Category: Processors

Nova Lake to feature new 2L-ILM socket to prevent CPU bending

CPU coolers, Motherboards, News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

Since Alder Lake (12th‑gen Core), Intel has been using a rectangular desktop CPU socket—first LGA 1700, now LGA 1851, and at the turn of the year the LGA 1954 platform for Nova Lake is expected. These sockets, however, have been associated with complaints about CPU bending caused by the mounting mechanism and cooler pressure. With Nova Lake, Intel is preparing a solution, though it may not be available on all motherboards. Read more “Nova Lake to feature new 2L-ILM socket to prevent CPU bending” »

Arrow Lake Refresh CPU pricing considerably higher than announced

News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

Last year’s Nvidia GeForce RTX 5000 and AMD Radeon RX 9000 GPU launches were widely criticised for “fake MSRP.” That refers to situations where companies announce an attractive price that creates a good first impression and earns praise in reviews, only for the cards to immediately become more expensive or never actually appear at the advertised price. It now looks like something similar may be happening with Intel’s new processors. Read more “Arrow Lake Refresh CPU pricing considerably higher than announced” »

Intel and AMD to increase CPU prices by 10–15 %

Processors, News | | Jan Olšan

Although memory and SSD prices are currently very high, the it wasn’t nearly as bad in the CPU market—Intel just released the new “Plus” refresh CPUs at surprisingly low pricing, and AMD responded with discounts. Unfortunately, rising manufacturing costs driven by demand for AI hardware will likely hit this segment as well. Both Intel and AMD are reportedly preparing CPU price increases, which will make PCs even more expensive. Read more “Intel and AMD to increase CPU prices by 10–15 %” »

AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 Dual Edition

Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 Dual Edition is here: 16‑cores and 2× 3D V‑Cache

Processors, News | | Jan Olšan

Ever since the first 3D V‑Cache processors in 2022, the possibility of a desktop CPU with 16 cores and 3D V‑Cache mounted on both CPU chiplets has been on the table. AMD never made it reality despite many asking for it, until now. Hints such a CPU was coming started pouring in last year though. It didn’t arrive with the gaming 9850X3D model in January, but this week, AMD is finally making this long-awaited CPU real. Read more “Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 Dual Edition is here: 16‑cores and 2× 3D V‑Cache” »

Core Ultra 270K Plus beats existing high-end. No KF version, though

News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

Intel is launching new CPUs for the LGA 1954 socket, refreshed “Plus” models of the Core Ultra 200S “Arrow Lake” lineup. These focus on offering great bang for buck, adding more cores. As a result, Intel abandoned the pricier Core Ultra 9 flagship and gave full core count to the lower-tier Core Ultra 7 270K Plus. In the end, it will even be faster than the previous Core Ultra 9 285K—in practice, ironically running at higher clock speeds. Read more “Core Ultra 270K Plus beats existing high-end. No KF version, though” »

Arrow Lake Refresh Intel desktop CPUs launched: SKUs and pricing

News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

Intel has officially released the so-called Arrow Lake Refresh CPUs for the LGA 1851 desktop socket. This platform won’t receive a new generation like laptops did in the 1.8 nm Core Ultra 300 Panther Lake CPUs. Instead, new models of the 3 nm Arrow Lake generationare coming. And although they do not have a new architecture, they should be very interesting when it comes to the bang-for-buck ratio. Read more “Arrow Lake Refresh Intel desktop CPUs launched: SKUs and pricing” »

Intel to unveil new Core Ultra 200 desktop processors next week

News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

Originally, Intel was expected to launch the Core Ultra 200 (Arrow Lake) desktop CPU refresh right at the beginning of the year in January. That did not happen, but Intel is still preparing these new models for its lineup, and they should reach stores very soon. The dates when customers can expect them have now leaked. Earlier reports indicated March or April, but Intel will apparently manage to launch them within the first quarter after all. Read more “Intel to unveil new Core Ultra 200 desktop processors next week” »

Unified Core: Breakthrough Change Is Coming To Intel CPUs

Processors, News | | Jan Olšan

Since 2021 Intel has been using a hybrid CPU architecture with big and little cores (starting with 12th-gen Core CPUs, though it had already been tried a year and a half earlier in the Lakefield SoC). However, the little “E-Cores” derived from former Atom SoC are quite unpopular among some. Now, a radical change is emerging on the horizon—instead of maintaining two completely different core architectures, Intel is moving to a single one. Read more “Unified Core: Breakthrough Change Is Coming To Intel CPUs” »

