Haswell’s successor is code named “Devil’s Canyon” and it’s here for us to check out today. And it turns out that the LGA 1150 socketed processor is compatible with both Z87 and Z97 motherboards which is great news for all enthusiasts. In short, Devil’s Canyon has two major revisions, which include a better thermal interface underneath the aluminum cap and a higher 4GHz base operating frequency than Haswell. The two simple questions we asked right away are, does the new processor actually run cooler than Haswell? And, will that 4GHz base frequency be an advantage without melting down itself? With the latest Z97 hardware in hand, we find out!
Features and Specifications
From just this table, you should be able to see the biggest change is the Base and Turbo frequencies. Haswell starts at 3.5 and Turbos to 3.9 GHz. Devil’s Canyon starts at 4 GHz and Turbos to 4.4 GHz. What this means is that CPU intensive applications and projects should speed along more noticeably, than previous incremental updates. But, it also means heat dissipation is very important to keep cool.
To handle the thermal physics, Intel has refined the die architecture to require less idle voltage, achieving the frequencies using a similar load voltage to Haswell, and they have also improved the thermal interface under the aluminum IHS top. A huge complaint of Haswell, leading to much “delidding” and repasting, to achieve higher overclocks.
The processor itself has two new updates I’m happy to see. The first is Directed I/O (VT-d). This is good news for users who run VMs. It was missing from the 4770K which I can personally attest, was a little behind the curve in that arena. The second update is Intel TSX-NI which should make programmers happy.
According to February 2012 article by James Reinder, TSX-NI is useful for shared-memory multithreaded applications that employ fine grain and course grain lock-based synchronization mechanisms. Any time execution can be increased, it’s always a good thing.
Test System Setup
To keep things simple and neat, I tested the Intel Core i7-4790K on both a Z97 and Z87 motherboard. The same CPU cooler, memory, SSD, graphics, and power supply was used on each test system in an open test bench.
- Processor: Intel Core i7-4790K Devil’s Canyon
- Motherboard 1: GIGABYTE GA-Z87X-UD7 TH
- Motherboard 2: ASUS Z97 Sabertooth Mark I
- Memory: Kingston HyperX Beast 2x8GB
- Storage: Kingston HyperX 240GB SSD
- Graphics: ZOTAC GTX 770 2GB
- Power: be Quiet 850 Watt Dark Power Pro 10 (80Plus Gold)
- CPU Cooling: be Quiet Dark Rock Pro 3
In motherboard reviews, I set a maximum operating temperature of 80C and 1.4 volts as the threshold. However, in these tests, we’re pushing up to 90C and 1.45 volts respectively. Keep in mind that there is a very good chance your processor performance will degrade over extended use at these more extreme levels. The room temperature is 20C which is a good comfortable level.
In terms of software, our operating system of choice will be Windows 7 professional, and we’ll be using SANDRA Mathematical and Multimedia, Cinebench R11.5, Graysky 5.0 H.264, PCMark7, Assassin’s Creed III, Battlefield 4, and Crysis 3. Each of these will give you an idea of the execution and internal bandwidth capabilities.
Thermal testing will be done underneath the very capable be quiet! Dark Rock Pro 3 cooler, and that completes our suite of tests. Short and sweet. Let’s get on with it!
PCMark7
Kicking things off, we use PCMark7 to set an overall direction of where the benchmarks should go. And based on the testing, PCMark7 seems heavily influenced by the 4790K’s higher operating frequencies. Which is to be expected. An overclocked 4790K scores the highest we’ve ever seen from a quad core processor, kicking out 8 threads. This chart came from our recently launched Intel Z97 motherboard round up, so make sure you have a look if you want extra information on potential platform performance differences.
Let’s move on to the more CPU vs CPU specific benches.
SANDRA Mathematical and Multimedia
With SANDRA, we see that most of the scores make sense, but then get a little odd in the multimedia integer score. Our 4770K must have some kind of magical cache because it scores higher for some reason. Even after repeated runs. After talking with other engineers, it turns out these scores are pretty accurate meaning the 4790K scored lower as well. Interesting. Let’s move on.
