For a few weeks now, the phasing out of the previous generation Skylake series motherboards and CPUs has been taking place as the Kaby lake equivalents have taken over.
The full range of 7000 series model i3, i5 and i7 series Kaby Lake CPUs are now exclusively available and to pair, the latest generation Z270, H270 and B250 series motherboards.
The full Intel 7th Gen Kaby Lake CPU Line Up
- i7 7700K Quad Core 4.5GHz – 8 Threads (Overclockable on Z270 Boards)
- i7 7700 Quad Core 4.2GHz – 8 Threads
- i5 7600K Quad Core 4.2GHz – 4 Threads (Overclockable on Z270 Boards)
- i5 7600 Quad Core 4.1GHz – 4 Threads
- i5 7500 Quad Core 3.8GHz – 4 Threads
- i5 7400 Quad Core 3.5GHz – 4 Threads
- i3 7100 Dual Core 3.9GHz – 4 Threads
- Pentium G4560 Dual Core 3.5GHz – 4 Threads
The new chipsets offer increased number of PCI-E lanes and m.2 SSD support along with native Kaby Lake CPU support, bold new aesthetic designs and a load of overall small improvements behind the scenes for an even more rock solid user experience.
While the impacts on gaming performance are non extreme over the previous generation, it is measurable and most importantly, pricing has stabilized making the equivalent Kaby lake models on par with their discontinued predecessors which are almost completely sold out across all retailers.
So what Kaby Lake CPU should I use in my gaming PC build?
Of course it depends on your budget and the types of games you play, but for this particular recommendation lets make a couple of assumptions.
- You want to play any and all new release games for the foreseeable future on high settings at a smooth frame rate.
- You want the best value for money option, not to pay a dis-proportionally higher amount for a relatively small performance difference.
If this sounds like what you’ve been thinking, then our recommendation would be the i5 7600K. Significantly cheaper than it’s i7 bigger brothers, it still delivers all the CPU throughput you need for any gaming title. While it only has half the cores of the the i7, it’s a sad fact that very few if any game engines actually utilize these additional codes in any meaningful way that improves overall gaming performance.
We have recommended the K model and not the vanilla i5 7600 as it comes with a slightly higher boost clock speed (nothing major) but most importantly, it’s overclockable. We don’t recommend overclocking unless you get to a stage where your unhappy with your gaming performance and the CPU is the bottleneck because it can introduce system instability and heat issues if not done properly, but leaving the the option open gives you some wriggle room in the future should you choose to crank up the clock speeds and squeeze a little more life out of your machine.
If you have a particular budget or a different use case and need more personalized recommendations don’t hesitate to contact us via email, our contact page, Facebook or by phone during business hours and our dedicated team will gladly assist!
Also worth remembering, and something we remind customers almost on a daily basis here at the Evatech offices, be sure to balance your CPU selection with your choice of graphics card (especially for gaming PCs)! Matching the wrong CPU and GPU will cause a bottleneck and the last thing you want is to lose potential performance you’ve already paid for.
To avoid bottle-necking in gaming we typically recommend;
- SLI GTX 1070 or 1080 with an i7.
- GTX 1070 or 1080 with to be paired with a high end i5 or any i7.
- GTX 1060 with a mid to low end i5.
- GTX 1050TI or lower with at least an i3.
So what’s next?
Get in touch if you have any questions or jump on our store page at www.evatech.com.au and start customizing your next Intel Kaby lake custom gaming PC today. With just a few clicks of a button, instant quotes, built in automatic compatibility checking, expert assembly and thorough burn in testing, it’s never been easier to yourself a custom built to order PC delivered anywhere in Australia.
