Article Tom's Hardware Core i9 9900KS Preview

[Zucker2k]

Power efficiency is incredible for 14nm.
Edit: Consumes 50 watts less than the i9 9900K @ 5GHz.



Link

 

[Thunder 57]

You know what I meant. Don't think I'm biased because I give Intel a hard time. And who are you to talk about bias?

 

[Markfw]

I've provided a link.
Naturally, the 7nm node of the Ryzens is going to be more power efficient, but at those clocks, the Intels are well outside that efficiency window but the previewed 9900KS is over 30%+ more power efficient (than a comparable 9900k) - a far cry from the doom and gloom some have predicted on this forum. I think it bodes well for the 10 core i9-10900K processor.

142 watts vs 130 is not 30% Its more like 10%. And they had a year to make that happen. In that same time frame, AMD has done way better than that.

Now why again is this so great ?

Edit; I had it backwards... It takes MORE at stock. Now overclocked it takes 15 watts less.

Oh boy, I can get 5% more FPS @50% more power....

 

[Markfw]

Try running your 2990WX at 4GHz with a Corsair H115i and let's see what temps you get.

Now that is just a stupid statement. I have 4 times the cores. And 89c on a 8 core CPU ? My 12 core 3900x does 71c at 4.1 ghz, 100% load on a 240 mm aio. They have a 280mm AIO, and it only manages 89c ?

Its a HOT chip

 

[maddie]

My skepticism is not directed at density or power consumption but rather max frequency.

I salute you, the heroic defenders of the last hill still to fall. Your struggles will be revered in the Hall of Heroes eternally.

 

[ArchAngel777]

No, I am trying to dispel the rumor that clocks rule, as some posters seem to maintain.

Honestly, I still don't see where he says what you think he says. Most of us have been here long enough to know about Netburst P4 arch, and how clock speed was meaningless. However, in this case, both Zen 2 and *Lake are close enough in IPC that clocks are at least relavent to the discussion.

That said, I do agree with you that clock speed in and of itself is meaningless. But in this context? No, I think it has meaning and merit.

 

[Thunder 57]

Holy crap, the old P4 argument again. Dont you guys ever get tired of digging up that red herring? Intel has at least equal IPC in gaming to AMD, plenty of cores, so clockspeed certainly does matter.

I included Faildozer too. Equal opportunity offender . It's not a red herring at all. Clock speed means nothing by itself. What you are getting so pissy about is that I am calling Zen more well rounded because it does everything well. You just want to focus on gaming. Even then, there are times when AMD ties or wins. For just about anything else, AMD wins. You do realize that this gaming advantage may very well go away when Intel inevitably moves to a non-inclusive L3 with a mesh rather than a ring? Just look at Skylake-X for reference.

I certainly don't want Intel to keep tripping up forever. We all see what happens when there is a pseudo monopoly. AMD is having that feeling already. Otherwise we would have B550 chipsets by now with PCIe 4. Rumor is PCIe 4 will only be on x570. So don't think I'm giving Intel a hard time because I'm biased.

What I am really tired of hearing though, is how Intel still wins at gaming at 1080p with a 2080. It gets super old. I wasn't here trying to defend AMD during the BD days saying how they were still great for VM's, because they weren't a good product. At this point Skylake just isn't that good.

I'll also add that when Intel was beating AMD in these same types of application benchmarks, nobody seemed to dismiss them. It was just more proof of Intel being on top. Now it's gotten so bad that Intel is trying to redefine what is a "real world" benchmark. It's pathetic honestly. Shut up and put out a better product. Don't try to change the game.

 

[Thunder 57]

At least I dont go around bragging about how "unbiased" I am. Your posts speak for themselves.

I can't help it if that's how you see my posts. I'll give AMD crap when they deserve it. It's just hard to do when their CPU's have been excellent lately. GPU's, not so much. And I just criticized AMD over their handling of the B550 chipset. I don't think I've once seen you criticize Intel. Some of your posts are completely fair. Others though, to use your words, "speak for themselves.

I mean six people liked that post so they understood what I meant. They didn't feel the need to try to twist my words against me. I could have worded it more clearly, but regarding the context it was clear what I meant. How many likes have you gotten trying to claim I'm biased? I think any reasonable poster sees what's going on here.

 

[Markfw]

Maybe... But a 3700x 8 core (85 watts) vs a 9900ks 8 core (142 watts) 57% more power ???? What is incredible about that ? That they are so handicapped on power ?

Since you did not provide a link, I am going to go look for it.

Edit: from their conclusion:

Intel has extended its lead in gaming over AMD's lineup, but you have to keep that in perspective. The Ryzen 9 3900X offers a lower price point and is more agile in heavily-threaded workloads, particularly in productivity applications. It's also comes with other advantages, like support for PCIe 4.0. If you're not chasing the bleeding edge of gaming performance or overclockability, the Ryzen 9 3900X still offers a compelling blend of price and performance in both gaming and productivity applications.
So, as we already knew it wins in games by a little, but gets destoyed at anything else at the same price or more. And usess 57A% more power (and heat)

So why again is this good ?

 

[Accord99]

Maybe... But a 3700x 8 core (85 watts) vs a 9900ks 8 core (142 watts) 57% more power ???? What is incredible about that ? That they are so handicapped on power ?

It's incredible relative to what it was before, it's been a while since power consumption of the same architecture dropped so much without a shrink. And a fairer comparison with the 3700X would be to clock it higher to try to match the overall higher performance of the 9900KS (or to reduce to the 9900KS down), the power consumption comparison would be much closer.

 

[Accord99]

Power efficiency is incredible for 14nm.
Edit: Consumes 50 watts less than the i9 9900K @ 5GHz.

