Intel Core i9-10900K

[Frick]

Wow... really? Link to that? I'm interested in seeing some numbers there!

Like I said earlier, I think this type of article is maybe good annually or something. But to test for it in each review sounds like a monumental PITA and not worth the time.

twitchtracker.com/statistics

I saw another page (statista.com) but that's behind a paywall I think. Still several million streamers/month before covid19.

And yeah annually or bianually would be a good thing. Or whenever both AMD and Intel have released new flagships.

 

[ratirt]

This tells users that because a certain heatsink/intel stock can't keep up with the HEAT, Intel doesn't include a stock cooler.

Mean what you say... say what you mean, please.

Who in their right mind would think a cooler isn't needed because it isn't included? lolololololol



A cooler can add more value, but again, intel and AMD do things differently, clearly. All AMD chips are unlocked and come with coolers (9590 didn't though, did it?). Intel, few chips are unlocked and those that are do not include a cooler. It is what it is. If you don't plan on buying an aftermarket cooler to overclock an Intel, you're in the wrong line.

Because they are overclocking. Great. I said it would have more value do you know why? Of course you will be overclocking the CPU for games mostly. And yet you still need a GPU (other components don't play much of a role here so i will skip these)
You don't need to OC straight from the start but what lack of cooler (certified by Intel for the processor) gives you is spending a lot of cash at a start to make the computer functional. $100-$150 cost is for any note worthy liquid (assumption is you would go with that one to get out of the CPU the best you can. I'm sure you would but maybe not straight form the start). That means you are robbed off $120 (lets say) because buying something for the time being (mid range cooler) is simply stupid. You are going to OC so you need best there is or at least a decent one which will cost. You could have spent this cash for better GPU since you got a stock cooler you can get the computer working right away. After 2 or 3 months you buy an awesome liquid (when you get the cash) for your CPU and OC and you get value because you already have 2080 Super instead 2070 Super for instance and you did it for games. (that is where the Intel CPU shine isn't it?) No stock certified cooler forces you to buy best there is at a start to make the computer work and OC but you may have to tone down the GPU purchase which is stupid because you are buying this PC for GAMES mostly.
That is how I see it and for me, stock cooler is very important and I'm sure there would have been way more buyers for this or other "K" line CPU from Intel if they have had that option. I would consider at least a purchase.
I don't care how Intel and AMD do things. I said, that for me (maybe for others as well) it has a value and saying because there never was or you will OC so stock cooler is useless is not anywhere near the answer I been expecting from someone who knows stuff about CPUs and other.

btw 4790k and 5775c both had a cooler,I have both sitting in the cabinet,they smell brand new.also-they're bad.

Great and this one doesn't so.... for years never had makes no sense and you still OC 4790k for instance not with that stock cooler.

 

[Vayra86]

lockdown is responsible for 70% of that probably


for 10900k it's just plain stupid to include one.that'd have to raise the cost,better not to include it and let ppl decide what kind of cooling they wanna run with it.

btw 4790k and 5775c both had a cooler,I have both sitting in the cabinet,they smell brand new.also-they're bad.

Well the copper core stock Intel cooler wasn't bad at all for a topflow. Not overly loud either. Still got the one coming off a 3570K, keeping it as a spare, emergency cooler for whenever a heatsink magically blows up or something

But overall I do agree, just include something in the lower range. Anything i7 and up should not have it IMO, and K definitely doesn't need it. Its a waste of metal imo. Similar story on Ryzen from the 5 onwards really. If its more than a quad, stick something cheap and decent on it, even if just for quality of life and getting the advertised perf out of it.

'No cooler included in the box'.

More needs to be made of this omission and in this case, you'll need a beefy, expensive cooler (240mm AIO optimal). The 3900X and upcoming 3900XT include coolers that you don't need to upgrade. So that adds at least $100 to the total price. Then there is added expense of more expensive mobos, only high-end for optimal performance.

So it's about $150-200 extra for 3.6% more fps at 1440p (realistic res) if you happen to have a 2080 Ti. No thanks.

EDIT: Actually, the listed price is the trade price. Already online the prices of these are $50 at least higher. So you're paying $200-250 more for a 10-core instead of a 12-core and I'm not exaggerating. Terrible deal.

You don't need a 240 AIO to extract the advertised performance from this CPU, and any overclocking is worthless anyway. The review literally spells that out. So where is the cooler mark up in this situation? You place some 30-40 bucks worth of air on it and you're done. End result: you lose maybe 3-5% of the top perf you can get out of this chip. OTOH, why not just get some non-K version then

 

[Jism]

Am I the only one who's not impressed with either AMD/Intel sticking as many cores as they can on their CPUs?

