Intel Core i9-11900K CPU Review

Today we get to check out Intel’s new 11th-generation ‘Rocket Lake-S’ based Core i9-11900K. This is Intel’s first new architecture for the Mainstream Desktop segment in several generations and it brings some updated technologies such as PCIe 4.0, additional PCIe lanes for dedicated storage, and a wider DMI bus. When coupled with the recently released 500 series chipsets, you also get some serious levels of connectivity. With 8 cores, 16 threads, and the ability to boost well into the 5Ghz range, you know it’s going to be potent. We also find optional platform support for USB 3.2 gen2x2 20gbps USB, Intel Thunderbolt 4, USB4, and WiFi 6E support for maximum speed connectivity to, well, everything. New overclocking features such as a new memory controller with real-time memory overclocking from your desktop, memory overclocking support on H570 and B560 chipsets, AVX enable/disable options, and even AVX2 and AVX-512 guard-band overrides, you can tune like never before. The elephant in the room, or not? We’ll immediately go after the elephant in the room: yes, this is another 14nm part from Intel. However, this is NOT a slightly tweaked Skylake (what are we on now, Skylake five-point-oh? 14+++++ or something?). This is a new architecture entirely. With the mind-bogglingly difficult task of shrinking process nodes down further while already measuring transistor gates in mere atoms wide, Intel has decided to back-port Ice-Lake, developed for 10nm, to the exceptionally well-refined 14nm process node. Some readers might be quick to point out that “AMD (TSMC being the actual fab) is already on 7nm!” but it’s not quite that simple. Many generations ago, the node or marketing size in nanometers was nearly universally measured as the minimum transistor gate length. Now, things are driven more by marketing, than physical properties. The IEEE states “Driven by competitive marketing in the most recent decade, this label has become decoupled from, and can be several times smaller than, the actual minimum gate length, while it also fails to convey other essential characteristics of the technology.” What this means, in laymen's terms, is that since silicon manufacturing has gone from a 2D planar design to a highly 3D process to construct transistors and other elements and the old marketing terms really don’t offer any insight in an apples to apples kind of way. As it turns out, size-wise, there is very little difference between AMD/TSMC’s 7nm node and Intels' 10nm node. The REAL difference comes from the actual design and construction of the silicon features and now how they do or done measure up with a single number. Popular Youtuber and well-known overclocker Der8auer has a spectacular video on this channel that explains this very well and shows both sides in great detail with the aid of a scanning electron microscope. We encourage you to check his video out here and be sure to show him some love for the hard work he put into that content. Now that we’ve clarified that the marketing number doesn’t actually mean much to most of the world, and cant be used as an indicator of performance, Let’s see how the Core i9-11900K actually does! We want to thank Intel for sending us over the new Core i9-11900K to test out! Intel’s take on the Core i9-11900K: The 11th Gen Intel® Core™ desktop processor family puts you in control of your computing experience. It features an innovative new architecture for reimagined performance, immersive display and graphics for incredible visuals, and a range of options and technologies for enhanced tuning. When these advances come together, you have everything you need for fast-paced professional work, elite gaming, inspired creativity, and extreme tuning. The 11th Gen Intel® Core™ desktop processor family gives you the power to perform, compete, excel, and power your greatest contributions. Performance: Reimagined Performance 11th Gen Intel Core desktop processors are intelligently engineered to push the boundaries of performance. The new processor core architecture transforms hardware and software efficiency and takes advantage of Intel Deep Learning Boost to accelerate AI performance. Key platform improvements include memory support up to DDR4-3200, up to 20 CPU PCIe 4.0 lanes, integrated USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 (20G), and Intel Optane Memory H20 with SSD support. Together, these technologies bring the power and the intelligence you need to supercharge productivity, stay in the creative