Did I do wrong for buying an i9-12900k?

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Least_Comedian_3508@reddit

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eatingpotatochips@reddit

“ the amount of CPU's that were affected was in the single-digit percentile” that’s just straight up disinformation.

If only this wasn't a Google search away

https://www.pugetsystems.com/blog/2024/08/02/puget-systems-perspective-on-intel-cpu-instability-issues/?srsltid=AfmBOoqF5bVGzGNVzPn0PHG7XeSApHK148DHDC7L8fjoDk49vIYVhgs_

Based on the failure rate data we currently have, it is interesting to see that 14th Gen is still nowhere near the failure rates of the Intel Core 11th Gen processors back in 2021 and also substantially lower than AMD Ryzen 5000 (both in terms of shop and field failures) or Ryzen 7000 (in terms of shop failures, if not field).

Honestly, I think you should read a little more carefully. From the same article:

Since that time, our stance at Puget Systems has been to mistrust the default settings on any motherboard. Instead, we commit internally to test and apply BIOS settings — especially power settings — according to our own best practices, with an emphasis on following Intel and AMD guidelines.

The most concerning part of all of this to us here at Puget Systems is the rise in the number of failures in the field, which we haven’t seen this high since 11th Gen.

We believe that our commitment to internally developed power settings is why we have been much less impacted than others by these Intel stability issues.

To summarize, Puget Systems is an outlier because they apparently set custom power settings on every system they ship out, and yet are still experiencing an elevated amount of failures. Of course, this is somewhat of a puff piece where they're patting themselves on the back for doing so, but the implications are still relevant.

Apparently, even if you followed Intel's own guidelines from the moment 13th and 14th released, you'd still have a higher rate of processor degradation than normal. This issue is not fixable by the end user. Only Intel microcode can do anything about it, and we still don't really know if it works or not. Couple that with the fact that most people out there have no idea where to even begin adjusting CPU power settings in their BIOS, even if someone told them to do so, and the situation looks pretty grim.

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eatingpotatochips@reddit

Puget could not have known what power settings were required to prevent chip degradation, especially before the issue was known. The power settings could've easily been to reduce heat production or total system power draw.

Only Intel microcode can do anything about it, and we still don't really know if it works or not

If this is the case, Puget changing the power settings shouldn't have done anything, so why even bring up custom power settings?

There still hasn't been anyone who has provided a source to the actual Intel 13th and 14th gen failure rates. If you don't like the source I provided, you are welcome to provide your own.

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Sea_Outside@reddit

nah stop dooming like the typical reddit idiot. it wasn't as bad as you're making it out to be since it was a voltage problem and most people are either too tech illiterate or lazy to overlock their system or even tweak it in anyway. the average consumer just powers on their pc and uses it

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ADB225@reddit

OMG..her we go again with someone posting Pugetsystems crap and others talking about voltage problem like it was the consumer doing it!

No one is dooming anything..Intel f'ed up big time, twice. and is getting it's backside handed to it with RMA's. First issue was an oxidation issue, and Intel kept mum about it even going so far as to deny an issue and deny RMAs. the run was small, about 4 months but none were called back. however and have since been yanked from retail.

The second was a microcode issue. Basically the CPU's could cook themselves without the consumer having to do anything. It was mostly upper tier i7s and i9s 13/14th gen however a number of upper tier i5s were also affected. Hence why they all got an extra 2yr warranty.

The new microcodes have been rolled out and will take time to see if they did the job. I tell folks you want a brand new 13/14th gen, go for it as long as the motherboard has the update microcode. No doom no gloom

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Cradenz@reddit

Oxidation only was an issue for a small amount of batches for 13th gen. 14th gen did not have that issue.

We can see the new microcode stops transient voltage spikes.

On my apex encore it has a transient spike monitor shows that it no longer has spikes of 1.56-1.6v

I can say that it has been fixed.

Again. If you want to be mad at Intel for being shady and not telling people about the oxidation issue then that’s fine. But AMD has had scummy shit too so you have to be mad at them as well if you’re not a fanboy.

