
Temperatures were taken using Core Temp RC8, and confirmed with Asus’ AISuite III utility. We benchmarked both cores using Prime95 to load them for extended periods of time. In our tests, we locked all four cores at the same frequency - at 4.4GHz, our Core i7-4790K is technically overclocked by 4.7% (at least, compared to how Intel normally implements Turbo Mode). The Core i7-4770K therefore runs Prime95 at 3.7GHz on all four cores, while the Core i7-4790K runs at 4.2GHz. Haswell changed this - the Turbo Mode frequency for all four cores is now typically 200MHz below the maximum speed.

In the past, Intel quad-cores would often hit full Turbo frequency on all four cores, even under full load.

One thing to be aware of is that Haswell’s Turbo mode operates somewhat differently than other Intel chips. Using the Voltair means that our power consumption figures for the CPU are about 50W higher than they’d otherwise be - so keep that in mind when checking our results. It’s also absolutely massive and weighs well over three pounds - so much, in fact, that we test it in a tower lying on its side (I’m not gutsy enough to try lifting the thing given that Intel specifies a maximum heat sink weight of about 1.5 pound when this weights twice that). The Voltair is unique among air coolers in that it incorporates a Peltier cold plate directly into the heat sink design. When the Core i7-4770K launched it appeared to confirm that trend, but does Devil’s Canyon herald a return to the good old days of scaling? To find out, we outfitted both cores with the largest air-cooler we’ve ever tested - the V3 Voltair. Two years ago, we predicted that the overclocking business was headed for a slow death as future CPU cores would have less and less headroom.

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