flow, and game at the highest level. Creativity: Immersive Display & Graphics Experience rich, stunning, seamless visuals with high-performance graphics on 11th Gen Intel Core desktop processors. Enhanced Intel UHD Graphics featuring Intel Xe graphics architecture offers powerful media and graphics capabilities to bring your virtual world to life. Key platform advances enable complete immersion—with integrated HDMI 2.0 and HBR3 for up to three simultaneous 4K HDR displays at 60Hz; 12bit HEVC/VP9 decode and E2E compression for efficient, enhanced quality of media; and 10bit AV1 Codec decode support that provides true fixed function-based decoding for fast, energy-efficient performance with video calling and screen share. Just sit down and dive in—to uncompromised in-game performance while streaming and recording, seamless multi-tasking across multiple screens, or fast creating and editing for even the most demanding tasks. Tuning: Enhanced Tuning & Control 11th Gen Intel Core desktop processors offer you the flexibility and control to power your greatest contributions. Unlocked 11th Gen Intel® Core desktop processors enable you to overclock confidently with enhanced features3 like Intel® Performance Maximizer, Intel Extreme Tuning Utility4 (Intel® XTU), Solder Thermal Interface Material (STIM), and improved overclocking customizations. Now you can push your CPU to the limits, open new performance horizons, or re-imagine streaming and recording. 11th gen processors also simplify connectivity through Intel® Thunderbolt 4 (discrete USB4 compliant), enhance expandability through high-speed PCIe lanes and USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 (20G), and advance wireless connectivity through discrete Wi-Fi 6E. Take control and push ahead with the processors that maximize whatever matters most to you. Intel Z590 Chipset Block Diagram A few key takeaways here. The first thing to note is the updated DMI Bus. Intel has used a PCIe 3.0 x4 based DMI bus for a handful of generations now, Z590 with a compatible 11th gen chip doubles this to PCIe 3.0 x8. The Next is a new dedicated PCIe 4.0 x4 link from the CPU for storage. Important features: New Processor Core Architecture PC improvements transform hardware and software efficiency and increase real-world performance for smooth gameplay, immersive productivity, and fast creation. Intel® Deep Learning Boost (VNNI) Accelerates AI inference—vastly improving performance for deep learning workloads. Gaussian Neural Accelerator 2.0 (GNA 2.0) Runs AI workloads on the accelerator to more efficiently blur video background and suppress background noise. Intel® UHD Graphics featuring Intel® Xe graphics architecture Rich media and intelligent graphics capabilities enable amplified visual complexity, enhanced 3D performance, and faster image processing. Enhanced Display (Integrated HDMI 2.0, HBR3) Immerse in up to three simultaneous 4K displays at 60Hz or a pair of 5K displays at 60Hz8 with increased connectivity to enhance display support. Enhanced Media (12bit HEVC, 10bit AV1 decode, E2E compression) Greater system-wide performance and support for enhanced quality of media encode and decode, efficiently. New Overclocking Features and Capabilities A range of enhanced overclocking capabilities, including Intel Performance Maximizer,4 Intel® Extreme Tuning Utility, Intel Extreme Memory Profile—and, on unlocked processors, per-core hyperthreading, enhanced voltage frequency control, and PCle overclocking. Discrete Wi-Fi 6E (GIG+) Wi-Fi connection that is 3 times faster and with 40% higher peak data rates compared to the standard 802.22ac 2x2 and dual spatial stream 802.11ac, respectively. Increased DDR4 speeds Smooth media editing, fast multitasking, and enhanced productivity with memory support up to DDR4-3200. 20 CPU PCIe 4.0 lanes Additional lanes (compared to previous generations) increase PCIe throughput and flexibility for fast connection of next-gen PCIe devices. Intel® Optane™ Memory H20 Performance improvements and power reduction over Intel® Optane™ memory H10 with SSD. Integrated USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 (20G) Up to twice the USB bandwidth (vs USB 3.2 Gen 2x1 (10G)) for fast data transfers. USB Audio Offload Deep sleep states are possible with the USB Audio Offload. Discrete Intel Thunderbolt 4 (USB4 compliant) Universal cable connectivity for a simple, reliable connection that provides incredible performance. Quick Specs: # of Cores - 8 # of Threads - 16 Processor Base Frequency - 3.50 