Intel Skylake / Kaby Lake

[meloz]

Don't know what is more disappointing: Skylake, or Anandtech's "review".

I expected this website's quality to fall after Shimpi sold out, just not this sharply. I would go in detail about all that can be improved, but why bother. Would be an utter waste of my time. Besides you can always go back and read earlier generation CPU reviews (like the Sandy Bridge review, that was a good one) and see how the mighty have fallen.

What is up with that laughable "Sandy Bridge, Your Time Is Up" warcry towards the end. Do Intel pay extra for publishing such twaddle? Perhaps they hope that people who do not read the benchmarks carefully will throw their perfectly decent Sandy Bridge systems and buy Skylake?

Rather underwhelming. I expected more. Both from Intel and Anandtech.

As for Skylake, where to begin. Another CPU arch that could have delivered so much more if not crippled in design. Intel keep cheapening out on basic things like PCIe lanes. They give their new generation CPUs absurdly low memory speeds, when anyone could see months/year ago that 2133 MHz was aiming too low. It's as if they want to kill desktop. Worst there is no alternative, crippled-by-design / mental retardation it might be on Intel's part and yet Skylake is still better than anything from AMD.

Here's hoping next launch (Kaby?) actually delivers something tangible and desirable. New CPU launches -on both sides, Intel and AMD- continue to get more and more disappointing. These days we live in hope for a better future, because actual CPUs are so damn underwhelming. :|

 

[RussianSensation]

I'd just like to stand up for the enthusiasts and their frivolous upgrading. I have a 2500K. It can do 5 Ghz. I still want to upgrade. Why? Cuz it's FUN to upgrade. It makes me happy. I want a fresh system, faster, less watts. More functionality & longevity. We're all here cuz we love building, clocking, and operating fast PCs. So many phrases thrown around like "not worth it to upgrade if you have SB." Oh yeah, not worth it to whom? This is America and we can throw our $$ around however we please.

That's great, but some of us have other hobbies which means we don't have $3000 to upgrade the entire PC from top-to-bottom. If you had actually read the thread in its entirety, you would have noticed that no one is saying to not upgrade at all costs -- but that it's important to consider the other items in your PC that should be upgraded first. Why? Because upgrading them will provide a superior experience/higher level of reward than would be the case with upgrading the CPU from SB/IVB/Haswell to Skylake. If you don't care about a modern monitor upgrade, GPU upgrade, SSD/PCIe M2 upgrade, speakers/headphone upgrade or can afford to do all of those along with an i7-6700K upgrade, then of course knock yourself out and get Skylake i7-6700K.

For example, let's consider your case:

1) Your SSD is small and outdated in terms of speed too which means you'd once again benefit more from a larger SSD like a 500GB/1TB Samsung 850 EVO. Do you plan to upgrade the SSD to a newer faster+larger version?

2) Do you already have a 1440P/4K monitor that's of high quality? Does it have FreeSync/GSync?

3) Are you going to be upgrading the HD7970 for gaming?

If you said No to any of these questions and you are a gamer, you would actually be wasting $ by prioritizing Skylake over any of those other upgrades. Now, if you still decide to upgrade to Skylake because you want to, no problem but if you keep all of these other components and just carry them over, it will still mean you upgraded poorly from an objective/logical point of view. In other words, yes there is such thing as a "poor" upgrade or a "wasteful" upgrade. That's the whole point of forums like these too. If you want to upgrade for emotional reasons, no one can tell you that you are wrong. That's not even being discussed/debated.

You say this is America but even in America in the real world, usually a person upgrading has some limited budget. For example, someone has a fixed upgrade budget of $500-1000 and that means they cannot just upgrade to an i7-6700K+new Z170 mobo+DDR4 + GTX980Ti+new SSD+new monitor all at once. If you can, that's awesome, congrats! Once a PC user/gamer starts prioritizing which upgrades provide the most benefits for gaming or productivity or long term value, it becomes a lot clearer that upgrading to an i7-6700K for a lot of gamers is more than likely going to end up far lower on the totem pole.

For example, what do think is going to be a more WOW factor upgrade for gaming/productivity? Moving from i5-2500K 5Ghz OR getting a 4K 40" FreeSync monitor?

It's no wonder people aren't impressed by 25% more performance over SB in 4 years and 8 months. In comparison, moving from a $550 980 to a $650 980Ti provided a greater boost in gaming performance and 50% more VRAM and that all happened in 9 months. By comparison, for gaming moving to Skylake from SB is a waste of $ and not at all justifable.

