the project, whereas my FX9590 took 31m45s to complete the same task. I rendered another video (43GB). The 4790k took 29m14s, whereas my FX9590 took 29m8s to render the same video project. This is not a joke. I have also kept a detailed diary of all my benchmark results for the last two years.
With regards to gaming, I tested the most cpu and gpu intensive game which is crysis3 (ultra settings). With the opening mission on the ship, my FX9590 was giving a steady 80-86fps (with 2x290 TRIX in xfire). The 4790K was giving 60-70fps (with 2x290 TRIX in xfire). That is the same fps when I had my FX9590 with 2x770GTX-SLI before upgrading to 2xSapphire TRIX 290's!. No joke!. Just to drive the point home, the 2x290TRIX works out at circa 8.2GB of GDDR5 VRAM @ 5200MHz and 5120 stream processors (so no small potatoes!).
It seems to me that the 4790K performs very well on synthetic benchmarks. However, I believe these sort of tests can be misleading as these programs have been written to favour intel and Nvidia. Indeed not so long ago, AMD actually sued cinebench because it was found that the cinebench software had a subset of instructions to cripple AMD cpu performance.
As mentioned, I am still in the process of running tests and will update my review accordingly. However, bearing in mind the exorbitant price tag of £500 for the cpu and motherboard, I am very disappointed with the lacklustre performance. In fact, the only real benefit I have seen is that my L4 batch 4790K runs substantially cooler than my FX9590 (idle 20c versus 37c) and also runs very cool when under load (does not go above 45c versus up to 62c with the FX9590). Due to improved thermals, my pc case fans do not run at full whack so my pc is much quieter now. TBH, that is the only real benefit I have seen. Performance wise in real life tasks, it is not that much faster than my FX9590. In fact, the 4790k is actually slower than my FX9590 for the sort of tasks I run.
Despite getting less fps in gaming with the 4790K, it has however reduced somewhat the intermittent choppiness in games such as crysis3. However, this still does not justify the exorbitant price tag (bearing in mind you can now get the FX9590 for £140 at sale price). I was going to give this intel cpu 2 stars, but bearing in mind the low temps at idle and under load, I decided to add an extra star.
TBH, I am capitulating with regards to continue using the 4790K for the next 18 months (or not) but as soon as AMD release their flagship K12/X86 'Zen core', high performance cpu (12 genuine cores at 6Ghz each core, no more CMT so SMT all the way) and AM4 platform, then you can bet your bottom dollar I am going to ditch intel like a soiled nappy and go back to AMD (I have personally found that AMD cpu's and gpu's are nowhere as bad as what critics make them out to be).
On a side note, I have read that AMD is also going to merge the new Opteron cpu and new gen FX cpu onto a unified AM4 platform. The new gen Opteron will come as 12, 16 and 20 core cpu's with built in ARM-cortex processors. If the price is right, I will buy the 20 cores K12 Opteron and high end AM4 workstation motherboard.
UPDATE 1 on 09/10/14: I tested the intel HD4600 with some games. It played mass effect2 at a reasonable 35-40fps (at high settings). However with other games such as crysis2, NFS the runs, tomb raider (to mention only a few), I was getting a very pathetic 7-16fps. I then tested the 4790k by playing crysis3 with 'BOINC SETI@HOME' running in the background. The core temps were a good 40-45c, but fps dropped massively in crysis3 (24-31fps) even with my brand new Zotac 980GTX which I have owned for only 3 days. I am also getting a lot of stuttering and freezing during gaming. When I turn off BOINC, then gaming is okay, so it seems to me there is an issue with running multiple cpu intensive programs on this 4790k.
In stark contrast I would have my FX9590 running 'BOINC SETI@HOME' in the background whilst playing crysis3 (ultra settings) with my pair of high end Sapphire TRIX 290's in xfire and even though there was an fps drop and increase in core temps (up to 62c), I would still be getting a very playable c.60fps. Ever since I purchased this 4790k over 2 weeks ago, I have had BSOD 7 times. That is more BSOD's than my trusty FX9590 had in 12 months!.