CPU's are hitting a speed wall beyond 5GHz. It takes immense power and cooling in order todo so. So if you cant go any faster, simple go wider. More and more games / programs are suitable for multiple threads instead of just the traditional one thread.

The race who had the fastest CPU related to just clocks is long way over. It's all down to optimizing the current to even more IPC.

 

[ThrashZone]

Hi,
A lot of fuss over intel not including air coolers with their chips
Boxes are getting big enough to include a D15 lol not sure why they don't sure there's some cheap China copies running around they could stuff into the box for pennies on the yen

I have nothing against amd just waiting for amd 4 and thread ripper 4 and see what it's going for
Price difference from 3950x and 3960x if that price difference didn't double I would of gotten a 3960x so too bad I was all set until that happened.

Instead I now have a 10 core gaming chip that is slaughtering HEDT delid 7900x/ 9900x & 10900x for less money in the first two cases a lot less $$$$ so it's all good

 

[Rahmat Sofyan]

Comet Lake ... no wonder why these CPU really hot ... made from comet ..

mehhh

 

[gamefoo21]

Well it looks like the leap frogging continues.

Zen 3 should pull it back with AMD on top. If the rumours of the XT series pan out, them AMD should be able to narrow the gap.

Too bad we didn't get to see the 3950x in the benches.

The per core HTT sounds like a good time. Only turn it on with the best cores and use the extra power budget for more clocks.

 

[cucker tarlson]

The per core HTT sounds like a good time. Only turn it on with the best cores and use the extra power budget for more clocks.

da wat?

 

[mrthanhnguyen]

Another silicon lottery was hit by Dancop

 

[gamefoo21]

da wat?

On the 10 series you can disable HTT on a per core basis. So you can run 10c/10t - 10c/20t... Like if you wanted 10c/16t for benching certain apps or whatever.

 

[cucker tarlson]

really ?

 

[gamefoo21]

really ?

That was something Buildzoid geeked out over.

 

[cucker tarlson]

That was something Buildzoid geeked out over.

useless imo
but yeah,they way HT is implemented,why not.
it'd be interesting to see HT scaling in games.
not really practical though.

 

[gamefoo21]

useless imo
but yeah,they way HT is implemented,why not.
it'd be interesting to see HT scaling in games.

Well the thing is if you are concerned with power usage, running HTT on 2 or 4 cores will get you most of the benefit.

Look at the power usage differences between the 9700K and 9900K, when unlocked and overclocked on air you are looking at a 70W increase from HTT.

On mobile it's definitely something I would appreciate. On desktop you could get quite a bit more performance because the cpu can clock higher for longer without burning the power budget and overloading the cooling. For overclocking, you disable HTT on the weaker cores, and you can get more hard clocks.

 

[W1zzard]

I played with selective HT disablement today

three runs:

• turn off HT on first 2 cores
• turn off HT on mid 2 cores
• turn off HT on last 2 cores

No significant differences, no magical performance gains

The theoretical value proposition sounds nice, set aside some high-performance cores without HT, for "special" loads, and leave HT enabled on the rest, so you can run more threads. Also no response from Intel after asking "does disabling HT for specific cores change their CPPC2 core ranking?"

 

[dgianstefani]

I played with selective HT disablement today

three runs:

• turn off HT on first 2 cores
• turn off HT on mid 2 cores
• turn off HT on last 2 cores

No significant differences, no magical performance gains

Obviously you won't see any performance gains simply from turning off HT, you need to follow that up with OC. The point is to do it on either weak cores that can't otherwise achieve an all core OC, or your strongest cores so you can get an extra 100mhz or so.

Some workloads or games don't scale past say, 8 threads. So having 16 threads e.g from your 10c/20t cpu, with 4c having HT disabled but OC'd to 100 or 200mhz higher will give you much better gains than either 10c/10t or 10c/20t.

Say for example 4 cores at 5.3ghz no HT, 6 cores at 5.2 with HT. Or a CPU that has 4 cores that can't do 5.2 with HT on, so instead of 20x5.1ghz threads you have 16x5.2.

It's a bit more involved than your run of the mill turn all core multipler to xx number, but there are gains to be had there.

In the Batman build a while back, it was very successful at having some very fast ST/MT benches, due to per core OC optimization https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/batmans-caselabs-mercury-s8-work-computer.247314/. This just takes it further.

 

[birdie]

Thank you @W1zzard for staying factual in your review and conclusions - very precise, very unbiased unlike most of the comments here.