GHz Max Turbo Boost 3.0 Frequency - 5.20 GHz Intel® Thermal Velocity Boost Frequency - 5.30 GHz-Single/4.8GHz-All Core Cache - 16 MB Intel Smart Cache TDP - 125 W Max Memory Size - 128 GB Memory Speed - DDR4-3200 Max # of Memory Channels - 2 Processor Graphics - Intel UHD Graphics 750 Scalability - 1S Only PCI Express Revision - 4.0 Max # of PCI Express Lanes - 20 Sockets Supported - FCLGA1200 Intel 11th Gen Comparison Table A Closer Look Intel has sent reviewers a flashy review kit the last few generations and 11th gen is not different. This go around, we get a large blue colored cube about of about 8 inches. The top lifts off to reveal a staged display. This reminds us of a flashy display box you would see on a convenience store counter tempting you to grab a new flavor of your favorite candy bar. Amusingly this isn’t terribly far from the truth for us. Besides the i9 and i5 SKUs included, there is also a small crystal cube sitting in the tray. Each CPU box lifts out of a slot in the base, as does the Intel crystal. The rear ‘billboard’ magnetically attaches and pops off easily. The packaging is kind of fun, but not something you can get on a retail shelf. Let’s open up the i9-11900K and check it out. Inside, you see the same clear clamshell packaging over the CPU you’re used to, nothing new here. The back of the CPU looks pretty much identical to the previous 10th gen CPUs and indeed it should since they are both LGA1200 CPUs. Synthetic Testing Test Platform: CPU – Intel Core i9-11900K Mobo – ASUS Maximus XIII Hero RAM – 32GB (4x8GB) HyperX Fury RGB 3200MHz C16 GPU – Nvidia RTX 2080 Founders Edition SSD – Kingston KC1000 1TB PSU – Thermaltake Toughpower Grand RGB Gold 750W Chassis – Open BenchTable Cooling – Custom Liquid Loop (EKWB Velocity CPU Block, EKWB PE240 Rad, 1x DDC Pump) All testing is performed at stock settings except for enabling XMP (Profile 1: 3200MHz 16-18-18-38 1.35V) and Asus's Multicore Enhancement disabled in the BIOS. Super PI Modded 1.5 “In August 1995, the calculation of pi up to 4,294,960,000 decimal digits was succeeded by using a supercomputer at the University of Tokyo. The program was written by D.Takahashi in collaboration with Dr.Y.Kanada at the computer center. This record should be the current world record. (Details are shown in the windows help.) This record-breaking program was ported to personal computer environments such as Windows NT and Windows 95. In order to calculate 33.55 million digits, it takes within 3 days with a Pentium 90 MHz, 40 MB main memory, and 340 MB available storage.” One of Intel’s biggest claims to fame this generation is the per-core IPC uplift, meaning per clock cycle, you get more performance. The easiest way to see this is a single-threaded test and indeed here we see a large uplift in SuperPi. CINEBENCH R15 "CINEBENCH is a real-world cross-platform test suite that evaluates your computer's performance capabilities. CINEBENCH is based on MAXON's award-winning animation software CINEMA 4D, which is used extensively by studios and production houses worldwide for 3D content creation. MAXON software has been used in blockbuster movies such as Iron Man 3, Oblivion, Life of Pi or Prometheus, and much more. CINEBENCH is the perfect tool to compare CPU and graphics performance across various systems and platforms (Windows and OS X). And best of all: It's completely free." In single-threaded test mode, the 11900K easily climbs ahead of every other blue processor, but can't quite edge out the latest flagship chips from AMD. In multi-threaded, the 8-core 11900K crawls just ahead of the previous 10-core 10900K. Raw core count is still king here so AMD’s 12 and 16-core chips still hold a commanding lead overall. CINEBENCH R20 Cinebench is a real-world cross-platform test suite that evaluates your computer's hardware capabilities. Improvements to Cinebench Release 20 reflect the overall advancements to CPU and rendering technology in recent years, providing a more accurate measurement of Cinema 4D's ability to take advantage of multiple CPU cores and modern processor features available to the average user. Best of all: It's free. In the newer Cinebench R20, the 11900K actually pulls a win in single-threaded mode. In multi-core mode, we see the same trend as Cinebench R15. Passmark Performance Test - CPU Mark “Fast, easy to use, PC speed testing, and benchmarking. PassMark Performance Test ™ allows you to objectively benchmark a PC using a variety of different speed tests and compare the results to other