Intel Core i9-9900K 9th Generation CPU Review @ [H]

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FrgMstr

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Intel Core i9-9900K 9th Generation CPU Review - 8am CDT

The new 9th generation Intel i9-9900K CPU is upon us! AMD has been pushing into Intel's desktop market and Intel knows it. Today Intel is pulling the curtain back on "not paid for" reviews and we are happy to be serving you one of those up here today. Is the i9-9900K better than the Ryzen 7 2700X, and is it worth the staggering price premium?

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Not worth the premium over the 2700x to me, but glad as hell to see it on the landscape. We actually got competition again. We all know what the next Ryzen is going to target, and we all win.

Real question is when Intel is going to show a new design. Because this thing is almost screaming 1.13ghz P3 again.
 
Kyle, do you think 5.0 all core with no AVX offset is doable on a H115i?
 
Fuck me that's one hot running knee jerk reaction to 2700x bodge job of a cpu. I'd hate to see the temps if they were using their toothpaste tim, so for all their bluster about "hey guyz out of the goodness of our hearts we're using solder again" it's more like they NEEDED to use it to get temps even this bad.
 
bigdogchris said:
I suspected a while ago that Intel was only using sTIM to be able to push the chip really hard OOB and there would be limited OCing headroom. You can't just pull massive CPU gains out of your ass in a short time, and it seems Intel basically factory OCed this chip for you and slapped a K on it to make you think you could add more.
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The one positive being anyone that buys this will have to spend less on their Winter heating this year :D
 
Great review. This just shows the real reason Intel wanted all of the reviews embargoed ahead of the pre-order release.... I dont really see the reason to go up to the 9900k, if you have a prev gen high end, that is anywhere near 5GHz. Im surprised at how close the CPU is already at the limit. Not what we come to expect from the top end K processors. And def can use the system as your winter room heater.
 
Looking forward to seeing an i7-9700K review: I won't be surprised if the non-HT part OC's better and is the top gaming CPU.

Edit: From Anandtech: "For the Core i7-9700K, we hit 5.3 GHz very easily, for a small bump in power and temperature."
 
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Rough IPC comparison.

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Remove Heaven and the average for Score benchmarks drops to 79%.
 
So uh, do we want to address what happens to performance once the Spectre/Meltdown fixes are added, or do we not care?

I'm not trying to start something here, this is a genuine question. I'm still on a 2500k and haven't been keeping up with this issue because my PC is usually off these days.
 
Great review! I noticed the same thing with power / heat when pushing my 8700k over 4.8ghz, I can do 4.8 all core with fairly low bump in voltage, and manageable heat on a 280mm AIO setup, however getting to the magic 5.0 takes a lot more power and the heat shoots up(delid/relidded with liquid metal)
 
If the CPU was $1000, would it still have gotten a gold award? What about $2000? Is it a performance only award? You often factor the cost in your PSU reviews, but CPU/GPU not so much. Is 16% even noticeable?
 
sirmonkey1985 said:
you mean the hardware fixes for spectre/meltdown? performance hit should be less than the software fix overhead that currently exists.
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I mean whatever fixes are applicable to the CPU under review. I don't know if they've added hardware fixes to these parts, or if we still need to fix it in software.

If I want to run a 9900K that is as immune as currently possible to spectre/meltdown, what does that do to performance?
 
Meeho said:
If the CPU was $1000, would it still have gotten a gold award? What about $2000? Is it a performance only award? You often factor the cost in your PSU reviews, but CPU/GPU not so much. Is 16% even noticeable?
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For what we see as high end or halo products we generally award these on performance, as we truly do not expect "value" in this category. As always, the award is subjective, and if you want to obsess on that and ignore all the words written about the product, that is surely your prerogative. However, if you read even just the conclusion in our review, I think we have laid out what the 9900K is all about in very specific terms on performance and price.
 
Many after the launch presentation hated on the 9900K.
I really didn't understand that, hate the company but not the product.

They gave us a 8 core mainstream platform cpu.
They gave us Soldered heatspreader.
They maintained clocks, it's all the specs all wanted.

Is it great value ? no, but it's the pinnacle of an allround cpu and the best at it but if it's the best product I don't know....
It's borderline gold rating as nothing else offers anything close.
 
Nicepants42 said:
I mean whatever fixes are applicable to the CPU under review. I don't know if they've added hardware fixes to these parts, or if we still need to fix it in software.

If I want to run a 9900K that is as immune as currently possible to spectre/meltdown, what does that do to performance?
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We are using the latest version of Win 10 Pro with all the latest updates, so the performance we show is the performance you would get. We do this now with both AMD and Intel CPUs.
 
pcgeekesq said:
Looking forward to seeing an i7-9700K review: I won't be surprised if the non-HT part OC's better and is the top gaming CPU.

Edit: From Anandtech: "For the Core i7-9700K, we hit 5.3 GHz very easily, for a small bump in power and temperature."
Click to expand...

Really makes me consider just disabling HT on the 8700K and getting another 100-200mhz with lower volts/temps.
 
Good review guys, Glad to see the real numbers, and for me its a hard pass...They are right on the ragged edge to claim these ~16% performance numbers all while pushing that 60-70% price premium. I like bang for your buck, not throwing my money down on whatever they feed us.

One thing I will say is that the 9900k will keep your system more relevant than say the 2700X as GPU's get faster, so you should be able to squeeze another year out of a rig built with the 9900K vs the 2700X before bottlenecking the GPU too bad (yay frequency!)

But im still resolute in waiting for 7nm and PCIe 4.0, before upgrading...as I like to live on the 5-6 year upgrade path, i've also seen DDR5 articles popping up more, maybe thats where to jump in again. Great times to be a PC enthusiast again, reminds me of the 2003-2006 era. Thanks again guys, keep up the good work!
 
90c when overclocking? Woah! I like the performance of the 9900K but the high temps are a no-go. If I ever buy a 9900K I'd be happy at stock clocks since most of the games I play perform very well at 4.0 to 4.4Ghz as they did on the 4790K I used to own.

Thanks for the review [H].
 
Clocked to the ragged edge to extend the lead as much as possible to justify the price. That's why they brought back solder, because they had too. Even the new 28 core Xeon monster they are releasing still uses standard TIM. More shenanigans from the blue camp, just like the green camp. Sad, truely sad. I see through the bullshit.

Cannot wait for Zen2.
 
Big bad Intel halo cpu beats up AMD cpu that is half the price. Good job guys. /s
 
Given the 9900Ks lackluster OC headroom, I’m starting to think the 9700K is the CPU to have this go-around, if you’re an overclocker.
You’ll get better performance with an easy all-core 5.0+ OC that the 9900K can’t touch. Seriously contemplating cancelling my preorder and going with a 9700K...
 
Brahmzy said:
Given the 9900Ks lackluster OC headroom, I’m starting to think the 9700K is the CPU to have this go-around, if you’re an overclocker.
You’ll get better performance with an easy all-core 5.0+ OC that the 9900K can’t touch. Seriously contemplating cancelling my preorder and going with a 9700K...
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That was my thought as well.
 
The only way I was going to get a 9900K is if I could have a stable sub-1.4v all-core 5.0 without an AVX offset.
Looks like that’s not going to happen - not even close...
 
Sorry to hear your 8700k died, but based on what I've seen I'm thinking the 9900k would be waste for my needs anyway. This coupled with the nvidia 2k series results (and lack of AMD competition in the high end,) sounds like I get to stay happy with my setup a while longer.
 
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