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Intel Announces 8 Core I9-9900KS: Every Core at 5Ghz, All the Time

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Re: Intel Announces 8 Core I9-9900KS: Every Core at 5Ghz, All the Time

#151
post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple and AMD just have to ask TSMC to do their magic to make 7nm chips - they haven't had to do anything spectacular, just use TSMCs design libraries. Intel is struggling because of their struggles with 10nm. Apple and AMD are not because TSMC has pulled off 7nm. Architecture matters, but process node matters a lot too.

What would you say are the primary differences between the two companies? Is it more just a matter of luck that has allowed for TSMC to have been able to succeed where Intel hasn't? Or is there actually a meaningfully different process design and/or problem solving approach that is enabling this?

Not tntn, but I've been following this and it seems to be both Intel's now decades long history of very bad high level engineering and personal management catching up with their crown jewel, and being more aggressive than TSMC's initial 7nm node. Perhaps Intel depending on a particular lithography? technique that TSMC isn't, or isn't yet heavily, but we don't really know, no one authoritative is talking, and Intel is still claiming 10nm is going to make it.

Re: Intel Announces 8 Core I9-9900KS: Every Core at 5Ghz, All the Time

#152
post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple and AMD just have to ask TSMC to do their magic to make 7nm chips - they haven't had to do anything spectacular, just use TSMCs design libraries. Intel is struggling because of their struggles with 10nm. Apple and AMD are not because TSMC has pulled off 7nm. Architecture matters, but process node matters a lot too.

What would you say are the primary differences between the two companies? Is it more just a matter of luck that has allowed for TSMC to have been able to succeed where Intel hasn't? Or is there actually a meaningfully different process design and/or problem solving approach that is enabling this?

The full story on how Intel managed to fuck up 10nm so badly may not see the light of day for years if ever. But generally, it seems that Intel tried to make too many changes in one generation. They probably wanted their 10nm to be the most advanced process that didn't require EUV lithography. Some features of their 10nm process ended up not working (evidence points to the cobalt interconnects as one of the hang-ups). In the meantime, it looks like EUV is coming along nicely.

They compounded their problems by essentially stopping microarchitecture development on 14nm, which is why eg. their laptop processors still don't support LPDDR4, and they're still shipping basically the same CPU core they released in 2015. Coupling microarchitecture and fabrication development has at times been an advantage for Intel, but for the past few years it's been a huge mistake, and they've promised changes to their design processes so that they don't get stuck like this again in the future if fab advances aren't ready when new microarchitectures are.

TSMC naturally doesn't have this problem, because they're a pure play foundry. Their customers have to each make their own bets on when new fab processes will be truly ready, and how well they will perform in practice.

Re: Intel Announces 8 Core I9-9900KS: Every Core at 5Ghz, All the Time

#153
post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ... none of these Consumer CPU upgrades interest me anymore What about the Ryzen 3000 line up? The benchmark leaks make it seem like it is going to be a huge improvement and AMD isn't susceptible to Zombieload.

This probably doesn't contribute to the conversation but with the number of serious vulnerabilities that have popped up recently I'm not inspired to solve the truth table for the CPU vendor that leaves me the least exposed. As others have said - and I have seen - some of these can be exploited with Javascript in the browser. (I do not know much about Zombieland presently) Looking forward to a less complex architectur…

I remember mentioning before we should have learned with the first Xeon Phis to program microkernels for high core count in-order CPUs.

Because the future is looking increasingly in-order high-core-count with hard partitioning between security contexts.

Re: Intel Announces 8 Core I9-9900KS: Every Core at 5Ghz, All the Time

#154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Base frequency isn't the same as lowest frequency (ya... it's weird). Base frequency is vaguely related to the idea that if you had all cores running at the base frequency, you would run just about at the system's TDP (it's really a complete mess, this is a simplification). Your system can still drop CPU cores down to 400-800MHz in low energy states. What this announcement is basically saying is that Intel now has a…

According to siliconlottery.com 38% of 9900K are overclockable to 5 GHz. Probably they just decided to select good chips from 9900K at factory, those not exactly new chips.

That's mentioned in the article: "The new Core i9-9900KS uses the same silicon currently in the i9-9900K, but selectively binned in order to achieve 5.0 GHz on every core, all of the time."

