Comet Lake Discussion Thread

[SteelCrysis]

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/cheape...and-newegg

If you're in the market for an Intel Core i5 processor and looking at the i5-10600K (our review here), you might have noticed that prices are a little steep on NewEgg and Amazon, with the e-tailers asking for $295 and $320, respectively. Both these prices are well above Intel's MSRP of $262, but worry not. You can now score a binned Intel Core i5-10600K that is guaranteed to overclock to 4.7 GHz on all cores at once for just $290. At stock settings, the chip boosts to 4.8 GHz, but Silicon Lottery also allows the 4.7 GHz model to hit 4.8 GHz on two cores, too.

Yes, you read that right. At this time, both NewEgg and Amazon are gauging the prices of Intel chips, which sucks for us consumers. But, Silicon Lottery is happily shipping out Intel Core i5-10600K's for $290 after testing their overclocking capabilities. Sure, that's still above MSRP, but you're getting a tested chip that likely runs better than one off Amazon or NewEgg for less money. Seems like a win-win if you ask me.

https://www.techpowerup.com/review/intel...00/22.html

Despite having 10 cores and 20 threads, application performance is relatively low, with the i9-10900 just 4% faster than the Ryzen 7 3800XT and 6% faster than the 3700X. Even more shocking is that the Core i7-10700K is 1.2% faster than the Core i9-10900! Last generation's Core i9-9900K is 7% behind, and the i9-9900KS is 2.5% faster. Intel's flagship, the Core i9-10900K is 11% faster. AMD's Ryzen 9 3900X is 8% ahead, at similar pricing as the i9-10900. The reason why the Core i9-10900 does so poorly is its 65-watt TDP. Because of a generous PL2 power limit of 224 W, the CPU will run almost unconstrained for less than a minute, but once that power budget is used up, the CPU is throttled to respect the 65 W power limit (PL1), which severely cripples performance for long-running workloads. This is "working as intended"—otherwise, Intel wouldn't be able sell the Core i9-10900 as a 65-watt processor. Our Office benchmarks reveal that the power limit is not an issue for light applications that only use up to a few cores. But why would anyone with such a usage profile buy an i9-10900 in the first place?

Things get interesting once you adjust the power limit, which is possible on all motherboards and chipsets, even dirt-cheap H410 boards, using Throttlestop. When unleashed, the i9-10900 delivers truly impressive performance. On average, it runs 10% quicker, which makes it the fastest processor in our test group, faster than all AMD CPUs; the only exception is the Core i9-10900K, which ends up 0.4% faster. Wow! The gains are very dependent on the application profile, though. Highly intensive workloads, like rendering, run up to 40% faster(!), whereas single-threaded apps gain almost nothing. Basically, the higher the theoretical power draw of an app, the bigger the improvement.

Gaming results, on the other hand, show almost no difference between the i9-10900 running at 65 W TDP or unconstrained—seems that gaming doesn't put enough load on the CPU to hit the 65 W limit in the first place. For gaming, the i9-10900 is still an outstanding choice. Even at stock, it is faster than any processor we have ever tested with the exception of the i9-10900K, which is 2.4% faster at 720p. For non-academic resolutions, the difference is less than 1%. This means the i9-10900 is faster than any AMD processor; even last week's Ryzen 9 3900XT is 7% slower at 1080p, and more expensive. It's still important to realize that CPU power isn't that important for gaming, especially at higher resolutions, where the GPU is the bottleneck. For example, a Core i5 or Ryzen 5 is MUCH more affordable, yet the delivered FPS is not that different—if you spend the savings on a faster GPU, the slower CPU and faster GPU will be the combination that gives you more FPS.
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Power consumption and heat output of the Core i9-10900 at stock are laughable. With just 40°C under load, it runs cooler than all the high-end CPUs in our test group, which is not surprising because of the 65 W TDP. When throttled, it chugs along at relatively low clock and voltage, which makes the i9-10900 the most power-efficient Intel processor. With just 10 kilojoules to complete Cinebench, it is more energy efficient than even the majority of Zen 2 Ryzens. Only the Ryzen 9 3900XT is slightly better at 9.6 kJ. Once you unleash the beast, things are different. Power consumption shoots up to 240 W from 140 W, temperatures rise to 75°C, and energy usage is at 14 kJ for a Cinebench run—but it runs 33% faster, making it a very interesting example to illustrate where the 14 nm process runs out of steam. Is that power increase bad? I'm not sure, doesn't everybody want options? Now you have them. You can run super-efficient and wait longer for calculations to complete or speed things up to Core i9-10900K levels at the cost of higher heat and power, which will be a reasonable tradeoff for many of our readers.

Priced at $440, the Core i9-10900 is expensive if you consider what it offers at stock. Application performance is lower than with the Core i7-10700K, a processor that's $70 cheaper. The Ryzen 9 3900X is $430 and much faster in apps, too. For better price/performance you might even want to look at the Core i5-10600K or Ryzen 7 3700X. Gaming runs great on the Core i9-10900, even with the default power limit. I guess that can justify its price for many gamers. Our gaming results show that the smarter choice is a Core i5-10400F for $160, with savings invested in a faster graphics card. If you are willing to spend 30 seconds in the BIOS, you can turn the i9-10900 into a price/performance monster. With the power limit removed, the CPU will run at its full potential, basically rivaling the Core i9-10900K at much lower pricing, and a heatsink is included, too. While we don't recommend the stock cooler for the maximum power-limit configurations, it's still a possible upgrade path. Use the stock cooler with the TDP raised from 65 W to 100 W until you have more cash available and can buy a decent aftermarket cooler, or even go watercooling.