I7 9700k vs i9 9900k

[Exeon]

Some context first, I currently have a 9600k and my wife has a 8300.

Her CPU is struggling pretty hard as she's gaming more often.

 

I was thinking of getting her a 8600 or 8700k but then realized her motherboard is compatible with the 9 series CPU's

 

So the plan is to get either a 9700 or 9900k for me as an upgrade and to give her my old CPU, which should be a massive jump.

 

The 9700k often sells for 250€ the 9900k for 300€, any advice on what would be more worthwhile?

 

I realise for gaming there isn't going to be much difference, are there any gains to be had from ocing? I do have some hefty cpu cooling going on

[curiousmind34]

7 minutes ago, Exeon said:

Some context first, I currently have a 9600k and my wife has a 8300.

Her CPU is struggling pretty hard as she's gaming more often.

 

I was thinking of getting her a 8600 or 8700k but then realized her motherboard is compatible with the 9 series CPU's

 

So the plan is to get either a 9700 or 9900k for me as an upgrade and to give her my old CPU, which should be a massive jump.

 

The 9700k often sells for 250€ the 9900k for 300€, any advice on what would be more worthwhile?

 

I realise for gaming there isn't going to be much difference, are there any gains to be had from ocing? I do have some hefty cpu cooling going on

i7 9700k is one of the fastest CPUs to not have hyperthreading, so multitasking will be better on the 9900k. Otherwise, they are both 8 core chips clocked at the same speed.

[SFFDesigns]

14 minutes ago, Exeon said:

but then realized her motherboard is compatible with the 9 series CPU's

The 9900K is a better chip, and for the price it's the better value. However, can her motherboard actually handle it in terms of VRM?

[jones177]

The main difference to me between the is that the i9 9900k is a 5ghz CPU and the i7 9700k is not.

The reason it is important to me is when I used GTX 1080 tis or less, 5ghz did not matter but when I got a RTX 2080 ti it did matter. So anyone that wants to run a RTX 3070 or better now or in the future needs it with an Intel CPU or they are leavinf lots of performance on the table.

 

You could say that you can overclock the i7 9700k but all my Intel CPUs can do their boost clock in an all core overclock but going past that is up to the silicon lottery. I don't like to lose so I don't buy Intel CPUs that are not 5ghz.

 

Why is 5ghz in an Intel CPU a big thing? It is a performance plateau that produces the most gain.  

 

Also

i9 9900ks are really nice. They are 5ghz CPUs that have not been eclipsed by what have come after them. So they are not outperformed by i7 10700k(8 core Intel) and it looks like it wont be with the i7 11700k.

 

I have one and for most games I don't consider even my i9 10900k an upgrade.

 

The only problem with them is they need a good motherboard and cooling solution to perform well.

Mine uses a Z390 Aorus Ultra and a Noctua NH-D15 and runs cool with one fan and a 5ghz all core overclock.

 

 

[Heliian]

Firstly, what are the system specs and what GPU do you have? 

 

You may not see the full potential of a 9900k, it's about $100 difference at MSRP but I've seen the 9700k on sale at times for an even better deal. 

 

I've got a crappy rtx2060 and my 9700k cpu doesn't hit over 60-70% usage @ 4.8ghz wile gaming with the GPU at max.

 

If you get into the 80 series gpus then you'll want the 9900k for maximum power. Also, like jones177 said, you'll need to beef up the rest of the system. 

[xg32]

1 hour ago, Exeon said:

Some context first, I currently have a 9600k and my wife has a 8300.

Her CPU is struggling pretty hard as she's gaming more often.

 

I was thinking of getting her a 8600 or 8700k but then realized her motherboard is compatible with the 9 series CPU's

 

So the plan is to get either a 9700 or 9900k for me as an upgrade and to give her my old CPU, which should be a massive jump.

 

The 9700k often sells for 250€ the 9900k for 300€, any advice on what would be more worthwhile?

 

I realise for gaming there isn't going to be much difference, are there any gains to be had from ocing? I do have some hefty cpu cooling going on

for a 50dollar diff i'd go for the 9900k, of course it also depends on your mobo+vrm

[Exeon]

On 3/7/2021 at 5:04 PM, Hymenopus_Coronatus said:

The 9900K is a better chip, and for the price it's the better value. However, can her motherboard actually handle it in terms of VRM?

