The Intel Broadwell-E Review: Core i7-6950X, i7-6900K, i7-6850K and i7-6800K Tested
by Ian Cutress on May 31, 2016 2:01 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
- Intel
- Enterprise
- Prosumer
- X99
- 14nm
- Broadwell-E
- HEDT
Professional Performance: Windows
Agisoft Photoscan – 2D to 3D Image Manipulation: link
Agisoft Photoscan creates 3D models from 2D images, a process which is very computationally expensive. The algorithm is split into four distinct phases, and different phases of the model reconstruction require either fast memory, fast IPC, more cores, or even OpenCL compute devices to hand. Agisoft supplied us with a special version of the software to script the process, where we take 50 images of a stately home and convert it into a medium quality model. This benchmark typically takes around 15-20 minutes on a high end PC on the CPU alone, with GPUs reducing the time.
Cinebench R15
Cinebench is a benchmark based around Cinema 4D, and is fairly well known among enthusiasts for stressing the CPU for a provided workload. Results are given as a score, where higher is better.
HandBrake v0.9.9: link
For HandBrake, we take two videos (a 2h20 640x266 DVD rip and a 10min double UHD 3840x4320 animation short) and convert them to x264 format in an MP4 container. Results are given in terms of the frames per second processed, and HandBrake uses as many threads as possible.
Hybrid x265
Hybrid is a new benchmark, where we take a 4K 1500 frame video and convert it into an x265 format without audio. Results are given in frames per second.
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unityole - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
well time to readDrumsticks - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
I've gotten through about half of it so far (and the conclusion) but man, those prices... Zen is supposed to be really, really close to Broadwell in IPC. Imagine that 8-core Zen part with 90-95% of BDW-E performance at 30% of the price. That would be really pretty nice.Great review so far, and I'm sure the rest is awesome!
SunLord - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
If Zen is 90% the performance of BDW-E then it will be priced to match that though I doubt they'll break $999. AMD will try and under cut Intel but it's not gonna give a away a great performing chip like it had to with the crappy cores it has nowjjj - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
lol 7$ per mm2 for top SKU is beyond outrageous. Anyone buying this deserves a nomination for the Darwin Awards.Zen can compete with Intel's 2 and 4 cores + pointless GPU on price, easily.
Railgun - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
Because dying in a stupid way is akin to buying an expensive chip. And since when would price per area be any useful metric?Shadow7037932 - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
>Zen can compete with Intel's 2 and 4 cores + pointless GPU on price, easily.That's what you're hoping for. For all we know, there could be some serious issues with Zen. Remember the TLB issue with the original Phenoms?
silverblue - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
...and the AVX memory write performance issues with Piledriver. Still, what architecture doesn't have bugs?Ratman6161 - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
I've been wanting to like AMD for a long time. I still remember the good old days of the Athlon 64 and 64 x2 when they used to beat Intel and at a lower price. but they keep on disappointing me. I'm taking an "I'll believe it when I see it approach"Azethoth - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
I think you mean we remember that one time the Athlon 64 beat intel and we bought it but everyone else stuck with Intel because Intel, or AMD is for gamers, or Intel being monopolistic.That is more than 10 years ago though and it seems that by stated policy those days are never coming back for AMD.
usernametaken76 - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
Eh, I remember prior to Athlon 64, just plain old Athlon XP, the value was tremendous compared to Intel. There was no sense in buying Intel if you were building a gaming rig, something for yourself to do basic computing tasks, etc. Intel was for suckers who bought business class desktops.