Intel Core i7-4960X Extreme Edition Processor Review

System Overview & Testing Procedures
We will be directly comparing the Intel i7-4960X to the previous generations i7-3970X processor. The processors specifications are extremely close, which means this will be a good test to see what Intel has improved in this generation. The i7-3970X has a default clock speed of 3.5 GHz and a turbo boost up to 4.0 GHz. The i7-4960X has a default clock speed of 3.6 GHz and a turbo boost up to 4.0 GHz.

Since the i7-4960X uses the same LGA2011 socket as the previous generation we will be using the same system for testing. Our test system is comprised of the following components.

Processor: Intel Core i7-4960X / i7-3970x
Motherboard: ASUS P9X79 Pro
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680
Memory: 16GB Kingston 10th Anniversary DDR3-2400
Power: Thermaltake Smart 750W
Storage: 120GB SSD
Cooling: Noctua NH-U12S
Case: Cooler Master Cosmos II with 5 fans

Before we started testing we set the optimized defaults in the BIOS. Then we went ahead and enabled the XMP settings for our memory.

I have separated our benchmark testing into 3 separate categories and you can see below.

CPU Testing
AIDA64
– CPU Queen
– CPU PhotoWorxx
– CPU ZLib
– CPU AES
– CPU Hash
X264 HD Benchmark 5.0
Sisoftware Sandra
– Processor Arithmetic
– Processor Multimedia
CINEBENCH R11.5 64-Bit

Overall System Testing & Video
PCMark 8
PCMark 11
3DMark
3DMark 11

Gaming
Alien vs. Predator
BioShock Infinite
Sleeping Dogs

Let’s get into testing!

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