How Beneficial AreThe Increased Base Clocks Of An Unlocked CPU If You're Not Overclocking?

[Jon Doe]

There have been multiple moments throughout LTT videos (for example Riley's Intel $5000 Extreme Tech Upgrade) where Linus has mentioned people getting a K series chip even if their MB doesn't support OC because of the higher base clock. I'm wondering if anyone has at least a ballpark idea of how beneficial this actually is? I'm deciding between a 12700 & 12700k on a B series MB and I'm not sure what to go with. The 12700 is $70 cheaper (pro) in my region but of course has lower base clocks (con):

 

12700

Performance Core Base 2.1

Efficient Core Base 1.6

 

12700K

Performance Core Base 3.6

Efficient Core Base 2.7

 

Thanks

[Levent]

It only matters when you disable Intel Turbo Boost. No desktop CPU just stays at its base clock. I also find that "getting a K series CPU cuz baseclock is higher" argument dumb as hell. Its just waste of money to get K series CPU and pair it up with B and H series chipsets.

[jaslion]

6 minutes ago, Levent said:

It only matters when you disable Intel Turbo Boost. No desktop CPU just stays at its base clock. I also find that "getting a K series CPU cuz baseclock is higher" argument dumb as hell. Its just waste of money to get K series CPU and pair it up with B and H series chipsets.

Except the 12600k as that one does come with more cores.

 

But other than that baseclock is almost a worthless thing

[Jon Doe]

Thanks for the info guys. I'll save myself the $70 and go with the 12700. The whole higher base clock argument felt off to me but I wanted to ask/confirm since it's been mentioned several times.

[KaitouX]

Just make sure to put a proper cooler on it and increase the power limit, that way it will perform pretty close to the 12700K even in heavy tasks.

https://www.techspot.com/review/2391-intel-core-i7-12700/

[Jon Doe]

1 hour ago, KaitouX said:

Just make sure to put a proper cooler on it and increase the power limit, that way it will perform pretty close to the 12700K even in heavy tasks.

https://www.techspot.com/review/2391-intel-core-i7-12700/

Thanks a lot for that article. Although I'm a little confused. It seems like the way to prevent the problem where the 12700 enters into the 65w PL1 state is to use a certain motherboard such as the one mentioned in the review, and to use a good cooler. But are you saying that there is also a power limit setting in say the BIOS that must also be increased to prevent the issue from occurring?

[mariushm]

Also be careful what B660 motherboard you choose. Some are capped at 65w or 90w or some such small limit, which causes reduced performance. Some claim there's no limit a reasonable limit (125w) (see the gigabyte boards in the video below) yet still have reduced performance because they overheat. 

 

Hardware unboxed had a series of 3 videos where they tested a bunch of B660 videos. 

 

edit: to be clear, basically the Gigabyte boards are throttled by temperature. You can see at 19:00 that with a 12700 on Gigabyte boards throttle the performance as the VRM reaches 95c, while the top performer Asus board is capped at 100c+.  You can see at 20:30 with direct air flow blowing down on the VRM, the three Gigabyte models actually score very well, behind only one asus model, and the vrm temperature drops from 95 to 60ish degrees.

But in default configuration, it seems they configured the throttle at 100c-105c and therefore the 12700 performance is limited in default operation (because vrm overheats)

 

 

[KaitouX]

1 hour ago, Jon Doe said:

Thanks a lot for that article. Although I'm a little confused. It seems like the way to prevent the problem where the 12700 enters into the 65w PL1 state is to use a certain motherboard such as the one mentioned in the review, and to use a good cooler. But are you saying that there is also a power limit setting in say the BIOS that must also be increased to prevent the issue from occurring?

Any motherboard will allow to change the power limit, but some cheaper ones might limit how much you can increase it. You just need one that will actually be able to deliver the power the CPU needs, like the MSI Pro B660-A, Asus TUF Gaming B660 Plus or Gigabyte B660M Aorus Pro, check the videos posted above by @mariushm to see some good motherboard options.

[Jon Doe]

9 hours ago, mariushm said:

Also be careful what B660 motherboard you choose. Some are capped at 65w or 90w or some such small limit, which causes reduced performance. Some claim there's no limit a reasonable limit (125w) (see the gigabyte boards in the video below) yet still have reduced performance because they overheat. 

 

Hardware unboxed had a series of 3 videos where they tested a bunch of B660 videos. 

 

edit: to be clear, basically the Gigabyte boards are throttled by temperature. You can see at 19:00 that with a 12700 on Gigabyte boards throttle the performance as the VRM reaches 95c, while the top performer Asus board is capped at 100c+.  You can see at 20:30 with direct air flow blowing down on the VRM, the three Gigabyte models actually score very well, behind only one asus model, and the vrm temperature drops from 95 to 60ish degrees.

But in default configuration, it seems they configured the throttle at 100c-105c and therefore the 12700 performance is limited in default operation (because vrm overheats)

 

 

 

8 hours ago, KaitouX said:

Any motherboard will allow to change the power limit, but some cheaper ones might limit how much you can increase it. You just need one that will actually be able to deliver the power the CPU needs, like the MSI Pro B660-A, Asus TUF Gaming B660 Plus or Gigabyte B660M Aorus Pro, check the videos posted above by @mariushm to see some good motherboard options.

Got it thanks. Now I've got some good options for a MB. Glad I found out about the VRM issues with some of the boards.