If the same level of power reduction is in the 10980XE vs 9980XE, then the 5.1 GHz all-core overclock might actually be possible with off-the-shelf cooling.

 

[Zucker2k]

Maybe... But a 3700x 8 core (85 watts) vs a 9900ks 8 core (142 watts) 57% more power ???? What is incredible about that ? That they are so handicapped on power ?

Since you did not provide a link, I am going to go look for it.

I've provided a link.
Naturally, the 7nm node of the Ryzens is going to be more power efficient, but at those clocks, the Intels are well outside that efficiency window but the previewed 9900KS is over 30%+ more power efficient (than a comparable 9900k) - a far cry from the doom and gloom some have predicted on this forum. I think it bodes well for the 10 core i9-10900K processor.

 

[Zucker2k]

142 watts vs 130 is not 30% Its more like 10%. And they had a year to make that happen. In that same time frame, AMD has done way better than that.

Now why again is this so great ?

Edit; I had it backwards... It takes MORE at stock. Now overclocked it takes 15 watts less.

Oh boy, I can get 5% more FPS @50% more power....

It's 142 watts of the 9900KS vs 192 watts of the 9900K @ 5GHz so, yes, it's 30%+ more efficient than the 9900K at that clock - which is already well outside of optimal efficiency for the 14nm process.

 

[CHADBOGA]

It is just as well Intel has stumbled so badly on 10nm, it gives AMD a chance to become viable long term, but what Intel has managed to scrounge out of 14nm+++ makes me wonder if Intel on 7nm might be delivering another Conroe moment.

 

[UsandThem]

That's actually pretty impressive if the numbers hold true.

I'll wait for more reviews to see if there is any "funny business" from this pre-production CPU review.

The only issue I see with it is being the price. They say in the article it is rumored to be $560 (street price likely higher), and that puts it right at the entry-level Cascade Lake-X i9-10900X (although I think strict gamers would go with the 9900KS).

 

[ondma]

Maybe... But a 3700x 8 core (85 watts) vs a 9900ks 8 core (142 watts) 57% more power ???? What is incredible about that ? That they are so handicapped on power ?

Since you did not provide a link, I am going to go look for it.

Edit: from their conclusion:

Intel has extended its lead in gaming over AMD's lineup, but you have to keep that in perspective. The Ryzen 9 3900X offers a lower price point and is more agile in heavily-threaded workloads, particularly in productivity applications. It's also comes with other advantages, like support for PCIe 4.0. If you're not chasing the bleeding edge of gaming performance or overclockability, the Ryzen 9 3900X still offers a compelling blend of price and performance in both gaming and productivity applications.
So, as we already knew it wins in games by a little, but gets destoyed at anything else at the same price or more. And usess 57A% more power (and heat)

So why again is this good ?

Because gaming is my primary use, and I dont really care about productivity? Each to his own, but maybe you could consider occasionally that other uses may have different priorities than you.

 

[CHADBOGA]

Because gaming is my primary use, and I dont really care about productivity? Each to his own, but maybe you could consider occasionally that other uses may have different priorities than you.

The 1% always trumps the 99%.

 

[jpiniero]

That's actually pretty impressive if the numbers hold true.

I'll wait for more reviews to see if there is any "funny business" from this pre-production CPU review.

The power consumption is a little suspicious but I suppose Intel could just have binned tighter. The gaming performance didn't look too out of line compared to a 5 Ghz 9900K.

 

[Ajay]

Power efficiency is incredible for 14nm.
Edit: Consumes 50 watts less than the i9 9900K @ 5GHz.

View attachment 12121

Link

I’m really getting sick and tired of power use determination being calculated by applications that rely on AVX workloads. The VAST majority of consumer workloads use zero AVX code. It’s so moronic.

 

[Markfw]

It's 142 watts of the 9900KS vs 192 watts of the 9900K @ 5GHz so, yes, it's 30%+ more efficient than the 9900K at that clock - which is already well outside of optimal efficiency for the 14nm process.

I was comparing stock vs stock. Now you can twist the facts any way you want, I really don't care....

 

[gdansk]

I suspect we'll see a great deal of variation in measured power consumption. For three reasons: these are ultra-binned chips, motherboards doing things they don't say they are doing, and we saw a lot of variation in reviews with the 9900K.

 

[positivedoppler]

It's impressive how much they squeezed out using 14nm, but is this really a highly binned part?

 

[mopardude87]

Not gonna believe the hype about some reduced power consumption. Not gonna believe it for a minute. About the price and its place, i would rather sell off my B360/8700 non k/16gb ddr3 2666 and jump on the 3900x before i even consider paying the rumored $560. Would prob rather get the 9900 non k for $439 off Newegg and be set if i truly needed more cores. If my Asus B360-G Gaming can support it without throttling is another matter.

Its all desperate from Intel at this point and as someone who has loved their processors going back to my E6750 back in 2007, it breaks my heart to see Intel slacking but i am glad there is some true competition after all these years.

I get the idea that the 9900 has some insane clocks but is there a game where a 5ghz 8700 couldn't honestly deliver within 1-2 frames of a 9900KS at this point? Most benchmarks yeah the 8700 barely registers 50% usage in the mass majority of games. Yes i know there is more then gaming people do on the 9900 but dang some people seriously defend this chip for that.

 

[jpiniero]

I get the idea that the 9900 has some insane clocks but is there a game where a 5ghz 8700 couldn't honestly deliver within 1-2 frames of a 9900KS at this point?

You aren't getting 5 Ghz on a 8700 non-K though.

 

[mopardude87]

You aren't getting 5 Ghz on a 8700 non-K though.

Fixed but you had to of had known i meant the 8700k.