Intel Core i7 970

After the Core i7 980X, Intel has brought a second six-core processor for the general consumer: the Core i7 970. What's the difference between the two? The clock... and that's it! The Core i7 980X runs at 3.33 GHz and the i7 970 runs at 3.20 GHz.

For the rest, both have the same technologies such as Hyper-threading, which allows you to best use the different cores, and Turbo mode. This mode allows you to increase the clock of the processor depending on the number of cores being used. From 3.20 GHz, the i7 970 can thus go up to 3.46 GHz (3.60 GHz on the 980X).


In practice, the differences in clock translate to a little over 3% difference in performance. Not too much of a lag then for this processor which is very rapid across the board.

For a more detailed analysis of the Core i7 900 six-core series, we refer you to the detailed test of the Core i7 980X. In particular you'll see a breakdown of the benefits of the 32nm engraving and look at gaming performance.

Lastly, don't forget the performance index table gives you an overall view of performances for all the processors we've reviewed.

Power Use	Performance: Applications	Performance: Games

View Performance Index Table