The same applies to the Intel Core X-Series, as well as the AMD Threadripper line: It's a BYO cooler party in these cases. (Ryzen 4000 desktop processors were sold only to OEMs, not end-user PC builders, with just a few very recent exceptions.) You can find a few Threadripper air coolers, which are enormous, such as AMD's own Wraith Ripper(Opens in a new window)or the wonderfully namedFryzen from Deepcool(Opens in a new window), but you'll have to factor in the cost of a heavy-duty air or liquid solution since Threadripper chips, like Intel Core X, don't include a cooler in the box. But in most cases, if you have a midrange or better CPU on a given dead-end platform, unless you're getting a new chip cheaply, you'll get more bang for your buck buying a new motherboard and processor on a current platform. It's possible to objectively measure CPU performance across a range of applications and usage cases, and if you're not bound by mere mortal concerns such as budget, it's easy enough to get a pretty good idea of what "best" means. Socket 1151 isphysicallycompatible with chips from the Celeron to the Core i9 across the 7th Gen ("Kaby Lake"), 8th Gen ("Coffee Lake"), and 9th Gen ("Coffee Lake Refresh") platforms. Sign up for Lab Report to get the latest reviews and top product advice delivered right to your inbox. With that in mind, let's take a look, in turn, at each of the lines that are relevant today for PC builders, buyers, and upgraders. All of the Core X-Series chips have model numbers ending in X and are unlocked for overclocking. (Only the Core i9 chips supported HT.) The Core X-Series chips have seen two major refreshes since their debut, going from the initial 7000 series under the names "Skylake-X" and "Kaby Lake-X" to the all-"Skylake-X" 9000 series in 2018 and then the "Cascade Lake-X" 10000 series in 2019. Trying to figure out the best CPU for your next PC upgrade or DIY build? Gaming performance now at parity with, or better than, Intel Core i9, Record-setting content-creation results in its price bracket. Threadripper processors are hugetheir big dies are derived from AMD's EPYC server chipsand require special coolers or brackets. The Core i9-12900K is Intel's first truly innovative high-end desktop CPU in years, showing great potential in its performance/efficiency mixed-core design and support for DDR5 memory. Still awake? AMD's Zen 3-based Ryzen 9 5900X is the new pace-setter, topping Intel's Core i9-10900K on all the fronts that matter. (These kinds of on-die graphics solutions are also referred to as "integrated graphics processors," or IGPs.) The latest generations employ Socket 1700. This is where formal benchmarking and labs-based reviews like ours come to the fore. Traditionally, Intel's mainstream CPUs have incorporated on-chip video acceleration under the name Intel HD Graphics, UHD Graphics, Iris Graphics, and now, Xe Graphics. Keep an eye on your inbox! In descriptions of CPUs, you may see the core/thread count in a sort of shorthand (we'll do so below), for example, 8C/16T, meaning eight cores and 16 threads. The midrange Core i5-11600K is a six-core, 11th Generation CPU just fast enough to keep Intel's new "Rocket Lake" chips in the game against tough AMD opposition. Note that Intel, with its 9th Generation mainstream Core CPUs for desktops, pushed HT further up its stack than ever before. Casual content creators can get by with the CPUs we recommended for enthusiast gamers (the Core i9-11900K is 8C/16T, the Core i9-10900K is 10C/20T, and the Ryzen 7 3700X and 5800X are 8C/16T), with the Core i7-11700K (8C/16T) also quite viable. Overclocking can void your CPU's warranty, and there's no guarantee that you'll gain much from it. For almost a quarter-century, I worked on the seminal, gigantic Computer Shopper magazine (and later, its digital counterpart), aka the phone book for PC buyers, and the nemesis of every postal delivery person. These are affordable choices for shoppers who want to avoid buying a dedicated graphics card. Should you go with air cooling or liquid cooling? So you want to check the specs carefully to make sure that the motherboard you have or are considering supports the exactand we do mean exactchip you're looking at. Expect to pay about $250 to $700 for the chips in this class. (The three available chips range from a 16-core Threadripper Pro 3955WX at $1,149 to a 64-core Threadripper