I7-7700K or I7-7800X for Gaming??

[perkynips]

I am able to afford either one at this time so it's not necessarily a pricing issue, up until an hour ago I was deadset and have already preordered a 7800X with the assumption since it's 6/12 cores and just coming out it would be the clear winner, however some of my research is starting to make me wonder.

If it helps the primary applications I will be playing is WoW, Destiny 2, and occasional FPS games.

thank you in advance.

 

[Herc08]

You are doing some serious overkill jsut for those type of games. Unless you need to do some extreme editing, do you really think you need to spend $300 on a motherboard?

If you are a dead-set on Intel, get the 7700K. You will barely see a benefit with the 7800K.

If you are considering Ryzen, you may want to look at the R5 1600 as it offers similar specs to the 7800x, but only a fraction of the price.

 

[mdd1963]

Unless a serious streamer/content creator *and* gamer, I'd go 7700K....

 

[geofelt]

What will be your graphics card?
If you are looking at a GTX1080ti, I think a I7-7700K would be appropriate.

If you will be running many threaded batch apps, then the higher thread count of ryzen might be appropriate.

 

[joex444]

7800X is 6C/12T @ 3.5GHz, 7700K is 4C/8T @ 4.2GHz. Assuming you don't overclock either of them, the 7700K is better for gaming.

If you do overclock, then the 7800X should be able to reach 4.0GHz fairly easily, but it would still not really outperform the 7700K. Perhaps in a couple years once game developers have decided that the majority of people who would use more than 4C/8T are on such a platform and would go ahead and design their game to run better on 6C/8C/10C CPUs then you would see the 7800X outperforms the 7700K. That is to say... intrinsically, the 7800X is a more powerful CPU but you need programs to take advantage of it and we're not there yet. As it currently stands, the higher clock rate from the 7700K will be more useful for gaming. Also consider that the 7700K has a good heat spreader while the 7800X uses thermal paste so you're less likely to overclock the 7800X as high as the 7700K.

The advantage that the 7800X has is related to the X299 platform over the Z270 platform. X299 has quad channel memory versus Z270's dual channel, and the 7800X has 28 PCIe lanes (IIRC 7700K has 16 lanes). If your build consists of a motherboard, CPU, RAM, SATA drives, single GPU, and at most two PCIe x1 cards then the number of PCIe lanes and configuration of onboard ports literally doesn't matter for you. I've found that about 90% of builds fall into this category. (Even the PCIe x1 cards are rarely used, typically just for WiFi, and they would use the PCIe x1 slots that are connected to the chipset not the CPU so they do not interfere with the GPU or NVMe configuration.)

 

[perkynips]

I'm starting to agree with Joex444 in everything I read - I currently have a 1070 and had someone offer me cash the same amount I paid for it $450 I am considering selling it and using the extra money I would dump on a new x299 mobo and just get a 1080ti and 7700K - thank you for the responses. I think I've made up my mind.

 

[perkynips]

So moving on, how about this.

If I wanted the best CPU for gaming what about 7700k vs 7740x vs ryzen(I'm clueless so which one best for gaming <$400)

I was looking at the 7740x and it looks like a slightly updated version of the 7700k

 

[geofelt]

7740X goes in X299 motherboard, and they are a bit pricey.
Unless you might need the extra pcie lanes that a X299 gives, stick with 7700K and a Z270 motherboard.

 

[Phaaze88]

So moving on, how about this.

If I wanted the best CPU for gaming what about 7700k vs 7740x vs ryzen(I'm clueless so which one best for gaming <$400)

I was looking at the 7740x and it looks like a slightly updated version of the 7700k

If you simply don't have money to blow, stay away from x299: 7640, 7740, 7800, 7820, 7900...

Then down to 7700k - still gaming king - and ryzen 1600 & 1700(the top 2 selling AMD units on newegg, at least, for ~$200 & $300 respectively); cheaper than 7700k, with negligible performance differences!(Someone please correct me if I'm wrong on this.) Since you appear to be on a tight budget, 1600(1st option), 1700(2nd), then 7700(last).

 

[mdd1963]

The 7740 *is* 100 MHz higher on the base clock across it's 4 cores, and, with the deletion of internal graphics, it's possible a few golden samples will OC to 5.2/5.3 GHz or so...; but, if you are playing at decent resolution and settings, I doubt the extra 1-2 fps will be all that noticeable...

As to if that's worth the added expense (compared to Z270) of a semi-unknown and even potentially buggy X299 while so new at it's 'in the wild plus 1 day' state, you will have to make that call....

 

[RobCrezz]

7740 is a waste of money. a few % more for a lot more cost (as you need a x299 board), and you dont even get all the x299 features.

Rumor has it that Coffee lake will be out sooner than expected, and youll be able to get a 6c/12t cpu on the mainstream z370 board.

 

[geofelt]

When comparing I7-7700K to I7-7800X, you are essentially comparing a 4 core vs. a 6 core, each with hyperthreading.
How much does 6 core(12 threads) help in gaming vs. 4 cores(8 threads)
Today, not much for most games.
Few games today can effectively use more than 2-3 threads.
Perhaps the best case for many threads is multiplayer with many participants.
Fast action shooters need fast graphics most.
Games such as sims, strategy and MMO will tend to be single threaded and will depend on the speed of the single master thread.

To that end, I7-7700K is likely to be the best you can buy.
As of 2/22/17
What percent can get an overclock at a somewhat sane 1.4v Vcore.

I7-7700K
4.9 78%
5.0 59%
5.1 28%
5.2 7%

The OC potential of the I7-7800K is not really known.
But, in previous 4/6 core comparisons, the 6 core processors have not been able to oc to the level of the 4 core processors.
The reason is that at a given tech level, each chip will have a limit to the power that can be applied.

For truly multithreaded apps, ryzen is impressive, but they top out with an overclock around 3.9 and their efficiency per clock is less than for kaby lake. That is not a killer if your games are shooters or multiplayer.
Not so great for MMO,sims, or strategy games.

At this level of budget, it takes a top tier graphics card to show up the difference.
Think GTX1080ti. Anything much less, and you would be satisfied with a lesser cpu.

 

[Shasha23]

I am able to afford either one at this time so it's not necessarily a pricing issue, up until an hour ago I was deadset and have already preordered a 7800X with the assumption since it's 6/12 cores and just coming out it would be the clear winner, however some of my research is starting to make me wonder.

If it helps the primary applications I will be playing is WoW, Destiny 2, and occasional FPS games.

thank you in advance.

If you can afford it buy the newer tech, go for the 7800x and X299 board, no use upgrading to outdated tech in my opinion!

 

[mdd1963]

So moving on, how about this.

If I wanted the best CPU for gaming what about 7700k vs 7740x vs ryzen(I'm clueless so which one best for gaming <$400)

I was looking at the 7740x and it looks like a slightly updated version of the 7700k

The 7740X might have a 1-2 fps advantage due to it's .1 GHz higher turbo, but that is generally offset by it's high mainboard cost; better to blow that extra $200 on a better GPU, IMO.....