Building the TSSDR ASRock Z790 Taichi Core I5-13600K Test Bench

INTEL CORE I5-13600K CPU

The Intel Core i5-13600K is a 14 core 20 thread CPU (6 x p/ 8 x e) capable of 5.10GHz and has a 3.50 p-core base frequency with integrated UHD Graphics 770.  This CPU runs smoothly at 5GHz in our Test Bench without any overclocking whatsoever.

Checking Amazon, we see the Intel Core i5-13600K priced at $317 which is a great price if this suits your specific need.  Hopefully, long gone are the days we are forking out close to 1K for a CPU.

Both PassMark and AIDA64 provided some really good results with respect to benchmark performance as we can see here:

CORSAIR iCUE H150i ELITE CAPELLIX 360MM LIQUID CPU COOLER

We have been pretty consistent with our choice of Corsair Liquid CPUs historically. It would be very hard to find one of our Test Benches with anything else. The reason is of course they are completely silent, do the job and they are very reliable.

The iCUE H150i Capellix comes with a 360mm radiator and we needed that because this system will be pushed using the latest Intel 13th Gen chip. The 360 was a given, although a bit overboard for this immediate build. It comes with three 120mm Corsair ML RGB magnetic levitation fans that are completely silent with speeds between 400 and 2400RPM, along with the Corsair iCUE Commander Core Smart RGB Lighting and Fan Controller.

Corsair iCue software controls most fans in this system. The pump head of the unit is RGB and lit by 33 ultra-bright Capellix RGB LEDs and there are two different face plates for the pump head that show this CPU cooler off very well. Better yet, fans only spin when necessary. When the system is cool they will come to a stop as they are not needed. Checking Amazon, we see the Corsair H150i Capellix Liquid CPU cooler priced at $199.