Intel 12th Gen Core Alder Lake for Desktops: Top SKUs Only, Coming November 4th +Z690 Chipset

[poochyena]

3 hours ago, suicidalfranco said:

but why e cores on desktop cpus

to use less power, producing less heat, which leads to less energy usage.

[igormp]

48 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Sure but it'll still be around the 35 GB/s range. Not saying either are good though in raw bandwidth terms, just a nice to know because if you lookup DDR5 bandwidth you'll often see only 51.2 GB/s mentioned which is for DDR5-6400 aka non existent.

Someone managed 6200MT/s with some overclocking:

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/core-i9-12900k-smashes-multiple-world-records-at-68-ghz

 

Still not quite the 6400 you mentioned, and that everyone loves to throw around as if it were going to be standard from day 1.

 

Maybe 3 years from now DDR5 will be reasonable, both in terms of price and speeds/latencies.

[jones177]

The new socket is lower than the older Intels so new cooling hardware is needed.

 

I am not in a hurry to upgrade since I need faster GPUs more than I need faster CPUs since I use 3080 tis for 4k gaming.

 

 

[Blademaster91]

1 hour ago, poochyena said:

to use less power, producing less heat, which leads to less energy usage.

But it looks like Intel still has issues with power consumption, or they're just being more truthful with TDP numbers. Although the e-cores make a lot more sense in a laptop than desktop, I'd rather have more performance cores.

2 hours ago, leadeater said:

Yes 3rd party retailers are selling them, some for quite a few days, this is not sanctioned or technically allowed by Intel right now.

 

Edit:

And you'll note if you do go on to Amazon and search "12900k" you won't get any hits.

So Intel doesn't allow it but they also don't seem to care, I didn't know that. I found the 12900K from a news site link and it was up for pre-order on amazon for $707usd, guess it was quickly taken down or that was a mistake.

But my point was people are going to see the 1st party "benchmarks" and unboxing hype and pre-order without waiting for any actual reviews.

Edited October 28, 2021 by Blademaster91

[Forbidden Wafer]

54 minutes ago, poochyena said:

to use less power, producing less heat, which leads to less energy usage.

Allowing them to push the performance cores power even further, based on their TDPs.

[poochyena]

33 minutes ago, Blademaster91 said:

But it looks like Intel still has issues with power consumption

what do you mean by "issues"?

[leadeater]

51 minutes ago, Blademaster91 said:

But my point was people are going to see the 1st party "benchmarks" and unboxing hype and pre-order without waiting for any actual reviews.

Well that's nothing new. You either get zero information about the product before it goes on sale and they don't talk about anything at all or you get this situation, where said company outlines the new archecture and it's improvements and gives indications of actual product performance gains.

 

Think I'd rather this than nothing, or leaks only.

[dizmo]

I'm really interested to see how these chips do. Especially the 12600k, which sadly I don't think many are going to test off the bat.

Also very curious about the impact using DDR4 will have vs DDR5, and the different RAM speeds.

This is easily going to be one of the most benchmark packed launches we've seen in a while, and I am ready.

 

11 hours ago, igormp said:

Bummer, I see no reason to go with DDR5 for a desktop if not to take advantage of the higher density DIMMs.

I don't really see the point of them putting more than 128GB of memory onto a consumer platform. It's not needed. There are many, many other advantages DDR5 has.

10 hours ago, The Sloth said:

Might be due to them trying to keep corporate and home market separate.  Really hope intel can grow up from this phase.

I don't see the point in them putting in the work for the very small handful of people that would ever put more than 128GB of RAM on a home system.

10 hours ago, leadeater said:

lol RIP, so they still haven't solved the massive peak power issue to get maximum performance. Really hope someone does some PL2 performance scaling tests from 125W through to that 240W, at 10W or 15W increments.

I saw a slide that showed that the new chips, at 65w, had the same performance as the 11900k at 250w.

Not sure what they were using to measure that performance, but it was interesting.

10 hours ago, HelpfulTechWizard said:

I really cant wait to see reall performance numbers, they look good, but wiht them being tested in windows 11 there could be a big performace differece between the said numbers and the real ones...

