Exclusive to China, the Intel Core i7-13790F Has a Small Amount of Additional Cache

The Intel Core i5-13490F is a processor SKU that is only available in China and is intended to compete well in terms of price and performance with AMD’s Ryzen 5 7600 series and perhaps even the Ryzen 7 7700. It turns out that the Core i7-13790F is another such SKU in addition to the i5-13490F. The i7-13790F, which sits between the i7-13700 and i9-13900, is a special piece of silicon. It has the same maximum P-core turbo frequency of 5.20 GHz and the same 8P+8E core arrangement as the i7-13700 and i7-13700K, but it has a 33 MB shared L3 cache that is somewhat more than the i7-13700.

The eight “Raptor Cove” P-cores on the i7-13790F each have a dedicated L2 cache of 2 MB, and the two available E-core clusters each have a shared L2 cache of 4 MB across the four “Gracemont” E-cores. The 8 P-core and 2 E-core clusters share a 33 MB L3 cache, which has been increased from 30 MB on the other 13th Gen Core i7 desktop SKUs. This is still less than the actual 36 MB of “Raptor Lake-S” silicon. There are a few surprises, though. With a 65 W base power and likely the same 219 W maximum turbo power as the i7-13700, this “locked” (non-K) SKU still has limited overclocking potential. Additionally, as a “F” SKU, it lacks integrated graphics. The i5-13490F and i7-13790F ship in a special black paperboard packaging and seem to be targeted at the SI and retail channels. The cost of the i7-13790F is RMB 2,999 tax included, or around $440.