Intel® Core™ i5-13600KF Desktop Processor 14 cores (6 P-cores + 8 E-cores) 24M Cache, up to 5.1 GHz

Product Information

Intel's Core i5-13600KF CPUs have 6 Performance cores (P-cores) and 8 Efficiency cores (E-cores) for a total of 14 cores. To maximize performance with professional tools, you'll want to use a CPU with a high boost frequency and many CPU cores. Good heat dissipation is needed to maintain boost frequencies for extended periods. We took these factors into account while assessing the expected CPU performance for professional tools. Depending on the game, the CPU will often handle tasks including scene management, gameplay logic, physics calculations, and asset loading. We took these factors into account when assessing the expected CPU performance for gaming. Office and web applications rarely max out the CPU for long periods. These applications can use boost speeds when a burst of processing power is needed, returning to the more efficient base frequencies afterward.

With a TDP of 125 W, the Core i5-13600KF consumes a lot of power, so good cooling is definitely needed. Intel's processor supports DDR4 and DDR5 memory with a dual-channel interface. ECC memory is supported, too, which is an important capability for mission-critical systems, to avoid data corruption. For communication with other components in the machine, Core i5-13600KF uses a PCI-Express Gen 5 connection. This processor does not have integrated graphics, you will need a separate graphics card. Boost frequencies are only achieved under ideal circumstances. However, with adequate cooling, you may be able to maintain speeds near the max boost frequency. Indeed, compared to its Intel counterparts, the 7-Zip compression benchmark nearly always benefits AMD processors. Intel processor numbers are not a measure of performance. Processor numbers differentiate features within each processor family, not across different processor families. See http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/processors/processor-numbers.html for details. We relied on last year’s MSI MPG Z690 Carbon WiFi board for this review. While there are new Z790 boards now available, they do not confer any speed advantages for the 13th Gen series of processors. The Z790 is more forward-looking as it adds one extra USB 3.2 (Gen 2x2) connection, up to 20 PCIe 4.0 lanes (compared to 12 with Intel’s 600-series chipset), fewer PCIe 3.0 lanes (up to 8 compared to 16), and the same 16 lanes of PCIe 5.0.Processors that support 64-bit computing on Intel® architecture require an Intel 64 architecture-enabled BIOS. Professional tools are often well optimized to use many cores. CPU cores allow tools to parallelize processing tasks. Increasing the number of cores can divide the time required to process a task if the tool has good multi-threading support.

We found that, in general, more cores do provide better performance in professional tools and when running multiple applications simultaneously. Based on our evaluation of using AMD's Ryzen 5 7600 CPU for gaming, you can expect excellent game performance with a high-performance CPU cooler.See our best Z690 motherboards for some ideas, as they will be more affordable than the newer Z790s). On 3Dmark’s CPU Profile, which includes six tests that feature custom simulations, the i5-13600K scored 10,370. All six tests use the same workload with variations in threading.