Also, specifically for i5-2500K users upgrading to an i7, why are they upgrading to an i7 if they could just go with an i5-6600K? Is it because of productivity? If so, 5820K vs. i7-6700K needs to be compared as a possible upgrade path too:

5820K @ 4.4Ghz vs. i7-6700K @ 4.8Ghz

Also, if you are going to use the argument of lower power usage, moving from HD7970 OC to a newer GPU is once again a far better upgrade to improve perf/watt.

 

[Absolute0]

New CPU launches -on both sides, Intel and AMD- continue to get more and more disappointing. These days we live in hope for a better future, because actual CPUs are so damn underwhelming. :|

The reality must set in for everyone now, Moore's law is not easy to maintain and the Kaby lake Tick-Tock-Tock announces this very plainly.

Performance isn't free; we keep shrinking down features and adding more of them, but the heat generated by the transistor density is high. Temps these days are higher than ever.

Someone asked why we can't have more clockspeed. More clockspeed is more watts. The market doesn't want 150 watt CPUs.

From a pure performance standpoint you could say the newer generations are disappointing. But it's no longer about pure performance.
Skylake is delivering 35w and 65w processors that pack a punch.

Not like either AMD or Intel just isn't trying.

 

[alcoholbob]

So no hdmi 2.0 confirmed? Looks like I'm sticking to current platform and just waiting for a GTX 950 then...

 

[RussianSensation]

Performance isn't free; we keep shrinking down features and adding more of them, but the heat generated by the transistor density is high. Temps these days are higher than ever.

Temps on Skylake are high because Intel continues to use cheaper TIM instead of solder that it uses on its workstation platforms. If Intel used solder on Skylake, we wouldn't be seeing 80-90C on 4.7-4.8Ghz overclocks on a Noctua NH-D14/15/Corsair H100 style coolers.

The market doesn't want 150 watt CPUs.

What is the reason they do not want 150 watt CPUs? Is it because they want to save the environment/save $ on electricity? Intel's Q2 2015 earnings noted record i7 mix which suggests a lot more people are getting i7 (likely including X99 i7s) vs. any time in Intel's history.

I heard the same arguments when GTX750/750Ti/970/980 came out and I called BS on that. I said the minute AMD/NV launch flagship 250-300W cards, PC gamers will upgrade to those. That's exactly what happened and 980TI is selling like hot cakes.

If more programs used 6-8 cores, a lot more people would buy 150W CPUs because it would improve their work/gaming.

From a pure performance standpoint you could say the newer generations are disappointing.

They are. I can't believe no one so far posted this Bit-Tech data:

i7-2600K @ 4.8Ghz vs. i7-6700K @ 4.8Ghz:
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2015/08/05/intel-skylake-review/7
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2015/08/05/intel-skylake-review/8

But it's no longer about pure performance.
Skylake is delivering 35w and 65w processors that pack a punch.

Ok fine so a PC user can just calculate how long it'll take for him/her to break-even on the cost savings of lower electricity by moving from Sandy, IVB, Haswell to Skylake-T. I am pretty sure for North American gamers this is going to take a long time. Considering most of the planet survived from 1900-1990s on 100W light bulbs, I don't see how suddenly moving from 88-91W TDP CPUs to 35-65W CPUs warrants spending hundreds of dollars. The same argument could have been made for the last 4-5 years against i7-2600K or i7 3770K or i7 4790K since we had lower power versions of i5/i7 CPUs from Intel. So this isn't a definitive selling point for Skylake.

More analysis needs to be made to verify real world power usage of Skylake-T series. Intel is known to throw marketing BS TDP numbers that have little to do with reality:

"Oddly enough, the processors do not differ much in power consumption when running games. It is the integrated graphics core which has to deal with the bulk of the overall load after all, and it is the same in the energy-efficient processors as in the regular ones. That's why the difference between the Core i5-4670 and Core i5-4670T is a mere 10 watts whereas the 84-watt Core i-4460 with a slower graphics core needs less power than the 45-watt T series model. Thus, the energy efficiency of Intel’s specialized processors shows up at computing loads only. You must take this fact into account in order not to have excessive expectations about the Core i5-4670S, Core i5-4670T and other products of this kind."
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core-i5-4670s-4670t_7.html

