The AnandTech Coffee Lake Review: Initial Numbers on the Core i7-8700K and Core i5-8400
by Ian Cutress on October 5, 2017 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
- Intel
- Core i5
- Core i7
- Core i3
- 14nm
- Coffee Lake
- 14++
- Hex-Core
- Hyperthreading
Benchmarking Performance: CPU Office Tests
The office programs we use for benchmarking aren't specific programs per-se, but industry standard tests that hold weight with professionals. The goal of these tests is to use an array of software and techniques that a typical office user might encounter, such as video conferencing, document editing, architectural modeling, and so on and so forth.
All of our benchmark results can also be found in our benchmark engine, Bench.
Chromium Compile (v56)
Our new compilation test uses Windows 10 Pro, VS Community 2015.3 with the Win10 SDK to compile a nightly build of Chromium. We've fixed the test for a build in late March 2017, and we run a fresh full compile in our test. Compilation is the typical example given of a variable threaded workload - some of the compile and linking is linear, whereas other parts are multithreaded.
For our compile test, it would appear that the extra memory width afforded by the quad-channel memory of Skylake-X can have a direct benefit in compile performance.
PCMark 10
PCMark 10 is the 2017 update to the family favorite, PCMark 8. PCMark 8 has been part of our test bed since the latest update in Q1. For the most part it runs well, although for some processors it doesn’t recognize, some tests will not complete, leading to holes in our benchmark data (there’s also an odd directory quirk in one test that causes issues). The newest version, PCMark 10, is the answer.
The new test is adapted for more 2016/2017 workflows. With the advent of office applications that perform deeper compute tasks, or the wave of online gamers and streamers, the idea behind PCMark 10 is to give a better ‘single number’ result that can provide a comparable metric between systems. Single metrics never tell the whole story, so we’re glad that Futuremark provides a very detailed breakdown of what goes on.
Ganesh’s article on PCMark 10 goes into more detail than I will here, but the ‘Extended Benchmark’ runs through four different sets of tests: Essential, Productivity, Creation and Gaming. Each of these have sub-test results as well, including startup performance, web performance, video conferencing, photo/video editing, spreadsheets, rendering, and physics, which you can find in Bench.
PCMark8: link
Despite originally coming out in 2008/2009, Futuremark has maintained PCMark8 to remain relevant in 2017. On the scale of complicated tasks, PCMark focuses more on the low-to-mid range of professional workloads, making it a good indicator for what people consider 'office' work. We run the benchmark from the commandline in 'conventional' mode, meaning C++ over OpenCL, to remove the graphics card from the equation and focus purely on the CPU. PCMark8 offers Home, Work and Creative workloads, with some software tests shared and others unique to each benchmark set.
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sirmo - Thursday, October 5, 2017 - link
No temperature comparison? According to some reviews I see Intel stubbornly continues to rely on their horrible TIM solution, after my horrible experience with Haswell overheating I am not considering Intel again in my build until this is fixed. There is nothing worse than when your build starts crashing because of overheating 2 years down the road.shreduhsoreus - Thursday, October 5, 2017 - link
The 8100 is basically a 6600 locked at it's quad core turbo frequency. Pretty decent for $120.Gordo-UT - Thursday, October 5, 2017 - link
Looking at these results, there is still no reason to migrate from my i7-2600k. Still running at 4.6 Ghz for years now, flawlessly with equal or better performace of all that came after. It would seem Moore's law failed to hold true for the past 5 years.For the price of a new i7, you can buy a used i7-2600k, z68 or z77 mobo, and 16 gb ram. It looks like that situation will not end soon.
Intel has to give me a compelling reason to spend a ton of money on NEW stuff.
vanilla_gorilla - Thursday, October 5, 2017 - link
"It would seem Moore's law failed to hold true for the past 5 years."Moore's Law is about transistor density, not performance.
mapesdhs - Friday, October 6, 2017 - link
For quite a lot less than a new i7, I bought a 3930K, ASUS R4E and 16GB/2400 RAM. And a 120mm AIO. And a 2nd R4E. :DCompelling reasons are perhaps more likely to come from peripheral and I/O scenarios, eg. if one wants the latest USB 3.1, M2 or somesuch. However, addin cards solve most of these, and numerous SB/SBE boards can now boot from NVMe. I saw great numbers with M.2 drives and Z68, and because of the wiring it should be possible for an M4E to use an M2 as boot and have two GPUs at x16 (aka 3.0 @ x8, same as modern mainstream split), while X79 has enough lanes anyway.
mapesdhs - Tuesday, October 10, 2017 - link
(btw, when I say a lot less than a new i7, I did mean the 8700K)SuperRobomike - Thursday, October 5, 2017 - link
5930k does surprisingly well compared to the 8700k in the gaming benchmarks (at least for the games tested). Any particular reason it would be doing so well? Can't think of any advantage it would have besides the quad channel memory.CTHL - Thursday, October 5, 2017 - link
Why are all these benches between sites so wildly different (with supposedly same settings/specs). RoTR has had some of the most absurd results... one has 8700k beating everything by 20fps, another has 7700k over 8700k by 40fps, and one even had a 6600k beating everything.firerod1 - Thursday, October 5, 2017 - link
i5-8400 is King performance/dollar!watzupken - Saturday, October 7, 2017 - link
The i5 8400 looks like a good value processor until you factor in the price of a Z370 motherboard which is the only chipset available.