I don't think the performance numbers will be as big as people think. What was it, something like a 5% reduction in performance?

Intel was also using something (can't remember what it's called, HardwareUnboxed tested it) that reduces performance in games when they tested the chips.

So, we're likely to see the same percentages, or even more tilted in Intel's favour.

10 hours ago, cj09beira said:

its 20 user accessible pcie lanes (x16 5.0 slot, and x4 4.0 for m.2), 28 total

 

so they finally stopped lying about the tdps, but....its still 240W,

that's way too much, seems close to a bulldozer moment if people were consistent, but who are we kidding they wont.

They weren't lying about TDP, people just don't know what it means.

I don't really see an issue with a TDP that high, on a high performance chip.

9 hours ago, leadeater said:

Bulldozer wasn't bad because it had high power, it was bad because it didn't have the performance to match the power usage, in fact it just didn't have any good performance outright.

 

Would have been better if Intel were able to get whatever the performance they have under 200W and then we could OC it ourselves to way higher, which we will be able to anyway. I could cool a 500W CPU no problem so long as the transfer through the silicon to the IHS and then to the water block is good enough and quite honestly if the CPU was completely stable at 500W and gave WAY more performance that's exactly how I'd run it lol.

Judging the improvements made to their OC suite, and the changes in IHS design, I think we might see some nice overclocks from Alder Lake.

I don't get the crying over the high power draw. If something's running at full tilt, on a top tier performance chip, I'd expect it to draw quite a bit of power.

9 hours ago, cj09beira said:

nearly 2x the power for the same performance seems like a pretty bad showing to me...

 

even at 200w one can start to feel the room warming up, now add a gpu to that and its going to get toasty

Except, it's not. The 11900k used more power than these at the same performance level.

8 hours ago, Mister Woof said:

I don't get the hate for Windows 11. I've been on it since August without any issues.

 

They fixed the AMD problem, didn't they?

 

About the only thing I don't like is how I don't have a clock on my secondary display.

I don't think it's so much hate, I think it's people being cautious based on previous experiences and lessons.

I'd love to upgrade to Windows 11, and I have no problem with the changes to design. I'm not, however, willing to risk turning on my PC the next day and seeing that all my data is gone. Which happened on several different occasions with the transition from 7 to 10. There are still reports of weird stuff with Windows 11.

7 hours ago, suicidalfranco said:

but why e cores on desktop cpus

Energy consumption. Why consume more than you need?

6 hours ago, igormp said:

Apparently DDR5 speeds are more disappointing than I thought:

 

 

 

Pretty sure those are JEDEC speeds. That's normal, and OC will allow higher speed RAM, as it always has.

6 hours ago, RejZoR said:

So, basically ALL of the bragging of "UP TO 30% BETTER THAN AMD" is pretty much entirely and totally worthless and it'll in the end be like 5%. If at all.

 

Also this whole unboxing thing and other useless stuff almost a week before actual launch is the dumbest s**t ever. No one cares about theoretical would be, might be stuff. We just want to see hard numbers, not this worthless PR fluff.

Not really. AMD said it was what, something like 5% performance difference? That's not going to close the gap. Not only that, Intel ran the tests with a feature enabled that lowers the performance of their chips. So, if anything, the gap is the same with the updated drivers, if not even larger in Intel's favour.

 

Personally, I'd rather have these little bits of information instead of waiting all the way until the 4th. We actually got some useful stuff, like prices, and a ton of information about the chips themselves. It wasn't just an unboxing and looking at the physical chip with no supporting information; I'd agree with you about it being stupid if that was the case.

5 hours ago, Forbidden Wafer said:

And they didn't re-run the tests after the issue became public and got fixed, which doesn't look good for them. 

There wasn't much time between the slide release and them fixing the issue. Just because you know of it now doesn't mean it's as easy as rerunning and posting.

4 hours ago, Forbidden Wafer said:

Well, I'd say their reputation is worth a lot more than running some benchmarks, but apparently their PR is completely stupid.

