Intel 6600K or 6700K for a new Gaming PC

[GamingDaemon]

Hi Fellow PC-Nuts, Techies and Gamers!!

So my wife recently pointed at my gaming PC and said, and I kid you not, these were her exact words:

"I want your PC!"

She's not a gamer, but she does produce videos for a living, and after teaching her about CPUs and GPUs, and how they interact for video rendering, my i7-4790K with its nVidia TitanX looked awfully appealing. My answer was, and is, "Ok, I will just hand this over to you minus my 4 SSD drives."

This puts me in the position of building a brand new gaming PC.

I am probably going to go with an EVGA 980GTX Ti SC. But what about the CPU???

I could go with another 4790K, but why not DDR4 and Skylake and a Z170??

So, Skylake it is! But do I buy the way overpriced 6700K (out of stock on Newegg at $419, or $450 on Amazon)? Or go with the much cheaper 6600K ($280 at Newegg) without hyper-threading?

But before you say, "DUH! Go with the 6600K," let me point you all to this youtube video:

Intel Skylake Core i7 6700K vs i5 6600K Stock/Overclock Gaming Benchmarks

The long and short of that video is that for right now, the 6600K is probably fine, but newer games are starting to take advantage of hyper-threading. Do I drop the $$$ on the lesser chip knowing I will need to spend more to upgrade in a year or two? Or do I make the sacrifice now and buy the overpriced 6700K part? Or is this all a false-hood?

Advice, opinions and facts are all welcome.

Thank you!

 

[Arachnotronic]

Buy a 5820K and overclock the snot out of it

 

[Burpo]

Get the 6600K and have some fun now You can overclock if you wish, but it's plenty potent stock. If you get the itch a yr. from now, you can upgrade the CPU and still get a pretty penny for yours on ebay.

 

[Raftina]

It seems to me that your wife would actually get more out of a new system than you would. To be more specific, the 6700K and 2011-3 CPUs offer very marginal improvements for gaming--what your use your system for--but they offer significantly more for video rendering. A mobo that has potential Xeon support (e.g. ASRock's X99) with either a Xeon or a 5820K (if you want to stay lower on the budget) for your wife would give your household the greatest increase in effective performance per dollar spent and leave a lot of room for future upgrades (e.g. retired Broadwell based Xeons).

 

[Termie]

The 4790K is the clear winner right now at $300. It's faster in nearly any task than a 6600K, certainly at stock, and almost always when overclocked. And including total platform cost, the 4790K is cheaper.

The Intel current-gen CPU pricing is in dire need of a correction. It's gotten out of hand solely because Intel is having trouble producing the chips, which is a very odd reason for people to pay more for them.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Get the 6600K and have some fun now You can overclock if you wish, but it's plenty potent stock. If you get the itch a yr. from now, you can upgrade the CPU and still get a pretty penny for yours on ebay.

6600k is a nice chip but it, too, is crazy hard to find

5820k overclocked gets the OP great 4c/8t perf with longevity thanks to the additional cores. And did I mention upgrade path?

 

[GamingDaemon]

Get the 6600K and have some fun now You can overclock if you wish, but it's plenty potent stock. If you get the itch a yr. from now, you can upgrade the CPU and still get a pretty penny for yours on ebay.

Yes, I think I am leaning toward this same way of thinking. Especially giving me a more future-proof system down the road that requires a small bump to the next-gen processor in the 1151 slot in a year or so

It seems to me that your wife would actually get more out of a new system than you would. To be more specific, the 6700K and 2011-3 CPUs offer very marginal improvements for gaming--what your use your system for--but they offer significantly more for video rendering. A mobo that has potential Xeon support (e.g. ASRock's X99) with either a Xeon or a 5820K (if you want to stay lower on the budget) for your wife would give your household the greatest increase in effective performance per dollar spent and leave a lot of room for future upgrades (e.g. retired Broadwell based Xeons).

You are probably right. But I did look at the 2011v3 CPUs, like the 5820K, in comparison to the 4790K and the differences for rendering video between the two were not that impressive (look at this video 1:00 minute in...this link has it starting at 1:00). The 5820K wins everywhere else, but is only slightly better at rendering. Since that is her biggest pain point right now, I think handing her a water-cooled, overclocked 4790K is a huge win. Especially over what she is using now (3750K not overclocked).