Bartlett Lake, Intel’s P-Core Only CPUs: Models and Specs

Processors, News | | Jan Olšan

We’ve previously covered Bartlett Lake, a remarkable CPU generation from Intel that resembles something of a parallel Plan B product. While Arrow Lake is being sold for the desktop LGA 1954 socket, Bartlett Lake continues to use LGA 1700, is manufactured on a 7nm process, and supports DDR4 memory. Most notably, it drops E-Cores entirely and consists solely of “big” cores. We’ve now learned the complete specs of these chips. Read more “Bartlett Lake, Intel’s P-Core Only CPUs: Models and Specs” »

Zen 6: How Many Cores Will AMD’s New Desktop Processors Have?

Processors, News | | Jan Olšan

Recently, we’ve covered upcoming Intel products a lot, but here’s something for the fans of AMD looking forward to its next-generation Zen 6 architecture processors to be excited about. In addition to new cores and a newly designed I/O chiplet—expected to deliver better memory performance and lower power consumption—Zen 6 is primarily set to increase core counts.And the actual core counts for various individual models has now surfaced online. Read more “Zen 6: How Many Cores Will AMD’s New Desktop Processors Have?” »

Intel Nova Lake: P-Cores clustered, 52-core draws up to 700 W?

News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

While we wait for the refresh of Arrow Lake desktop CPUs—except the cancelled the top-tier SKU—new details have surfaced shedding light on the upcoming Core Ultra 400 “Nova Lake” generation, expected to deliver a major next-gen leap. The leaks cover power consumption and cooling, as well as the architecture of the high-performance cores in these processors. Intel is preparing a previously unseen change to CPU cache and interconnect design. Read more “Intel Nova Lake: P-Cores clustered, 52-core draws up to 700 W?” »

AMD preparing Strix Halo refresh. Zen 6 successor not until 2028

News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

AMD does not have a new desktop CPU generation this year and is just refreshing previous Zen 5 chips, as in the Ryzen AI 400 “Gorgon Point” APUs announced at CES 2026. While a matching refresh of last year’s high-performance Ryzen AI Max 300 processors was not announced there, it appears this lineup will also receive similar a minor update. That will have to suffice for a while, as a brand-new generation is still far away. Read more “AMD preparing Strix Halo refresh. Zen 6 successor not until 2028” »

Gorgon Point APUs and Ryzen 7 9850X3D launch dates revealed

News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

At CES 2026, AMD officially announced thew Ryzen AI 400 series processors for laptops, a refresh of the Ryzen AI 300 lineup still based on the Zen 5 architecture, and a new flagship gaming CPU, the Ryzen 7 9850X3D. As to when these products would actually go on sale, the company only referred to later part of the current quarter. Actual launch days info has leaked now though, and the good news is that the wait should not be long. Read more “Gorgon Point APUs and Ryzen 7 9850X3D launch dates revealed” »

Phison E37T controller: Affordable Gen5 SSDs with 15 GB/s speeds

Processors, News | | Jan Olšan

NAND flash has become significantly more expensive, while DRAM prices have surged even more dramatically. DRAM is used as cache in higher-end drives and modules and cheaper SSDs will therefore become more important than ever—especially those that do not require DRAM. “DRAMless” SSDs have improved considerably in recent years, but a new PCIe 5.0 controller from Phison could push them even further—practically to high-end levels. Read more “Phison E37T controller: Affordable Gen5 SSDs with 15 GB/s speeds” »

Ryzen 7 9850X3D is here: 3D V-Cache for games and 5.6 GHz clock

News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

AMD’s Tuesday CES 2026 keynote was entirely dominated by artificial intelligence hype. While it wasn’t completely devoid of hardware announcements, it focused mainly on servers and the enterprise market. Surprisingly, what many of you may have been waiting for—new Ryzen processors—did not happen (just like last year with the Radeon RX 9000). However, a new flagship gaming CPU was silently launched at the time: the Ryzen 7 9850X3D. Read more “Ryzen 7 9850X3D is here: 3D V-Cache for games and 5.6 GHz clock” »

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