Methodology: temperature and clock speed tests
The 12th generation Intel Core processors – Alder Lake is now out and we already have the full-fledged tests for you. These processors are significantly different from the previous ones in many aspects and many things are used “for the first time”. Among them are DDR5 memory support, PCI Express 5.0, 7 nm manufacturing process or hybrid concept of small and large cores. It’s time for a detailed analysis!
Methodology: temperature and clock speed tests
When choosing a cooler, we eventually opted for Noctua NH-U14S. It has a high performance and at the same time there is also the TR4-SP3 variant designed for Threadripper processors. It differs only by the base, the radiator is otherwise the same, so it will be possible to test and compare all processors under the same conditions. The fan on the NH-U14S cooler is set to a maximum speed of 1,500 rpm during all tests.
Measurements always take place on a bench-wall in a wind tunnel which simulates a computer case, with the difference that we have more control over it.
System cooling consists of four Noctua NF-S12A PWM fans, which are in an equilibrium ratio of two at the inlet and two at the outlet. Their speed is set at a fixed 550 rpm, which is a relatively practical speed that is not needed to be exceeded. In short, this should be the optimal configuration based on our tests of various system cooling settings.
It is also important to maintain the same air temperature around the processors. Of course, this also changes with regard to how much heat a particular processor produces, but at the inlet of the tunnel it must always be the same for accurate comparisons. In our air-conditioned test lab, it is currently in the range of 21–21.3 °C.
Maintaining a constant inlet temperature is necessary not only for a proper comparison of processor temperatures, but especially for unbiased performance comparisons. Trend of clock speed and especially single-core boost depends on the temperature. In the summer at higher temperatures, processors may be slower in living spaces than in the winter.
For Intel processors, we register the maximum core temperature for each test, usually of all cores. These maximum values are then averaged and the result is represented by the final value in the graph. From the outputs of single-threaded load, we only pick the registered values from active cores (these are usually two and alternate during the test). It’s a little different with AMD processors. They don’t have temperature sensors for every core. In order for the procedure to be as methodically as possible similar to that applied on Intel processors, the average temperature of all cores is defined by the highest value reported by the CPU Tdie sensor (average). For single-threaded load, however, we already use a CPU sensor (Tctl/Tdie), which usually reports a slightly higher value, which better corresponds to the hotspots of one or two cores. But these values as well as the values from all internal sensors must be taken with a grain of salt, the accuracy of the sensors varies across processors.
Clock speed evaluation is more accurate, each core has its own sensor even on AMD processors. Unlike temperatures, we plot average clock speed values during tests in graphs. We monitor the temperature and clock speed of the processor cores in the same tests, in which we also measure the power consumption. And thus, gradually from the lowest load level on the desktop of idle Windows 10, through audio encoding (single-threaded load), gaming load in three games (F1 2020, Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Total War Saga: Troy), to a 10-minute load in Cinebench R23 and the most demanding video encoding with the x264 encoder in HandBrake.
To record the temperatures and clock speed of the processor cores, we use HWiNFO, in which sampling is set to two seconds. With the exception of audio encoding, the graphs always show the averages of all processor cores in terms of temperatures and clock speed. During audio encoding, the values from the loaded core are given.
- Contents
- Intel Core i9-12900K in detail
- Methodology: performance tests
- Methodology: how we measure power draw
- Methodology: temperature and clock speed tests
- Test setup
- 3DMark
- Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla
- Borderlands 3
- Counter-Strike: GO
- Cyberpunk 2077
- DOOM Eternal
- F1 2020
- Metro Exodus
- Microsoft Flight Simulator
- Shadow of the Tomb Raider
- Total War Saga: Troy
- Overall gaming performance
- Gaming performance per euro
- PCMark
- Web performance
- 3D rendering: Cinebench, Blender, ...
- Video 1/2: Adobe Premiere Pro
- Video 1/2: DaVinci Resolve Studio
- Graphic effects: Adobe After Effects
- Video encoding
- Audio encoding
- Broadcasting (OBS a Xsplit)
- Photos 1/2: Adobe Photoshop a Lightroom
- Photos 2/2: Affinity Photo, Topaz Labs AI apps, ZPS X, ...
- (De)compression
- (De)cryption
- Numerical computing
- Simulations
- Memory and cache tests
- Processor power draw curve
- Average processor power draw
- Performance per watt
- Achieved CPU clock speed
- CPU temperature
- Conclusion
There is a small error, the i9-12900k is manufactured in 10 nm (intel 7).
We decided to treat is as a 7nm process, since it more or less reflects reality, and Intel more or less wants it to be treated like that. The “Intel 7” does not actually say “nm” anywhere, but the follow up processes will actually be marketed like that. The 20A and 18A processes actually refer to Angstroms, which are non-SI units meaning 0.1nm. So those processes are officially 2nm and 1.8nm when it comes to Intel messaging.
But when we put that aside, in my opinion it is more useful than not to use “7nm” for the Alder Lake chips. Intel’s 10nm process was in fact roughly comparable to TSMC’s N7 (7nm) process, once Intel got rid of the problems (in the SuperFin or Enhanced SuperFin versions). It is not equal parity in everything, but these technologies can be considered competitive. Calling it 10nm makes it look the process is worse than it is if people assume it is similar to 10nm Samsung or TSMC process node.
We would basically have to keep reminding people that “Intel’s 10nm is on the level of TSMC’s 7nm”. And it’s not practical to to keep repeating that every time. Ideally this should have been done earlier so that the products were not referred to as 10nm for 2-3 years in press.
In isolation, the process renaming would not be a good thing, but in a way, Intel only did what TSMC and Samsung did before them. Their processes could be said to be renamed already, so Intel just caught up with that marketing. (Not saying they are at the exact same tech level, but it’s in the ballpark for better or worse).