Still Intel has a lower failure rate the. AMD 5000, 7000 and Intel 11th gen. Numbers don’t lie

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ADB225@reddit

If you notice i was replying to Sea Outside. Did I mention anywhere at all about AMD or earlier Intel units? Did i mention anywhere about 14th Gen having the issue of oxidation? It wasn't just the oxidation issue I mentioned and it was a lot more than a small batch. Small run yes but 4 months of production from a major FAB.

A few can see the voltage spikes have dropped but to say with certainty it's stopped is wrong.

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Jbarney3699@reddit

*Microcode of a suspected hardware defect

Let’s just make that clear. We don’t actually have any data on if the updates fixed the depreciation. Also the issues were not that sparse. Quite a few companies reported back pretty large amounts of their CPUs experiencing worsening performance.

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ADB225@reddit

The microcode wasn't rolled out due to a hardware defect. That first batch that had oxidation issues, nothing could fix those except replacement. The microcode was rolled out due to idiotic coding that was boiling CPU's inside.

"Quite a few companies reported back pretty large amounts of their CPUs experiencing worsening performance." Really?? Odd has most of us heard the performance hit was minimal, and sometime non existant.

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Eeve2espeon@reddit

You forget that involves buying a whole new motherboard along with the CPU, and RAM if you’re someone who saved some money going with DDR4 And that isn’t forgetting the fact you have to go through tons of loops to uninstall unused drivers, or reinstall windows if the system is still unstable

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Tyko_3@reddit

I always hear this but every time I decide to upgrade the platform has already moved on and I end up having to buy a new mobo anyway

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Sure but dont trust them blindly. I wouldnt consider any part without benchmarks and reviews.

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awp_india@reddit

I’ve never trusted any PC component blindly. lol

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EmergencyGreat5525@reddit

I did. The 12900kf. Awesome cpu

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karmapopsicle@reddit

I highly doubt they’ll go back on their til 2027 claim.

The problem is that everyone loves to fill in the blanks with their own fantasies. All AMD has said is that AM5 will be “supported” through at least 2027. They have said absolutely nothing specific about what that means for future architectures. They consider AM4 to have been supported through 2024 because they’ve released additional updated SKUs this year, despite the last architecture release for the platform being Zen 3 in 2020.

If consumer DDR6 is on track for 2026 I strongly believe we’ll see Zen 6 launch with it on a new AM6 platform, and the remaining support for AM5 will just be updated Zen 5 chips for a few more years.

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lordofblack23@reddit

+100

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timmmay82@reddit

Ditto. While there is little performance headroom upgrading from 12th gen i9 to 14th gen i9, the 12th gen i9 will still be a relevant CPU for years to come. It isn’t bleeding edge anymore, but it’s still in the 90th percentile. The GPU it’s paired with will be the limiting factor. Being 12th gen also provides more comfort during overclock under PL2 since issues seem to be more problematic in 13/14 gen, though my i9-13900K has exhibited no issues over the last few years under an aggressive overclock. I upgraded from an i7-12700k because I had a use for my old i7 elsewhere, and in my case, the i9 was a decent speed boost over the previous gen i7, and the i9 was dirt cheap because of the reputation.

Zen_360@reddit

That is true if you choose AMD. :) not so much for Intel.

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TheReal-loki515@reddit

Have to agree to disagree. I have bias opinion for sure since all my pcs and laptops all intel and nvidia. I bought a 9900k in 2018 with a asus tuf board. Started with 2070, and generic basically memory, cpl yrs later upgraded to higher better memory and a 3090..

That cpu still runs everything great, resell on ebay or whatever is still very high for such a old cpu.

Another thing making me bias is, I have MULTIPLE machines. I even mined with that chip and board for a few yrs and still is good too go. Was over clocked many yrs before and after mining for hard-core gaming.

Just my two cents. I also have a I5-12600k, asus rog strix z690 that one of the mb refuses to accept two sicks of ddr5 ram even when many sets tried.. funny thing is with even just the 1it will 16gig stick of dddr5 5400, I play FPS and run obs, with stream elements streaming on the same machine. And works fine.