Their reputation won't be affected. AMD would have done the same thing. Their graphs also aren't incorrect. Always have to read the fine print.

3 hours ago, igormp said:

But 4800 is the best case scenario for the spec, Intel ran the sticks @ 4400. I don't think we can expect XMP to go much over that with this first batch of DDR5, not to mention the latencies.

We can, as we always have. There's already much higher kits out in the wild, and they'll be tested next week when people can release reviews.

3 hours ago, leadeater said:

Sure but it'll still be around the 35 GB/s range. Not saying either are good though in raw bandwidth terms, just a nice to know because if you lookup DDR5 bandwidth you'll often see only 51.2 GB/s mentioned which is for DDR5-6400 aka non existent.

6400 exists. G.Skill has 6800 as well. Samsung even teased 7200, 512GB DIMMS for the server market.

[Mister Woof]

11 minutes ago, dizmo said:

I'm really interested to see how these chips do. Especially the 12600k, which sadly I don't think many are going to test off the bat.

Also very curious about the impact using DDR4 will have vs DDR5, and the different RAM speeds.

This is easily going to be one of the most benchmark packed launches we've seen in a while, and I am ready.

 

I don't really see the point of them putting more than 128GB of memory onto a consumer platform. It's not needed. There are many, many other advantages DDR5 has.

I don't see the point in them putting in the work for the very small handful of people that would ever put more than 128GB of RAM on a home system.

I saw a slide that showed that the new chips, at 65w, had the same performance as the 11900k at 250w.

Not sure what they were using to measure that performance, but it was interesting.

I don't think the performance numbers will be as big as people think. What was it, something like a 5% reduction in performance?

Intel was also using something (can't remember what it's called, HardwareUnboxed tested it) that reduces performance in games when they tested the chips.

So, we're likely to see the same percentages, or even more tilted in Intel's favour.

They weren't lying about TDP, people just don't know what it means.

I don't really see an issue with a TDP that high, on a high performance chip.

Judging the improvements made to their OC suite, and the changes in IHS design, I think we might see some nice overclocks from Alder Lake.

I don't get the crying over the high power draw. If something's running at full tilt, on a top tier performance chip, I'd expect it to draw quite a bit of power.

Except, it's not. The 11900k used more power than these at the same performance level.

I don't think it's so much hate, I think it's people being cautious based on previous experiences and lessons.

I'd love to upgrade to Windows 11, and I have no problem with the changes to design. I'm not, however, willing to risk turning on my PC the next day and seeing that all my data is gone. Which happened on several different occasions with the transition from 7 to 10. There are still reports of weird stuff with Windows 11.

Energy consumption. Why consume more than you need?

Pretty sure those are JEDEC speeds. That's normal, and OC will allow higher speed RAM, as it always has.

Not really. AMD said it was what, something like 5% performance difference? That's not going to close the gap. Not only that, Intel ran the tests with a feature enabled that lowers the performance of their chips. So, if anything, the gap is the same with the updated drivers, if not even larger in Intel's favour.

 

Personally, I'd rather have these little bits of information instead of waiting all the way until the 4th. We actually got some useful stuff, like prices, and a ton of information about the chips themselves. It wasn't just an unboxing and looking at the physical chip with no supporting information; I'd agree with you about it being stupid if that was the case.

There wasn't much time between the slide release and them fixing the issue. Just because you know of it now doesn't mean it's as easy as rerunning and posting.

Their reputation won't be affected. AMD would have done the same thing. Their graphs also aren't incorrect. Always have to read the fine print.

We can, as we always have. There's already much higher kits out in the wild, and they'll be tested next week when people can release reviews.

6400 exists. G.Skill has 6800 as well. Samsung even teased 7200, 512GB DIMMS for the server market.

Much less of an issue in 2021 when most people utilize cloud or NAS storage these days

[dizmo]

5 minutes ago, Mister Woof said:

Much less of an issue in 2021 when most people utilize cloud or NAS storage these days

Uh, no. No it's not. That's terrible reasoning.

[Mister Woof]

14 minutes ago, dizmo said:

Uh, no. No it's not. That's terrible reasoning.