 

[Absolute0]

That's great, but some of us have other hobbies which means we don't have $3000 to upgrade the entire PC from top-to-bottom. If you had actually read the thread in its entirety, you would have noticed that no one is saying to not upgrade at all costs -- but that it's important to consider the other items in your PC that should be upgraded first. Why? Because upgrading them will provide a superior experience/higher level of reward than would be the case with upgrading the CPU from SB/IVB/Haswell to Skylake. If you don't care about a modern monitor upgrade, GPU upgrade, SSD/PCIe M2 upgrade, speakers/headphone upgrade or can afford to do all of those along with an i7-6700K upgrade, then of course knock yourself out and get Skylake i7-6700K.

For example, let's consider your case:

1) Your SSD is small and outdated in terms of speed too which means you'd once again benefit more from a larger SSD like a 500GB/1TB Samsung 850 EVO. Do you plan to upgrade the SSD to a newer faster+larger version?

2) Do you already have a 1440P/4K monitor that's of high quality? Does it have FreeSync/GSync?

3) Are you going to be upgrading the HD7970 for gaming?

If you said No to any of these questions and you are a gamer, you would actually be wasting $ by prioritizing Skylake over any of those other upgrades. Now, if you still decide to upgrade to Skylake because you want to, no problem but if you keep all of these other components and just carry them over, it will still mean you upgraded poorly from an objective/logical point of view. In other words, yes there is such thing as a "poor" upgrade or a "wasteful" upgrade. That's the whole point of forums like these too. If you want to upgrade for emotional reasons, no one can tell you that you are wrong. That's not even being discussed/debated.

You say this is America but even in America in the real world, usually a person upgrading has some limited budget. For example, someone has a fixed upgrade budget of $500-1000 and that means they cannot just upgrade to an i7-6700K+new Z170 mobo+DDR4 + GTX980Ti+new SSD+new monitor all at once. If you can, that's awesome, congrats! Once a PC user/gamer starts prioritizing which upgrades provide the most benefits for gaming or productivity or long term value, it becomes a lot clearer that upgrading to an i7-6700K for a lot of gamers is more than likely going to end up far lower on the totem pole.

For example, what do think is going to be a more WOW factor upgrade for gaming/productivity? Moving from i5-2500K 5Ghz OR getting a 4K 40" FreeSync monitor?

It's no wonder people aren't impressed by 25% more performance over SB in 4 years and 8 months. In comparison, moving from a $550 980 to a $650 980Ti provided a greater boost in gaming performance and 50% more VRAM and that all happened in 9 months. By comparison, for gaming moving to Skylake from SB is a waste of $ and not at all justifable.

Also, specifically for i5-2500K users upgrading to an i7, why are they upgrading to an i7 if they could just go with an i5-6600K? Is it because of productivity? If so, 5820K vs. i7-6700K needs to be compared as a possible upgrade path too:

5820K @ 4.4Ghz vs. i7-6700K @ 4.8Ghz

Also, if you are going to use the argument of lower power usage, moving from HD7970 OC to a newer GPU is once again a far better upgrade to improve perf/watt.

Hey, well I appreciate the long response you gave to my short post. And your analysis is spot on. .

The objective analysis is good, it is scientific, it is right by all metrics. It tells uninformed people where to put their money. GPU, hard drive, etc. Being a scientist, it's weird that I argue for something that is not hard and quantitative, but rather governed by emotions. But I LOVE processors. I've owned and overclocked DOZENS. I am an enthusiast. There's value beyond just the quantitative analysis, that's the joy of being an enthusiast with new hardware, clocking up a new processor, doing some benching. I know I'm not alone. Just plain old fun for me.

Also, while TIM/solder may be part of the issue, I believe the transistor density on the die itself is another issue for the heat generation. As for the market not wanting 150w CPUs, well it is a blanket statement, but the market is a big, global market, encompassing many devices. Desktop power users are a tiny fraction.

 

[RussianSensation]

actually digital foundry tests in the same spots for Witcher 3 and GTA V. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JWxncqbe1H8

in GTA V, digital foundry is getting slightly better performance with their stock 4790k than in that vid you posting running it at 4.7. and also the actual game is not that cpu intensive either.

In the horse riding section of Witcher 3, digital foundry is getting well over twice the framerate with a stock 4790k than in your earlier video with it at 4.7.