So I think you did great. Change the cpu hold down to the debaur one, run tests, plenty of air flow, water etc. And you will be great for a long time...

Besides new chips aren't showing some marvel of increase in performance. Most testing showing actually slower without major tweeks most won't do...

Good luck bro. I think you did find. I'm going to either delid the 12600k or direct die, never done it but since new system is almost finish, it will be OK.

Listen to people like Jay2cents, Steven from gamers nexus or Linux. They are the real pros and will be able to answer your questions

Happy holidays

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gigaplexian@reddit

Besides new chips aren't showing some marvel of increase in performance. Most testing showing actually slower without major tweeks most won't do...

I quite literally described it as “the overwhelming success of the X3D project”.

The point here is that the platform got 4 years of architectures, which happened to be 4 architectures (technically 5 if you count the Excavator-based Bristol Ridge chips the platform initially launched to OEMs with).

I think there are various possible scenarios where AM5 sees another architecture, but I think it’s more likely Zen 6 launches on a new platform after we get some refreshed Zen 5 SKUs in early 2026.

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kyralfie@reddit

I quite literally described it as “the overwhelming success of the X3D project”.

You are still trying to do both. Draw the line of support at vanilla Zen3 in 2020 to claim shorter effective support timeline of AM4 yet praise X3D. I don't get why. 5700X3D is so significant, probably more people got it that even 5800X3D. So if you praise X3D you draw the line in at least 2022 but for me it's definitely 2024 for 5700X3D reasons.

I think there are various possible scenarios where AM5 sees another architecture, but I think it’s more likely Zen 6 launches on a new platform after we get some refreshed Zen 5 SKUs in early 2026.

Pretty sure it'll launch on AM5. But we'll see.

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karmapopsicle@reddit

I don’t know what part of this is so difficult to grasp. The whole point is that it would still be entirely on a similar track to deliver 4 years of latest architecture support for AM5, even if we get some further upgraded Zen 5 chips in year 5-6.

It’s possible that consumer DDR6 is lagging enough and DDR5 CUDIMMs hit fast enough speeds that they decide to put off the transition to 2028 and just fully launch Zen 6 on AM5. The most recent rumours suggest Zen 6 will indeed launch on AM5 possibly late 2026 or early 2027.

Regardless the kind of basic point here is that it’s simply foolish to assume and bank on the availability of future upgrades with zero concrete announcements let alone availability. They’ve pulled the rug out before on straight up promised upgrade paths like with sTRX4 which only ever got the Zen 2 Castle Peak chips despite a promised Zen 3 upgrade path that ultimately only arrived for its sister platform sWRX8 with significantly more expensive Zen 3 Chagall Threadripper Pro.

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kyralfie@reddit

I don’t know what part of this is so difficult to grasp.

Me neither. Thanks for the convo.

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I also have a 12900k and it has been great. I have it paired with a 7900 XT and 32Gb DDR4

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MaliceInCyberland@reddit

With about $500 set aside to buy any CPU back in Jan 2025... and after hours & HOURS of research & reading reviews... I chose a cheaper $280 i9 12900K too, w/ DDR5 6000.
Still on my test bench, because my i9 9900K w/ RTX 4070 Super does just fine w/ gaming & light production stuff. I only upgraded because I'm moving outside USA, and wanted a tested, running, stable, and powerful PC before leaving... and the i9 12th Gen won the toss.
I just wanted to let you know that if you have a Z790 you shouldn't need to update BIOS... especially if your XMP is working fine. My Z790 Aorus is on the stock Sept 2023 F4 BIOS ver. before all the microcode hoopla for the overheating 13th/14th gen.
I played around with newer BIOS versions, and it decreased my 12900K's performance a bit... probably related to new microcode voltage reduction crap. So I'm keeping the BIOS on the F4 version from 2023.
On older BIOS Cinebench R23 multicore is 27,367 / 85C / Noctua NH-D15s... with a slim 92mm fan in front. On newly released BIOS from this year Cinebench R23 went down to 26,829 / 85C. Single core test Cin R23 went down a bit too: 1991 points on older BIOS... down to 1927 w/ new BIOS.
Just thought I'd share that info with another wise person who went with the 12th Gen i9... lol

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Silver_Scalez@reddit

Just built with a 12900k and 4070 super. It's a great cpu and saves you a boat load of money. Don't let the haters bug you, it's plenty fast.