 

[CHADBOGA]

Hi Fellow PC-Nuts, Techies and Gamers!!

So my wife recently pointed at my gaming PC and said, and I kid you not, these were her exact words:

"I want your PC!"

She's not a gamer, but she does produce videos for a living, and after teaching her about CPUs and GPUs, and how they interact for video rendering, my i7-4790K with its nVidia TitanX looked awfully appealing. My answer was, and is, "Ok, I will just hand this over to you minus my 4 SSD drives."

This puts me in the position of building a brand new gaming PC.

I am probably going to go with an EVGA 980GTX Ti SC. But what about the CPU???

I could go with another 4790K, but why not DDR4 and Skylake and a Z170??

So, Skylake it is! But do I buy the way overpriced 6700K (out of stock on Newegg at $419, or $450 on Amazon)? Or go with the much cheaper 6600K ($280 at Newegg) without hyper-threading?

But before you say, "DUH! Go with the 6600K," let me point you all to this youtube video:

Intel Skylake Core i7 6700K vs i5 6600K Stock/Overclock Gaming Benchmarks

The long and short of that video is that for right now, the 6600K is probably fine, but newer games are starting to take advantage of hyper-threading. Do I drop the $$$ on the lesser chip knowing I will need to spend more to upgrade in a year or two? Or do I make the sacrifice now and buy the overpriced 6700K part? Or is this all a false-hood?

Advice, opinions and facts are all welcome.

Thank you!

Are you an overclocker?

If not, then the i7 4790K is a better CPU than the i5 6600K.

Even if you are an overclocker, the 4790K is probably the better cpu.

Considering DDR4 still commands a decent premium over DDR3, that is another thing in the 4790K's favour.

Perhaps you should build a 6 core beast using a processor from Intel's HEDT line and give that to your wife and take back your 4790K.

 

[bystander36]

You are probably right. But I did look at the 2011v3 CPUs, like the 5820K, in comparison to the 4790K and the differences for rendering video between the two were not that impressive (look at this video 1:00 minute in...this link has it starting at 1:00). The 5820K wins everywhere else, but is only slightly better at rendering. Since that is her biggest pain point right now, I think handing her a water-cooled, overclocked 4790K is a huge win. Especially over what she is using now (3750K not overclocked).

Assuming you OC, then the 5820K gains a LOT more than the 4790K, as the base clock on the 5820K is very low compared to its potential.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Assuming you OC, then the 5820K gains a LOT more than the 4790K, as the base clock on the 5820K is very low compared to its potential.

This. On good cooling, hitting 4.5GHz on a 5820K is pretty common. Haswell-E chips truly shine when they are overclocked.

 

[Lepton87]

This. On good cooling, hitting 4.5GHz on a 5820K is pretty common. Haswell-E chips truly shine when they are overclocked.

Tell that to mine sample, even with the best water cooling it just refuses to go beyond 4.4GHz regardless of the voltage or any other setting, it seems like a hard wall. If someone expects 4.5GHz or more he could be due for a rude reality coming knocking at his door. 4.2GHz seems like a sure thing, everything on top should be consider luck.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Tell that to mine sample, even with the best water cooling it just refuses to go beyond 4.4GHz regardless of the voltage or any other setting, it seems like a hard wall. If someone expects 4.5GHz or more he could be due for a rude reality coming knocking at his door. 4.2GHz seems like a sure thing, everything on top should be consider luck.

Ah, bummer. 4.4GHz is still really solid. I'd take that over a 4.7-4.8GHz HSW-DT, easily.

 

[Lepton87]

Ah, bummer. 4.4GHz is still really solid. I'd take that over a 4.7-4.8GHz HSW-DT, easily.

It's not like there's any noticeable difference in practice between 4.4GHz and even 4.8GHz. I don't even run it this high because it takes a disproportionate amount of additional voltage compared to the frequency gain going from 4.25GHz to 4.4GHz. 4.25 works under 1.2V while 4.4GHz needs 1.3V.

 

[RussianSensation]

Get the 6600K and have some fun now You can overclock if you wish, but it's plenty potent stock.

