Review: Scan 3XS Z370 Vengeance Ti

Conclusion

We often look back at the Core i7-2600K as a pivotal part that led to years of Intel dominance in the desktop CPU space. Said chip offered four efficient cores way back in 2011, and you could argue that Intel has drip-fed incremental performance improvements for the best part of the decade.

Thankfully, and with AMD Ryzen snapping at its heels, Intel has finally felt the need to move things along. The transition begins with eighth-generation Core processors, codenamed Coffee Lake and spearheaded by the Core i7-8700K. Increasing core count by 50 per cent, this six-core, 12-thread chip is, in our estimation, the most meaningful desktop processor to emerge from Intel HQ since 2011.

Multi-threaded performance on the latest Z-series platform is a marked improvement over previous generations, with barely any impact on power consumption, and high shipping frequencies ensure that straight-line speed remains best in class.

The time has come for many-core computing, and Scan highlights the advantages of upgrading to Core i7-8700K with the 3XS Z370 Vengeance Ti. Cranked-up to 5GHz across all cores and armed with an overclocked GeForce GTX 1080 Ti graphics to boot, this well-built system represents all-round performance excellence at a cost of £2,300.

Bottom line: still clinging to your second-generation Sandy Bridge CPU in the hope of a meaningful upgrade? Eighth-generation Coffee Lake is it.

Scan 3XS Z370 Vengeance Ti

HEXUS.where2buy

The Scan 3XS Z370 Vengeance Ti base unit is available to purchase from Scan Computers.

HEXUS.right2reply

At HEXUS, we invite the companies whose products we test to comment on our articles. If any company representatives for the products reviewed choose to respond, we'll publish their commentary here verbatim.