Acktuawaialallly....

 

The practice of regularly backing up important data is an old and established one. 

 

Cloud and NAS storage just makes it easier than ever before. 

 

It makes the stability issues of a new OS much less of an issue.

 

I didn't say it was a non-issue.

 

[Mister Woof]

I can't remember the last time I lost anything important from an unexpected windows complete failure.

 

Shit even chrome saves all your passwords so you don't even lose that stuff anymore.

 

But to emphasize, I simply said it's much less of a problem with automated backup systems in modern computing.

 

Obviously it's still a pain in the ass, and every individual runs their own personal risk/benefit analysis.

 

But IMO, if whatever you're doing is that important, you'd ensure proper backups anyway and unlikely to switch to a new OS anyway.

 

Vast majority of users don't fit in that bucket and are mostly well served by the automatic backup systems already in use to not worry about Windows 11 losing them data.

[suicidalfranco]

4 hours ago, poochyena said:

to use less power, producing less heat, which leads to less energy usage.

its a desktop chip, power and heat are not a concern

energy saving, yeah, those couple of euros at the end of the year are really going to make my life easier 

[suicidalfranco]

57 minutes ago, dizmo said:

Why consume more than you need?

why cripple your cpu on a format that doesn't require to sip power

[poochyena]

5 minutes ago, suicidalfranco said:

its a desktop chip, power and heat are not a concern

energy saving, yeah, those couple of euros at the end of the year are really going to make my life easier 

If intel ships millions of these chips, then yes, it will make a big difference in energy output that is still largely dependent on fossil fuels. Or even on a smaller scale, schools, offices, library, and other places where there are dozens or even 100 computers in one room can really make a difference in heat output and energy costs. Its dumb how much power desktop computers use at idle, doing almost nothing. There is a huge amount of people who leave their computers on 24/7 too. Just think about all that wasted energy.

[suicidalfranco]

7 minutes ago, poochyena said:

If intel ships millions of these chips, then yes, it will make a big difference in energy output that is still largely dependent on fossil fuels. Or even on a smaller scale, schools, offices, library, and other places where there are dozens or even 100 computers in one room can really make a difference in heat output and energy costs. Its dumb how much power desktop computers use at idle, doing almost nothing. There is a huge amount of people who leave their computers on 24/7 too. Just think about all that wasted energy.

yeah, but if it means less performance, i really do not care.

Leave that crap to mobile platform. I'd rather have 2 extra P-cores than waste space on 8 E-cores 

[dizmo]

59 minutes ago, Mister Woof said:

Acktuawaialallly....

 

The practice of regularly backing up important data is an old and established one. 

 

Cloud and NAS storage just makes it easier than ever before. 

 

It makes the stability issues of a new OS much less of an issue.

 

I didn't say it was a non-issue.

 

Right, but to say most people have a NAS or use cloud storage is factually incorrect, and isn't an excuse for having an OS erase all your data.

20 minutes ago, suicidalfranco said:

why cripple your cpu on a format that doesn't require to sip power

Didn't know you'd already seen the benchmarks! Please, enlighten me, how did it fare?

[suicidalfranco]

Just now, dizmo said:

Right, but to say most people have a NAS or use cloud storage is factually incorrect, and isn't an excuse for having an OS erase all your data.

Didn't know you'd already seen the benchmarks! Please, enlighten me, how did it fare?

i didn't, still would have preffered 2 extra P-cores than waste space on E-cores that bring no advantages to desktops that don't live off of batteries 

[saltycaramel]

Intel: our higher end chips need more e-cores than our lower end chips

 

Apple: our higher end chips need less e-cores than our lower end chips

 

who’s wrong

or what’s the reasoning

(probably the devil is in the details of how these are manufactured and binned)

[Mister Woof]

23 minutes ago, dizmo said:

Right, but to say most people have a NAS or use cloud storage is factually incorrect, and isn't an excuse for having an OS erase all your data.

Didn't know you'd already seen the benchmarks! Please, enlighten me, how did it fare?

