Question Why would someone go with 12700K instead of 13600K/14600K?

[igor_kavinski]

@coercitiv posed an interesting question by pasting this screenshot of Amazon x86-64 CPU sales ranking in his post:

https://forums.anandtech.com/attachments/screenshot-2024-05-31-090939-jpg.100081/

My response:

We don't see the 14600k/13600k/12600K in the top 10, instead folks seem to be buying discounted 12700K(F) - which is a very interesting point that might be worth discussing separately in another thread.

Why even discuss it? It's simple. Core i5 gives people less bragging rights and makes them feel inferior to their friends who get an i7. There may be cases where 13600K/14600K can spank a 12700K but the latter has two more P-cores and those could make all the difference in workloads that are more sensitive to the number of P-cores. Plus, 12700K is easier to cool than those other two. I believe you have a 12700K too if I recall correctly. It's good value for money at the prices you showed. I've actually been trying unsuccessfully to "kill" my 12700K by running it at crazy frequencies while not pumping too high voltage and current into it using Intel XTU (coz electrocuting would be murder) and my 12700K has yet to croak. It's kinda impressive how much punishment it can take.

Spoiler: 12700K/13600K/14600K on Intel ARK

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www.intel.com

The three Zen 3 Ryzens outselling 12700K/KF can easily be explained by their pricing. People are getting excellent performance for their dollar there.

 

[SteinFG]

>Why would someone go with 12700K instead of 13600K/14600K?
Kind of a pointless question when you look at the price. 13600KF is 24% more expensive than 12700KF.
And for a lot of people it's not worth it to overpay.

 

[coercitiv]

Two posters in this thread began their answer by stating the reason is trivial to explain, then proceeded to give two different explanations. Looking forward to the third analysis.

 

[igor_kavinski]

But 13th gen/14th gen are more recent and will get longer support plus they have more cache and they clock higher and more supported by Intel tools like APO.

That kinda makes it a hard decision for an informed buyer but then, most people rarely research that much when making a purchase. They ask fellow techies and go with their recommendations and judging by the various sorts of techies I've met, the really knowledgeable ones are like finding a needle in a haystack. It seems if you can install Windows, build a system and troubleshoot some common problems, that's all you need to earn the title of a "techie". I've seen with my own eyes people being recommended "cringe-worthy" stuff by these techies and I did not intervene or interrupt the exchange because I know from past experience that it's a major waste of time and ends up doing nothing other than ruining my day, mood and blood pressure. I'll be frothing at the mouth asking them pointy questions to explain themselves and they will stay as calm as a stupid cow and it just makes me look like a mad fanatic to the non-techie.

 

[Wolverine2349]

2 more P cores and less expensive.

 

[TheELF]

But 13th gen/14th gen are more recent and will get longer support plus they have more cache and they clock higher and more supported by Intel tools like APO.

Longer support in what?! They have all the same instructions I believe, so they will be able to run all the same stuff until something comes out that will not run on any of the three gens.
APO is down to the mobo maker including 12th gen CPU support in their bios, otherwise anything that runs on 13/14 will run on 12th as well.

Cache and clocks are the only difference but if you already get enough performance with 12th gen then the added money for the newer gens isn't worth it.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Longer support in what?!

Security updates. iGPU drivers. Intel could decide to save some validation time and exclude the 12th gen as being too old and out of their support window.

 

[TheELF]

Security updates. iGPU drivers. Intel could decide to save some validation time and exclude the 12th gen as being too old and out of their support window.

They all have the same uhd7x0 iGPUs
I don't know much about how security updates work for CPUs but it stands to reason that intel would drop 12-13 and 14 at the same time because, they are the same...