computers.” Passmark gives the 11900K a strong lead over the higher core count 10900K and it even shows gains on the Ryzen 3900X with 50% more cores. SiSoft Sandra – Cryptographic Bandwidth “SiSoftware Sandra provides a robust package of diagnostic tools for testing your system and teasing out its problems--or potential headaches.” SiSoft Sandra gives the 11900K a bit lower score here than the 10900K. Y-Cruncher Written by Alexander J. Lee “From a high-school project that went a little too far...” y-cruncher, (y for gamma) is a number-crunching program that can compute various mathematical constants. It was originally a small program specialized for computing the Euler-Mascheroni Constant. (Which uses gamma as its symbol, hence the name). It has since gained the ability to compute other constants. It is the first of its kind that is multi-threaded and scalable to multi-core systems. Ever since its launch in 2009, it has become a common benchmarking and stress-testing application for overclockers and hardware enthusiasts. We tested using the built-in benchmarks to compute Pi to 1 Billion Digits in both single and multi-threaded mode and recorded the Total Computation time at the end of the run. Y-Cruncher is also able to take advantage of AVX512 instructions in compatible CPUs. Due to the thermal load of running Intense AVX workloads, Intel has implemented an AVX offset clock that may scale the CPU’s clock speed back, even below stock speeds when running intense AVX loads. For this reason, we note the CPU’s clock speed in both single and multi-threaded test modes. The 11900K almost ties the 10900K in multi-threaded mode, but 11th gen includes AVX-512 support and this manifests itself as THE fastest compute times of any CPUs we’ve ever tested, including HEDT chips that have had AVX512 support for several generations. AVX512 isn't commonly used but can lend itself to certain computations more common in workstation tasks. Black Hole 4.2 Let the beast run and benchmark your system in three different tests (Multithreaded, Single-threaded & 4-Threaded) that will test your CPU to the very limit, and score you among hundreds of other systems that have tested. Multithreaded will test your CPU's efficiency of running more than one thread without major system lag. The higher you score on this one, the more threads your CPU can handle with a comfortable speed. High multithreaded scores generally mean you can render things faster. 4-Threaded tests your CPU's performance in games since most games currently run on 4 threads. Single-threaded evaluates how fast the CPU can handle a single, dedicated thread for processing. The 11900K just crushes this benchmark with it just edging out the 12-core AMD Ryzen 5900X. Even the 11600K flys way ahead of the 10900K. Workstation & Productivity Testing PCMark 10 PCMark 10 replicates many common tasks an office user might do such as manipulating photos, video conferencing, and spreadsheet editing and the 11900K holds first place overall in our list, even against the latest AMD chips. Blender Benchmark 2.82 – BMW27 A new platform to collect and display the results of hardware and software performance tests. Aimed at an optimal comparison between system hardware and installations using open source software and testing content in the public domain. Blender can take full advantage of multiple cores so our breakdown here almost perfectly reflects core counts rather than raw performance. POV-Ray 3.7 Standard Benchmark – CPU POV-Ray also scales linearly with core counts though we do find the 11900K edging out the aging 10-core i9-7900X. x265 HD Benchmark A benchmark that measures how fast your computer can encode HD (1080p) video in the new H.265 / HEVC format. Transcoding video likes core counts but doesn’t really solely on parallelization so our 11900K fights its way up into the 12-core pack pretty easily. 