Another thing I noticed is that when I try to overclock the 4790K (the Z97WS has 3 settings - default, turbo and extreme. I selected the 'extreme' mode on mobo settings). However, the cpu is only able to overclock up to 4.3GHz (and not the 4.4GHz turbo boost) and I keep getting BSOD. BTW, I am using a high end Alpenfohn K2 Mount Doom air cooler with three of the new 3000rpm Noctua fans (110CFM each) and core temps are 13c, 14c, 14c, 15c at idle (under load with BOINC, core temps go up to 42c, 43c, 43c, 45c). Please note, I could easily overclock my FX9590 to 5GHZ with the same air cooler even before I purchased the Noctua industrial fans (I was using three Akasa venom fans on my air cooler).
So I am perplexed and really disappointed with my new intel rig. I shelled out £500 on this rig but I am not getting the trail blazing performance that intel fanboys claimed I would get. In real life applications it really is not that much faster than my FX9590 (and in some real life tasks, it is an underperformer). So I need to try and find out why this thing is under-performing and try to fix it (if it can be fixed). See my rig specs -
4790K
Asus Z97WS (with high quality shinetsu thermal paste)
Alpenfohn K2 Mount Doom air cooler with triple 3k-rpm Noctua fans
16GB Team Extreme 2400MHz RAM
2xSapphire TRIX 290-xfire BUT now new Zotac 980GTX
Samsung Evo 1TB ssd (boot drive)
Crucial MX500 960GB ssd (my games)
WD caviar black 2TB HDD (storage drive)
WD eco-green 4TB HDD (storage drive)
Creative ZXR
2xLGBDRE
Coolermaster 1200w pro power 80+ gold silent psu
CM storm trooper case
Benq XL2411T
Gamdias Hermes mech gaming keyboard
Gamdias Zeus e-sport gaming mouse
Logitech X540 5.1 speakers.
TBH, when I look back at my decision to return to intel, I realise it was a 'panic buy' and in the process, I compromised my ethics. If only I could go back three weeks, I wish I never shelled out £500 on this 4790K rig.
UPDATE 2 on 14/10/14: Last night, I decided to give the 4790K another try. I began rendering a video file (43GB size), with BOINC-SETI running in the background and I was playing Crysis3. The result was shocking to say the least. Crysis3 fps was low (21-35fps) and kept stuttering/sticking. Also the audio was not synchronised with game play and was lagging behind by about 3 or 4 seconds. Eventually the game crashed. I closed origin and I also noticed that the rendering software for the 43GB video file also crashed. I rebooted my pc. This morning I called Intel customer support (08706072439) and made a formal complaint. The lady transferred me over to tech support and I explained to the guy the problems I have had over the last three weeks and that this 4790K is incapable of handling a heavy workload. He responded by saying it may be possible that the cpu is faulty (albeit very unlikely, in fact he was adamant about this). I responded by saying this outcome is much worse for intel if the cpu is not faulty (as it means intel cpu's are over-hyped and over-priced crap).
He advised that bearing in mind the sort of work I am doing, the quad core 4790K is not enough and that I should really be looking at purchasing at least the 5930K. I told him this is downright criminal as I am not going to be extorted £430 just for the 5930K cpu. I also asked why is it that my previous AMD FX9590 and Asus FZ were able to handle this sort of workload without skipping a beat (despite temperature increases to 62c)?. He responded by saying he cannot comment on AMD cpu's. He apologised for the inconvenience caused and suggested I should RMA the 4790K to the retailer if I am unhappy with it's performance.
