Over at Computex last week, Intel announced the anniversary edition Core i7-8086K, which they kind of did silently. Probably there was a good reason for that. The processor is advertised as 5 GHz processor, and while that is true you need to be ready for a big disappointment if you purchase one.
As we mentioned a couple of times already, the Core i7-8086K is nothing more than a six-core 14 nm Coffee Lake part rebadged from the Core i7-8700K. It has a 4.00 GHz base clock, with a maximum Turbo Boost frequency of 5.00 GHz. Until today it, however, was still unclear for how many threads the processor actually clocks towards 5.0 GHz. I initially expected one, with the rest of the turbo bins to be faster compared to the 8700K. Well, I’ve been finally able to confirm this. As it turns out the single digit difference is that 1 core actually clocks towards 5.0 GHz and the rest of the turbo bins clock precisely similar towards the Core i7 8700K. And yes, Intel will charge you an extra 75 bucks for a 6% frequency increase on just one core and the base frequency. Let me place the turbo bins in a table so you understand a little more what I am ranting about:
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| One core | Two cores | Three cores | Four cores | Five cores | Six cores | |
| Core i7-8086K | 5 GHz | 4.6 GHz | 4.5 GHz | 4.4 GHz | 4.4 GHz | 4.3 GHz |
| Core i7-8700K | 4.7 GHz | 4.6 GHz | 4.5 GHz | 4.4 GHz | 4.4 GHz | 4.3 GHz |
Amazing to see huh? Yeah, I nearly purchased one to be able to review it. I mean the 8700K by itself is an excellent processor of course. But the 8086K, that’s just money thrown away in a nice limited edition packaging. Of course, Core i7 8086K looks great in a forum signature. No guys seriously, the Core i7-8700K remains money better-spent, if you opt to choose between these two.
