Intel has added two F-series chips to its 13th Generation Raptor Lake lineup. The new Core i7-13790F and Core i5-13490F, which are likely exclusive to the Chinese market, will vie for a spot on the list of best CPUs for gaming.
The Core i7-13790F features a similar recipe as the Core i7-13700F. The 16-core, 24-thread chip arrives with eight P-cores and eight E-cores. The clock speeds for the P-cores are identical on both processors. They operate with a 2.1 GHz base clock and a 5.2 GHz boost clock. On the contrary, Core i7-13790F's E-cores have a 100 MHz higher base clock than the Core i7-13700F.
Besides the slightly improved clock speeds, the Core i7-13790F has a larger L3 cache. Intel bumped it up to 33MB, 10% bigger than the L3 cache on the Core i7-13700F. It's an unorthodox number, and the chipmaker did some magic to arrive at 33MB on the Core i7-13790F. The conventional Core i7-13700F features eight Raptor Cove clusters and two Gracemont clusters. Remember that each Raptor Core and Gracemont has a 3MB L3 cache, with the latter housing four E-cores. With the Core i7-13790F, Intel essentially used one complete Gracemont cluster and partially enabled two other Gracemont clusters. As a result, the Core i7-13790F still ends up with eight E-cores with a 9MB L3 cache.
Regarding power consumption, the Core i7-13790F shares the same 65W PBP and 219 MTP as the Core i7-13700F. Intel's 65W SKUs don't support overclocking, but motherboard vendors have found ways around that. Neither the Core i7-13790F nor Core i5-13490F wields an iGPU, so consumers will need to pair the chip with one of the best graphics cards for a gaming system. The processors will drop into existing LGA1700 motherboards, although some may require a simple firmware update.
Core i7-13790F, Core i5-13490F Specifications
Processor | Street / MSRP | Cores / Threads | P-cores / E-cores | P-Core Base / Boost (GHz) | E-Core Base / Boost (GHz) | L3 Cache (MB) | PBP / MTP (W) |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Core i7-13790F | $441 | 16 / 24 | 8 / 8 | 2.1 / 5.2 | 1.5 / 4.1 | 33 | 65 / 219 |
Core i7-13700F | $369 | 16 / 24 | 8 / 8 | 2.1 / 5.2 | 1.4 / 4.1 | 30 | 65 / 219 |
Core i5-13490F | $235 | 10 / 16 | 6 / 4 | 2.5 / 4.8 | 1.8 / 3.5 | 24 | 65 / 148 |
Core i5-13400F | $196 | 10 / 16 | 6 / 4 | 2.5 / 4.6 | 1.8 / 3.3 | 20 | 65 / 148 |
Core i5-12490F | $199 | 6 / 12 | 6 / 0 | 3.0 / 4.6 | N/A | 20 | 65 / 117 |
Core i5-12400F | $194 | 6 / 12 | 6 / 0 | 2.5 / 4.4 | N/A | 18 | 65 / 117 |
The Core i5-13490F, which succeeds the Core i5-12490F, has ten cores and 16 threads, consisting of six P-cores and four E-cores. The base clock speeds for the P-cores (2.5 GHz) and E-cores (1.8 GHz) on the Core i5-13490F match the Core i5-13400F. On the other hand, the boost clock speeds on the former are 200 MHz faster than the latter.
Like the Core i7-13790F and Core i7-13700F, the Core i5-13490F also flaunts a more generous L3 cache. The new chip has 4MB more L3 cache, equivalent to a 20% increase. The extra L3 cache comes from Core i5-13490F leveraging two partial Gracemont clusters. Despite the higher clocks and larger L3 cache, the Core i5-13490F's power metrics remain untouched compared to the Core i5-13400F. The PBP and MTP are still 65W and 148W, respectively.