Since this morning I have been on forums trying to find out the reason for this under-performance. I managed to communicate with a very knowledgeable techie and he explained that the intel hyper-threading facility on the quad core 4790K is a very poor substitute for actual physical processing cores. Hyper-threading will boost the 4790K quad core performance by only c.20-30% (depending on application). He explained the AMD BD/PD/Steamroller cpu's are superior in running multi-threaded applications compared to intel quad cores (due to actual 8 physical processing cores). Looking back, it makes sense why the intel tech support guy was saying I need to be looking at either the 6 core 5930K or 8 core 5960X cpu to undertake the sort of work I do. However, I will not be held to ransom for the 5930K (£430) and 5960X (£750) cpu's. I also found an interesting TekSyndicate review on youtube where Logan stated that consumers are taking a very big silicone lottery when purchasing intel cpu's (as intel is playing very loose with the quality of silicone they are using on their cpu's). Yesterday, I RMA'd this intel 4790K cpu and I purchased a brand new FX9590 cpu and Asus FZ mobo, which have arrived today and which I will install after posting this updated review. I have also decided to downgrade my rating for the 4790K from 3 stars to 2 stars.
UPDATE 3 on 17/10/14:
I installed my new FX9590 and Asus FZ on 14/10/14. Upon first boot, everything booted up without hassle. I installed OS, mobo drivers, 980GTX drivers and updated BIOS. I have been using my new FX9590 rig for 3 days now and it is working like a dream. Completely hassle free. I am no longer having problems with any of my games (all games are working perfectly). More importantly, I have not had a single BSOD or any other type of crash or failure. After 4 weeks of constant headache and disappointments with the 4790K, this FX9590 is a breath of fresh air. I tested my FX9590 with the same heavy workload I used with the 4790K (BOINC-SETI running in background, rendering the same 43.3GB video file and playing crysis3 at the same time). I also threw in an extra task as I wanted to download some youtube pc tech reviews and UFO documentaries.
Prior to starting these tasks, my FX9590 was at 35c idle. When I was running all four tasks at the same time, I had FRAPS running in the background when I was playing crysis3 (ultra setting). I was getting 47-57 fps with an average of 52fps (this is with my new 980GTX). Smooth game play with no stuttering or glitching. My FX9590 temperature was 52c and my 980GTX was 73c (when running all four tasks). My FX9590 took slightly longer to render the 43.3GB video file at 31m51s (on account of running 4 heavy workload tasks at the same time and running a 5th program, FRAPS). I am incredibly pleased with my FX9590. It really is a trooper. BTW, I forgot to mention but I ran this heavy workload test at stock clock of 4.7GHz. If I had oc'd my FX9590 to the 5GHz turbo boost speed, then I am sure it would have performed even better.
The sterling performance of the FX9590 is in stark contrast to the impotent, gasping, wheezing effort of the 4790K (which could not run even 3 demanding programs simultaneously!). The subsequent generational iterations of Bulldozer (viz. PD, steamroller and upcoming excavator) are respect worthy designs but it is a travesty that AMD scrapped steamroller and excavator designs for the AM3+ platform, as they could not afford to R&D and implement these designs for AM3+ and the APU's. It really is a shame as I would have liked to have these chips in my rig.
There is also the cost aspect to consider, £500 for the 4790k rig versus £320 for the FX9590 rig (£160 each for mobo and cpu). That is a massive saving of £180. You would be far better served using that £180 towards high spec DDR4 RAM, or towards a 970GTX, 980GTX or even a second 290/X to put in xfire. You could even use that £180 to buy the new Zalman 1200 watts 80+ gold psu with 5 years warranty for £150 here on Amazon (and you would still have £30 left over). Bearing in mind the massive disparity in price between AMD and intel and (in my experience), the very little performance gain with intel, I cannot justify spending £500 just because it is intel. I want `bang for buck' and intel has ALWAYS failed to deliver on this (heck, even the old 3770K is only £10 less than the 4790K!).
So guys, please learn from my very costly mistake. Please save your money and support the under-dog. AMD is second fiddle but have patience as AMD will be releasing the new gen high performance `zen' cpu (March 2016) and even Jim Keller said the new K12 will be the definitive game changer. If you don't buy AMD cpu's and gpu's, then intel will dominate the market and as I learned they will continue to use sub-standard grade silicone for their cpu's, yet still have the bare faced audacity to sell them at extortionate prices.
