Intel Core i7-13790F And i5-13490F Black Edition CPUs Spotted At Retail
Intel is expanding its 13th Gen Core processor lineup with a couple of new desktop CPU additions, those being the Core i7-13790F and Core i5-13490F. While neither chip has been formally introduced, both SKUs do show up in an official Intel document. They've also been spotted at retail, with at least one of them boasting faster clocks and more cache than the "xxx00F" variants they're based on.
These "xxx90F" iterations are often referred to as Black Edition CPUs, though that's an unofficial designation based on the black retail packaging. This is notable because AMD had, for a time, marketed and sold actual Black Edition processors, with those chips sporting unlocked multipliers for easier overclocking (like the FX-8350 Black Edition from over a decade ago).
In any event, a material declaration data sheet (MDDS) at Intel reveals that the Core i7-13790F and Core i5-13490F do exist, though it doesn't shed any light on the specifications or pricing. For those bits, we have to turn to Twitter, where @wxnod posted a CPU-Z screenshot (more on that in a moment), and to a retail site in China.
As it pertains to the latter, a product listing for the Core i5-13490F at JD.com reveals that it is a 10-core/16-thread processor with 6 P-cores and 4 E-cores, just like the Core i5-13400F. However, the Core i5-13490F can turbo to 4.8GHz, which is 200MHz faster than the Core i5-13400F. It also wields a bit more L3 cache—24MB versus 20MB.
The asking price for the Core i5-13490F is 1,599 Chinese Yuan, which is equivalent to around $236. For reference, you can snag a Core i5-13400F for $209.97 on Amazon. Actual pricing doesn't usually covert so neatly from one region to another, but it's moot for US buyers anyway—we suspect these new additions will be limited to the Chinese market, just like the previous generation Core i5-12490F.
Looking at the CPU-Z screenshot, the Core i5-13490F scores 779.7 in the single-threaded test and 6,834.5 in the multi-threaded test. A recent validated CPU-Z run for the Core i5-13400F shows it scoring 669 in the single-threaded test and 6,461 in the multi-threaded test. If going by those numbers, the Core i5-13490F is around 16.5 percent and 5.8 percent faster, respectively.
Not too shabby, though obviously this is just one set of benchmarks. Still, a 200MHz bump at the top end and 4MB of additional L3 cache should improve performance in some situations, just not dramatically in most situations.
Details for the Core i7-13790F are more difficult to pin down. There's no direct retail listing that we're aware of like there is for the Core i5-13490F at JD.com, just the ability to add the chip as part of a motherboard and CPU bundle. The only things to note are that, like the Core i5-13490F, the Core i7-13790F lacks integrated graphics (as indicated by the "F" designation) and doesn't have an unlocked multiplier (as denoted by the lack of a "K" designation). We can also reasonably assume it has a 65W TDP.
