Skip to main content

Intel’s upcoming 10-core i9 chips will hit 4.5GHz without even overclocking

intel
Image used with permission by copyright holder
New details have emerged for Intel’s upcoming 10-core Skylake X CPU, the i9 7900X, and it looks like the chip could end up being more powerful than anyone expected. Along with its 10 cores, it sports a base clock speed of 4.0GHz, which boosts up to 4.5GHz. That shows a real architectural difference between it and AMD’s upcoming Threadripper Ryzen chips.

The latest details for Intel’s i9 series CPUs appeared in a published Sisoft Sandra benchmark results post. Although it labels the chip as an i7 part, that’s erroneous because of the lack of official support for such a chip yet. The specifications, however, should be perfectly accurate, telling us that despite running 10 cores and 20 threads, this chip is still capable of hitting 4.5GHz without any overclocking.

This is far higher than we would expect from a chip with 10 cores as there is a real possibility of a CPU running rather hot at that sort of speed. Considering it was initially expected to be clocked far lower, some have speculated that this could be a revision on Intel’s behalf to counter the potential for AMD’s Ryzen CPUs to unseat its performance crown before the end of the year.

Other details about the chip confirmed by this listing include the fact that it has 10MB of level two cache with 1MB for each core and 13.75MB of level 3 cache, with a TDP of 175W (thanks Overclockers, via TPU).

Although this release is mostly exciting because of the Intel CPU detail reveal, we can also draw a little information on the motherboard from it. The Gigabyte X299 Aorus Gaming 7 is an unannounced motherboard and shows that Gigabyte will be one of the first partners supporting Intel’s upcoming CPU design.

While chips like this aren’t really designed for everyday consumers, the added performance of that high clock speed should further ramp up the competition between AMD and Intel, which has been raging this year since the launch of Ryzen. It’s a good year to be a hardware enthusiast.

Editors' Recommendations

Jon Martindale
Jon Martindale is the Evergreen Coordinator for Computing, overseeing a team of writers addressing all the latest how to…
Intel’s Core i9-13900KS hits 6GHz out of the box, but there’s a catch
Intel Core i9-13900K held between fingertips.

Intel has just launched the Core i9-13900KS, a CPU to end all CPUs -- at least in this generation. This is Intel's most powerful chip right now, fully poised to top the list of the best processors on the market.

This doesn't just mark yet another entry into Intel's impressive CPU arsenal. The Core i9-13900KS stands out as the first consumer processor to hit 6GHz out of the box without extra overclocking. To hit that peak, however, it's going to consume a whole lot of power.

Read more
Intel’s 24-core laptop CPU might outclass desktop i9 processors
A render of Intel's H-series mobile processors.

Intel is pushing laptop CPU core counts to places they've never been before. The company announced its 13th-gen Raptor Lake mobile processors at CES 2023, including the flagship Core i9-13980HX which includes a massive 24 cores that could top the list of the best Intel processors.

That sounds insane considering even AMD's desktop Ryzen 9 7950X only comes with 16 cores. But Intel's cores aren't all built equally. Like the previous generation, 13th-gen mobile Raptor Lake processors include a combination of performance (P) cores and efficient (E) cores. The most powerful chips in the range come with 24 cores, but they're split across eight P-cores and 16 E-cores.

Read more
Overclockers surpassed the elusive 9GHz clock speed. Here’s how they did it
The Intel Core i9-13900K being overclocked to 9GHz.

Asus has just announced that its team managed to break yet another world record, this time by overclocking the Intel Core i9-13900K to an extreme level.

The CPU was able to hit a whopping 9.009GHz, surpassing the previous 8.8GHz record. Intel shared a video that describes the whole process, which involved some quite innovative solutions.

Read more