At an event in New York City today, Intel officially announced the Intel Core i9-9900K processor. As long rumored, this is Intel’s first processor with a 5GHz Turbo Boost maximum, 8 cores, and 16 threads.
Intel noted this newest processor was tested with 19 of the most popular games today, and across genres like shooters, and RPGs. In fact, the firm demoed in the keynote that the chip is able to run two games at once on a brand new PC. That adds up for anywhere between 10-11% more performance over the previous generation in popular games like Hitman 2 and World of Tanks.
Pre-orders on the i9-9900K processor are open today and a ship date of October 19. New desktops from the Acer Predator, Lenovo Legion, Dell Alienware range will also have the processor onboard, and a few of those machines were briefly showcased on the stage during the keynote. Currently, the processor is listed for $579 on Newegg, but an earlier leak suggested a price of $580 at retail.
Other notable specs on board the Core i9-9900K processor include a base clock speed of 3.6 GHz, 16MB Intel Smart Cache, and up to 40 platform PCI-E Lanes. The Core i9-9900K processor will also be compatible with the new Intel X390 Chipset, and all Intel Series 300 Chipsets, support up to two channels of DDR4-2666 memory and come with the benefits of Intel Optane Memory and Intel Optane SSD support.
Aimed at developers, Intel announced new Xeon W-3175X and X-series processors at this event. The Xeon series processors come packed with 28 cores, 56 threads, and a 4.3 GHz frequency out of the box. As for the X-series processors, those come packed with up to 18 cores, and 36 threads, 68 lanes of Platform PCIe, Quad Channel DDR4 memory, and solder TIM for better overclocking.
Earlier in the month, the Core i9-9900K processor leaked on Amazon. That leak provided a look at some stylish dodecahedron packaging, which indeed held up to be true.
Considering that this is Intel’s response to AMD’s new eight-core Threadripper chips, there is definitely a lot to be excited about this holiday season. Keep tuned for more, as you can expect for laptop makers to refresh their devices with the new Intel processors before the end of the year.
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