Intel Core i7-12700
Benchmarks & Specs

The Intel Core i7-12700 is a 12-core hybrid processor from Intels 12th Core i generation. It combines 8 performance cores (Golden Cove) and 4 smaller efficiency cores (Gracemont). The Golden Cove CPU design is an evolution of the regular CPU cores that Intel already used in the previous Intel Core i processors. The efficiency cores are based on a design previously used in Intels Atom processors.

Both architectures or core designs have their advantages and disadvantages. While the Core i CPU cores (Golden Cove) have a lot of power, the Atom cores (Gracemont) handle arithmetic tasks very efficiently. Therefore, these are often used for background tasks. However, the design of the Intel Core i7-12700 also allows all CPU cores to work on one task at the same time. A modern operating system such as Windows 11 is recommended, since Microsoft has optimized the task scheduler with Windows 11 for the new hybrid CPUs.

The Intel Core i7-12700 clocks its performance cores at up to 4.9 GHz (single-core turbo), the base clock is 2.1 GHz. The larger CPU cores support Intels hyperthreading technology and can process 2 threads at the same time. The Intel Atom cores are limited to 1 thread per CPU core.

While Intel has greatly adapted and optimized the CPU core design of the 12th generation, the Intel UHD Graphics 770 iGPU is again only available for simple image output, since the FP32 raw performance of the iGPU is less than 0.8 TFLOPS and is therefore not suitable for playing newer titles. Intel relies on the installation of a dedicated graphics card here.

Up to 128 GB of DDR4 or DDR5 RAM is supported, the official maximum is DDR5-4800. Significantly higher clock frequencies of the main memory are also possible by overclocking the main memory. The new PCIe 5.0 interface is also supported by the 12th generation Intel Core i processors.

• Strong multi-core and single-core performance
• Modern PCIe 5.0 support
• Efficient 10 nm manufacturing
• Integrated Intel UHD Graphics 770