What's the CPU with the highest stock clock speed available on the market?

simonz93

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Obviously only referring to the ones on the market for gaming, not those for super computers at NASA. Don't want to overclock it myself.

I saw some people with 4.9 GHz, but they say water cooling is mandatory in this case. Is it true?

Thanks!
 
Solution
As others have said, clock speed isn't necessarily a measure of performance or even raw performance. Unless it's purely to have the highest clock speeds to put down on paper then yes, amd does have the highest clock speeds. But because ipc (instructions per clock or performance per core) isn't comparable, they're not the 'fastest'.

That would be the i7 6700k or 4790k. Technically the 4790k has higher clock speed by a couple hundred mhz but due to ipc improvements on the 6700k they're pretty close to one another despite the slightly lower clock speeds on the 6700k. Both are clocked faster than the 6/8 core 2011v3 cpu's including the 5960x flagship extreme cpu. In order to keep overall tdp down as the number of cores increases their...
wasn't there 4.0ghz pentium 4s in 2006. a 2006 pentium 4 at 4.0ghz would get completely demolished by your smartphone running at 1.6ghz.

the highest stock clocks are the fx9370 at 4.7ghz turbo and the i7-4790k at 4.4ghz, the later being much faster overall.
 

svan71

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The 9590 is Amds fastest it turbos at 5ghz
 
As others have said, clock speed isn't necessarily a measure of performance or even raw performance. Unless it's purely to have the highest clock speeds to put down on paper then yes, amd does have the highest clock speeds. But because ipc (instructions per clock or performance per core) isn't comparable, they're not the 'fastest'.

That would be the i7 6700k or 4790k. Technically the 4790k has higher clock speed by a couple hundred mhz but due to ipc improvements on the 6700k they're pretty close to one another despite the slightly lower clock speeds on the 6700k. Both are clocked faster than the 6/8 core 2011v3 cpu's including the 5960x flagship extreme cpu. In order to keep overall tdp down as the number of cores increases their clock speed is slightly dropped.
 
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simonz93

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Thanks guys. i'm actually happy with my 3.4GHz i7 6700, except its performance in the CPU-intensive Total War games is atrocious. Some people with smooth gameplay told me that I need one with the highest clock speed as possible to be able to truly enjoy the games.
 

svan71

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I doubt your cpu is the problem, what's your video card?
 
People who suggest clock speed as the end all be all solution don't understand clock speed. You've currently got one of the fastest desktop cpu's around, faster than anything in the amd camp. Something else may be the issue including game optimization. Some games just run horribly for many people.

Suggesting that one of the latest i7's is the problem when it comes to game performance is much like saying oh well you drive a ferrari, that explains your slow track times.

Are you playing the game single player offline or playing on an online server? (I don't play total war). If online, internet connection or game server issues can come into play as well.
 
Even though even the recommended sys req's aren't too intimidating, Total War seems to be a real bear to max out for even the strongest systems. I don't personally play it, but everything I've read suggests you need a pretty high end rig to come close to maxing it, even at 1080p. I haven't seen it said anywhere, but my guess is just poor optimization.

As for the original question, yeah, clock speed is just a number that doesn't mean a whole lot at face value. Don't get caught up in clock speed numbers, and anyone that tells you that's all that matters just doesn't know what they're talking about.
 

simonz93

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980Ti. Pretty sure it's not a problem lol, especially since TW aren't GPU intensive as it's CPU intensive.
 

simonz93

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I'm playing offline only.

Having done some researches, yeah the general consensus it's that the game is terribly optimized.

Thanks everyone