There’s just been a big price crash on Intel CPUs over on Amazon, with loads of 12th-gen CPUs going for bargain prices. There are several good offers here, but our favorite Intel CPU deal is the Core i5-12600KF going for just $153.99. That’s a fantastic price for a ten-core CPU that boosts up to 4.9GHz, and you can even overclock it if you’re prepared to get your hands dirty.
To put that price into perspective, that’s over $100 cheaper than the Core i5-13400 on our best gaming CPU guide, and the Intel 12600KF has the same number of cores (six P-Cores for performance and four E-Cores for efficiency) and a higher boost clock speed of 4.9GHz, compared to the 13400’s 4.6GHz.
Don’t be put off by the ‘12’ in the name either – the Intel 12th-gen Alder Lake CPU architecture is very similar to the Raptor Lake architecture in its 13th-gen and 14th-gen processors, with only minor changes between them.
What’s more, that ‘K’ in the 12600KF’s model name means it’s unlocked for overclocking if you have a motherboard with a Z-series chipset, and I’ve found that you can push the P-Cores on these CPUs up to 5GHz across all cores (using a 1.36V voltage), making this CPU even faster in multi-threaded workloads.
In case you’re wondering, the ‘F’ in the model name means there’s no integrated GPU inside this CPU, but that won’t be an issue if you’re already using it with a separate graphics card, and it’s still a bargain at this price. Again, the Core i5-13400F without an integrated GPU costs $50 more, and has a slower boost clock speed.
There are some other 12th-gen deals to be found on Amazon today as well. If you want a bit more power, the Core i7-12700KF is currently going for $213.99, giving you eight P-Cores and four E-Cores, as well as a 5GHz boost clock speed out of the box. That’s a great price for a Core i7 processor, and you can also step up to a Core i9-12900KF with 16 cores (eight P-Cores and eight E-Cores) and a 5.2GHz boost clock speed for $324.49.
Basically, there are some fantastic bargains to be found on unlocked Intel 12th-gen CPUs at the moment, and while they might not hit the big clock speeds of the latest 14th-gen CPUs, such as the Core i9-14900K, the prices are amazing. Just 18 months ago, the Core i5-12600KF would have cost you nearly $300, so $154.99 is a great deal. If you want to get a bit more power, make sure you also check out our review of the new Core i5-14600K, which has 14 cores and boosts up to 5.3GHz.