I disagree. Most people I know use google drive or apple icloud, or even MS onedrive to store documents, photos, videos, etc. I think you grossly underestimate the desktop/mobile integration for your average user.

 

Power users are going to use a NAS or backup their shit on the reg. 

 

But you don't care about that and want to put words in my mouth.

 

If you actually read my post, I never implied it was an excuse. I literally stated:

 

Quote

Much less of an issue in 2021 when most people utilize cloud or NAS storage these days

Never said a thing about excusing the operating system.

 

But I digress - I personally don't feel the risk of "losing your data" is a significant enough reason to be weary to adopt Windows 11...especially if you're going to be using a 12th generation CPU that relies on it for optimized scheduler.....especially when you should be using cloud or your own local network storage to back your shit up.

 

If you don't want to - obviously you do you. I just gave a very modern and legitimate reason why a normal person might not care.

[leadeater]

1 hour ago, dizmo said:

6400 exists. G.Skill has 6800 as well. Samsung even teased 7200, 512GB DIMMS for the server market.

All of these only exist in marketing PR news announcements, there are zero on the market above 5000 that I know of. When they become real tangible products you can hold in your hand then we can have a different discussion 

[Moonzy]

@Mister Woof

1) I don't really have a NAS, and even if I do, I don't wanna spend an evening formatting my PC where I could be gaming instead.

2) there's no reason for me to risk moving to an OS that's still having issues recently, AMD lowered performance for example, meaning it's not yet ironed out

I'm not against it, I just want a smooth experience

 

Gonna wait for benchmarks, hype

Probably gonna move away from AMD platform for now anyways, so as long as it's not horse crap then I'll go for it

[Mister Woof]

14 minutes ago, Moonzy said:

@Mister Woof

1) I don't really have a NAS, and even if I do, I don't wanna spend an evening formatting my PC where I could be gaming instead.

2) there's no reason for me to risk moving to an OS that's still having issues recently, AMD lowered performance for example, meaning it's not yet ironed out

I'm not against it, I just want a smooth experience

 

Gonna wait for benchmarks, hype

Probably gonna move away from AMD platform for now anyways, so as long as it's not horse crap then I'll go for it

On the one hand, people on the internet are very vocal about their apprehension to new stuff and no hands on experience.

 

On the other, I've been using it on two machines for 3 months without issue.

 

Keep in mind, this thread is about 12th gen, which has been designed around windows 11, and which windows 11 seems to be designed around 12th gen. 

 

But I agree, reinstalling OS for an hour or so kinda sucks if you don't have to do it. 

 

Will 12th gen and windows 11 have issues? Maybe, but I'm not buying that anyway.

[Kisai]

14 hours ago, leadeater said:

lol RIP, so they still haven't solved the massive peak power issue to get maximum performance. Really hope someone does some PL2 performance scaling tests from 125W through to that 240W, at 10W or 15W increments.

 

In a way, it's kinda disgusting that Intel still markets the CPU with unrealistic TDP.

 

We're probably going to see a wave of blown up PSU's due to OCP and failed CPU's due to using air-cooling on these parts until Intel starts admitting that 90w+ parts should have been liquid cooled and have a 250w PSU headroom.

 

 

[Kisai]

1 hour ago, saltycaramel said:

Intel: our higher end chips need more e-cores than our lower end chips

 

Apple: our higher end chips need less e-cores than our lower end chips

 

who’s wrong

or what’s the reasoning

(probably the devil is in the details of how these are manufactured and binned)

 

When you can build the OS around those specifications you can make any decision you want about it.

 

Personally, my opinion is that the e-cores should have "replaced" hyperthreading, as that could have solved the spectre/meltdown and similar attacks from even being possible. Everyone knows that HT gets you maybe 15% more performance, at a latency/peak-cpu-performance tradeoff.  So if you simply have e-cores at 25%-50% the performance of the P cores, you're already ahead of HT.

 

Apple doesn't have HT in the M1's.

 

My opinion here is also that Microsoft can support the P/E cores on Windows 10 with a scheduler update, but until then you have to use Intel's bloatware and tell it what software should run on the P-cores only.