The Core i5-13490F has a $235.96 price tag; meanwhile, the Core i7-13790F sells for $441.62. They're 20% more expensive than the Core i5-13400F and Core i7-13700F, respectively. Early results show that Core i5-13490F and Core i7-13790F could offer over 10% higher performance than their existing counterparts. However, that was a single benchmark and not a very reliable one at that. It remains to be seen whether the Core i5-13490F and Core i7-13790F are worth the premium.
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Zhiye Liu is a news editor and memory reviewer at Tom’s Hardware. Although he loves everything that’s hardware, he has a soft spot for CPUs, GPUs, and RAM.
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helper800
Classic Intel product segmentation... Remember when hyperthreading cost and extra 150-200 dollars?bolweval said:A $72 price bump for 90mhz and a little L3 bump? -
Loadedaxe helper800 said:Remember when hyperthreading cost and extra 150-200 dollars?
And when was this?
when HT was in its infancy cpus were barely selling for $200 (unless you wanted a EE), and yes that is with HT.
Hyperbole -
evdjj3j Loadedaxe said:And when was this?
when HT was in its infancy cpus were barely selling for $200 (unless you wanted a EE), and yes that is with HT.
Hyperbole
Take your lies somewhere else. The 3.06 P4 w/HT was $631 when it debuted as the first CPU with hyper threading. The next processor down on the list was the 2.8 Ghz P4 wo/HT for $401. -
chickenballs guess despite the name its nothing like the performance gain we got from the i7 4790K over the 4770KReply -
Loadedaxe
The P4 mainstream cpus with HT sold between $178-278, no lies here. If anything Intels P4 HT line dropped in pricing. Do some research.evdjj3j said:Take your lies somewhere else. The 3.06 P4 w/HT was $631 when it debuted as the first CPU with hyper threading. The next processor down on the list was the 2.8 Ghz P4 wo/HT for $401.
Your trying to argue with one cpu, the most expensive of the lot, I never said there weren't more expensive options. Now you could correct me in saying "There were some high end cpus that sold for more"
But just like the 7950X and the 13900k, there are more people on $200-300 cpus than there are on $600 ones. Point is, HT did not cost $150-200 more. -
TerryLaze
China market so any comparing of prices is futile unless you know how much the other CPUs go for in China.bolweval said:A $72 price bump for 90mhz and a little L3 bump?
which are likely exclusive to the Chinese market
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evdjj3j Loadedaxe said:The P4 mainstream cpus with HT sold between $178-278, no lies here. If anything Intels P4 HT line dropped in pricing. Do some research.
Your trying to argue with one cpu, the most expensive of the lot, I never said there weren't more expensive options. Now you could correct me in saying "There were some high end cpus that sold for more"
But just like the 7950X and the 13900k, there are more people on $200-300 cpus than there are on $600 ones. Point is, HT did not cost $150-200 more.
The prices I quoted were MSRP when they were released, you're full of <Mod Edit>. The 3.06 GHz was the first hyperthreaded CPU released. You used the word infancy so the first hyperthreaded CPU would be the one to use the price from. It's not an EE processor either, it was a mainstream offering. I remember, I was there, I sold tons of them. Lying liar lies. -
Loadedaxe lolReply
Infancy:
the early stage in the development or growth of something:
You can try and split hairs all you want. It did not cost 150-200 more for HT
List of Intel Pentium 4 processors - Wikipedia -
helper800
Since the beginning of hyperthreading until 9th gen Intel CPUs had segmented their CPUs by price for hyperthreading. Not even accounting for inflation, almost every single generation had at least a 115 dollar MSRP premium for the feature. That is a fact nobody can dispute without being contrarian for the purposes of being contrarian. Early on, as mentioned by others that premium was significantly higher and in the range of my original post. Towards Sandy bridge and Ivy bridge this premium dropped below 150, but still cost over 100 dollars, when that was actually a decent chunk of money.Loadedaxe said:lol
Infancy:
the early stage in the development or growth of something:
You can try and split hairs all you want. It did not cost 150-200 more for HT
List of Intel Pentium 4 processors - Wikipedia