No way. Among i7 4790K, 5820K, 5930K, 6700K, this is the worst choice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3g_t_gJnavI

An i7 is the only logical choice for a 980Ti GPU for someone who intends to use the system for the next 4-5 years, even if it means going with DDR3 i7 4790K combo. I'd only recommend the i5 6600K if the OP knows he won't play any games that take advantage of more than 4 threads and/or he has a backlog of many older titles which do not benefit from an i7. Then he can use the i5 6600K for those games and upgrade to i7 Kaby Lake in Q4 2016.

You are probably right. But I did look at the 2011v3 CPUs, like the 5820K, in comparison to the 4790K and the differences for rendering video between the two were not that impressive (look at this video 1:00 minute in...this link has it starting at 1:00).

Those are stock benches though, right?

Overclock the i7 5820K, and it'll beat an i7 6700K OC for productivity.

If you need rendering speed, i7 5820K + OC over i7 4790K/6600K/6700K. Also, then that platform would have upgrade path to an 8-10 core Broadwell-E.

My advice is that since your wife is going to need the most raw CPU horsepower for rendering, I'd actually build her the i7 5820K OC rig and keep your own i7 4790K for yourself. She doesn't need the Titan X so you can keep that in your system and buy her a GTX970 and spend the difference on an M.2 Samsung 950 Pro/larger SSD/better monitor for her instead of the 980Ti. Alternatively, pass on your monitor to her and get yourself a GSync monitor to pair with the Titan X.

*Bonus points* For your own rig, sell your Titan X and buy 980Ti (SLI). With a single 980Ti, you'd retain 95% of the performance or more since TX reference can't overclock as well as an after-market 980Ti. If you sell the TX for $850, buy a 980Ti for $600, that's $250 towards your wife's rig OR your own GSync monitor upgrade. If you go 980Ti SLI, you'd get more performance for yourself.

 

[bystander36]

It's not like there's any noticeable difference in practice between 4.4GHz and even 4.8GHz. I don't even run it this high because it takes a disproportionate amount of additional voltage compared to the frequency gain going from 4.25GHz to 4.4GHz. 4.25 works under 1.2V while 4.4GHz needs 1.3V.

Mine hits 4.4 @1.25V, and 4.5 @1.3V with standard 2133mhz memory speed. With XMP at 3000mhz, I can only hit 4.375Ghz @ 1.26V. 4.5Ghz isn't stable with 3000mhz DDR4. I've been using 4.375Ghz with 3000mhz memory.

 

[GamingDaemon]

Are you an overclocker?

If not, then the i7 4790K is a better CPU than the i5 6600K.

Even if you are an overclocker, the 4790K is probably the better cpu.

Considering DDR4 still commands a decent premium over DDR3, that is another thing in the 4790K's favour.

Perhaps you should build a 6 core beast using a processor from Intel's HEDT line and give that to your wife and take back your 4790K.

I am an overclocker...and I have somewhat committed to this project as I saw a good deal on 32GB of DDR4 memory a few weeks ago and snagged it. It was about the same price as much slower DDR3 memory, and I couldn't resist.

So there it is...

And I am just not convinced that a hexa-core really adds much to the gaming experience. Video editing/rendering, yes. But not to gaming. Not sure if VR/AR will make a difference in that department when it finally becomes available. But right now, Occam's Razor says keep going with Skylake and a 6600K/6700K and the DDR4 memory I have already bought.

 

[Arachnotronic]

I am an overclocker...and I have somewhat committed to this project as I saw a good deal on 32GB of DDR4 memory a few weeks ago and snagged it. It was about the same price as much slower DDR3 memory, and I couldn't resist.

So there it is...

And I am just not convinced that a hexa-core really adds much to the gaming experience. Video editing/rendering, yes. But not to gaming. Not sure if VR/AR will make a difference in that department when it finally becomes available. But right now, Occam's Razor says keep going with Skylake and a 6600K/6700K and the DDR4 memory I have already bought.

One of the main reasons I'm big on Haswell-E is that at current prices Skylake isn't the best bang for your buck unless you are planning on using a super cheap motherboard. 5820k is $389; 6700k is like $420...if you can find it.