Okay, some people may not like what I have to say but it is what it is. Only last week (19/09/14), I built my new intel rig (4790K and Asus Z97WS motherboard), although it took me two days to get the bloody thing working. I will come back to this later. It was with a heavy heart that I decided to 'upgrade' my trusty and reliable AMD FX9590 and Asus Crosshair V Formula Z rig. In fact, I have not seen a new AM3+ motherboard since September 2012 when Asus released the then new Formula Z. I did not want to 'upgrade' to intel but felt it would be wise to do so (in a monetary sense at least) since my phone conversation with the AMD tech support advisor confirmed that the current AMD road map has no plans to release any more new AM3+ motherboards for 2014/15.
I decided to sell my current AMD rig whilst I can get good money for it, rather than wait till March 2016 when the new gen K12/X86/ARM hybrid cpu's will be released by AMD alongside the new AM4 platform. If I keep my current rig, it would sell for a pittance in March 2016 and I would lose a lot of money. Only a few days ago I sold my FX9590 for £150 and my Formula Z for £120 (total £270).
I was initially going to go for the X99 platform and the 5930K but after looking at benchmarks against the new 4790K 'Devils canyon' (odd name for a cpu!), I could not justify the exorbitant price tag of the X99 platform. Since I plan to use intel only for the interim, it also made sense not to spend so much money. I opted for the Asus Z97WS motherboard as it offers quad SLI/Xfire support, with the first two cards running at x16 in pcie3 configuration (I have a pair of Sapphire TRIX R9-290's in Xfire). However, there is a great deal of contention stating dual pcie3 x16 does not offer any significant performance improvement. After reading various intel fanboy reviews, I was looking forward to a substantial improvement in benchmarks and gaming performance.
Long story short, I have been building pc's since March 2007 and prior to migrating to AMD with the advent of FX8150 in September 2011, I have owned 6 intel rigs (but I ditched intel for personal and ethical reasons). So building a new (intel) platform is not an issue for me. The only new components in my new rig was the 4790K and Z97WS. However, once all of the hardware had been installed and upon first boot, I kept getting 'fatal error' and 'chassis intrude' messages as well as a secondary message 'please check your build'. I dismantled and carefully rebuilt my system. I eventually managed to resolve the problems but it took two days of systematic trouble shooting. People always say that AMD is not as fast as intel and in general, that may be the case BUT nobody ever talks about reliability and stability. In the last 3 years, I have built quite a few AMD rigs for friends and family and not once have the AMD rigs given me any trouble (even my old Athlon was a damn sight more stable than my 'Pentium 3 netburst' which used to crash like a cancer patient all the time).
Please note, that the L3 batch of 4790K cpu's are known to have overheating issues even when at idle and thus require high performance AIO liquid coolers. The L4 batch were released with extra transistors to better handle the heat and improved TIM. You can easily find out if your 4790K is either L3 or L4 batch by looking at the label on the box. It will clearly say Batch:L3 (or L4) and then a series of numbers. Fortunately, I received a Batch L4 cpu (hence good thermals).
Anyways, all sorted now. Installed OS and other software, yet there are other issues I am noticing. For instance, some games via Origin and Steam are no longer working on this new intel platform (eg - crysis1, mass effect 1&3 and BF3. Also, BF4 stays on a loop and then crashes. This did not happen on my FX9590 rig). I have also been running some benchmarks and to be honest I am quite disappointed with the results. In some synthetic benchmarks (such as performance passmark), the 4790K does score highly against the FX9590 (5304 versus 3836.5). Also see -
Unigine valley (4176 versus 3178)
Firestrike Extreme (8034 versus 7562)
The above three tests were done at stock clocks for both cpu's. I am still in the process of running more benchmarks but come on intel, do you honestly think I am going to use my 'high end' pc just to run synthetic benchmarks all day?. Synthetic benchmarks aside I am far more interested to see how the 4790k would perform in real life tasks such as video editing and gaming (my two main areas). I rendered a 7.8GB video with the 4790K and it finished the project in 17m17s. I had previously rendered the same video with my trusty FX9590 and it completed the project in 17m12s. I was very surprised, since according to all of the intel fanboy reviews (which btw, are supposed to be unbiased but clearly transpired not to be the case) I should have seen much better results with the 4790K. I decided to compile two different videos. So I opted for my two biggest video files. The first was 43.3GB and the 4790K took 31m52s to complete the project, whereas my FX9590 took 31m45s to complete the same task. I rendered another video (43GB). The 4790k took 29m14s, whereas my FX9590 took 29m8s to render the same video project. This is not a joke. I have also kept a detailed diary of all my benchmark results for the last two years.
