i7-7740X or i7-7800X?

[trawetSluaP]

Hi all,

As you can see from my sig I'm currently running a 6850K. I initially bought a beefier CPU as I planned to do a fair amount of video encoding. This has now changed and my PC's use (95% of the time) will be gaming.

Now I am planning to change my motherboard as I'm having a few issues with the one I have, so this is the main reason I am considering a CPU change as I've heard X99 is a dying platform. With that in mind I don't want to simply get a new X99 board.

I've been looking at the above CPUs and general consensus us that with gaming 4 cores are more than enough. Is this the case? Will the i7-7740X be fine? Or (for an extra £30!) would the i7-7800X be a better idea?

At this point I realise that these two CPUs could be considered a side-grade but do bear in mind I am definitely changing my motherboard!

Alternatively, if you have other suggestions please feel free to give them.

One last thing. If I do decide to go with one of the above CPUs on the X299 platform, will my current water block be compatible?

Thanks,
Paul

 

[gavinh87]

7800x for £30 more is a no brainer.
Does coffeelake not interest you? This would be better suited for a gaming build.

 

[Radox-0]

Personally I would go 8700k coffelake over either of those picks once its back in stock at reasonable price if gaming is your main priority. Ability to hit high clockspeeds which games love, those two extra core's for those games staring to make use of additional core's (so benefit of nice core count plus clockspeed) + z370 has cheaper boards options.

Your CPU block will work fine with X299 however as its the same as X99 and while I am not sure what block you have, usually CPU blocks from likes of EK or AIO's would work with z370 also with right mount.

 

[trawetSluaP]

I looked briefly at the Coffee Lake CPUs but the 8700K is £100 more expensive then the 7800X and only 0.20 GHz faster so is there something I'm missing?

Not overly fused about the 370 boards being cheaper.

Should've mentioned what block I have - It's the Supremacy EVO.

 

[Radox-0]

Ahhh yeah supply is still right so 8700k is overpriced. Delta is smaller depending where you look then £100 though.

They do use a different topology and cache makeup with the 8700k's ringbus seemingly performing better at times. Example of video by hardware unboxed here of 7800x vs 7700k but drop in the 8700k and even add a bit of a bigger gap: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mTQ6ymQIY64 web version article showing the 7800x overclocked yet the 7700k at stock still opening a significant gap in some titles:https://www.techspot.com/review/1445-core-i7-7800x-vs-7700k/

Also while the base clock speeds is different by 0.2 ghz out the box. The 8700k has a significantly higher 4.7 GHz turbo speed vs 4.0 GHz vs the 7800x. Of course while the turbo will drop based on cores active and workload, I expect without manual overclocking the 8700k will run at a higher clockspeed then 0.2 GHz delta.

But yes, your Waterblock will transfer perfectly fine from x99 to x299. Same mounting mechanism.

In all either CPU would work great. Given the option, 8700k would be my pick, but I did not realise price difference was still so significant (sorry should have checked before my initial post) so either would work well.

 

[trawetSluaP]

Ahhh yeah supply is still right so 8700k is overpriced. Delta is smaller depending where you look then £100 though.

They do use a different topology and cache makeup with the 8700k's ringbus seemingly performing better at times. Example of video by hardware unboxed here of 7800x vs 7700k but drop in the 8700k and even add a bit of a bigger gap: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mTQ6ymQIY64 web version article showing the 7800x overclocked yet the 7700k at stock still opening a significant gap in some titles:https://www.techspot.com/review/1445-core-i7-7800x-vs-7700k/

Also while the base clock speeds is different by 0.2 ghz out the box. The 8700k has a significantly higher 4.7 GHz turbo speed vs 4.0 GHz vs the 7800x. Of course while the turbo will drop based on cores active and workload, I expect without manual overclocking the 8700k will run at a higher clockspeed then 0.2 GHz delta.

But yes, your Waterblock will transfer perfectly fine from x99 to x299. Same mounting mechanism.

In all either CPU would work great. Given the option, 8700k would be my pick, but I did not realise price difference was still so significant (sorry should have checked before my initial post) so either would work well.

Good info but I've just ruled out Coffee Lake and the 7740X as I'd like quad channel memory support.

EDIT: Considering waiting until next year now. Not sure what to do.

 

[yoyo59]

nothing wrong with the 7740x, the motherboards are expensive though, you won't notice a different between dual channel or quad channel unless you do productivity

also it seems ocuk have free games with the x299 CPUs

 

[trawetSluaP]

Really unsure what to do now!

 

[gavinh87]

Pure gaming coffee lake is what you should be looking at. X299 isn't all that for gaming, in fact with threadripper it isn't all that full stop.

 

[Radox-0]

Really unsure what to do now!

As mentioned quad channel's main benefit is productivity. In fact most additional features x299 offers that z370 may be missing would likely all be geared for productivity.

If your going to wait until next year, I would definitely keep the 8700k in the running for a pure gaming machine (would be top pick tbh) as Intel have there Chinese factory now pumping out the cpus to ease supply, may see a notch down in price as a result.