Intel Kaby Lake: Core i7-7700K, i7-7700, i5-7600K and i5-7600 in review

Intel is currently in the midst of the biggest restructuring in the company's history. In terms of its own growth forecasts, the focus is increasingly shifting toward IoT, cloud, and data centers. At the same time, the CPU... 200 chipsets and Optane Ready support Both the 200 and 100 chipsets support Kaby Lake and Skylake processors. This dual compatibility could create an interesting dilemma for enthusiasts who want to create a Skyl... Processors Core i7-7700K Core i7-7700 Core i7-7600K Core i7-7600 Motherboard and memory As the basis of our test platform, we use both the seventh (Kaby Lake) and the sixth (Skylake) generation of core CPUs MSIs Z... Benchmark selection and practical relevance Of course, you could make it easy and roll out synthetic benchmarks that show exactly one thing in the end: that there is actually nothing to show. In any case, not if the respective equivalent ... OpenGL: Cinebench R15 Before we let the very hard guys out, we insert a little synthetic foot insert in the form of the OpenGL benchmark in the Cinebench package. Takt goes ahead, you don't need more than four cores here. Own... Since we were always asked which graphics card or CPU is best when using Adobe CC & co. more intensively, we can now give an answer at least with regard to the CPU - at least as long as it is on our ... 3D-Peformance with dedicated graphics card Of course, the reader will also want to know how good (or bad) a new CPU is when playing challenging titles. For the next two tests, we use an Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 FE, which is about as ... Important preliminary remark We have not known since today that the processors are subject to very large variations in quality during production. This time, however, our test samples are not directly from Intel, but are normal retail CPUs... This CPU does not have an open multiplier compared to the core i7-7700K and also has a significantly lower base clock. In addition, Intel's other values (e.g. Ringbus) deliberately chosen in such a way that even an overclocking over an increase... This CPU, like the Core i7-7700K, has an open multiplier and also has a significantly higher base clock than the non-K models. Of course, this also opens up enough space for your own manual overclocking attempts. If the ex works is... This CPU, like the Core i7-7000, does not have an open multiplier compared to the Core i5-7600K and also has a significantly lower base clock. Also with this CPU, an overclocking overane was increased BCLK by certain factory specifications... Golden Sample or Potato Chip? As already written, we have tested this time with pure retail CPUs - exactly with the material that the normal buyer can expect if he wants to upgrade as an "Early Adaptor" in a timely manner. However, it is... Intel's last generations of Intel's CPU have been characterized by a slow progression in incremental upgrades and have not exactly helped to keep their own products at a distance from those of the...

Golden Sample or Potato Chip?

As already written, we have tested this time with pure retail CPUs – exactly with the material that the normal buyer can expect if he wants to upgrade as an "Early Adaptor" in a timely manner. However, we really need to advise caution and prudence at this point, because there are still great fluctuations in terms of production and thus chip quality, especially at the beginning of production. We had to experience this first-hand with the Core i7-7700K.

Inquiries from the motherboard manufacturer have shown that MSI has conducted an inter-house investigation with a total of 30 such retail CPUs in order to determine the voltage settings required for a given cycle in the BIOS, where a stable operation of a certain benchmarks was still possible. Now, while 30 CPUs are still not a really large or statistically relevant quantity, this selection shows how big the quality gap for the Core i7-7700K is now.

We can see from this curve that the chip stuck in our German test system sticks to the lowest curve of the survey, because the voltages and also the maximum clock of "only" five GHz are absolutely identical. This also explains why this Core i7-7700K had to spread the wings during the factory cycle in the PTU run: it is simply too bad and the voltage is necessarily set too high to remain sufficiently cool!

Undervoltages as emergency patches?

Especially the phenomenon of mass returns of "bad" CPUs or graphics cards occurring in Germany – whereby one can take advantage of a special right of withdrawal in online purchases in Germany – is likely to soon drive some retailers into madness again. Now Intel has been giving each CPU a kind of identifier (VID specification) for generations, by which the motherboard adjusts the voltages in such a way that stable operation within the specifications is possible.