With regards to gaming, I tested the most cpu and gpu intensive game which is crysis3 (ultra settings). With the opening mission on the ship, my FX9590 was giving a steady 80-86fps (with 2x290 TRIX in xfire). The 4790K was giving 60-70fps (with 2x290 TRIX in xfire). That is the same fps when I had my FX9590 with 2x770GTX-SLI before upgrading to 2xSapphire TRIX 290's!. No joke!. Just to drive the point home, the 2x290TRIX works out at circa 8.2GB of GDDR5 VRAM @ 5200MHz and 5120 stream processors (so no small potatoes!).
It seems to me that the 4790K performs very well on synthetic benchmarks. However, I believe these sort of tests can be misleading as these programs have been written to favour intel and Nvidia. Indeed not so long ago, AMD actually sued cinebench because it was found that the cinebench software had a subset of instructions to cripple AMD cpu performance.
As mentioned, I am still in the process of running tests and will update my review accordingly. However, bearing in mind the exorbitant price tag of £500 for the cpu and motherboard, I am very disappointed with the lacklustre performance. In fact, the only real benefit I have seen is that my L4 batch 4790K runs substantially cooler than my FX9590 (idle 20c versus 37c) and also runs very cool when under load (does not go above 45c versus up to 62c with the FX9590). Due to improved thermals, my pc case fans do not run at full whack so my pc is much quieter now. TBH, that is the only real benefit I have seen. Performance wise in real life tasks, it is not that much faster than my FX9590. In fact, the 4790k is actually slower than my FX9590 for the sort of tasks I run.
Despite getting less fps in gaming with the 4790K, it has however reduced somewhat the intermittent choppiness in games such as crysis3. However, this still does not justify the exorbitant price tag (bearing in mind you can now get the FX9590 for £140 at sale price). I was going to give this intel cpu 2 stars, but bearing in mind the low temps at idle and under load, I decided to add an extra star.
TBH, I am capitulating with regards to continue using the 4790K for the next 18 months (or not) but as soon as AMD release their flagship K12/X86 'Zen core', high performance cpu (12 genuine cores at 6Ghz each core, no more CMT so SMT all the way) and AM4 platform, then you can bet your bottom dollar I am going to ditch intel like a soiled nappy and go back to AMD (I have personally found that AMD cpu's and gpu's are nowhere as bad as what critics make them out to be).
On a side note, I have read that AMD is also going to merge the new Opteron cpu and new gen FX cpu onto a unified AM4 platform. The new gen Opteron will come as 12, 16 and 20 core cpu's with built in ARM-cortex processors. If the price is right, I will buy the 20 cores K12 Opteron and high end AM4 workstation motherboard.
UPDATE 1 on 09/10/14: I tested the intel HD4600 with some games. It played mass effect2 at a reasonable 35-40fps (at high settings). However with other games such as crysis2, NFS the runs, tomb raider (to mention only a few), I was getting a very pathetic 7-16fps. I then tested the 4790k by playing crysis3 with 'BOINC SETI@HOME' running in the background. The core temps were a good 40-45c, but fps dropped massively in crysis3 (24-31fps) even with my brand new Zotac 980GTX which I have owned for only 3 days. I am also getting a lot of stuttering and freezing during gaming. When I turn off BOINC, then gaming is okay, so it seems to me there is an issue with running multiple cpu intensive programs on this 4790k.
In stark contrast I would have my FX9590 running 'BOINC SETI@HOME' in the background whilst playing crysis3 (ultra settings) with my pair of high end Sapphire TRIX 290's in xfire and even though there was an fps drop and increase in core temps (up to 62c), I would still be getting a very playable c.60fps. Ever since I purchased this 4790k over 2 weeks ago, I have had BSOD 7 times. That is more BSOD's than my trusty FX9590 had in 12 months!.
