Processors that support 64-bit computing on Intel® architecture require an Intel 64 architecture-enabled BIOS.

See http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/architecture-and-technology/hyper-threading/hyper-threading-technology.html?wapkw=hyper+threading for more information including details on which processors support Intel® HT Technology.While Intel Meteor Lake chips still use the same 10nm "Intel 7" process as the previous 12th-gen Alder Lake chips, the 13th-gen chips improve on the previous architecture in a number of key ways. The Core i5-14600K managed to pull less power overall while running the Adobe Premiere Pro PugetBench benchmark, though this was reversed when running Cinebench. Given the Core i5’s competitive performance compared with the Ryzen 7 7700X, we can clearly see that the Core i5-14600K and Core i5-13600K provide more efficiency overall. This is a bit less certain with the Ryzen 5 7600X, though, as its Cinebench power consumption was considerably lower. The big concern we have here: The climbing price of Core i5 processors will also likely mean budget-friendly options released further down the road will also cost more. This is a trend we have seen far too much of in recent years, and Intel certainly isn’t alone here, but that doesn’t counter our disappointment at this generational price increase. Is this a dealbreaker? Not yet, but if Intel thinks it can keep the top spot by just keeping its foot on the gas while AMD is making real investments in power efficiency within a single generation of processors, this won't be good for Intel in the long run. The Intel Core i7-13700K, meanwhile, is meant for more professional users who have more taxing workloads like professional designers, video editors, 3D modelers, and program developers. Gamers are also major targets for the 13700K, since many games require a lot of computational power at a fairly constant rate for long stretches of time, something very few other apps demand.

In the end, the Core i5-13600K outperforms the Ryzen 5 7600X by about 40%, while improving on the Core i5-12600K's performance by about 25%. As far as bottom line results go, this would make this processor a slam dunk, but one thing keeps this chip from true greatness: its power consumption. AMD’s Ryzen 9 and Ryzen 7 chips might have handily undercut their Core i9 and Core i7 competitors in terms of power consumption, but Intel’s Core i5 processors put up a respectable fight against the Ryzen 7 and Ryzen 5 CPUs. All in all, the Core i5-14600K did exactly as we expected in testing, matching the Core i5-13600K in almost every way. However, the difference is so slim as to leave us questioning why we would recommend it over the previous generation. We can’t really see any advantage to owning the Core i5-14600K over the Core i5-13600K, and we actually can see some disadvantages to it.

Idle States

The way the 13600K vs 13700K breaks down is that the i5-13600K is a more mainstream processor meant for everyday use, basic to moderate productivity, light media editing (like working with family photos and video), and moderate gaming. Intel's relative price increase with the Core i5-13600K is unwelcome. But we’ve run our tests and cannot deny that the Core i5-13600K still offers exceptional performance for what you pay. Sure, it isn't as fast as the Core i9-13900K or the AMD Ryzen 9 7950X in CPU tests (those flagships have a big core-count advantage), but in games with an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080—or anything weaker. really—it is more than a match for these two higher-end CPUs. Given this information, it seemed likely that these processors would trade places, depending on the test, but instead the Core i5-13600K performs better in every test. It doesn't win by a wide margin in some tests, but it does win. The Core i5-12600K, for its part, was left in the dust,and the Core i5-13600K even manages to perform slightly better than the 16-core Ryzen 9 7950X in a few tests. (That said, the Core i5 lost to the 16-core/32-thread Ryzen 9 7950X badly in most tests, as you'd expect.)