I'd like to remind people that:

• Single threaded performance is always more preferrable than MOAR cores because 1) some workloads don't scale 2) some algorithms cannot be parallelized no matter how hard you try 3) in games there's always be a thread which manages all other threads loads which means faster but fewer cores will beat slower but MOAR cores 3) Most desktop applications are"spiky" in terms of CPU load, so if your CPU is able to boost high it'll mean less delays and faster response times for the user. Again, even if you have 128 cores that will not help at all in such scenarios.
• Comet Lake, even if it's gen 5 Sky Lake from 2015, is still faster than Zen 2 from 2019 in the resolution most competitive gamers game at, i.e. 1080p because FPS does matter even if you don't like it or like to downplay it. I would love to see your comments again once Zen 3/Ryzen 4000 has been released (hopefully it'll reliably boost to 4.8GHz and has at least a 15% IPC increase, which will allow AMD to gain that 1080p gaming crown and AMD fans will finally claim the victory).
• Yes, PL1 power consumption is quite high, however at least Intel is not deceiving its customers about it. 10900K sustained TDP is exactly 125W, v.s. e.g. Ryzen 7 3700X whose sustained TDP is around 90W which is a far cry from the advertised 65W. 3800X has a similar story: 90W advertised, around 120W real life power consumption.
• Much touted AMD's advantage in power consumption/efficiency is kinda insincere to say the least. Last time I checked AMD had sold GloFo which is stuck at 12nm (which is a lot worse than Intel's 14nm) and has been using TSMC for the past several years. Intel on the other hand doesn't have this luxury while they shot too high with their initial 10nm plans whose "benefits" they have been reaping for the past two years starting with a failure called Cannon Lake.
• Speaking of power consumption. AMD recommends water cooling for its 3900X and 3950X CPUs, so it makes perfect sense for the 10900K as well. Also, people who buy high end CPUs can normally afford good cooling solutions and they couldn't care less whether their CPU consumes 150 or 250W under load. In no way I excuse Intel for dragging their 14nm node for the sixth year straight but given the circumstances I don't think it's such a big issue.
• The game of waiting for AMD fans continues, "Zen 3 is around the corner". "This year/next year/soon AMD will become the indisputable leader in performance". Aren't you tired of it? It's been like that for the past 10 years already if not more.
• Now I'm going to disagree with @W1zzard on the cost of motherboards. X570 mobos were and remain quite expensive and some cost up to ... $1000, e.g. Asrock X570 Aqua. At the same time Intel has already released four more chipsets which will manifest in cheaper motherboards. B550 based mobos have just started to be sold almost a year after Ryzen 3000 CPU were released. Both companies are not alien to gouging.

Kudos to AMD for retaining socket compatibility for so many years. This is where Intel just doesn't want to yield. But then again, I wonder who on Earth upgrades their CPUs every year. I'm now rocking Ryzen 7 3700X and my previous purchase (Core i5 2500) was almost ten years ago. This whole intergenerational CPU socket compability is important maybe for less than 3% of customers, yet every review we'll find dozens of people who are extremely upset about that. But then you realize that most people never leave comments and the ones you see commenting do not represent the status quo.

 

[Shatun_Bear]

Thank you @W1zzard for staying factual in your review and conclusions - very precise, very unbiased unlike most of the comments here.

I'd like to remind people that:

• Single threaded performance is always more preferrable than MOAR cores because 1) some workloads don't scale 2) some algorithms cannot be parallelized no matter how hard you try 3) in games there's always be a thread which manages all other threads loads which means faster but fewer cores will beat slower but MOAR cores 3) Most desktop applications are"spiky" in terms of CPU load, so if your CPU is able to boost high it'll mean less delays and faster response times for the user. Again, even if you have 128 cores that will not help at all in such scenarios.
• Comet Lake, even if it's gen 5 Sky Lake from 2015, is still faster than Zen 2 from 2019 in the resolution most competitive gamers game at, i.e. 1080p because FPS does matter even if you don't like it or like to downplay it. I would love to see your comments again once Zen 3/Ryzen 4000 has been released (hopefully it'll reliably boost to 4.8GHz and has at least a 15% IPC increase, which will allow AMD to gain that 1080p gaming crown and AMD fans will finally claim the victory).
• Yes, PL1 power consumption is quite high, however at least Intel is not deceiving its customers about it. 10900K sustained TDP is exactly 125W, v.s. e.g. Ryzen 7 3700X whose sustained TDP is around 90W which is a far cry from the advertised 65W. 3800X has a similar story: 90W advertised, around 120W real life power consumption.
• Much touted AMD's advantage in power consumption/efficiency is kinda insincere to say the least. Last time I checked AMD had sold GloFo which is stuck at 12nm (which is a lot worse than Intel's 14nm) and has been using TSMC for the past several years. Intel on the other hand doesn't have this luxury while they shot too high with their initial 10nm plans whose "benefits" they have been reaping for the past two years starting with a failure called Cannon Lake.
• Now I'm going to disagree with @W1zzard on the cost of motherboards. X570 mobos were and remain quite expensive and some cost up to ... $1000, e.g. Asrock X570 Aqua. At the same time Intel has already released four more chipsets which will manifest in cheaper motherboards. B550 based mobos have just started to be sold almost a year after Ryzen 3000 CPU were released. Both companies are not alien to gouging.