 

[GamingDaemon]

No way. Among i7 4790K, 5820K, 5930K, 6700K, this is the worst choice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3g_t_gJnavI

An i7 is the only logical choice for a 980Ti GPU for someone who intends to use the system for the next 4-5 years, even if it means going with DDR3 i7 4790K combo. I'd only recommend the i5 6600K if the OP knows he won't play any games that take advantage of more than 4 threads and/or he has a backlog of many older titles which do not benefit from an i7. Then he can use the i5 6600K for those games and upgrade to i7 Kaby Lake in Q4 2016.

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My advice is that since your wife is going to need the most raw CPU horsepower for rendering, I'd actually build her the i7 5820K OC rig and keep your own i7 4790K for yourself. She doesn't need the Titan X so you can keep that in your system and buy her a GTX970 and spend the difference on an M.2 Samsung 950 Pro/larger SSD/better monitor for her instead of the 980Ti. Alternatively, pass on your monitor to her and get yourself a GSync monitor to pair with the Titan X.

*Bonus points* For your own rig, sell your Titan X and buy 980Ti (SLI). With a single 980Ti, you'd retain 95% of the performance or more since TX reference can't overclock as well as an after-market 980Ti. If you sell the TX for $850, buy a 980Ti for $600, that's $250 towards your wife's rig OR your own GSync monitor upgrade. If you go 980Ti SLI, you'd get more performance for yourself.

You make some interesting points... So if I build her the 5820K, in a Z99, and use the DDR4 memory I have already bought and give her a new case, overclock it to 4.2 or even 4.4, water-cooled... hmmmm taps chin... give her the TitanX (can't leave her with the 680GTX she has now), and then buy myself the 980GTX Ti SC (and my daughter gets a 3750K with a 680GTX) ... I like this!!

I am intrigued by the m.2 NVMe SSD drives, and the Z170 boards, but I can wait... I have a 30" 2560x1600 and would like a 4K monitor... but can wait on that too...

OK, thank you. This may work...

 

[Arachnotronic]

You make some interesting points... So if I build her the 5820K, in a Z99, and use the DDR4 memory I have already bought and give her a new case, overclock it to 4.2 or even 4.4, water-cooled... hmmmm taps chin... give her the TitanX (can't leave her with the 680GTX she has now), and then buy myself the 980GTX Ti SC (and my daughter gets a 3750K with a 680GTX) ... I like this!!

I am intrigued by the m.2 NVMe SSD drives, and the Z170 boards, but I can wait... I have a 30" 2560x1600 and would like a 4K monitor... but can wait on that too...

OK, thank you. This may work...

I approve of this!

 

[ShintaiDK]

I would get the 6700K, you already come from the 4790K, and you get the 4Ghz base clock as baseline for your OC. But a Haswell-E will most likely better serve her needs, leaving you with the 4790K still. Take a look at both 5820K and 5930K if Haswell-E.

But be careful your dicta...wife

 

[NTMBK]

Neither, buy your wife a Xeon E3-1270 v5: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819117616&cm_re=xeon_e3-_-19-117-616-_-Product

The hyperthreading will be helpful for video editing tasks.

 

[Burpo]

Nice find & in stock! Single thread is excellent too!
http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+E3-1270+v5+@+3.60GHz

 

[bystander36]

Neither, buy your wife a Xeon E3-1270 v5: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819117616&cm_re=xeon_e3-_-19-117-616-_-Product

The hyperthreading will be helpful for video editing tasks.

Wouldn't both the i7 6700K and the i7 5820K be faster? That just looks like an Xeon version of the 6700K, but at lower clocks and locked, and the 5820K has 2 more cores and 4 more threads.

 

[myocardia]

If you are sold on Skylake for other reasons than DDR4, then go for it, but the i7 5820K also uses DDR4. It can even use up to 128Gb, and can uses dual, triple and quad channel DDR4.

Non of the 2011-3 K processors can use more than 64GB of RAM. Intel fuses that capability off. The Xeons that the X99 chipset supports, though, can use up to 128GB (on X99).

 

[bystander36]

Non of the 2011-3 K processors can use more than 64GB of RAM. Intel fuses that capability off. The Xeons that the X99 chipset supports, though, can use up to 128GB (on X99).

My bad.