Another thing I noticed is that when I try to overclock the 4790K (the Z97WS has 3 settings - default, turbo and extreme. I selected the 'extreme' mode on mobo settings). However, the cpu is only able to overclock up to 4.3GHz (and not the 4.4GHz turbo boost) and I keep getting BSOD. BTW, I am using a high end Alpenfohn K2 Mount Doom air cooler with three of the new 3000rpm Noctua fans (110CFM each) and core temps are 13c, 14c, 14c, 15c at idle (under load with BOINC, core temps go up to 42c, 43c, 43c, 45c). Please note, I could easily overclock my FX9590 to 5GHZ with the same air cooler even before I purchased the Noctua industrial fans (I was using three Akasa venom fans on my air cooler).
So I am perplexed and really disappointed with my new intel rig. I shelled out £500 on this rig but I am not getting the trail blazing performance that intel fanboys claimed I would get. In real life applications it really is not that much faster than my FX9590 (and in some real life tasks, it is an underperformer). So I need to try and find out why this thing is under-performing and try to fix it (if it can be fixed). See my rig specs -
4790K
Asus Z97WS (with high quality shinetsu thermal paste)
Alpenfohn K2 Mount Doom air cooler with triple 3k-rpm Noctua fans
16GB Team Extreme 2400MHz RAM
2xSapphire TRIX 290-xfire BUT now new Zotac 980GTX
Samsung Evo 1TB ssd (boot drive)
Crucial MX500 960GB ssd (my games)
WD caviar black 2TB HDD (storage drive)
WD eco-green 4TB HDD (storage drive)
Creative ZXR
2xLGBDRE
Coolermaster 1200w pro power 80+ gold silent psu
CM storm trooper case
Benq XL2411T
Gamdias Hermes mech gaming keyboard
Gamdias Zeus e-sport gaming mouse
Logitech X540 5.1 speakers.
TBH, when I look back at my decision to return to intel, I realise it was a 'panic buy' and in the process, I compromised my ethics. If only I could go back three weeks, I wish I never shelled out £500 on this 4790K rig.
UPDATE 2 on 14/10/14: Last night, I decided to give the 4790K another try. I began rendering a video file (43GB size), with BOINC-SETI running in the background and I was playing Crysis3. The result was shocking to say the least. Crysis3 fps was low (21-35fps) and kept stuttering/sticking. Also the audio was not synchronised with game play and was lagging behind by about 3 or 4 seconds. Eventually the game crashed. I closed origin and I also noticed that the rendering software for the 43GB video file also crashed. I rebooted my pc. This morning I called Intel customer support (08706072439) and made a formal complaint. The lady transferred me over to tech support and I explained to the guy the problems I have had over the last three weeks and that this 4790K is incapable of handling a heavy workload. He responded by saying it may be possible that the cpu is faulty (albeit very unlikely, in fact he was adamant about this). I responded by saying this outcome is much worse for intel if the cpu is not faulty (as it means intel cpu's are over-hyped and over-priced crap).
He advised that bearing in mind the sort of work I am doing, the quad core 4790K is not enough and that I should really be looking at purchasing at least the 5930K. I told him this is downright criminal as I am not going to be extorted £430 just for the 5930K cpu. I also asked why is it that my previous AMD FX9590 and Asus FZ were able to handle this sort of workload without skipping a beat (despite temperature increases to 62c)?. He responded by saying he cannot comment on AMD cpu's. He apologised for the inconvenience caused and suggested I should RMA the 4790K to the retailer if I am unhappy with it's performance.