Re: Intel Announces 8 Core I9-9900KS: Every Core at 5Ghz, All the Time

#156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I expect that the vast majority of PC gamers keep Javascript enabled in their browsers.

I wouldn't expect that. Is this the kind of thing that would be reported by the Steam hardware survey (if that's still a thing)? Edit: I took a look and it seems they don't ask/record that info. I apologise for the offence this idea seems to have caused someone.

Nobody was offended by the other. I think people are downvoting you and gameswithgo because you appear to be applying your own personal notions to an entire segment with little to no evidence.

'PC enthusiast' is such a blanket term to start with, so applying a blanket statement to such a group is obviously doomed to failure from the very start.

Re: Intel Announces 8 Core I9-9900KS: Every Core at 5Ghz, All the Time

#157
post #61
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their design for 10nm and the implementation didn't line up. Whatever their (still undisclosed) problems were, the entire node was fundamentally flawed. It might have been hubris at having been at the cutting edge of fab tech for so long. It could have just been the fruits of pushing the envelope - sometimes what you predict will happen when you put theory to application proves false. It has warped their business hea…

I more and more tend to believe the rumors (started by Semiaccurate) we will not see 10nm in mass quantities and 7nm is the next. We will see very, very soon: Intel said 10nm CPUs in client systems will be on shelves for the 2019 holiday season.

But weren't there Intel 10nm chips sold for revenue in 2017? [0] Granted, it was an OEM-only part for some China specific education laptops...

0: https://www.anandtech.com/show/13405/intel-10nm-cannon-lake-...

Re: Intel Announces 8 Core I9-9900KS: Every Core at 5Ghz, All the Time

#158

Most 9900K can hit 5.0 all core OC for non-AVX loads. With AVX 4.8-4.9 is still doable without hitting the top 30% of CPUs in the CPU lottery. My 9900K does 5.1 without any AVX offset but this is a top 10-20% CPU if the figures form Silicon Lottery are to be believed. So it’s not that surprising Intel can simply bin CPUs to do 5.0 at near stock voltages since many resellers have been doing just that.

What does that spell for regular 9900K then?

Nothing if you don’t care about AVX workloads you can get a 9900K and set it to 5.0ghz with an AVX offset of 2 pretty much out of the box.

Unless the KS would guarantee a 5.3-5.4 all core OC I don’t see it being anything more than a PR release anyhow.

That said I’m not even sure if the 9900KS doesn’t come with an AVX offset to begin with most higher end motherboards come with a 9900K 5.0 preset anyhow which sets the voltage to about 1.3-1.325 and an AVX offset of 3 it just yells at you that you need a good cooling solution and this is not guaranteed to work.

Re: Intel Announces 8 Core I9-9900KS: Every Core at 5Ghz, All the Time

#159
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Intel was ahead, and hit the wall first. Apple & AMD are not ahead, they're just catching up. I don't want to understate how big a problem that could be for Intel, of course. But they're also doing it on low margin parts, and Intel continues to make bank with their data center parts. I don't think any of this represents a short-term problem for Intel, other than the general downturn in processor sales because fewer p…

Apple sold millions of iPhones with 7nm chips while Intel struggles to build comparable 10nm chips and keeps releasing 14+++ nm. AMD will release 7nm chips very soon. It does not seem like they are catching up. Quite the opposite.

My simplest laptop in current use has 4 times more memory than my current phone and I probably would need to make huge compromises to live with half as much. A lot of the chips in phones don't even have external memory buses. A top-of-the-line iPad Pro sports an 8-core asymmetrical core design, with 4 fast cores and 4 slow ones and, overall, is slower than a 2-core Core M-based MacBook (although it feels great because iOS does a lot less than macOS).

Also, Apple doesn't make its own A-series processors - it uses TSMC for that.

Re: Intel Announces 8 Core I9-9900KS: Every Core at 5Ghz, All the Time

#160

Is that a typo on the table or do those CPUs really cost the same whether they have an integrated GPU or not?

Those numbers are Intel's "Recommended Customer Price", not actual retail prices. The -F parts really are listed with the same RCP as the parts with GPUs enabled. No, it doesn't make much sense, but Intel has been experiencing a CPU manufacturing crunch, and the desktop market gets the short end of the stick when that happens.
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