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Irapotato@reddit

I have a 12900K and a 4080 TI super, and I'm convinced I wont be upgrading. By the time this rig is outdated I'll have kids going into kindergarten, for anyone looking the 12900k + 4070 S / TS is fucking bananas. Paired with a 1440 165hz LG monitor I got for $150 new and its literally everything I ever need for gaming. Crushes 1440 165 HZ games.

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Ready-Brilliant3664@reddit

12900K is a 300W housefire hazard on a dead intel platform. So unless you got it for less than $200, you fucked up. It will perform okay, at a cost of a LOT of power consumption.

You've been yelled at for a reason.

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BigWheelThaGod@reddit

wtf is wrong with these people ?

Dude , you have a good pc , best in the world ? No , you don't need it to be to play games

Relax and enjoy it

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ItsSeung@reddit (OP)

Yeah after having it for a while. I kinda just found out these people were crazy. Like sure I can upgrade later but tbh the CPU doesn’t run hot like people made it seem. Idk

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coleisman@reddit

in reality, its fine, was it the most optimal choice? probably not. but its a good cpu and will last a long time and unless ur trying to hit 300+ fps in every game cpu matters so little anyways as long as its not hilariously outdated

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bitesized314@reddit

I have had my share of both. 2500K 4790K, Ryzen 3700, 5f800X3D, 7800X3D. I would say AMD slams Intel hard currently...
But that processor is still a good chip. It runs a bit hot and needs good cooling. But it won't be a bad experience. Build it and start gaming. We must all remember when we have discussions, it's okay to disagree and be okay afterwards.

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ItsSeung@reddit (OP)

I'll know when Its built soon enough. Since I'm gonna get the build started tomorrow.

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Important-Gear-2210@reddit

This is kind of late but, To all the people telling you you were wrong, say this.

"You buy me what you think I should have bought! It was my money and I bought what I wanted so STFU!"

contradude@reddit

It's a lot slower on a dead socket from a company that's really struggling right now. If you got it for extremely cheap, it's fine. If you paid MSRP get a refund

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gwoodtamu@reddit

I mean I’m buying a 12900k eventually, thought situation is different in that I already own a 12600k and generally always buy years later the best option to upgrade my CPU. Normally I would buy a 14900k, buuuuuuuut I’m slightly worried about the longevity of those given the recent issues.

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Slimy-Python@reddit

You have bought the worlds best intel overclocker cpu in the z690-z790 motherboard LGA 1700 family (also b660-760).

Its even got one of the best igpu UHD 770, that can be gamed on with no dedicated gpu.

But im the type that cares that their motherboard is running pcie 5.0, has ddr5 ram, has VRM heatsinks, has NVME slots, extra fan headers, etc

so unless you ordered the new mobo with ddr5 pcie4/5, you arent technically future proofing and will buy a new motherboard anyway.

None of it matters in this tier anyway because all the current CPU options cannot max out a 4090ti. So until they make a CPU faster than the 4090, you did good spending more on a nicer gpu which will be the “future-proof” item in your build.

My personal future proof focus was a nice DRAM nvme (4tb 2400tbw) and a gpu that can support new codecs for encoding and decoding.

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MastodonMaliwan@reddit

Yes.

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ultrafrisk@reddit

I actually upgraded to ddr4 low latency ram. I paired this with over 16 gb vram.four sticks for dual bank, dual channel mode.

I was so impressed with my old 6700k, it ran Space Marine 2 at 60fps pretty comfortably at 4.6ghz.

I really only upgraded because of how cpu heavy these new open world games are. (Looking at you forbidden west and Stalker 2) 🤣

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ImBulletm9@reddit

No, if you like the pc, the can pound sand.

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PHiddy1976@reddit

You have an i9-12900k, I have an i7-11700K. My CPU can do more than I can ever put it through. However, I am a bit jealous of your i9. Enjoy your CPU, and stop listening to others.

