i5-13600KF

Updating my review for mid 2025, this processor is a beast, it has enough power to handle anything I've thrown at it. it's stable and safe so long as you have the correct bios. It's easy to install but it does run hot. I'd strongly recommend a 360 aio or Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 which is what I have on mine right now. The vetroo V5 which is a fantastic budget cooler struggles at load even with push-pull fan set-up. With adequate cooling my bench marks match or beat the 14600 with zero over clocking and over a year of use with zero signs of degradation which was a real concern for this generation.

A beast of a gaming CPU. I am currently using this CPU in a stream pc, and it handles every task that I throw at it. Just make sure to have a good CPU cooler attached to it to maintain the performance.

I come from an i5 4690k, no complains about that processor. But wow, everything is snappy now! Most apps loading is almost instantaneous, with the same SATA SSD that I used before. I had to manually adapt my old cooling system, because the mounting size was different, but eventually I will change it. This CPU takes more power that my previous processor, so when it hits 130 or 150 watts the AIO fan spins and the temps go up to 80+ or 90+ °C. Power saving mode from the mobo helps when it happens if you dont want to keeo temps at that numbers, but I guess it's all normal with this moddel. Iddle temps go from 28 to 34 with an old 140mm Corsair AIO. Below 100 watts it remains under 70-80, again I assume it's normal. The degradation issue reported with 13th and 14th generation got me worried for sure, but I got my mobo updated to the lastes BIOS, so we will see how it goes. For 175 dollars, no other CPU was close in performance. Great value and performance overall so far!

There was a ton of controversy around this generation of @intel CPUS. Mine has been a beast. Probably a little over kill for my PC but, oh well. Welcome to the master race! It is fast, consistent, I've had no issues... however, I do use a pretty strong AIO Cooler with it.

Works as should, good budget cpu for gaming.

Let’s be real, most gamers do not need more than 165fps in 2024 Call of Duty Black Ops 6. I likely get over 1000 frames in Fortnite with low graphics settings. You can pretty much get away with any game if you’re a casual player. Now if I was a streamer, or very highly competitive FPS gamer, then yes 240+ is probably normal across all games. At that point you do need an RTX 4090 paired with the latest greatest 14900k or 7800x3d etc. Point is, this CPU and my 4070 will ride me through the next 4 years before i do another full upgrade (if I’m still gaming by then). This CPU is great and actually an incredible value for the price.

This CPU is powerful enough to run my pc super fast. I have a simple air cooler, and the temps do get a bit hot, so I wish that was better. It did get too hot one time when playing Black Ops 6 and shut down my computer on me, but I restarted it and gave it more ventilation. My room was fairly warm, which could have contributed to this. I bought an AIO cooler to combat this problem. Other than that, the CPU has been very stable, and I’ve been able to play demanding games with no problem. For reference I also have a 4070 super, ASUS B760 motherboard, and 32GB of DDR5 Ram. For a decent pc on a budget, this CPU is the way to go especially for the price point, but it’s definitely not perfect or the most powerful in its generation so keep that in mind.

I was on the fence about upgrading from i5 12400f, which is a beast of a cpu. Some pros and cons. My specs: RTX 4070ti, z790 ddr5 gigabyte mobo, 32 gb fury ram, 1tb WD black SSD gen 4. Pros: More cores Noticeably faster in some areas like booting and some applications. Some triple A GPU bound games will get a noticeable FPS boost. (Not huge, talking 3-10 at most). CPU bound games (emulators for me) will get much better stability and cpu usage reduction. Cons: If you are looking for energy efficiency these 13th gen and higher chips are NOT it. More cores means more energy draw for sure. On Triple A games the chip is using 20-30 watts more electricity. In emulators like RPCS3 it’s nearly double. I went from 30- 40 watt average to average 80 and in some instances spiked above 100. The good thing is emulators are much less GPU bound so the wattage balances out, sort of. Heat- I’m running an AIO lian li 360 Galahad, with the 12400f I was nearly always running at room temp (my house gets lots of shade and stays cool/cold) so I was used to 22c range. With the 13600k you will see a 10 degree increase even at idle. Emulators will get into the 60s while triple A games 40s and 50s. With the 12400f my fan curve rarely ever triggered high fan speeds. With the 13th gen you will definitely hear those fans work at load. Side notes I tried the 13600k on two mobos (z790 and 690) you can use it on older 690 compatible mobos, you just need to flash bios to latest. It was super easy on the gigabyte z790 and 690 mobo. Overall. The performance jump is noticeable in some games. But far more noticeable is the increase in heat and wattage usage. If you have a 12th gen and are on the fence you really don’t need to upgrade, however depending on what you are doing with it could be the main factor. I wanted my RPCS3 to run at 60fps in 4k constantly and the 13600k did the trick. (playing MGS4 guns of the patriots in 4k and stable is unreal!)