Intel
Intel Core i7-4790
The locked Haswell Refresh i7 and the fastest CPU you can put in a non-Z LGA1150 board: four cores, eight threads and a 4.0 GHz turbo, within a few percent of a stock 4790K. It is the default upgrade for an ex-corporate H87 or B85 machine.
Pros
- 4.0 GHz maximum turbo — the highest of any locked chip on this socket
- Eight threads and 8 MB L3 without needing a Z-series motherboard
- 84 W base power versus the 88 W of the Devil's Canyon K parts, so stock coolers cope
- VT-d and TSX both present, unlike the 4770K
- AVX2, PCIe 3.0 x16 and HD Graphics 4600 with Quick Sync
Cons
- Locked multiplier — what you see at 4.0 GHz is all you get
- Older 8-series boards need a BIOS update before they will POST with a Haswell Refresh chip
- Four cores and DDR3-1600 make it a poor match for a current GPU
- 32 GB memory ceiling and no NVMe boot on many 8/9-series BIOSes without modding
Below average
Computed from specs & benchmarks via our public methodology.
Full specifications
Everything we track for the Intel Core i7-4790
General
- Announced
- 2014
- Socket
- LGA1150
- Process
- 22 nm
- Base TDP
- 84 W
- Unlocked multiplier
- No
- Cooler included
- Yes
Cores & Clocks
- Cores
- 4
- Performance cores
- 4
- Efficiency cores
- 0
- Threads
- 8
- Base clock
- 3.6 GHz
- Boost clock
- 4 GHz
- L2 cache
- 1 MB
- L3 cache
- 8 MB
Integrated GPU
- iGPU
- Intel HD Graphics 4600
- iGPU clock
- 1,200 MHz
Memory
- Memory support
- DDR3-1600
- Max memory
- 32 GB
- Memory channels
- 2
Platform
- PCIe version
- 3
- CPU PCIe lanes
- 16
Benchmarks
- Geekbench 6 (single)
- 1,230
- Geekbench 6 (multi)
- 4,050
- Cinebench R23 (multi)
- 4,600
- PassMark
- 8,300
Quick answers
Is the Intel Core i7-4790 good in 2026?
The Intel Core i7-4790 earns an Inno Score of 25.9/100 (“Below average”) based on its specs and benchmark results. The locked Haswell Refresh i7 and the fastest CPU you can put in a non-Z LGA1150 board: four cores, eight threads and a 4.0 GHz turbo, within a few percent of a stock 4790K. It is the default upgrade for an ex-corporate H87 or B85 machine.
What are the key specs of the Intel Core i7-4790?
Cores: 4 · Threads: 8 · Boost clock: 4 GHz · Socket: LGA1150
What are the closest alternatives to the Intel Core i7-4790?
Its closest rivals on InnoReviews are Intel Core i5-6600K, Intel Core i5-7500, Intel Core i7-4770K — open the comparison pages for a spec-by-spec breakdown.