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skyline090@reddit

12900k is a great deal right now. Microcenter has a $599 CPU, z790 MB, ram combo., or you can buy it standalone for $219.

Here is a good comparison of the past 3 generations of Intel cpu's.

Nolaboyy@reddit

I mean, will it suck completely? No. Was it the best choice for performance or price? Also no. If its possible to return it and build an am5 platform with the 9800x3d, then i would definitely recommend that. However, if youre stuck with the chip, it will still be a decent pc and will serve your needs as long as youre not a professional gamer.

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Letscurlbrah@reddit

It's clearly a poor choice to buy new today, but it will run software fine.

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rwcycle@reddit

You did fine. Religious zealots will always behave as they do. Both processors are great performers. I've had the 12900k since release, zero issues, great performance.

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t0bimaru@reddit

If your goal was to impress someone you know or someone online with the build list then sure; it’s the wrong processor.

I’ve been building PCs since my 486sx in the 90s. Don’t overthink it. Back in the day I used artic silver and still have some tubes around, but properly applied paste (size of a grain of rice right in the center) makes little difference between brands. I’ve measured a few degrees max.

<300USD, that's a great price

It's competing with the R7 7700X at that point, which is a much slower CPU for single & multi core(normal intel power draw & heterogenous core issues aside)

It's perfectly fine. There's an expression "there is no bad hardware, only bad prices."

I recently upgraded my gaming PC from an i7-7700k to a i9-12900k. This was a budget upgrade - the CPU and motherboard were cheap and I could reuse 64GB DDR4 memory from my old build. It handles games like Outlaws and Cyberpunk like a champ on Ultra settings at a locked 60fps with a 4070 Super. Works for me, perfect. This should be good for another 5 years at least.

The 12th generation is also arguably Intel's most recent good CPU generation considering the 13th and 14th generation were the exception to the "no bad prices" rule and fried themselves - and then the Core Ultra CPUs have performance bugs that they're trying to figure out with firmware updates.

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dstamura@reddit

Its a better option than getting a 13900K or 14900K. But 12900K sits on a dead platform. If you have a budget, Ryzen 7 7700X on AM5 would be better choice since AM5 will be supported beyond 2025, up until Ryzen Zen 6 or probaby Zen 6-series. For ultimate gaming performance, you have only 2 choices, Ryzen 7 7800X3D or 9800X3D. For 2025, I9 12900K is still a good processor, but even Ryzen 5800X3D beats it in gaming with almost 60% less power consumption. In productivity workload, It has still computational power to flex.

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Eville_Empire@reddit

My 2nd reply: again as you said its your 1st custom, take this as a learning experience.

My 1st build was AMD bc when I looked, Intel was more expensive and I was just looking to learn.

If its not too late to return, do so. Otherwise stick through it, and learn.

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There is no right or wrong answer as you said; its your first custom.

As a rule of thumb, I start with the Ram and if I want the latest I build around it however if I'm on a budget I go a step below. I built my 1st custom on DDR2 though DDR3 was available, my budget didn't allow so I took it as a learning experience.

I just now upgraded from DDR2 to DDR5 so in reality it is ok that I made that small flaw. I gathered enough parts to get to DDR3 because my CPU supported DDR2 and 3.

Again your leaning so don't count this as a mistake and don't take the negative feedback as discipline nor as an insult.

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SatanicRiddle@reddit

judge for yourself

Honestly, yes, especially if this is for gaming.

First of all that CPU is two generations old on a now dead socket. Second the 9800X3D would out-perform it in most cases, especially in gaming, and it's socket is likely still going to give you upgrade options in the future and is current. Third the extra cores on the 12900K are not going to give you any benefit in 99% of games. Fourth 9800X3D would also use less power and be easier to cool while doing all this.

Unless you have some workloads that depend heavily on core count and not the power of the CPU, or really really REALLY need QuickSync, then I would say yes, it was a bad idea to get a 12900K over a 9800X3D.

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AsianEiji@reddit

The CPU is not bad at all, so you were NOT screwed over cpu wise. 9800x3d eh good luck finding one at retail.... so whatever.

