With all of that data out of the way, I’ll share some of my opinions. Having reviewed the
i9-10900K and
i7-10700K recently, we have a good idea of how those models fit into the current CPU landscape. In short, both are objectively good, but they’re also niche products.
The Core i9-10900K is unquestionably the world's fastest gaming processor, but its nearest rivals are within spitting distance and happen to offer a number of advantages. Because games don’t benefit in a meaningful way of 10 cores in 2020, the 10700K is just as good, and by extension the outgoing 9900K. Meanwhile, the
Ryzen 9 3900X will mostly deliver a gaming experience that is indistinguishable to the Core i9's, but there's a lower asking price, less power draw, and it's also much more powerful for productivity tasks.
The Core i7-10700K matches the price of the 3900X and that makes it a better value choice for gamers when compared to the 10900K, but it falls well short of Ryzen when it comes to productivity performance and performance per watt. In summary, the 10700K is either on par with the
3700X for a massive 40% price premium or much slower than the 3900X for the same price.
... the Core i5-10600K has the potential to deliver 10700K and 10900K-like performance at an even cheaper price point.
On the other hand, the Core i5-10600K has the potential to deliver 10700K and 10900K-like performance at an even cheaper price point. So for those seeking strong gaming performance and good value, the 10600K is an appealing option. When overclocked it can match the $400 and $500 parts, or at least get so close it doesn’t matter. That in my opinion makes it Intel’s best value high-end gaming CPU.
For those of you exclusively gaming, I can see how the Core i5-10600K makes sense. I should point out that under realistic gaming conditions, it's ~6% faster than the 3700X as seen in our 1080p data with the RTX 2080 Ti across 7 games. That margin is reduced to just 3% at 1440p. That being the case, I can also see how buying a processor with 25% less cores for roughly the same price might not be the wisest of investments moving forward. But, if you’re playing games such as Fortnite or PUBG, and you’re using competitive settings, then you'll see double-digit gains with the 10600K.
In short, if you’re after a powerful gaming CPU but don’t care about entering the realm of diminishing returns, then the Core i5-10600K is the part to get. However, if you’re after something a little more well-rounded it’s hard to pass on the
Ryzen 7 3700X with its ~30% better productivity performance.
If you’re seeking maximum value -- for both gaming and application tasks -- then it’s very difficult to ignore the Ryzen 5 3600 at
just $175, that’s an incredible deal which sees the 10600K cost 60% more, while offering a minor 6% speed bump in 1080p gaming.
But let's not stop at the CPU. The Core i5-10600K is even more expensive than that as it doesn’t come with a cooler and decent Z490 boards are more expensive than a good quality B450 or upcoming B550 motherboard. The cooler issue can be solved for just $30, but when you add in the price of the motherboard it starts to get more expensive. For example the MSI B450 Tomahawk Max costs $115 and supports the Ryzen 9 3950X, whereas the cheapest Z490 boards we’d recommend investing in cost around $190, like MSI’s Z490 Tomahawk.
Factor in $30 for an affordable tower cooler and $75 more for a decent Z490 motherboard, you’re at a little over $100 of additional costs to support the 10600K. If you plan to overclock to at least 5 GHz, you can double the price of the cooler. Factoring all that in, you're looking at having to pay at least $500 for the 10600K, with a decent entry-level Z490 motherboard and a budget tower cooler. The
Ryzen 5 3600 will set you back $290 with something like the MSI B450 Tomahawk Max. Coincidentally, that’s about what you’d pay for just the 10600K.