7-Zip The benchmark shows a rating in MIPS (million instructions per second). The rating value is calculated from the measured speed, and it is normalized with the results of the Intel Core 2 CPU with a multi-threading option switched off. So if you have a modern CPU from Intel or AMD, rating values in single-thread mode must be close to real CPU frequency. There are two tests, compression with the LZMA method and decompression with the LZMA method. Once the total passes reach 50, the score is taken In file compression activities, the 11900K gives an impressive show with almost 81,000 MIPS. Not quite up to the 10-core 10900K level, but going toe to toe with HEDT chips of yesterday. WebXPRT 2015 WebXPRT gives the 11900K a score of 945, the second-highest we’ve seen. Memory & Cache Testing AIDA64 Engineer Edition “FinalWire Ltd. today announced the immediate availability of AIDA64 Extreme Edition 1.50 software, a streamlined diagnostic and benchmarking tool for home users; and the immediate availability of AIDA64 Business Edition 1.50 software, an essential network management solution for small and medium scale enterprises. The new AIDA64 update implements AVX-optimized benchmarks for the upcoming Intel Sandy Bridge processors, adds a brand-new video encoding benchmark, and supports the latest AMD and NVIDIA graphics processors.” Intel’s 11th gen chips exhibit a bit more performance than their 10th gen counterparts with the same memory indicating a more efficient architecture. A more efficient architecture manifests itself as lower overall latency and we see that here with the 11900K shaving a few nanoseconds off. Intel’s 11th gen chips show a strong gain in Level 1 and Level 2 cache bandwidth but fall off a bit on Level 3 cache bandwidth. Passmark Performance Test - Memory Mark - Threaded “Fast, easy to use, PC speed testing, and benchmarking. PassMark Performance Test ™ allows you to objectively benchmark a PC using a variety of different speed tests and compare the results to other computers.” Passmark shows the 11900K with significantly higher memory performance than 10th gen. SiSoft Sandra – Memory Bandwidth - Aggregate. “SiSoftware Sandra provides a robust package of diagnostic tools for testing your system and teasing out its problems--or potential headaches.” SiSoft shows aggregate memory bandwidth only bested with chips rocking quad-channel memory, pretty impressive! Synthetic Game Testing 3DMark – Fire Strike "Fire Strike is a showcase DirectX 11 benchmark designed for today's high-performance gaming PCs. It is our most ambitious and technical benchmark ever, featuring real-time graphics rendered with detail and complexity far beyond what is found in other benchmarks and games today" There might not be a substitute for raw core count in CPU rendered physics, but Intel tries hard to prove that wrong. We see the 11900K ahead of AMD’s 12-core offerings with the 10900K slightly behind. 3DMark – Time Spy "3Dmark Time Spy is a new DirectX 12 benchmark test for Windows 10 gaming PCs. Time Spay is one of the first DirectX 12 apps to be built “the right way” from the ground up to fully realize the performance gains that the new API offers. With DirectX 12 engine, which supports new API features like asynchronous compute, explicit multi-adapter, and multi-threading, Time Spy is the ideal test for benchmarking the latest graphics cards.” Time Spy’s CPU Physics test shows the 11900K matching the AMD 5950X but both just behind the 10900K. Game Testing Sid Meier’s Civilization VI Originally created by legendary game designer Sid Meier, Civilization is a turn-based strategy game in which you attempt to build an empire to stand the test of time. Become Ruler of the World by establishing and leading a civilization from the Stone Age to the Information Age. Wage war, conduct diplomacy, advance your culture, and go head-to-head with history’s greatest leaders as you attempt to build the greatest civilization the world has ever known. Civilization VI offers new ways to engage with your world: cities now physically expand across the map, active research in technology and culture unlocks new potential, and competing leaders will pursue their own agendas based on their historical traits as you race for one of five ways to achieve victory in the game. Our first real game test shows how much game optimization can make a difference. The new architecture is technically more powerful, but Civilization 6 just doesn’t take advantage of it well yet. Far Cry 5 Anything can happen. Everything will. Welcome to Hope County, Montana, land of the free and the brave, but also home to a fanatical doomsday cult—known as The Project at Eden’s Gate—that is threatening the community's freedom. Stand up to the cult’s leaders, Joseph Seed, and the Heralds, as you spark the fires of resistance that will liberate the besieged community. Far Cry 5 on the other hand uses the 11900K to great effect and gives us an average frame rate of 147 FPS. Shadow of the Tomb Raider Experience Lara Croft’s defining moment as she becomes the Tomb Raider. In Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Lara must master a deadly jungle, overcome terrifying