Intel Xeon E3-1281 v3 vs Intel Core i7 X 980

Xeon E3-1281 v3 vs Core i7 X 980 benchmarks

Our benchmark analysis concludes that the Xeon E3-1281 v3 performs better than the Core i7 X 980. Furthermore, our gaming benchmark shows that it also outperforms the Core i7 X 980 in all gaming tests too.

In terms of the number of cores of each of these CPUs, the Core i7 X 980 has significantly more cores than the Xeon E3-1281 v3. Indeed, the Core i7 X 980 has 6 cores compared to 4 cores found in the Xeon E3-1281 v3. It also has more threads than the Xeon E3-1281 v3. Our comparison shows that the Xeon E3-1281 v3 has a slightly higher clock speed compared to the Core i7 X 980.

Most CPUs have more threads than cores. This technology, colloquially called hyperthreading, improves performance by splitting a core into multiple virtual ones. This provides more efficient utilisation of a core. Indeed, the Xeon E3-1281 v3 has more threads than cores. Each physical core is split into multiple threads.