Pro 3995WX.) (Theveryfirst Core i9 chips debuted in 2017 on Intel's Core X-Series; more about Core X below.) This depends on the processor family you're looking at, whether a cooler comes bundled in the box, whether your existing cooler will work with the new CPU, and if you intend to overclock. The multiplier is locked down on other chips. So, the first big one: Are you upgrading a PC, or building a new one from scratch? Whether you're upgrading your desktop PC or building a new one, choosing the right processor is the most crucial and complex choice you will make. The base clock is a multiple of the system's low-level clock and the CPU multiplier (which may be manually tweakable; more about that in a moment) and is the default speed at which the chip cores run. Enthusiast, high-refresh-rate gaming. Threadripper Pro supplies up to 128 PCI Express 4.0 lanes. On the whole, we'd chalk up most gains from overclocking as modest at best for productivity users, and recommend leaving the practice to hobbyists and enthusiasts. Googling the name of your current processor and selecting the spec page on AMD's or Intel's site will divulge what "socket" the CPU is on Again, we reiterate: This is a rough guide! This matters if you tend to use applications for content creation, rendering, and other intensive operations that make use of all the threads you can get. SMT is supported up and down the mainstream chips in AMD's Ryzen desktop line. Certain Intel and AMD CPUs support multithreading. Read Great Stories Offline on Your Favorite, Intel Core i7-12700KF 12-Core Unlocked Desktop Processor, Intel Core i5-10400 6-Core Unlocked Desktop Processor, AMD Ryzen 5 5500 6-Core Unlocked Desktop Processor, AMD Ryzen 5 5600X 6-Core Unlocked Desktop Processor, PC Magazine Digital Edition (Opens in a new window), How to Free Up Space on Your iPhone or iPad, How to Save Money on Your Cell Phone Bill, How to Convert YouTube Videos to MP3 Files, How to Record the Screen on Your Windows PC or Mac, Read Our AMD Ryzen Threadripper 3970X Review, Read Our Intel Core i9-10980XE Extreme Edition Review, How to Choose the Right RAM for Your Desktop or Laptop PC in 2021, How to Choose the Best Laptop Processor in 2022, New Graphics Card Too Expensive? In a nutshell, multithreading allows your PC to run two discrete processing assignments, or threads, on each CPU core. Most are CPUs only, obliging you to invest in a discrete graphics card. Overclockingrunning a CPU at a higher-than-stock clock speedis easier than it has ever been, but is still a process for the patient at heart. As with the Intel Core X-Series, AMD X399- and TRX40-based boards are geared to extreme power users and enthusiasts. If you're looking at Intel's mainstream CPUs on Socket 1151 or 1200, most come with Intel's capable, recently upgraded stock air cooler. Let's de-perplex it! You don't necessarily need a liquid cooler, but you'll want to be sure that any cooler you get has some extra TDP-support overhead if you intend to try overclocking. The cost of adoption is high for now. Again, things get a little more complicated with Intel's new-for-2021 12th Generation processors. After all, a new board on Intel's or AMD's mainstream platforms can set you back as little as $50. One thing to note: Two of the early "Kaby Lake-X" processors were stripped-down chips with limited PCI Express lane support and modest core/thread counts. If you're a pro content creator with the ready cash, look no further: This is the V16 engine that makes your heart rate rev up. In most cases with Intel boards, upgrading to another chip that works in the same socket as your current one will have limited upside. At this writing, several generations of Intel's mainstream Celeron, Pentium, and Core i3/i5/i7/i9 processors share the market. An X470 chipset will give you access to slightly higher system-memory clocks than X370, as well as support for StoreMI, a flexible storage-management feature that lets you pair an SSD and a hard drive to facilitate keeping your most frequently accessed files and programs on the faster drive. For example, the Z390, Z370, B365, B360, H370, and H310 chipsets all are relevant for the 8th and 9th generations of Intel CPUs, but you'll want to check the compatibility lists. It's AMD's equivalent to Intel's Core X-Series, and for many users a better value. (These were theCore i5-7640Xandthe Core