Good evening all,

I just went to pickup my new motherboard (MSI Pro Z690-A) and CPU, I originally went with the intention of picking up the i7-12700K and after a long chat with a very knowledgeable sales guy who I have dealt with before I actually came away with the i5-12600K. He asked me what I was planning to do with my new build and I told him it was exclusively for MSFS 2020 with some video editing using Davinici resolve. He was in the same boat last year and was ready to buy the i7-12700K but went for the i5-12600K and a 3070TI instead and it handles every game he throws at it with ease as well as streaming at the same time. He could easily just have sold me the more expensive CPU but he chose to take the time to talk with me and find out what my usage will be, that is a huge plus in my books. I already purchased a EVGA FTW3 Ultra 3080TI which I am super happy with.

I have 14 days to decide whether or not I want to change the CPU to the i7, I am not planning on opening everything for the next few days. The dilemma I am having is will I suffer from buyers remorse if I keep the i5 over the i7? On paper single core performance between the two is almost nothing but here in Canada the i7 is around $150 plus taxes more.

I would love to hear from anyone who has the i5-12600K with either a 3080/3080TI and what your experience has been. When I brought my current CPU in 2019 it was then rated as an all round good choice for gaming and to be fair has performed really well, it overclocked out of the box @ 5Ghz and hasn't missed a beat since.

I really am torn lol this is one of the hardest upgrades decisions I have had to make so please help me 🙂 

Richard

Edited June 22, 20223 yr by RJC68

According to this recent review, which shows results for both processors you mention, there is not much in it at 1080p (roughly 3-5% in favour of the i7), which would be even less at higher resolutions. Whether that is worth the price difference is up to you.

Depends if you have the money to burn. I don't think the extra cores/hyperthreading bring much benefit to MFS. In fact, in the ended I ended up with an i5-12400F.

i bought the 12700F because it was only 20.00 higher than the 12600k, and 70.00 cheaper than the 12700k. Thats what i paid during the prime sale over the past couple days. Keeping your cpu cool is gonna play the biggest roll in fps from everything i read. I know the fps goes up alot more on the non K chips 12700F,12600F, 12400F on and on if you max the power level out unimited un Intel Xtu and will push the 65W non K chips to 125w like the k series chips. keeping your cpu cool will allow your cpu's to reach max boost clocks regardless of the cpu you have. I plan on putting a custom water loop together because it keeps my previous cpu's maxed out in the 50-60C range. That cost me about 120.00 to throw together cheap, But thats worth it too me.

1 hour ago, Patriot3810 said:

i bought the 12700F because it was only 20.00 higher than the 12600k, and 70.00 cheaper than the 12700k. Thats what i paid during the prime sale over the past couple days. Keeping your cpu cool is gonna play the biggest roll in fps from everything i read. I know the fps goes up alot more on the non K chips 12700F,12600F, 12400F on and on if you max the power level out unimited un Intel Xtu and will push the 65W non K chips to 125w like the k series chips. keeping your cpu cool will allow your cpu's to reach max boost clocks regardless of the cpu you have. I plan on putting a custom water loop together because it keeps my previous cpu's maxed out in the 50-60C range. That cost me about 120.00 to throw together cheap, But thats worth it too me.

I ended up getting the 12700K, I had budgeted for that and it is what I wanted.

I have had my system built now for a couple of weeks with a fresh Win 11 Pro installation and I am very happy, performance is stellar with my EVGA 3080TI FTW3. I decided to stick with a Noctua air cooler and went for the exact same NH-D15S but the black version and it looks wicked. I have rarely seen the temps above 60 degrees in MSFS on my CPU.

I had a little chuckle today, I went to my computer store to grab a new WD Black NVME and the guy behind me at the checkout was buying a 1,200W power supply. On my way out I looked at him and said "Getting a 40 series GPU are we" His reply was "maybe, I just hope I can afford the hydro bill when I fire up my PC with a 1.2KW power supply in it" We both laughed.

Seriously a 1.2KW power supply in a PC that is just insane beyond all belief lol

Yeah it's very odd for sure.  Most industry's are seeing power reduction and efficiency gain.  Certainly not the case with gaming machines