Intel Core i7-6700K vs Intel Core i9-12900KF

Compare Intel 6th Generation Core i7 4 core CPU vs Intel 12th Generation Core i9 16 core processor, specs and benchmark score. Which is the better CPU for gaming?

CPU Comparison

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Price

The cheapest price from our partner retailers

$ 274.86
$ 5.13 slightly less expensive
$ 279.99

Benchmark Score

Overall Score

A combined score of all workloads

3497 points
12789 points
265% significantly better overall score

Gaming Score

The raw gaming performance with a fast GPU

5633 points
14030 points
149% significantly better gaming score

Multitasking Score

Performance in workloads using up to 8 cores

2866 points
12383 points
332% significantly better multitasking score

Heavy Workload Score

Performance in workloads using up to 16 cores

2751 points
12302 points
347% significantly better heavy workload score

Free CPU Benchmark

Want to compare your processor against the Core i7-6700K and the Core i9-12900KF? Download our free and quick PC Performance Test.

Other Benchmarks

3DMark Physics score

3DMark Physics score

Physics simulation benchmark

3242 points
11666 points
259% significantly higher 3DMark Physics score
Blender score

Blender score

Cycles Render (Samples per minute)

81.27 points
361.08 points
344% significantly higher Blender score
Geekbench 5 (multi) score

Geekbench 5 (multi) score

Multi threaded benchmark

4822 points
14840 points
207% significantly higher Geekbench 5 (multi) score
Geekbench 5 (single) score

Geekbench 5 (single) score

Single threaded benchmark

1442 points
2507 points
73% significantly higher Geekbench 5 (single) score
Geekbench 6 (multi) score

Geekbench 6 (multi) score

Multi threaded benchmark

4936 points
14786 points
199% significantly higher Geekbench 6 (multi) score
Geekbench 6 (single) score

Geekbench 6 (single) score

Single threaded benchmark

1506 points
2584 points
71% significantly higher Geekbench 6 (single) score

Specifications

Cores

Number of physical processing units

4
16
300% significantly more cores

Threads

Number of logical processing units

8
24
200% significantly more threads

Clock Speed

Base frequency at which the chip operates

4 GHz
25% slightly higher clock speed
3.2 GHz

Turbo Speed

Higher frequency used for heavy workloads

4.2 GHz
5.2 GHz
23% slightly higher turbo speed

TDP

Thermal Design Power: Measure of heat generated by the CPU

95 W
153% significantly lower TDP
241 W

PCIe Lanes

Number of physical connections between the CPU and expansion slots

16
20
25% slightly more pcie lanes

Memory Channels

Lanes for simultaneous memory access

2
Identical
2

Supported Memory

Maximum amount of RAM supported by this CPU

64 GiB
128 GiB
100% significantly more supported memory

L1 Cache

Smallest embedded memory, but the fastest

256 KiB
1280 KiB
400% significantly more L1 cache

L3 Cache

General memory pool for all cores

8 MiB
30 MiB
274% significantly more L3 cache

Other details

Rank

Ranking in the hardwareDB database

482nd of 1,089
44th of 1,089

Family

The product line

6th Generation Core i7
12th Generation Core i9

Release date

The official date of release of this chip

2015 August
2021 November

Memory Type

The type of memory used by this chip

DDR4-1866
DDR5-4800

Is Unlocked

Can this CPU can be overclocked

No
Yes

Supports ECC memory

Does this CPU support error correcting memory

No
-

Core i7-6700K vs Core i9-12900KF comparison

In our benchmarks, the Core i9-12900KF beats the Core i7-6700K in overall performance. Furthermore, our gaming benchmark shows that it also outperforms the Core i7-6700K in all gaming tests too.

When comparing core counts for these CPUs, we notice that the Core i9-12900KF has significantly more cores with 16 cores compared to the Core i7-6700K that has 4 cores. It also has more threads than the Core i7-6700K. Our comparison shows that the Core i7-6700K has a slightly higher clock speed compared to the Core i9-12900KF. Despite this, the Core i9-12900KF has a slightly higher turbo speed. A Core i7-6700K CPU outputs less heat than a Core i9-12900KF CPU because of its 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 i7-6700K has more threads than cores. Each physical core is split into multiple threads.

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