Without a new architecture or improved processor node on its near-term horizon, the only real way Intel can stay competitive with AMD at this point is on price. And at just $299 at Best Buy, Intel’s eight-core i7-9700K is a sweet early Black Friday CPU deal that’s tough to ignore.
This CPU is still our pick for the best gaming CPU , and Best Buy is selling it for about $20 less than any previous price we see on PCParkPicker . If you’re gaming at high resolutions, your CPU doesn’t matter as much. But at 1080p, this chip delivers the best frame rates we tested to date. That makes it a good fit in particular if you have a high-refresh monitor and you’re looking to squeeze every frame possible from your graphics card .
Intel Core i7-9700K: was $339, now $299 @ Best Buy
With its 4.9GHz single-core boost and eight physical cores, the Core i7-9700K delivers the best frame rates of any CPU we've tested. You can grab it from Best Buy for about $40 less than its normal sale price. View Deal
Note that the Core i7-9700K lacks hyperthreading, so the eight physical cores here are all that’s available for multitasking. So if you do a lot of video editing or other highly threaded tasks along with gaming, something like an AMD Ryzen 3600 (with six cores and 12 threads) might be a better bet. But if gaming is your primary concern, this is the best CPU you can buy --at the lowest price we’ve seen yet.