i7-7740X.) Our expert industry analysis and practical solutions help you make better buying decisions and get more from technology. (Typical mainstream Intel chips top out at 16 lanes.) This is hard to do at 4K resolution (GPUs are generally handling the load here), but the CPU matters quite a bit more in performance if you play at 1080p or 1440p. Indeed, buying a desktop processor is akin to a wholeforestof decision trees. Under race conditions, I've built PCs from bare-board to bootup in under 5 minutes. Note: We are listing only the retail chips above. (Examples of this family: See our reviews of theCore i9-7980XE Extreme Edition,the Core i9-9980XE Extreme Edition, andthe Core i9-10980XE Extreme Edition.). Just expect a high initial cost of adoptionand, perhaps, some PC-gaming growing pains. Middle-aged ones use the now-dead-ended Socket 1200. PCMag.com is a leading authority on technology, delivering lab-based, independent reviews of the latest products and services. Also on Socket 1200, newer 11th Generation "Rocket Lake" chips arrived this past March, to mixed reviews. As we alluded to earlier, one thing to note with 9th Generation Intel mainstream CPUs is that only the highest-end ones support the doubling of processing threads via Hyper-Threading. The second generation split the Threadripper line into two tiers, the "ordinary" X series and higher-end WX chips. Hardcore/professional content creation. With Intel Socket 1151, you'll want a Z390 or Z370 motherboard; with Socket 1200 or 1700, look for a Z490, Z590, or Z690 platform; and with Ryzen, look for an X570, X470, X370, B550, B450, or B350 board. The "Extreme Edition" label usually denotes the top chip in a given Core X-Series generation. Ryzen? This doubles the simultaneous processing potential, assuming that the software and operating system are written in a way that can leverage it. Eight P-cores threaded twice, combined with eight single-thread E-cores equals 24 threads. MULTITHREADING. And their bundled cooling solutions (when included, anyway) are attractive, adequate to running at stock speeds, and good values. Some of these chips come with no cooler; others are bundled with one of the Wraiths. (Spoiler:For consumers, Intel Core i9-10980XE Extreme EditionorAMD Ryzen Threadripper 3990X, priced at one or four grand respectively. Previously, he worked as a freelancer for Gadget Review and Digital Trends, spending his time there wading through seas of hardware at every turn. It's a gross oversimplification, but think of core count like engine cylinders; more cores generally indicate more power, all else being equal. (Of course, if your older system is still on DDR3 memory, you'll need new RAM, too; both Intel and AMD use DDR4 on their current consumer platforms, while Intel's 12th Generation Core CPUs and Z690 motherboards are the first to feature support for DDR5. Any cooler you are looking at should (a.) There are edge cases on every line. Picks:Intel Core i9-10980X Extreme Edition, Intel Xeon W-2295,AMD Ryzen Threadripper 2970WX,AMD Ryzen Threadripper 3960X,AMD Ryzen Threadripper 3970X. Intel's lower-end Xeon workstation CPUs also come into play if you're running apps with independent software vendor (ISV) certifications and a need for ECC memory, but if you need those things, you should follow software makers' recommendations carefully. Their actual die size is larger than the mainstream Cores, and their slightly higher wattages demand more robust cooling solutions. The Ryzen 5 line is especially attractive as a mainstream value pick. It requires a unique chipset, the WRX80. This loose equation has gotten more nuanced, however, with the launch of Intel's 12th Generation "Alder Lake" processors, and more specifically the introduction of what the company is calling its "Performance Cores" (P-cores), and "Efficiency Cores," or E-cores. Measured in gigahertz (GHz), these are two of the primary specs for any given CPU, but they require a bit of context. Below are the down-and-dirty specs for (and links to deep-dive reviews of) most of the CPUs recommended above. The oldest ones make use of a motherboard CPU socket called Socket 1151. And at CES 2022, AMD tipped that Threadripper Pro 5000 WX series CPUs will appear in selected workstations in 2022. Decent frame rates for a midrange CPU in gaming runs, Slower than comparatively priced AMD options in nearly every