WAY cheaper. $275 vs $780.

Not saying the 12900k is the best deal. I bought one last year but i did it at microcenter, which had a killer deal on it (and that deal still exists to my knowledge), but if you had to buy it off of amazon or newegg, you could probably find a comparable CPU for much cheaper. 14600k is $220 looking just now. 5700X3D is a similar price. 12700k is a slightly lower clocked 12900k with 4 fewer ecores at $200. $288 for the 13700k which is better.

I mean, it's not a bad CPU its just awkward from a value perspective.

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Hurricane_Ivan@reddit

Part of the reason I jumped on a 12700k $170 deal last month.

A Z790 motherboard was about that too..

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JonWood007@reddit

Nice. i got the 12900k $400 CPU/mobo/RAM deal last year, it's been good to me. If youre not buying that though the 12700k is far better for the price though. A marginal loss in performance for like $75 less.

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Hurricane_Ivan@reddit

Meanwhile all these people out here advocating dropping $700+ on a 9800 X3D for a 7-10% increase in performance 🤔

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JonWood007@reddit

Eh, the performance over the 12900k can be substantial, dont get me wrong. But we're talking like an average of 30%, with it maxing out at 70-100% in the most extreme scenarios (I think digital foundry found it doubling the 12900k in a few cache heavy games).

Still, thats not worth 3x the price. The modern X3D processors are currently very overpriced for the performance they offer. They're the best, but the price/performance proposition is currently horrible.

They're halo products for the same people who buy 4090s.

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Hurricane_Ivan@reddit

Eh, the performance over the 12900k can be substantial, dont get me wrong. But we're talking like an average of 30%, with it maxing out at 70-100% in the most extreme scenarios

How'd it fare compared to a 14900k? Seems like that would be a more apt comparison (but still $200 less).

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JonWood007@reddit

14900k is like around 15-20% better in gaming than the 12900k. Honestly, the 14900k's big thing is having those extra ecores for productivity, the extra single core speed helps but it's not that huge. The 14900k does kinda start coming up on the 7800X3D a bit although its still far worse than the 9800X3D.

Either way, not really worth discussing as the 14900k is a different price class of CPU entirely, and i wouldnt recommend it for gaming either. If youre at that price point id still go for a 7800X3D or 9800X3D if you can find them at MSRP or less.

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Water_bolt@reddit

Its like half the price rn on pcpartpicker

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2raysdiver@reddit

12900k, $250.

9800X3D, $778 on Amazon

12900k isn't a bad CPU. It does run hot. and it is a few generations old. But it will give you 13700K performance. (I have 13700K, and I don't see me upgrading for quite a while) By the time you will want to upgrade it, even AM5 will be dead. If money is no object, 9800X3D. If you have a budget and can squeeze the 12900K into it, go for it.

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RogueCereal@reddit

What's the i5 14600 equivalent in and and is there a mobo with lots n lots of pcie lanes, ipmi workstation like w680 ace? When building my consumer server I couldn't find the cheap enough xeon and nvme with modern pcie. was too expensive. I run cctv with ai, proxmox, home assistant, frigate NVR , blue iris maybe in windows VM. Australia is so expensive. I outgrew my optiplex. Got an rm41-506 for Nas, just 2hdd for now, maybe more later. But 2 mirror x18 exos enterprise are huge. A second backup HDD exos 18 . Wanted to do 4-5 z1-z2 zfs truenas but 3000+ in HDDs was beyond me. Might get another ssd to saturate sfpplus. 10gbps between gaming PC and server, only 2gbps on my laptop which is old.

Server can run opnsense backup router. I envy USA ex enterprise gear prices.

16gb 4060ti but it's just for messing with stable diffusion and blue iris cctv. 14700k 128gb ddr5 non ecc, well on die. Was 1200 for ECC. I'm disabled so not much cash and this is a learning platform. Probably could have done better though.

Gaming PC is a 12700k 64gb ram (Photoshop n cad) 1070ti. Haven't felt gaming bug lately. Played some helldivers and red dead, cyberpunk. Waiting for elder scrolls 6. Gta6. Don't get into homelabbing and ai stuff lol. So expensive here.