BTW, did you see this i5-4690K @ 4.6Ghz vs. i7-4790K stock vs. i7-4790K @ 4.6Ghz in Crysis 3 compared in different areas?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8vGwz35Hqs

In some cases the i5-4690K OC shows dips in gaming:

38 second mark = 42 fps vs. 50 fps
2 min 29 second mark = 48 fps vs. 60 fps

^ This is running 780Ti and SMAA T2X + VSync engaged. GPUs will continue to get faster, games will become even more advanced and with DX12 likely benefit from more cores. I guess if you don't agree on 6-core vs. 4-core HT today at least you can acknowledge that it's worth spending $80-100 for an i7-6700K over i5-6600K over 4-5 years period? :biggrin:

 

[iSkylaker]

Nothing stopping you from writing a review now, tho. Why wait, when you can speculate? ;-)

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KPRWAX8

 

[RussianSensation]

MSI Z170A XPOWER GAMING TITANIUM Achieves DDR4 4605MHz

http://valid.canardpc.com/gir779

Faster DDR4 kits at affordable prices need to come out!

 

[toyota]

BTW, did you see this i5-4690K @ 4.6Ghz vs. i7-4790K stock vs. i7-4790K @ 4.6Ghz in Crysis 3 compared in different areas?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8vGwz35Hqs

In some cases the i5-4690K OC shows dips in gaming:

38 second mark = 42 fps vs. 50 fps
2 min 29 second mark = 48 fps vs. 60 fps

^ This is running 780Ti and SMAA T2X + VSync engaged. GPUs will continue to get faster, games will become even more advanced and with DX12 likely benefit from more cores. I guess if you don't agree on 6-core vs. 4-core HT today at least you can acknowledge that it's worth spending $80-100 for an i7-6700K over i5-6600K over 4-5 years period? :biggrin:

yeah I would NOT get a 6600k if wanting to use high end gpus over the next two or three years. even digital foundry said they were pegging all 4 cores of the 6600k in some games. they even said despite the high framerates the i5 cpus were still hitching compared to the i7 in those cases too. having HT gives you some headroom for games using all four cores or more and also for background tasks.

and if wanting to use top end sli then I still would go 5930k to get the most out of my video cards especially those you upgrade to down the road. personally I think Intel will drop Broadwell E and move up Skylake E but will see. if they do then I might go with that next year. for now my next upgrade will be an SSD and gsync monitor...:hmm:

 

[Brunnis]

I think some reviewers that recommend SB owners to upgrade have failed to take a step back and actually, really, evaluate what you're getting from the upgrade.

With a 2600K and a 6700K both overclocked to max comfortable levels, the 2600K probably has a lead of 100-200 MHz. The end result is that the 6700K is some 15% faster on average. If we imagine a game being completely CPU bound and going down to say 30 FPS, a 15% improvement would turn those 30 FPS into ~35 FPS. I think pretty much everyone will agree that that's a rather pointless upgrade.

And perhaps the most important thing to keep in mind: This is assuming there even exists games that slow down to such a degree that it's really noticeable on an overclocked 2600K. I think those are pretty few and far between. For non-gaming scenarios, a performance increase of 15% would seem even less interesting.

For the non-overclocked case, the performance increase would obviously be bigger. However, I'd still argue that SB owners really should think hard before taking the plunge. It's definitely worth asking yourself "Have I really noticed any slow-down that can be attributed to a CPU bottleneck?". The answer will probably be "no".

As for myself, I'm actually contemplating keeping my trusty i7-860 @ 3.6GHz for a while longer. I expect I would get upwards 70% more CPU performance with an overclocked 6700K, which is decent but hardly spectacular after 6 years. To be honest, though, the 860 actually keeps up very well after all this time. An upgrade would be fun, though, and I think that's what's really driving most enthusiasts when thinking about an upgrade these days.

 

[CHADBOGA]

I think some reviewers that recommend SB owners to upgrade have failed to take a step back and actually, really, evaluate what you're getting from the upgrade.

With a 2600K and a 6700K both overclocked to max comfortable levels, the 2600K probably has a lead of 100-200 MHz. The end result is that the 6700K is some 15% faster on average. If we imagine a game being completely CPU bound and going down to say 30 FPS, a 15% improvement would turn those 30 FPS into ~35 FPS. I think pretty much everyone will agree that that's a rather pointless upgrade.

