Intel Core i7-13700K Review

Introduction

Whenever a new CPU comes out we tend to get the affordable one, and the flagship one. After all, the affordable one is the one that shows how far the architecture has advanced things without just being able to throw money at the problem. The flagship, on the other hand, demonstrates the peak of today and what will be a midrange model in the future.

The grey area is always the middle child. Since it introduced the Core i9 at the top of the range, for Intel that middle child has become the Core i7. Neither powerful enough to satisfy those of you who aren’t happy unless you have every single core available to you, but also not affordable enough for those who just want a processor cable of feeding the voracious pixel appetite of their graphics card. Whilst sometimes a middle model is the best of both worlds, in processor terms it’s always neither one thing nor another.

We’ve just looked at the AMD 7000 series middle processors and come away with the conclusion that you really need to get either the top or bottom model depending upon if you’re a gamer or a creator. Therefore the important question has to be whether Intel are able to bridge the gap between the fast enough Core i5-13600K and the flagship Core i9-13900K with this, the latest in the famous i7 series, the Intel Core i7-13700K.

Technical Specifications

The Core i7-13700K gains two extra Performance Cores over the Core i5, and therefore 4 extra threads. Not a significant upgrade, but in combination with the 300 MHz boost on both P and E Cores it might be enough to justify the extra expense over the Core i5, even if it is much nearer the Core i5 on paper than it is in the middle of that and the Core i9.