CPU-centric test, Integrated graphics are there, but still Intel UHD Graphics. See our laptop processor explainer for the rather different nuances of selecting a CPU in a notebook PC.). AMD's mainstream Ryzen processors are, on the whole, excellent values for everyday users and quite a few power users. For example, the Ryzen 5000 Series stepped things back a bit from the 3000 Series, with the Ryzen 5 5600X including the Wraith Prism but the Ryzen 7 5800X, Ryzen 9 5900X, and Ryzen 9 5950X all shipping with no coolers in the box. Picks:IntelCore i9-10900K,Intel Core i7-11700K, Intel Core i9-12900K, AMD Ryzen 9 5900X,AMD Ryzen 9 5950X, AMD Ryzen Threadripper 2950X. Most recently, Intel finally moved beyond 14nm entirely on its latest 12th Gen launch to what it's dubbing the "Intel 7 Process," based on 10nm Enhanced Superfin parts built in Intel's fabs. The display of third-party trademarks and trade names on this site does not necessarily indicate any affiliation or the endorsement of PCMag. Intel calls this technology "Hyper-Threading" (HT), while in the AMD world it's referred to by the generic term "SMT," for symmetric multithreading. (The heat output you'll need to dissipate will be greater than the chip's rating.). Outright benchmark wins across many different runs, Z690 platform comes with support for DDR5, depending on the motherboard, High cost of adoption for peak performance, At the moment, not compatible with some games that use Denuvo DRM protection. With the latest generation, all come bundled with a nifty-looking air cooler from AMD's Wraith line. These lanes are the internal electrical data pathways employed by video cards, PCI Express solid-state drives, and other PCIe internal cards. Picks:AMD Athlon 200GE,Intel Pentium Gold G5600,Intel Core i3-10400, AMD Ryzen 3 3200G,AMD Ryzen 5 3400G. If the software you use is multithreaded (this especially applies to modern content-creation and image- and video-editing packages), more cores will help. Core X is a platform to consider if you're looking at an SLI or CrossFire multiple-video-card gaming rig (less relevant these days, with Nvidia winding down support for SLI or NVLink in most of its newest video cards) or a PCIe SSD array. You'll also want to make sure the cooler is adequate, per our advice above. Unlike Intel and its mainly more modest IGPs, AMD targets the best of its CPU/GPU combo chips (some of which fall under the Ryzen family; we'll get to them in the next section) as budget-friendly solutions for casual gamers. Which of the two big chipmakers should you go with: AMD or Intel? During that time, I've built and torn down enough desktop PCs to equip a city block's worth of internet cafes. The AMD X399/TR4 platform is a dead end, but the value proposition of those chips is still very good. You'll want to check at time of purchase what's in the box. (Late-model mainstream AMD CPUs, on the company's AM4 socket, have broken that cycle for the moment.) In his free time, youll find him shredding the local mountain on his snowboard, or using his now-defunct culinary degree to whip up a dish in the kitchen for friends. 1996-2022 Ziff Davis. The Core X-Series CPUs currently run on a socket dubbed LGA 2066. be compatible with the CPU socket type you're installing it on, and (b.) In most cases, for running at stock speeds, air cooling will be enough outside of the Core i9 and Ryzen 9 families, and you won't need more than the stock cooler designed to handle the CPU it's boxed with. Consider one of the Ryzen G chips if you plan on some very light gaming or just don't need a graphics card. You can opt for the graphics-less "F" versions of these Intel chips (for example, the Core i7-11700KF) to save some money assuming you have a video card you can run in the PC. All are unlocked for overclocking, if you are so inclined. This Z/B/H letter scheme has held for several generations now. Check. You'll need to provide your own cooler; Core X chips don't come with cooling fans in the box. Casual or enthusiast media-content creation. Check them out for more specific benchmarking details and more info on their supported platforms. AMD's 32-core Ryzen Threadripper 3970X performs so far ahead of the curve that it practically creates a new class of consumer-accessible CPU. (Note: This guide is decidedly about CPUs for desktop PCs. X570, meanwhile, debuted with third-generation Ryzen