She would get the 9600k, I would get the 9900k, her i3 8300 would be sold.

 

On 3/7/2021 at 5:43 PM, Heliian said:

Firstly, what are the system specs and what GPU do you have? 

 

You may not see the full potential of a 9900k, it's about $100 difference at MSRP but I've seen the 9700k on sale at times for an even better deal. 

 

I've got a crappy rtx2060 and my 9700k cpu doesn't hit over 60-70% usage @ 4.8ghz wile gaming with the GPU at max.

 

If you get into the 80 series gpus then you'll want the 9900k for maximum power. Also, like jones177 said, you'll need to beef up the rest of the system. 

I'm using a Asus Strix Z390-E motherboard I believe, not the highest end motherboard but I don't think it'll be an issue.

 

My CPU cooler is a noctua NH-D15 so I can't really improve it unless I go water, which I'm not willing to do.

 

I'm using an old 980ti, and I'm still waiting on a 3080.

 

The only thing in my pc that could do with improving at the moment is the CPU and maybe the RAM, I'm using 16GB of DDR4 @3000mhz

The memory is at least 5-6 years old, from around the time DDR4 came out I believe(I recall it being +200€).

[SFFDesigns]

3 minutes ago, Exeon said:

I'm using a Asus Strix Z390-E motherboard I believe, not the highest end motherboard but I don't think it'll be an issue.

 

That should be totally fine

[Mister Woof]

How much is the 9900k?

 

because if you're sellling her CPU anyway, you my as well sell it with her motherboard, give her your cpu.mobo, and just get yourself a 10700k + Z490.

 

9900k usually cost more than a 10700k and it's inferior thermally, in terms of security, and is less likely to clock as high.

[Exeon]

1 hour ago, Mister Woof said:

How much is the 9900k?

 

because if you're sellling her CPU anyway, you my as well sell it with her motherboard, give her your cpu.mobo, and just get yourself a 10700k + Z490.

 

9900k usually cost more than a 10700k and it's inferior thermally, in terms of security, and is less likely to clock as high.

Retail prices here put ther 9700K at 300€ and the 9900K at 350€

That said the main purpose will be gaming, I very much doubt I'll do anything that will make a 9700k struggle compared to the 9900k.

I could wait for some price drops.

 

Selling her motherboard and buying myself a new one is an option, but that increases the price again, plus if I'm changing the motherboard I might consider getting a Ryzen instead, although imo not much difference between intel and amd when it comes to gaming performance, splitting hairs on a couple of FPS

 

[Mister Woof]

3 minutes ago, Exeon said:

Retail prices here put ther 9700K at 300€ and the 9900K at 350€

That said the main purpose will be gaming, I very much doubt I'll do anything that will make a 9700k struggle compared to the 9900k.

I could wait for some price drops.

 

Selling her motherboard and buying myself a new one is an option, but that increases the price again, plus if I'm changing the motherboard I might consider getting a Ryzen instead, although imo not much difference between intel and amd when it comes to gaming performance, splitting hairs on a couple of FPS

 

How much does the 10700k cost? You'll also recoup a little bit extra or perhaps even make the sale of the 8300 easier if it has a motherboard also.

 

OR you can get a Ryzen.

 

IMO always good reasons to upgrade yours more!

[Heliian]

If you plan to go with a 3080 and better and more ram then get the 9900k.  Be warned that the d15 might not cut it for the 9900k if you want to really push it. 

[Exeon]

8 hours ago, Mister Woof said:

How much does the 10700k cost? You'll also recoup a little bit extra or perhaps even make the sale of the 8300 easier if it has a motherboard also.

 

OR you can get a Ryzen.

 

IMO always good reasons to upgrade yours more!

 

That's something I considered in my initial reasoning of getting a different CPU

The 10700k at retail price is going for 100€ more than the 9700k

In aplications and 1080p gaming this might be worth it, I'll be gaming at 2,5K so the difference will be splitting hairs as I don't really need hyper threading.

 

I'm currently leaning towards the 9700k, found one a tad cheaper at 235€.

If it was up to me I'd just get the 10700k, but I also need to convince the wife, and I've recently spent a lot on my PC, while I haven't recieved most of my pieces yet.