Intel Core i7-5960X Haswell-E CPU Review

Pros

Fastest CPU on the Market
New X99 Platform
Extreme Overclocking Potential

Cons

Price to Performance Ratio
Current price of DDR4

The 8-Core King of Performance

If you wanted to buy an 8-Core CPU you had to fork over thousands on an Intel Xeon server grade CPU or buy an outclassed AMD processor. In September, Intel unleashed its first ever consumer grade 8-Core CPU with never before seen DDR4 and the long awaited enthusiast chipset, X99. With a jaw dropping 8-Cores, 16 threads, 3.0GHz clock, 20MB of Cache, and 22nm architecture, the 5960X offers some devastating specs on paper. The over the top performance offered by this processor is not for everyone, if you want to buy the “Extreme” version of the Haswell variant you better be in the need for some extreme computing power.

Move Over Ivy Bridge- E

Intel released this CPU to take over the previous generation of extreme processors and reign as king to all the Haswell CPUs. Previously, old extreme chipsets lacked native USB 3.0 and only had 2 native 6 Gbps ports which brought the question, why are high end processors ending up on outdated chipsets? The 5960X revolutionizes all that, many changes were introduced with this generation, namely DDR4 and a new X99 chipset which is not compatible with previous “X” variant processors.

Too Much Too Handle

Model	Intel Core i7-5960X	Intel Core i7-5930K	Intel Core i7-5820K	Intel Core i7-4960X
Platform	Haswell-E	Haswell-E	Haswell-E	Ivy Bridge-E
Process	22nm	22nm	22nm	22nm
Cores/Threads	8/16	6/12	6/12	6/12
Cache	20 MB L3	15 MB L3	15 MB L3	15 MB L3
Core Clock	3.0/3.3 GHz	3.5/3.9-4.0 GHz	3.3/3.6-3.8 GHz	3.6/4.0 GHz
Socket	LGA 2011-3	LGA 2011-3	LGA 2011-3	LGA 2011
TDP	140W	140W	140W	130W
Memory	DDR4-2133 MHz	DDR4-2133 MHz	DDR4-2133 MHz	DDR3-1600 MHz
Chipset	X99	X99	X99	X79

Who would get this or any of the other extreme variants? Simply, Enthusiasts or Developers. You either want the best of the best and are willing to pay the premium or you are looking for insane computing power to handle heavy task. If you are one who is simply excited for the X99 chipset but don’t want to sell your kidney, Intel has introduced other lesser specced variants of the 5960X, namely the i7-5930K and the i7-5820k.

Intel Core i7-5960X Haswell-E CPU Review