The Intel Haswell-E CPU Review: Core i7-5960X, i7-5930K and i7-5820K Tested
by Ian Cutress on August 29, 2014 12:00 PM ESTLoad Delta Power Consumption
Power consumption was tested on the system while in a single MSI GTX 770 Lightning GPU configuration with a wall meter connected to the OCZ 1250W power supply. This power supply is Gold rated, and as I am in the UK on a 230-240 V supply, leads to ~75% efficiency under 50W and 90%+ efficiency at 250W, suitable for both idle and multi-GPU loading. This method of power reading allows us to compare the power management of the UEFI and the board to supply components with power under load, and includes typical PSU losses due to efficiency.
We take the power delta difference between idle and load as our tested value, giving an indication of the power increase from the CPU when placed under stress. Unfortuantely we were not in a position to test the power consumption for the two 6-core CPUs due to the timing of testing.
Because not all processors of the same designation leave the Intel fabs with the same stock voltages, there can be a mild variation and the TDP given on each CPU is understandably an absolute stock limit. Due to power supply efficiencies, we get higher results than TDP, but the more interesting results are the comparisons. The 5960X is coming across as more efficient than Sandy Bridge-E and Ivy Bridge-E, including the 130W Ivy Bridge-E Xeon.
Test Setup
| Test Setup | ||||
| Processor |
Intel Core i7-5820K Intel Core i7-5930K Intel Core i7-5960X |
6C/12T 6C/12T 8C/16T |
3.3 GHz / 3.6 GHz 3.5 GHz / 3.7 GHz 3.0 GHz / 3.5 GHz |
|
| Motherboard |
ASUS X99 Deluxe ASRock X99 Extreme4 |
|||
| Cooling |
Corsair H80i Cooler Master Nepton 140XL |
|||
| Power Supply |
OCZ 1250W Gold ZX Series Corsair AX1200i Platinum PSU |
1250W 1200W |
80 PLUS Gold 80 PLUS Platinum |
|
| Memory |
Corsair 4x8 GB G.Skill Ripjaws4 |
DDR4-2133 DDR4-2133 |
15-15-15 1.2V 15-15-15 1.2V |
|
| Memory Settings | JEDEC | |||
| Video Cards | MSI GTX 770 Lightning 2GB (1150/1202 Boost) | |||
| Video Drivers | NVIDIA Drivers 337.88 | |||
| Hard Drive | OCZ Vertex 3 | |||
| Optical Drive | LG GH22NS50 | |||
| Case | Open Test Bed | |||
| Operating System | Windows 7 64-bit SP1 | |||
| USB 2/3 Testing | OCZ Vertex 3 240GB with SATA->USB Adaptor | |||
Many thanks to...
We must thank the following companies for kindly providing hardware for our test bed:
Thank you to OCZ for providing us with PSUs and SSDs.
Thank you to G.Skill for providing us with memory.
Thank you to Corsair for providing us with an AX1200i PSU and a Corsair H80i CLC.
Thank you to MSI for providing us with the NVIDIA GTX 770 Lightning GPUs.
Thank you to Rosewill for providing us with PSUs and RK-9100 keyboards.
Thank you to ASRock for providing us with some IO testing kit.
Thank you to Cooler Master for providing us with Nepton 140XL CLCs and JAS minis.
A quick word to the manufacturers who sent us the extra testing kit for review, including G.Skill’s Ripjaws 4 DDR4-2133 CL15, Corsair for similar modules, and Cooler Master for the Nepton 140XL CLCs. We will be reviewing the DDR4 modules in due course, including Corsair's new extreme DDR4-3200 kit, but we have already tested the Nepton 140XL in a big 14-way CLC roundup. Read about it here.
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ol1bit - Tuesday, September 2, 2014 - link
You would think since intel seems stuck at a specific design speed for the most part(other than die shrink) that AMD could come up with a better architecture. Maybe there is no better architecture out there?coachingjoy - Tuesday, September 2, 2014 - link
ha, in three years we have 10-15% performance increase.
willis936 - Tuesday, September 2, 2014 - link
Since those parts are nearly identically clocked with a cost per core core being so low you're really getting about a 280% increase in performance per dollar over three years. Compared to other market segments that have practically stalled out everywhere in x86 land yes it is pretty amazing.LemmingOverlord - Tuesday, September 2, 2014 - link
about the gaming benchmarks, core count doesn't really make a difference in most of your chosen games... however there are still a few good CPU-benchmark games that come to mind, Civ V and the Supreme Commander series, to mention a couple. In fact I'd keep an eye out for Planetary Annihilation. It's avalilable this weekend, although I'm pretty sure Uber Entertainment would hand one over just for benchmarking.Gonemad - Tuesday, September 2, 2014 - link
"now the lowest end CPU for the extreme Intel platform". Yep, I'm just using an i7-920, that was exactly at the same spot in its day. Same architecture and memory as the extreme flagship, at a fraction of the cost. Not counting server chips, right?Intel Core i7-5820K, you say eh? Hmm... maybe I should write that down for later... Except I'm not planning anything beyond 1080p, then all of these chips and cards are a bit overkill.
Correction: I want full pedal-to-the-metal at 1080p, perhaps the "average build" should help... right? I appreciate anybody pitching in on the details for a machine to run anything at 1080p (or 1920x1200 actually) at 60 fps, but not more.
azazel1024 - Tuesday, September 2, 2014 - link
I'd like to add what is the most interesting to me is the 5820k. Hexacore cheap (Intel Hexacore, which IMHO is the only kind that matters). I'll likely never have the budget for a $1000 chip and then the system to do it justice.However I currently have an i5-3570 OC to 4GHz. Cost something like $380 for processor and board at the time. For what appears to be around $600 I could now get 50% more cores, hyperthreading and probably be able to reliably OC to a "consevative" 4.2GHz for probably >60% performance improvement for less than half again the cost.
In comparison to moving up to the i7-4770k, which would only cost maybe $50 or so less, with a modest performance improvement (probably only 15-30%).
It does make me VERY interested in Broadwell-E and Skylake-E, as those are the most likely points at which I might be looking at an upgrade. I do wonder if Skylake-E will see entry level Enthusiast Octocore, and maybe even if it'll mean high end mainstream Skylake Hexacore.
That would be an interesting decision if 6 or 8 core processors were not terribly far off in price.
Nfarce - Wednesday, September 3, 2014 - link
"However I currently have an i5-3570 OC to 4GHz. Cost something like $380 for processor and board at the time. For what appears to be around $600 I could now get 50% more cores, hyperthreading and probably be able to reliably OC to a "consevative" 4.2GHz for probably >60% performance improvement for less than half again the cost."Dude, did you forget about the cost of having to buy DDR4 memory modules? That will throw your numbers out the window.
BLOODYHELL - Thursday, September 4, 2014 - link
WHAT DO YOU GUYS THINK FOR LARGE FILE VIDEO EDITING? MMA FIGHTING ETC. ADOBE PREMIRE CS6, VEGAS?BLOODYHELL - Thursday, September 4, 2014 - link
What do you guys think for large video editing MMA FIGHTS, WEDDINGS? Trying to save time editing and rendering videos.naxeem - Thursday, September 4, 2014 - link
Well, since Broadwell is not out yet, I doubt we'll see SkyLake that soon...