in 2019 and brings support for PCI Express 4.0, which is for now mostly of interest to shoppers looking to install the fastest possible PCI Express 4.0 SSDs or those looking to use the new "resizable BAR" feature steadily making its way to AMD and Nvidia GPUs. Also consider the slightly cheaper non-"K" variants if you don't plan to overclock. However, our cheat sheet below will give you a good basic idea of the chip lines to look at, depending on what you do. Works with mature X299 chipset ecosystem. Very fast gaming results on integrated graphics, Unlike Ryzen 4000G chips, available for individual purchase, Eight cores will be overkill for some gamers and buyers, Performance in gaming with a dedicated GPU is lacking for the price, Limited motherboard compatibility at launch. Examine the CPU's spec sheet and our individual chip reviews for per-processor details. Another expense: a deluxe motherboard. Here, too, previous-gen (Socket TR4, on the X399 chipset) Threadrippers remain great values despite the sunsetting of their platform. If you're upgrading an existing desktop PC, your CPU upgrade options, by definition, will be limited: by the architecture, socket, and compatibility of the motherboard installed in the PC. Discrete-graphics-card gaming on a budget. Then eight. I'm a lifetime New Yorker, a graduate of New York University's journalism program, and a member of Phi Beta Kappa. If you own (or plan to splurge on) a video card, though, consider a Core i5 or Ryzen 3 or 5 for maximum value. He brings his experience benchmarking and reviewing consumer gadgets and PC hardware such as laptops, pre-built gaming systems, monitors, storage, and networking equipment to the team. Support for ECC memory with certain mainboards. Unmatched performance in multithread-aware tests, with 32 cores and 64 addressable threads. PCMag, PCMag.com and PC Magazine are among the federally registered trademarks of Ziff Davis and may not be used by third parties without explicit permission. Subscribing to a newsletter indicates your consent to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. To gain support for more than 44 lanes, needs new motherboard. Liquid cooling has an exotic cachet for many users, but today's all-in-one (AIO) liquid coolers from Cooler Master, Corsair, Deepcool, NZXT, and others have made water-cooling your PC as safe and easy as installing a case fan. A chip that's "unlocked" for overclocking has its clock multiplier open for tweaking within the BIOS or by using in-operating-system overclocking software. TDP is relevant as a yardstick for the heat output that the cooler will have to handle. It also uses a newer socket, LGA 1200, which is incompatible with all else that came before. Don't worry, this won't be on the test! (We've seen good deals on third-gen Ryzens, though the chip shortages from late 2020 that have persisted have put a damper even on these older chips. New TRX40 motherboard platform means high cost of entry. These graphics-less chips are set apart by the suffix "F." For example, the Core i9-12900KF is a CPU only, with no integrated graphics. PCMag Digital Group. (Many lesser 12th Gen CPUs will ship with the company's new Laminar stock coolers, and should be fine with those if you're not overclocking.). That means, assuming the motherboard has the appropriate video outputs, that you can use the IGP as your display solution, without needing a separate video card. Here's how to make sense of AMD's and Intel's lines, backed by dozens of our deep-dive reviews. Note, however, that the number of PCI Express lanes supportedcanvary depending on the Core X-Series CPU and motherboard combination you choose. AMD's cheaper Ryzen 3 3300X remains a stellar value among gaming CPUs, but the Ryzen 5 5600X is enough of a brute at its midrange price to make it the best pure gaming CPU of the year. Core X-Series and Ryzen Threadripper were made for this market. These boards and chips hit the market in mid-2020. (Overclocking suitability varies from chip sample to chip sample, what's known in enthusiast circles as the "silicon lottery.") The first-, second-, and fourth-generation Ryzens are a mixed bag. With few improvements over its predecessor and performance, in many cases, behind a less-expensive AMD Ryzen alternative, Intel's Core i9-10980XE is an enthusiast-class CPU that can't quite live up to the "Extreme" in its name.