tombs, and persevere through her darkest hour. As she races to save the world from a Maya apocalypse, Lara will ultimately be forged into the Tomb Raider she is destined to be. The latest Tomb Raider also sees the 11900K and even the 11600K topping the scoreboard with both managing an average FPS of 136. Far Cry New Dawn New Dawn also shows the 11900K holding down a commanding lead in gaming performance. Overclocking, Power & Thermals WE’ll use Intel’s Extreme Tuning Utility (XTU) first and enable its Speed optimizer. It brings the All core utilization speed up to 5.0GHz from the default 4.8GHz. This gives us a score of 5971, down an insignificant amount from 5997 Next, we’ll flip over to manual tuning under the advanced tab. We’ll start by pushing the minimum clock speed to 5.1GHz. This does get us a bump in the score up to 6227. We tried for 5.2GHz all core but quickly slammed into power throttling that required us to go into the Motherboard BIOS to unlock. With the power limits relaxed, we easily get to 5.2GHz all core but are seeing power draws quickly approaching 400W. Our temps are hovering around the 90C mark which isn’t terrible but is certainly on the hot side. While nothing apparent is limiting us, our score doesn’t climb as it should. 5.3GHz all core simply was unstable and would instantly crash the system with any multi-threaded benchmark. Intel Adaptive Boost Technology Shortly before launch, Intel reached out to us with a new feature of the 11th gen unlocked i9 processors (only the i9-11900K and i9-11900KF) known as Adaptive Boost Technology. This gives us a fourth frequency boost level for the already semi-confusing mix. It will boost core clock speeds when the active core count is 3-8 and there is still headroom in the power budget. End result functionality is very similar to AMD’s more recent Precision Boost 2.0. Base Frequency – guaranteed Frequency the CPU will run while staying within its specified TDP power level. Turbo Boost 2.0 - Map of boost frequencies based on the number of cores used. Turbo Boost Max 3.0 – Best cores of a chip get an extra speed boost when they are the only ones utilized. Thermal Velocity Boost – Similar to TB2, but if the highest temp detected is below a threshold, all cores get +100Mhz. Adaptive Boost Tech. – Similar to TB3, but when 3 or more cores are in use, the CPU boosts as far as it can while staying within the Power budget. This requires a BIOS update on your favorite motherboard and likely needing you to go into the BIOS and manually enable it. Running ABT, our Cinebench R20 score jumps from 5997 to 6167, a notable jump. Our Blender benchmark time droops from 2 minutes and 33 seconds to 2 minutes and 27 seconds. Our Time Spy CPU Physics Score jumps from 12,622 to 12,967 points. Apparently, Intel’s new boost algorithm works quite well! Conclusion It’s easy to look at a single metric like core count and just write off Intel’s 11th gen Core i9-11900K as a pointless backstep, but, you would be missing out on a lot of good things. CPU core aside, the entire platform is a welcome jump forward. The most obvious is PCIe 4.0 support which is something consumers have only enjoyed on the red platform the last couple of years. While honestly, it doesn’t make much difference for things like GPUs, it very much does make a noticeable difference with PCIe-based storage with PCIe 4.0 drives currently able to hit upwards of 7GB/s in sequential transfers, and yes, that is the big ‘B’ for Bytes. On top of this, Intel doubles the bandwidth between the CPU and the chipset from DMI 3.0 x4 to x8 and adds an additional 4 lanes of CPU-derived 4.0 lanes for a dedicated storage device of your choosing. Connectivity in general jumps radically with baked-in support for things like Thunderbolt 4 (and by Proxy, USB4 support), USB 3.2x2 20Gbps, and the latest 2.5Gbps wired networking and WiFi6e support for crazy speeds without wires. Most of this is going to depend on what your motherboard manufacturer decided to support on that given board model, but just know it’s there if they want it. We’ll cut right to the chase, If you are already running an Intel Core i9-10900K, and are happy with your connectivity, it’s probably not worth your time to upgrade. If you are on an older platform, Intel makes a very compelling case to upgrade. While productivity-oriented users may favor a higher core count, most users will enjoy a very powerful system that is adept at almost everything. Great job Intel!

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