Is the i7 10700F a good buy? Or should i stick with a 3700X?

AsbestosCollector · November 28, 2020

Hello there,

I was initially considering getting a 3700X until i noticed that the 10700F was slightly cheaper.

If i go with the 10700F i'll be able to afford a decent cooler to keep the cpu temps lower but i'll be limited to 2933mhz ram speed instead of 3200 like the 3700X (b460's and b450's are all i can afford, Z and X motherboards are too expensive where i live).

With the above factors and the general performance of these cpu's considered, which would be the better pick? I plan on using it for mild gaming + a lot of solid works and cad if that's relevant.

Prodigy_Smit · November 28, 2020

1 minute ago, AsbestosCollector said:

I plan on using it for mild gaming + a lot of solid works and cad if that's relevant

Because of this I would go for the 3700x and the faster ram.

porina · November 28, 2020

I don't think there'll be much in it performance wise.

The 10700F is 4.6 GHz all core turbo, and the 3700X will be lucky to see more than 4.2 GHz all core, the clock difference offsetting any IPC differences. BTW both will need decent cooling to get the most out of them. The 3700X stock cooler will lead to lower clocks due to high temperatures. I don't know what the 10700F cooler is like but assuming it is like past Intel coolers, just replace it.

Ram speed difference isn't major. I'd also view upgradability to be not that different either. If you go 400 chipset on AMD side, at best you're going to run the Zen 3 CPUs, although they can go to 16 cores if needed in future. Intel side you only have Rocket Lake to look forward to, not going to increase your core count, although improved IPC may help.

Edit: if it was pure gaming, I'd lean towards the 10700F, but I have no idea how the other workloads behave.