Typical Core i7 7700K Overclock Guesses

Mar 10, 2006
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Since Intel is making us wait until January to get our hands on the 7700K, I figured it'd be fun to do some speculation as to what the "typical" overclock on the chip will be when it gets into users' hands.

6700K did, what? 4.6-.4.8GHz? Let's call it 4.7GHz average with a good air or AIO cooler?

A 5% boost would put it at 4.94GHz or pretty much 5GHz. So I'm optimistic that we'll finally get an ultra-high perf/clock 5GHz chip (with overclocking) with KBL-S.

What do you all think?
 

Deders

Platinum Member
Oct 14, 2012
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Intel have scheduled the lower end chips for January, mostly dual cores.

Hopefully when the i7's do arrive, the newer process will allow for around 5GHz, but I think I hoped that for the last couple of gens. I like the 4.95GHz prediction.
 

spat55

Senior member
Jul 2, 2013
539
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Wonder if it'll be worth upgrading my system to Kaby or Zen? Should I wait for Coffee maybe? Got the upgrade itch now tbh.
 

dark zero

Platinum Member
Jun 2, 2015
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4.9 for Core i7
5.1 for Core i5

If is hackable...
5.3 for Core i3
5.5 for Pentium and Celeron
 

FlanK3r

Senior member
Sep 15, 2009
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4.7-4.8 GHz average, better chips 4.9-5 GHz stable I think, worse 4.6-4.7 GHz
 

IntelUser2000

Elite Member
Oct 14, 2003
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4.9 for Core i7
5.1 for Core i5

12% for process doesn't translate to 12% everywhere. Especially on Desktops where the frequency is at such a level they have to pull all the stops to get there.

The frequency scaling came to a screeeeching halt at 32nm.

Sandy Bridge-E claimed to reach 5GHz on air. Nope.
Haswell claimed to reach 5GHz on air. Nope.
Devils Canyon claimed to reach 5GHz on air, by everyone. Nope.
Broadwell C claimed to reach 5GHz on air. Fell a lot short.
Skylake claimed to reach 5GHz on air, by quite a lot of folks. Nope.

Of course we are talking about longer-term stable frequencies. What about burst?

World record air overclock is at 6.47GHz with FX-8150. 5.9GHz with 2500K. Barely any Ivy Bridge/Haswell DC/Skylake on air OC list. Highest overclock ever shows that most of the top are populated by very long pipeline CPUs: Prescott Celeron, Bulldozer-derivatives. Haswell much further down the line.

It's true even for IBM Power chips too. Despite reaching close to 5GHz frequencies, and some wiki entry stating they have chips at over 5GHz, it really doesn't do much over 5GHz, if at all. That's using a massive amount of power too. Kabylake will probably do 100-200MHz higher than Skylake.

Law of physics hindering progress? Yes. Also due to human limitation, which many do not like to admit.

Since absolute frequency ceiling became lower with 22nm/14nm processes, I doubt 5GHz will be breached. Interestingly, with Samsung talking about 3GHz cellphone chips, and Apple Tablet chips having Skylake-class IPC, in just a few years everyone will converge at same frequency, and same IPC.
 

spat55

Senior member
Jul 2, 2013
539
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What do you do with your system?

I mostly just game but do like to use Sony Vegas and probably will start to learn photoshop at some point. I also like extra cores just because I want to upgrade properly and not just sidegrade. I'd love Kaby to come with a decent IHS and be able to easily clock to 5Ghz on air but I'm dreaming.
 

witeken

Diamond Member
Dec 25, 2013
3,899
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4.9GHz easily. The only onfirmation I have is that 5GHz rumor. We'll have to see if the 5GHz "barrier" is breached :). I remain coutiously optimistic.
 

coercitiv

Diamond Member
Jan 24, 2014
6,151
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We'll have to see if the 5GHz "barrier" is breached :). I remain coutiously optimistic.
I'm quite optimistic for Kaby Lake, pretty much expecting 5Ghz+. While the sizeable increase in frequency for mobile chips cannot be directly linked to desktop gains, it is a clear indication Intel made progress on 14nm.
 
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wingman04

Senior member
May 12, 2016
393
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Intel says changing the transistor dimensions calling it 14nm+ they gained 300MHz with the same voltage, I don't see the equation to a higher maximum clock speed from that process.
 

moonbogg

Lifer
Jan 8, 2011
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Kaby-X will be the only interesting, and last interesting quad core CPU ever made IMO. I expect 5+Ghz to be a standard OC. I think we are at a transition point to more cores, similar to when people were thrilled about 4ghz OC's on dual core wolfdales, but soon after their release games like BF Bad Company 2 simply didn't run well without a quad. Die hard dual core people finally started to switch over to quads and the wolfdales were the last breed of interesting dual core CPUs. I think Kaby-X is it. If you buy that, you are at the crest of the quad core wave and you will soon come crashing down into the world of 6+ cores being standard.
 
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coercitiv

Diamond Member
Jan 24, 2014
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If you buy that, you are at the crest of the quad core wave and you will soon come crashing down into the world of 6+ cores being standard.
Wolfdales were 2 threaded CPUs, Kaby Lakes are 8 threaded. If anything, the "wolfdale" of today is the i5, but even this "soon to be obsolete" SKU might get new wind from the low level APIs that are supposed to bring it's doom. HEDT 6-8-10 cores have been singing the end of quad core gaming for quite a while now, yet all we heard so far were drums of war, the quad is still on the field, standing tall.
 
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