And perhaps the most important thing to keep in mind: This is assuming there even exists games that slow down to such a degree that it's really noticeable on an overclocked 2600K. I think those are pretty few and far between. For non-gaming scenarios, a performance increase of 15% would seem even less interesting.

For the non-overclocked case, the performance increase would obviously be bigger. However, I'd still argue that SB owners really should think hard before taking the plunge. It's definitely worth asking yourself "Have I really noticed any slow-down that can be attributet to a CPU bottleneck?". The answer will probably be "no".

As for myself, I'm actually contemplating keeping my trusty i7-860 @ 3.6GHz for a while longer. I expect I would get upwards 70% more CPU performance with an overclocked 6700K, which is decent but hardly spectacular after 6 years. To be honest, though, the 860 actually keeps up very well after all this time. An upgrade would be fun, though, and I think that's what's really driving most enthusiasts when thinking about an upgrade these days.

Well by waiting you should see faster and cheaper DDR4 and maybe even Kabylake.

 

[beginner99]

As for myself, I'm actually contemplating keeping my trusty i7-860 @ 3.6GHz for a while longer. I expect I would get upwards 70% more CPU performance with an overclocked 6700K, which is decent but hardly spectacular after 6 years. To be honest, though, the 860 actually keeps up very well after all this time.

I'm in the same boat. But since I also want to upgrade my display (higher res) which forces a GPU upgrade I'm kind of hesitant to spend money on skylake. Don't really see it. I can get DC and reuse DDR3 RAM and get about the same performance without any downside or just go for Haswell-e.

The i7-860 already has 8 threads (4+4) and if really needed you could probably push it up to 4 ghz.

 

[froggermuted]

The last thing I can't answer is how significant will the IGP improve fps with a dGPU. I've read somewhere that they will work together to improve performance but will it really become a thing and if so could it outcome 2 addiational core?

 

[toyota]

The last thing I can't answer is how significant will the IGP improve fps with a dGPU. I've read somewhere that they will work together to improve performance but will it really become a thing and if so could it outcome 2 addiational core?

that is probably the last thing to realistically be concerned about.

 

[froggermuted]

that is probably the last thing to realistically be concerned about.

That why said last thing, but an other thing crossed my mind, I believe kaby lake will be on 1151 too, if I get an 6700k and sell it to get a kaby lake later would it make more sense to get the 6700k insteed of the 5820k, since I dont think anything else will be release on the 2011-v3 socket, unless I'm wrong.

As much as I love new hardware release, I always tend to overcomplicated my choice

 

[Amrath]

Do you think going for a i5 4690k / Asus Z97 Hero / 16go DDR3 GSkill 2133mhz (68,000 yen 〜 540 usd) now is a mistake? I have an almost dead 5 years old computer and I was waiting for Skylake but it's a little more expensive than I expected in Japan and this may sound strange but I'm trying to make a good looking built and I can't really find a reasonable Z170 motherboard that coordinates well with my other components colors. 6600k/mid-range motherboard like an Asus Z170-A and DDR4 would cost me about 100 more dollars. And again 100 more if I want to go for a Maximus motherboard... I'll only use this computer for gaming (Witcher 3/MGS V/etc...).

 

[mikk]

Yes, DDR3L is officially supported by the Z170/Skylake CPU, but it's yet to be seen if higher voltages will be supported.

Up to 1.65V on regular DDR3 should work with this board.

 

[froggermuted]

Do you think going for a i5 4690k / Asus Z97 Hero / 16go DDR3 GSkill 2133mhz (68,000 yen 〜 540 usd) now is a mistake? I have an almost dead 5 years old computer and I was waiting for Skylake but it's a little more expensive than I expected in Japan and this may sound strange but I'm trying to make a good looking built and I can't really find a reasonable Z170 motherboard that coordinates well with my other components colors. 6600k/mid-range motherboard like an Asus Z170-A and DDR4 would cost me about 100 more dollars. And again 100 more if I want to go for a Maximus motherboard... I'll only use this computer for gaming (Witcher 3/MGS V/etc...).

If you can wait about 6-8 week, the price should be about the same, for the cpu and mother board, a little more expensive for the ddr4 vs ddr3. If you can't wait the 4690k is still a good choice.

As for me, I'm going to buy the 5820k, asus x99-a and ripjaws 2800 16-16-16-36 in a couple minute.