Cinebench R11.5
In order to make the comparisons more interesting, we include results from other platforms. Overall, it’s pretty close in most respects. Cinebench utilizes both CPU frequency and the interplay between cores, to score the benchmark. While the newer CPUs didn’t need much help, it’s still impressive that the older Core i7 3770K could be overclocked to reach them as well. Pretty impressive really.
Graysky 5.0 H.264
Again, the difference between the 4.0 to 4.4 GHz operating frequencies of the 4770K and 4790K make all the difference. Of course, this benchmark is heavily influenced by CAS 7 memory timings. The 3770K doesn’t benefit nearly as much from lower timings it seems.
7Zip Compression
Higher clock speeds make a big difference in this test, and the 4.4GHz frequency of Devil’s Canyon sure makes a difference in this benchmark. The 4790K should make quicker work of your bigger zipped projects, and should make even quicker work of them when overclocked.
With the synthetic benchmarks out of the way, let’s check out the gaming performance, do some thermal testing, and take it home!
Integrated GPU Gaming Performance
Starting with the generational differences between the Integrated Graphics, we start our gaming performance benches with them first. Curiously, the scores were almost identical. But of course, if you’re going to get a serious game on, an integrated graphics solution will be required. However, we will need to revisit this later, to see if there are any generational differences with Intel Quick Sync enabled applications.
Discrete GPU Gaming Performance
When paired with a capable graphics card, the scores are expected to go up. And then we see that, for most intents and purposes, for a gaming rig, the outgoing Core i7-4770K will game just fine. Or for that matter, so does the 3770K under gaming loads. These are all very high settings with DX11 tessellation making it pretty to watch. So we can safely say that, if you’re looking for a substantial upgrade in gaming performance, the M.2 slots on the Z97 boards will help you load everything faster, but you can probably keep your 3770K or 4770K.
Thermal Testing
When I first saw the top end full 100% resource core load temps, I cringed a little. But there’s a couple things to consider when you look at the temps. One, the idle temperature of the 4790K is better all around, especially idle. And two, the minimum core load operating frequency is 4 GHz jumping to 4.4 GHz, which we expect, should generate a bit more heat. But we also expected that the new thermal considerations (like the new IHS interface and other tweaks), should have lowered the temps even more overall.
However, Devil’s Canyon definitely Turbos up quicker than its predecessor, using very similar voltage. But overclocking does seem stunted due to high temps with even moderate efforts. We’ll have to look at this further in another article.
Final Thoughts
So how do we score Devil’s Canyon? It’s a very fast Haswell refresh that has no architectural equal. Stock clock users will love it thanks to a stock 4 GHz core which turbos to 4.4 GHz quickly, so you can get more done in less time. Although it seems that this is all we’re going to get out of the Haswell core without some significant breakthroughs or new advancements. We’re happy to get faster core operating frequencies, but enthusiasts however won’t be thrilled by Devil’s Canyon’s high operating temps, despite the efforts of the Intel team, to help tame it with an improved IHS and thermal compound.
Because of Devil’s Canyon’s high operating temps, in exchange for higher performance, at stock load, our excellent be quiet! Dark Rock Pro 3 hit 70C with the 4790K, making the 4770K 60C seem so much cooler. At an overclocked 4.8 GHz, 4790K rises to 85C easily. So to ensure stable and cool system performance, we recommend a cooler that can manage at least 220 Watts TDP. Anything with higher TDP will offer the best overclocking results. This basically means that you should throw out the stock cooler, if you haven’t already done so.
We can only imagine the challenge of cooling Devil’s Canyon in hotter climates. As long as you keep it cool, it’ll run for years and years. That said, Devil’s Canyon is recommended for those that need the very best quad core stock performance but not recommended for overclocking enthusiasts with limited thermal cooling experience.
We’ll try some other methods in an upcoming review, to see what it takes to tame Devil’s Canyon a bit more, and hit some overclocks worth talking about. But we’d still recommend it, if you’re building a new system today, and want great stock, out of the box, performance. Although we’ll have to knock the score down a tick over the Core i7 4770K because of the heat.
Pros:
- Stock 4GHz with Turbo up to 4.4 GHz
- Idle temps are very low
- Consumes only a few more watts than the at stock clocks 4770K
- The fastest Quad-Core processor out there
Cons:
- Retail CPU doesn’t come with much needed higher performance heatsink
- Limited overclocking due to heat
Overall Rating: 8.5 / 10.0
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