Since this morning I have been on forums trying to find out the reason for this under-performance. I managed to communicate with a very knowledgeable techie and he explained that the intel hyper-threading facility on the quad core 4790K is a very poor substitute for actual physical processing cores. Hyper-threading will boost the 4790K quad core performance by only c.20-30% (depending on application). He explained the AMD BD/PD/Steamroller cpu's are superior in running multi-threaded applications compared to intel quad cores (due to actual 8 physical processing cores). Looking back, it makes sense why the intel tech support guy was saying I need to be looking at either the 6 core 5930K or 8 core 5960X cpu to undertake the sort of work I do. However, I will not be held to ransom for the 5930K (£430) and 5960X (£750) cpu's. I also found an interesting TekSyndicate review on youtube where Logan stated that consumers are taking a very big silicone lottery when purchasing intel cpu's (as intel is playing very loose with the quality of silicone they are using on their cpu's). Yesterday, I RMA'd this intel 4790K cpu and I purchased a brand new FX9590 cpu and Asus FZ mobo, which have arrived today and which I will install after posting this updated review. I have also decided to downgrade my rating for the 4790K from 3 stars to 2 stars.
UPDATE 3 on 17/10/14:
I installed my new FX9590 and Asus FZ on 14/10/14. Upon first boot, everything booted up without hassle. I installed OS, mobo drivers, 980GTX drivers and updated BIOS. I have been using my new FX9590 rig for 3 days now and it is working like a dream. Completely hassle free. I am no longer having problems with any of my games (all games are working perfectly). More importantly, I have not had a single BSOD or any other type of crash or failure. After 4 weeks of constant headache and disappointments with the 4790K, this FX9590 is a breath of fresh air. I tested my FX9590 with the same heavy workload I used with the 4790K (BOINC-SETI running in background, rendering the same 43.3GB video file and playing crysis3 at the same time). I also threw in an extra task as I wanted to download some youtube pc tech reviews and UFO documentaries.
Prior to starting these tasks, my FX9590 was at 35c idle. When I was running all four tasks at the same time, I had FRAPS running in the background when I was playing crysis3 (ultra setting). I was getting 47-57 fps with an average of 52fps (this is with my new 980GTX). Smooth game play with no stuttering or glitching. My FX9590 temperature was 52c and my 980GTX was 73c (when running all four tasks). My FX9590 took slightly longer to render the 43.3GB video file at 31m51s (on account of running 4 heavy workload tasks at the same time and running a 5th program, FRAPS). I am incredibly pleased with my FX9590. It really is a trooper. BTW, I forgot to mention but I ran this heavy workload test at stock clock of 4.7GHz. If I had oc'd my FX9590 to the 5GHz turbo boost speed, then I am sure it would have performed even better.
The sterling performance of the FX9590 is in stark contrast to the impotent, gasping, wheezing effort of the 4790K (which could not run even 3 demanding programs simultaneously!). The subsequent generational iterations of Bulldozer (viz. PD, steamroller and upcoming excavator) are respect worthy designs but it is a travesty that AMD scrapped steamroller and excavator designs for the AM3+ platform, as they could not afford to R&D and implement these designs for AM3+ and the APU's. It really is a shame as I would have liked to have these chips in my rig.
There is also the cost aspect to consider, £500 for the 4790k rig versus £320 for the FX9590 rig (£160 each for mobo and cpu). That is a massive saving of £180. You would be far better served using that £180 towards high spec DDR4 RAM, or towards a 970GTX, 980GTX or even a second 290/X to put in xfire. You could even use that £180 to buy the new Zalman 1200 watts 80+ gold psu with 5 years warranty for £150 here on Amazon (and you would still have £30 left over). Bearing in mind the massive disparity in price between AMD and intel and (in my experience), the very little performance gain with intel, I cannot justify spending £500 just because it is intel. I want `bang for buck' and intel has ALWAYS failed to deliver on this (heck, even the old 3770K is only £10 less than the 4790K!).
So guys, please learn from my very costly mistake. Please save your money and support the under-dog. AMD is second fiddle but have patience as AMD will be releasing the new gen high performance `zen' cpu (March 2016) and even Jim Keller said the new K12 will be the definitive game changer. If you don't buy AMD cpu's and gpu's, then intel will dominate the market and as I learned they will continue to use sub-standard grade silicone for their cpu's, yet still have the bare faced audacity to sell them at extortionate prices.
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