Intel has just announced Core i7 6700K and this one will replace Core i7 4790K based on the Haswell upgrade, Devil's Canyon.
The Core i7 6700K, as we previously revealed, is a 4GHz processor that can reach 4.2GHz at its maximal turbo frequency. It has 8MB of cache and four cores and eight tread support. It supports 16 PCIe 3.0 lanes and two channel DDR4 2133 or DDR3L 1600. Powerwise, it sports a 91W TDP which is 3W higher than the Core i7 4790K and it uses the new LGA 1151 socket. It will sell at $350 and is available today.
The new CPU comes with Intel Turbo Boost Technology 2.0 that promises better overclocking and a new graphics core dubbed Intel HD Graphics 530, which is clocked at 1150 MHz.
We don't have much details about the graphics performance at this time, but the name is correct. We have no idea how you come from Intel HD Graphics 4600 to Core i7 4790K to HD Graphics 530 branding.The most important change with Core i7 6700K and Core i5 6600K is that the boxes are completely redesigned and splashy and they will make all your friends jealous. If your friends get jealous about such things.
The runner up is called Core i5 6600K and this one works at 3.5GHz base clock, and a single core can get a peak turbo frequency of 3.9GHz. It has four cores, four threads and 6MB cache. It also comes with 16 PCIe 3.0 lanes and dual channel DDR4 2133 or DDR3L 1600 memory support. It shares the same 91W TDP and comes in the LGA 1151 socket.
They both need Intel Z170 for its full overclocking potential. The Core i5 6600K will sell for $243.
Intel is promising up to 30 percent better performance than your three year old PC. Intel based this claim on SPECint*_rate_base2006(8 copy rate) IC14 scores comparing Core i7-6700K to Intel Core i7-3770K processor. In other words, there is at least one benchmark that will show 30 percent difference.
Intel also claims that Skylake S is 20 percent faster than a two year old PC and it uses the same test for comparison between Core i7-6700K and Intel Core i7-4770K, the original Haswell.
This means that if you had the Haswell Refresh aka. Devil's Canyon based Core i7 4790K you can expect some 10 percent better performance.
The new Core i7 6700K and Core i5 6600K should bring the new levels of Memory Overclocking with finer grain tuning and full Range Base Clock (BCLK) Tuning. You should know by now that the K processors including Core i7 6700K and Core i5 6600K are fully unlocked.
The Z170 chipset provides 40 percent more high speed I/O lanes for USB 3.0 and PCIe over Intel 9 series of chipsets. It comes with a PCI express 3.0 storage support with Intel Rapid Storage Technology.
Overclockers will love the fact that the full range 1MHz increment overclocking is back. This was one of the main complaints with Core i7 4790 Haswell refresh as that one came with 100, 125 or 166 ratio based base clock (BCLK). Intel claims that you can increase the memory frequency with DDR4 up to 4133 MT/s. It also promises finer grain increments in memory overclocking with Skylake. We will have to see for ourselves how this one goes, as we didn’t get a sample to test just yet.
