Intel Core i7-3960X vs Intel Core i3-1215U

Compare Intel Core X-series 6 core CPU vs Intel 12th Generation Core i3 6 core processor, specs and benchmark score. Which is the better CPU for gaming?

Benchmark Score
Other Benchmarks
Specifications
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CPU Comparison

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Benchmark Score

Overall Score

A combined score of all workloads

3693 points

12% slightly better overall score

3288 points

Gaming Score

The raw gaming performance with a fast GPU

4998 points

5718 points

14% slightly better gaming score

Multitasking Score

Performance in workloads using up to 8 cores

3261 points

25% slightly better multitasking score

2595 points

Heavy Workload Score

Performance in workloads using up to 16 cores

3155 points

27% slightly better heavy workload score

2480 points

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Other Benchmarks

Blender score

Cycles Render (Samples per minute)

69.62 points

21% slightly higher Blender score

57.10 points

Geekbench 5 (multi) score

Multi threaded benchmark

3363 points

4916 points

46% significantly higher Geekbench 5 (multi) score

Geekbench 5 (single) score

Single threaded benchmark

665 points

1875 points

181% significantly higher Geekbench 5 (single) score

Geekbench 6 (multi) score

Multi threaded benchmark

3209 points

4826 points

50% significantly higher Geekbench 6 (multi) score

Geekbench 6 (single) score

Single threaded benchmark

661 points

1815 points

174% significantly higher Geekbench 6 (single) score

Specifications

Cores

Number of physical processing units

Identical

Threads

Number of logical processing units

49% significantly more threads

Clock Speed

Base frequency at which the chip operates

3.3 GHz

175% significantly higher clock speed

1.2 GHz

Turbo Speed

Higher frequency used for heavy workloads

3.9 GHz

4.4 GHz

12% slightly higher turbo speed

TDP

Thermal Design Power: Measure of heat generated by the CPU

130 W

15 W

766% significantly lower TDP

PCIe Lanes

Number of physical connections between the CPU and expansion slots

100% significantly more pcie lanes

Memory Channels

Lanes for simultaneous memory access

100% significantly more memory channels

Supported Memory

Maximum amount of RAM supported by this CPU

64 GiB

Identical

64 GiB

Other details

Rank

Ranking in the hardwareDB database

464th of 1,089

501st of 1,089

Family

The product line

Core X-series

12th Generation Core i3

Release date

The official date of release of this chip

2011 November

2022 February

Memory Type

The type of memory used by this chip

DDR3-1066

DDR5-4800

Is Unlocked

Can this CPU can be overclocked

Supports ECC memory

Does this CPU support error correcting memory

Core i7-3960X vs Core i3-1215U specs and performance

In our benchmarks, the Core i3-1215U beats the Core i7-3960X in overall performance. Furthermore, our gaming benchmark shows that it also outperforms the Core i7-3960X in all gaming tests too.

When comparing these CPUs we notice that they have the same number of cores but the Core i7-3960X has more threads. With our hardware info, we find that the Core i7-3960X has a significantly higher clock speed than the Core i3-1215U. Despite this, the Core i3-1215U has a slightly higher turbo speed. The Core i3-1215U outputs less heat than Core i7-3960X thanks to a significantly lower TDP. This measures the amount of heat they output and can be used to estimate power consumption.

Modern CPUs generally have more logical cores than physical cores, this means that each core is split into multiple virtual cores, improving efficiency for parallel workloads. Indeed, the Core i7-3960X has more threads than cores. Each physical core is split into multiple threads.