The Old King of Gaming: Intel Core i7-8700K Revisited

Information technology'south fourth dimension we revisited the proficient old Core i7-8700K, an Intel CPU we're rather fond of later on it remained at the top of the game for quite some fourth dimension, and maybe even today.

But not everyone may have the same kind of feeling towards it. If you were building a gaming PC around iv years ago, information technology was a bit of a slap in the face for some Core i7 owners. That's because less than a year afterwards the release of the 7700K, Intel pushed out the 8700K on an incompatible platform for roughly the same price.

Basically if you bought a 7700K upon release or someday before Oct 2017, you were in for a shafting one time the 8700K dropped. For the first time in half a decade Intel finally upgraded their flagship Core i7 from 4 cores and 8 threads, to half dozen cores and 12 threads. And while that might sound like a footling upgrade today that nosotros have viii, 10, 12 and fifty-fifty 16-core desktop CPUs, at the fourth dimension it was a big deal and in many ways notwithstanding is.

That'due south considering after half dozen years of quad-cores the industry is finally moving on and games are now conspicuously benefiting from more cores. That as well means games tin can suffer from poor operation when limited to just 4 cores.

Looking back, it meant that for virtually the same kind of money, Intel was offering 50% more cores and this all happened within the same yr, which is why nosotros called the 7700K the worst CPU purchase of 2017. This may sound bad and anti-Intel, but it'south non, they were just rising to the competition. You lot could debate they should have fabricated these moves years earlier than they did, which would take fabricated Ryzen'southward splash onto the scene more of a drop, like a niggling trickle, non as splashy.

But they didn't, and what we ended up with was a somewhat rushed 8th generation Core serial with two more cores tacked on at the loftier-terminate. The results were very impressive though.

The 7700K was already a gaming fauna, but with more than cores the 8700K was set to retain that championship for a much longer menstruation. From day ane we called it 'The King of Gaming' and although it was technically superseded by the 9900K and then the 10900K, it's even so a very capable gaming processor. If you happen to own it, we doubt you'll be feeling the demand to upgrade any time soon.

If yous follow our CPU coverage you'll know nosotros have picked the new Core i5-10600K equally the best value option for loftier refresh rate gamers. The i5-10600K is clocked more than aggressively out of the box, but it shares its specifications with the 8700K. Both are unlocked parts that typically hit like clock speeds one time overclocked.

The 10600K is $100 cheaper, but it was released roughly two and half years afterward, and so nosotros tin safely say 8700K owners got their money's worth in that time.

To meet how the Cadre i7-8700K handles itself in 2020, we've tested information technology on the Gigabyte Z390 Aorus Ultra. The new 10th-gen Core processors were tested on the Asus ROG Maximus XII Extreme and all Ryzen on the Gigabyte X570 Aorus Master. All PC configurations were completed with an RTX 2080 Ti, 32GB of DDR4-3200 CL14 memory and a Corsair Hydro H150i Pro 360mm AIO liquid cooler.

Benchmarks

As usual we'll start with Cinebench R20 multi-core and as yous'd await, the 8700K with l% more than cores is almost l% faster than the 7700K. Out of the box we're looking at a 45% performance increase and once overclocked that margin does reach 50% as our 8700K clocks to five GHz much more easily. Overclocked, the 8700K is rightly on par with the Ryzen seven 2700X, so a very solid result for the vi-cadre processor. Of course, the newer 3rd-gen Ryzen serial fairs improve equally you'd expect.

Unmarried core operation is roughly on par with the 7700K and with both overclocking to a similar frequency, the OC results are also much the aforementioned.

Here we're seeing simply over a 40% comeback in compression performance with the 7-Zip file manager, so another significant functioning uplift seen within the same twelvemonth of the 7700K release.

The decompression margins are like, here the 8700K was 37% faster out of the box and when overclocked to 5GHz couldn't quite catch the Ryzen 5 3600 in this workload.

Operation in Blender was boosted by 46%, it's actually a 32% reduction in render fourth dimension making information technology 46% faster. This often confuses people and nosotros tend to become with faster, beingness 46% here as information technology's in line with the higher is better percentages, so please keep that in heed every bit nosotros proceed to await at the residuum of the results.

