Pros
- Superb gaming performance
- Ten cores for how much?!
- High clock speed
- Cheap motherboards available
Cons
- Higher power draw than 12th Gen model
- No secret overclocking 🙁
- AMD’s cheapest Zen 4 CPUs best for content creation
When considering a gaming PC, the Core i5 stands out as the most cost-effective CPU option. Throughout much of 2022, we endorsed the Core i5 12600K as the premier gaming CPU, while the Core i5 12400 was recognized as the optimal choice for budget-conscious gamers. In the previous year, the Core i5 13600K ascended to the leading position. Currently, the Core i5 13400F surpasses Alder Lake, offering an even more remarkable specification for the price.
The Intel Core i5 13400F is a processor I have eagerly anticipated testing since I first learned about it last year. The specifications will clarify my enthusiasm: it features a 10-core architecture consisting of six Performance-cores (P-cores) and four Efficient-cores (E-cores), resulting in a total of 16 threads. The highest-performing cores can achieve a clock speed of up to 4.6GHz straight from the factory, a frequency that would have been considered typical for a Core i7 just a few years ago.
In light of its remarkable specifications, the Core i5 is assigned a, as recommended by Intel. When comparing alternatives, this amount is slightly higher than the Core i5 12400 from the previous year, yet it is AMD’s Ryzen 5 7600.
Consequently, as an individual who has been contentedly utilizing an Intel Core i7 6700K for the past six or seven years, which is currently housed in a computer I assembled for my partner, I find myself contemplating an upgrade to a more recent processor for the first time.
It is truly remarkable on paper, and it maintains its impressive performance during testing.
The Core i5 13400F performs just a few frames below the Core i9 13900K in titles such as Total War: Three Kingdoms, Metro Exodus, and F1 2021. However, in Far Cry 6, this processor exhibits a notable performance gap compared to Intel’s premium offerings, indicating that Far Cry 6 is more constrained by CPU performance than the aforementioned games. A similar, albeit less pronounced, trend is observed in Shadow of the Tomb Raider.
Even in these two games where the Core i5 13400F does not match the speed of the more advanced 13th Gen processors, it still outperforms last year’s top gaming CPU, the Core i5 12600K. Additionally, it is considerably faster than the Core i5 12400, although it consumes more power in comparison.
The Core i5 13400F lacks support for BCLK overclocking, a feature we greatly appreciated in the Core i5 12400. Intel restricts multiplier overclocking to its K-series processors, which means that neither the Core i5 13400F nor the Core i5 12400 was intended to support this capability. Nevertheless, several motherboard manufacturers enabled BCLK overclocking for non-K 12th Gen processors. With such an overclock applied, reaching 4.8GHz, the Core i5 12400 outperforms the Core i5 13400F in certain gaming scenarios.
Nevertheless, I would choose the Core i5 13400F for its additional cores, even if it required sacrificing the unauthorized overclocking features of its predecessor.
AMD currently offers a robust lineup of Zen 4 processors to rival Intel’s Raptor Lake. Although the 3D V-Cache variants appear to be the most formidable competitors against Intel, their high price point makes them less relevant when compared to the Core i5. Instead, the i5 13400F is directly competing with the Ryzen 5 7600X, which is but is typically available for around in the current market, as well as the Ryzen 5 7600.
In our evaluations, neither the Core i5 13400F nor the Ryzen 5 7600X can be declared the definitive victor across the entire testing suite. However, when the AMD processor outperforms, it does so by a significant margin. The AMD chip clearly excels in productivity and content creation tasks, albeit at a higher price point. Additionally, motherboards compatible with AMD tend to be more costly compared to the more affordable Intel-compatible 600-series boards, resulting in an overall increase of approximately for the X-series AMD option. At present, the Core i5 13400F is priced aroundon Newegg, while the Ryzen 5 7600X is available for.
Intel’s platform offers an unexpectedly low cost for both the latest 700-series motherboards and the previous 600-series models. Additionally, there is a slight financial advantage with the ‘F’ designated variant. The ‘F’ indicates that the Core i5 13400F does not feature integrated graphics, which is not a significant drawback. In most cases, the integrated GPU is not particularly useful for gaming, and even the most affordable discrete graphics card available today will significantly surpass its performance.
It is advisable to combine this CPU with either AMD’s RX 6600 or RX 6600 XT, both of which have significantly enhanced their value following recent price reductions. Additionally, the recent price drop of Intel’s Arc A750 allows for an all-Intel budget-friendly option that can deliver commendable 1080p performance. However, it is important to note that a more advanced GPU will still yield excellent results when paired with the Core i5 13400, as demonstrated by our benchmark tests utilizing an RTX 3080.
It is important to note an additional point regarding the Core i5 13400F. In contrast to the other 13th Generation processors that have been evaluated thus far, the Core i5 13400F does not fully leverage the advantages offered by the new Raptor Lake architecture. The situation is rather intricate.
Intel employs both the new Raptor Lake and the older Alder Lake dies in the production of the Core i5 13400F. Although the final product remains consistent regardless of the die utilized, this results in the absence of the L2 cache enhancement that Intel implemented with Raptor Lake for the Core i5 13400F. However, it is important to note that while the Core i5 13400F may be perceived as merely an Alder Lake variant, it actually features a greater cache capacity than the Core i5 12400F due to an increase in core count. Nevertheless, it does not offer the additional L2 cache per core that is characteristic of the more advanced Raptor Lake processors.
This serves as a reminder regarding the variation in cache allocation per core between Alder Lake and Raptor Lake.
To clarify, the Core i5 13400F can be viewed as a Core i5 12600KF that has been intentionally downclocked or designed to resemble one. The distinction between the two is largely inconsequential; however, you can determine whether your processor is based on the Raptor Lake or Alder Lake architecture by checking the CPU revision in software like CPU-Z. A B0 stepping indicates Raptor Lake, while a C0 stepping signifies Alder Lake. The sample we reviewed is identified as a C0 chip.
Now that we have addressed the preliminary matters, let us return to the main focus: the Core i5 13400F. This processor is undoubtedly impressive. It boasts numerous advantages, including rapid gaming performance and a robust architecture featuring 10 cores, which renders any older four-core CPU significantly obsolete. Although the Core i5 13600K is still regarded as the top choice for gaming CPUs, and AMD offers strong competition in the approximately, Intel’s Core i5 13400F is clearly positioned as the leading budget gaming CPU for 2023.