Haven't had much experience with amd but next graphics card I may but the cuda cores I feel locked to NVIDIA. I dunno if Photoshop etc have similar for amd? What's the Plex experience like?

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codymcgg@reddit

I love amd but amd cpu users are the worst type of people, do what you want tell them to go fuck themselves

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Archy54@reddit

I bought a 14700k with w680ace. Why, pcie lanes. Couldn't afford threadripper or xeon. Home lab use mix of ai camera and other proxmox stuff.

Kinda wanted amd but in Australia I couldn't find cheap enough ecc ram ddr5 or more lanes. Not the best idea but I hope it works.

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insanestickers@reddit

Look, I recently went from a 9900kf to a 12900ks, mainly because it was on sale and I got it cheaper than the 7900x I was looking at. Yes it's a couple years old, yes there are new things coming out that beat it, but for the price I got it, the % gained on new ryzen or Intel didn't matter to me.

It's a good cpu, it games well and handles the workloads I give it with ease, and I have serious doubts it's ability to perform will degrade over the next few years before I'm in the market again to upgrade.

For non-gaming, if you have heavy multithreaded tasks you need, like industrial simulation, software video encoding, etc. then the 12900k has some significant benefits over the 12600k and is nearly twice as fast for those use cases.

The 13th and 14th gen CPUs are also a faster for gaming than a 12900k, with a 14600k costing $200 for about 5% better gaming performance, and a 13700k costing about the same as a 12900k while being about 15% faster in gaming and 5% faster in non-gaming.

The 12900k price is a bit inflated at the moment because it is the fastest Intel CPU that doesn't have the issues that the 13th and 14th gen have, and isn't insanely priced like the newer Core Ultra 200 CPUs (which the cheaper 14th gen beats in gaming performance). The 13th and 14th gen CPUs for the last two years have been literally killing themselves, with some CPUs only lasting a few months before they start having serious problems. We're still only about a two months since Intel released their "final fix" for the problem, so we're still not entirely sure if it's fixed the problem entirely. But certainly rampant reports of CPUs failing have subsided and so far I've only seen people who hadn't updated their motherboard BIOS to the newest releases still having problems. But the official stance by a lot of tech journalists / youtubers is to continue to avoid Intel CPUs until their long term testing has seen any issues or not.

So if we look at AMD CPUs, something like a 9600X is a little less than a 12900k at $245, and almost as fast as a 13700k for gaming sitting at a bit more than 10% faster than a 12900k, though no where near as fast for non-gaming being more on par with the 12600k for those tasks.

...

So, short version. If you must buy an Intel CPU, and want to avoid any of the 13th and 14th gen issues, a 12900k is the fastest CPU you can buy. It's just not the best in terms of price to performance for gaming.

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bitesized314@reddit

I have had my share of both. 2500K, 4790K (freebie from my friend), Ryzen 3700, Ryzen 5800X3D, Ryzen 7800X3D. Modern processors have gotten to be very good across a broad range of prices. The 12900K is still a great processor if you want to game. It runs hotter, it has no upgrade path. It uses more power. Exactly like what the 4790K my friend gave me to replace my 2500K. That ran hotter, used more powerful, but it was a good gaming experience for a bit.
But, I will say I would recommend most people get AMD at this point. AMD AM4 was like Sandy Bridge but better because AM4 lasted 4 generations of processors against teh Intel 2 gens. And now AM5 will likely continue that trend. The X3D CPUs use less power and you don't need an expensive cooler to get great performance without them throttling. Considering how expensive motherboards are now, it's a fantastic value to upgrade your stuff and keep chugging without replacing everything.
If OP has all his parts, just build and enjoy it now.

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Joel22222@reddit

I have a i7-12k and it barely breaks a sweat with anything I do. They’re good CPUs.

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iamjonmiller@reddit

I ran a 12900k for the past two years and had zero complaints. I recently upgraded to 9800X3D, but only because I was having motherboard issues unrelated to the 12900k and had to rebuild. I am also playing at 4k though, so marginal performance change.

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