For code compilation work the 8700K is simply shy of 40% faster than the 7700K and that actually made information technology slower than the Ryzen v 3600, even once overclocked to 5GHz. That said when compared to the Ryzen 5 2600, it was a good bit faster.

The eighth-gen Core i7 processor delivered excellent results in DaVinci Resolve Studio 16 and while at that place are certainly faster options available today, it has aged well.

The same is as well true of the Adobe Premiere Pro 2020 results, stock we're looking at Ryzen 5 2600-like operation while overclocked it was able to match the stock R5 3600.

The Adobe Photoshop 2020 performance is very respectable and the stock 8700K was able to match the Ryzen seven 2700X.

Adobe After Furnishings 2020 more often than not relies on single core performance, though the actress cores of the 8700K exercise give information technology a small advantage over the 7700K. Merely as this application predominantly just a few cores, the overclocked 8700K scores very well.

The 8700K is a 14nm processor running at aggressive clock speeds, even so the power consumption figures are very good. Of course, one time overclocked information technology becomes a bit of a power hog, just even and then we're talking nigh full system consumption south of 300 watts, which is not bad at all.

Gaming Functioning

Now it'due south time to look at gaming performance and we'll start with Battleground V which has been tested at 1080p using the ultra quality preset with an RTX 2080 Ti.

Remarkably we see an near 30% improvement in 1% low functioning when comparing stock functioning between the 8700K and 7700K. Then once overclocked that margin increases to 37%, so clearly equally games get more CPU demanding, the 8700K will become considerably faster than the 7700K and more importantly, provide a smoother gaming feel.

Fifty-fifty in Far Cry New Dawn which we don't think of every bit a core-heavy championship, is seeing some benefit from the 6-cadre 8700K and with both parts overclocked the 8700K is up to 22% faster.

We see a small ~10% gain when comparison 7th and 8th-gen Core i7 processors in Gears Tactics. The 8700K tin can match the new Cadre i9-10900K once overclocked to 5GHz in a very impressive result, proving why it's even so 1 of the best gaming CPUs.

Ghost Recon Breakpoint isn't very CPU sensitive so we're looking at similar performance across the board, particularly with the Intel CPUs and again the 8700K performs exceptionally well.

Shadow of the Tomb Raider like Battleground V tin can provide telling results, and it gives us a clear indication of where things are heading. Stock we're seeing a 21% increase in frame charge per unit from the 7700K to the 8700K, a pregnant increase given the CPUs are based on the aforementioned pattern. The stock 8700K is also on par with the Ryzen 5 3600 and this is how nosotros expect these processors to compare in time to come demanding titles.

Final upwards we take Red Dead Redemption 2 where we come across upward to an 18% performance reward in favor of the 8700K over the 7700K when comparing stock out of the box performance. The 8700K is besides comparable in this title with newer and more expensive Intel processors such as the 10700K and 10900K.

And Notwithstanding ! ... What We Learned

As you may take expected, 2017's male monarch of gaming CPU is withal a very capable gamer.

While piecing this content together we went back and read our original 8700K review. We establish the decision quite interesting given how everything played out over the by few years. Here's the bulk of that conclusion…

"Intel'south new mainstream flagship Core i7 processor is a beast. For gamers seeking the ultimate solution there is simply nothing better than the Core i7-8700K. Out of the box performance is incredible, overclocking is even more incredible, power consumption is impressive for a CPU running at over four GHz by default and needless to say, this bit is going to find its manner into my new gaming rig."

Gaming aside, what about productivity? Still from that review...

"... the Core i7-8700K has the Ryzen seven 1800X beat and information technology nearly wasn't even a contest. (...) Compared to the R7 1700 the 8700K is at best on par in terms of value but with both overclocked to the max the Ryzen vii has a piddling more to give.

Still the 8700K has proven to be much more of an all-rounder than the 7700K ever was. Overall I really like Intel's new Core i7-8700K."

A positive review then, and if y'all pulled the trigger on a Core i7-8700K you'll be looking back thinking you lot fabricated the correct choice, especially for a gaming automobile. AMD made the choice a little harder with 2nd-gen Ryzen chips, merely for high refresh rate gaming Intel's been the more obvious option and the Cadre i5-10600K continues that tradition today.