However, the voltage steps are usually quite rough, so that there could also be scope for a possible voltage reduction. That's what we want to test next. Can our Core i7-7700K be taught even more moderate drinking habits by good talk, or is it just a hopeless case for a withdrawal cure at the Betty Ford Clinic?

Our throttling reduces the power consumption values, but only slightly. Only in the PTU stress test did it reach eight watts, whereby the temperatures were slightly lower in all tests and thus the leakage currents decreased slightly as a result. The fact that this was so low was also due to the fact that a voltage reduction in the BIOS was only possible by one stage in order to guarantee stable operation at all. All other attempts ended as blue screen.

The tensions could be easily reduced, but big jumps look somehow different.

If you have caught such a potato chip, then there are actually only two possibilities: Either you cool as well as possible and hope for cooler days or you live in Germany and try to transport the part back into the Lostrommel and exchange it by revocation. But whether the next lot will not be a new riyre, but the jackpot, is also in the stars. There are no guarantees and the shares of DHL, UPS & Co. remain a safe investment.

An engineering sample in a retail box?

In any case, we were not too surprised when we received the CPU supplied directly by Intel, because at first everything looked like an original retail box, as you can also get it in the store if you buy a tray CPU without a cooler.

The amazement was all the greater after the removal of the glued seals during unpacking, because we held a real engineering sample in our hands at the end!

Should it even be a pre-seleted CPU that went much better than our own load-ready test pattern?

But even the first tests quickly resulted in disillusionment, because both power consumption and temperatures were on almost the same Levelas as our sample in the German laboratory, which we had hunted through the whole Bechmarks for days before. Even if they were only marginal changes, we have of course also documented this result.

Interestingly, the power consumption is about one watt lower for missing to medium loads, but two watts higher for Intel's PTU. The voltages are very similar in the course of the process, so that both CPUs act identically at the end. Unfortunately, the overclocking also ended at five GHz and 1.35 and 1.35 and 1.35 respectively for the two units available in the German laboratory. 1.36 volts.

We could have saved ourselves the three hours required for these tests, because the temperatures also look almost identical in the course of the course. We have chosen bar charts with intent, because otherwise all curves would simply lie on top of each other.

It's better – and how!

While here in Germany we are now sitting on two less good test samples for the part with the benchmarks and detailed measurements, there is a much more economical specimen in the US laboratory. We noticed the particularly much lower power consumption, which makes this CPU act much cooler; the necessary voltages for stable overclocking are also likely to be lower.

However, since we were not able to complete all measurements with identical air coolers, we relied on compact water coolers for our tests, which unfortunately do not perform identically in the end, because the Corsair H100i v2 used in the US laboratory has sporadic defects and otherwise definitely cooled worse than our German specimen. Therefore, we only compare the values for the power consumption at this point, since as such should already be meaningful enough.

After all, the savings in power consumption could not be more impressive! Whether idle or PTU stress test: Between the two CPUs lie not only worlds, but entire galaxies! It should be noted that these are sales versions and not hand-selected press samples from Intel. We have already seen how these are to be evaluated above.

What stood out enormously was the significantly lower value for Uncore, so that the difference between CPU Package and IA Cores was only about two watts. The leakage currents increased by a maximum of one watt when the CPU was fully heated. If you compare this with the four other stint CPUs, we can already assume that this one CPU seems to be something special.

Since we are within a CPU generation, the comparison with the adjacent voltage has to be evaluated slightly differently than in the pure generational comparison. Here, higher voltages with a lower overall power consumption also mean significantly lower currents – the CPU therefore also stays significantly cooler!

The CPU lottery continues

Also at Kaby Lake there will be really good, rather medium-sized and really "bad" CPUs, which have somehow made it through the grid. This will probably have to be lived for the time being, because the manufacturing process does not seem to be mature enough to deliver really high qualities all the time. In any case, we haven't seen such extreme differences since the first quad-core – Intel's Q-6600K.

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