Kudos to AMD for retaining socket compatibility for so many years. This is where Intel just doesn't want to yield. But then again, I wonder who on Earth upgrades their CPUs every year. I'm now rocking Ryzen 7 3700X and my previous purchase (Core i5 2500) was almost ten years ago. This whole intergenerational CPU socket compability is important maybe for less than 3% of customers, yet every review we'll find dozens of people who are extremely upset about that. But then you realize that most people never leave comments and the ones you see commenting do not represent the status quo.

Lucky then that CPUs are not just used for 1080p gaming...and we have graphics cards for that stuff, the hint is in the name.

 

[N3M3515]

for 10900k it's just plain stupid to include one.that'd have to raise the cost,better not to include it and let ppl decide what kind of cooling they wanna run with it.

Well, this cpu overclock is worth shit anyway, whatever cooler decent enough is fine. That said, 540 for the cpu + 50 cooler + 100 mobo = 690 vs 410 so, 50%+ for ten more frames at 110fps?, not to mention it runs hotter and consumes more power? WTF? not even an intel fan would buy this over a 3900X.

 

[chrcoluk]

Looks like OC isnt worth it on intel anymore, those temp figures are horrible for the asus bios profile and for the manual OC.

Similar on my 9900K as well, intel now get these chips close to a reasonable max efficiency out of the box now.

On my 9900k I basically reduced the vcore,sa,io voltages and slightly boosted all core overclock by 100mhz and left it at that.

Lucky then that CPUs are not just used for 1080p gaming...and we have graphics cards for that stuff, the hint is in the name.

You will see in many of the tests decompression, math calculation etc. intel still is a fair bit faster than AMD, even a 4.3ghz 8600k beats a 4400k AMD chip.

Most people have been influenced by AMD doing well in cinebench which to be frank is not a realistic test, it only represents encoding and nothing else, and the vast majority of consumers dont encode at all, never mind on their cpu.

If you want best bang for buck, honestly most people wont need more than a quad core chip regardless if its intel or AMD, this hype about more cores has led to people paying for cores they dont need, because a few people (namely reviewers) encode videos for a living they push it as some kind of need on everyone. 8 cores will be a bit better for optimal smoothness, but after that its ego and niche purpose only. Anyone buying a 3900x just for gaming is wasting money. 9900k is poor value for money so that deserves the same criticism as well but at least with a 9900 the extra single core performance will mean something to more people even if its only a little.

We can clearly see the impact of per core performance when comparing the 9900k to a 9900ks, a 9900ks is probably what the 9900k should have been and its a shame it was limited supply only. The 9900ks in many of the tests mixes with these 10xxx chips.

 

[Caring1]

@W1zzard Any chance of a review of the 10900X?

 

[Ruru]

The good old FX-9590 has been beaten in power draw, finally.

 

[W1zzard]

@W1zzard Any chance of a review of the 10900X?

No plans for HEDT reviews

 

[Mals]

The real question is.. when are these gonna be back in stock. They're sold out everywhere..and now that I'm finally not just playing Rocket League, my OC'd 3770k is starting to really show it's age xD

 

[Elysium]

We can clearly see the impact of per core performance when comparing the 9900k to a 9900ks, a 9900ks is probably what the 9900k should have been and its a shame it was limited supply only. The 9900ks in many of the tests mixes with these 10xxx chips.

Man I thought the exact same thing when Coffee Lake refresh emerged. If they had so much of this 14nm silicon lying around, why did they not just make the 9900KS a not-so-special-edition chip and bump everything that didn't make the bin down to 9700K? I mean, it's not much of a self-inflicted gunshot wound all by itself but now that we see what Comet Lake is made of, hindsight is really showing how bad of a strategic decision that was.