 

[witeken]

4 years and we need an entire platform change to get 30%.


This also confirms that average IPC gain per year is 5-7%. After Sandy Bridge the gains practically collapsed.

What is really shows is how excellent Intel's architecture has been for the past couple of years while ARM, Nvidia, Apple, AMD and Qualcomm have tried catching up and are still far behind. So instead Intel focused on power consumption and efficiency instead of digging for more IPC gains which won't be found; and likely worsening performance per watt.

 

[witeken]

I think Kaby Lake will be primarily a GPU/media upgrade and the CPU will be the same uArch as Skylake. The only difference is that Intel's 14nm yields will be better which might allow for SKUs at higher CPU clocks than what this year's lineup will bring.

The next GPU arch is Cannonlake's Gen10.

 

[meloz]

From a pure performance standpoint you could say the newer generations are disappointing. But it's no longer about pure performance.
Skylake is delivering 35w and 65w processors that pack a punch.

We have not seen any benchmarks about those mythical 35 watt and 65 watt processors yet. But from what we have seen, I am not hopeful.

The PR narrative is that Intel is now focused on improving performance/watt, and that's where we are seeing great progress.

Except we aren't. If you look at benchmarks which Anandtech will not publish:

you realize that Skylake is not offering any significant performance/watt improvement over its predecessor.

I can live with not getting significant gains in single-threaded performance as long as performance/watt is improving. It is an acceptable if not desirable trade-off. But when both start to plateau -and then these hardware reviewers try to hide this and hype an underwhelming product- I begin to get extra grumpy.

What is that saying again? You can piss on my leg, just don't tell me it is raining.

One area where Intel have improved over the years is in reducing platform idle power consumption, and this is obviously important for battery operated toys. But my feel is that Intel have reached diminishing returns, and I for one would be surprised if upcoming Skylake notebooks offer tangible improvement over Broadwell.

Of course, that won't stop certain websites from advising their gullible readers to throw out their perfectly fine Haswell or Broadwell era notebook for one with Skylake™ inside.......for an additional 30 second battery life.

 

[know of fence]

I don't approve of the doom and gloom in this topic. Intel delivered a 4 GHz CPU, that isn't weighed down by too much iGPU, which is pretty much what people wanted. They also don't include a crappy cooler, which means that humanity can finally move on from the terribly loud desktops and tiny fans. Massively contributing to the general dislike of desktops.

Folks with recent systems don't have to upgrade, but at the same time there is enough incentive to buy a desktop at this point if someone is stuck with some crappy notebook or something. Though I'm not sure if Skylake is still stuck with 6Gbit/s SATA for system drives (or weird M.2).

Probably the smartest thing would be to buy a power efficient (non OC, non embarrassingly "GAMEZORZ" branded) mother board and run that 6700K at default speeds. Splurge on a Sync-monitor and graphics card if you have to.

 

[Fjodor2001]

What is really shows is how excellent Intel's architecture has been for the past couple of years while ARM, Nvidia, Apple, AMD and Qualcomm have tried catching up and are still far behind. So instead Intel focused on power consumption and efficiency instead of digging for more IPC gains which won't be found; and likely worsening performance per watt.

In what way are ARM, NVidia, Apple and Qualcomm behind Intel? If you compare CPUs in the same TDP range, I'd say they are actually doing better than Intel, and have been for several years. And just look at what CPUs are in the majority of all low power devices like phones and tablets. It's nearly all ARM. And that is despite Intel's contra revenue program to "give away" Intel CPUs to the OEMs.

As for desktop and server x86, there is only AMD to compare with. But yes, you are correct that Intel has had a quite substantial lead for some time. However I think Intel should be more worried about the future, because for several years Intel has only provided tiny performance improvements going from one CPU generation to the next. So if AMD doesn't screw up with Zen, they have a golden opportunity to catch up, with a completely new uArch and 14 nm process tech. The fact that Intel made a good "base uArch" several years ago is no excuse for not continuing to evolve rapidly.

 

[tenks]

Can someone show me this microcenter 5820k+extreme4 bundle for $350 after rebate? I see it for $479 and a $30 rebate, so $449? where you getting the other $100 off from?


Also I expect to see DDR4 take a huge price stumble in the fall right before black friday. The mid and lower end Skylakes will be trickling in by then for the masses. DDR4 will surely get cheaper for the h170/h110 platforms.