More Intel i5 7640K and i7 7740K Details Emerge

Yesterday, some surprising rumours came out about Intel’s response to Ryzen. Due to the new threat posed by AMD’s new Zen architecture, Intel was reportedly preparing the i7 7740K and i7 7640K as their response. One of the interesting tidbits was that the i5 7640K would be featuring HyperThreading. Despite the logic of such a move, that no longer appears to be the case on the latest report out today.

According to new reports, the i7 7740K and i5 7640K are not going to be based on the LGA 1151 platform. Instead, they form part of the Kaby Lake-X lineup on the new X299 LGA 2066 HEDT platform. As we’ve noted before, Kaby Lake-X complements Skylake-X by offering quad-core solutions for X299. The main differentiator compared to Z270 is the higher clock speeds, premium platform, and even higher TDP. Underneath, they are the same Kaby Lake-S dies with iGPU disabled and better TIM.

The i7 7740K reportedly clocks in at 4.3 GHz base and 4.5 GHz boost with a TDP of 112W. This is backed up by HyperThreading and 8MB of L3 cache. The i5 7640K is more interesting as it is reportedly coming in at 4 GHz base and 4 GHz boost at the same 112W TDP. I’m of the opinion that these numbers aren’t the real ones. Despite lacking HyperThreading, it would be the first i5 ever on the HEDT platform. Both are limited to dual channel DDR4 as well.

These two chips finally bring back the quad-core game to the HEDT, something missing since the Ivy Bridge-E days. The goal is to provide an alternative to the expensive hexa-cores on LGA 2066 and allow easier access tot he HEDT platform to combat Ryzen. It will be interesting to see how this all plays out in the end with AMD and intel battling it out once more.