Let's take a look at the hot, insatiable flagship of the end of the year 22. The title of the article already makes it clear that the Core i9-13900KF is not about a smart choice, and after a carload of reviews on the Internet, Intel's new top-of-the-line has gained fame as a red-hot threat to the power grid and a desperate desire to take the top spot on the podium at any cost.
We're not going to excuse the 13900KF for its obvious weaknesses, but we're still used to drawing conclusions not only based on the results of tests in real working applications and games, but also in the context of competition and market desires.
The first context is in the gray box - the Ryzen 9 7950X has recently scalded red fans with boiling water and, unfortunately, set and strengthened a trend that has long been at home on laptops: running at maximum cooling.
To be honest, we have nothing against this approach, because now the owners of three-sectional and custom SVOs are reaping the rewards of their investments. What used to be a delight for the eyes and ears has now become quite a rational cooling solution for fresh flagships.
I've already talked about the second context in previous videos: the release of GeForce RTX 4090 has shaken up the top-end CPU segment even more than video cards. And now, 5+ gigahertz CPU frequencies are no longer a fun thing to score points in 3D brands, but a necessity in 1440p and even 4K with rays.
Contents:
- Features, prices and competitors
- Heating and energy consumption
- Limits out of the box
- VRM, its temperature, operation
- Test results
- Tests in games
- Conclusions
- Where can I buy the i9-13900KF processor?
Price characteristics and competitors
But before we get too excited about temperatures and power consumption, let's compare the old and new flagship from Intel with the new top from AMD in terms of features and price. There are currently few 13900KF offerings on the market, so it's too early to draw conclusions about the real price.
We think that the price will be close to the 7950X price, but there's a complete mess with the declared frequencies, which we'll soon figure out. In terms of cache size, the 7950X is even somehow inconvenient to compare with Intel, and in terms of the number of high-performance cores, the current and previous top from AMD is out of reach.
For some reason, Intel decided to add eight more small cores, and at first glance, this is almost the only tangible upgrade on paper. At a second glance on the Intel ARK website, the price tag, which has lost almost 60 bucks, is striking. We've already dealt with the cores, again, the traditional confusion about frequencies, a doubled L2 cache and outright lies about at least "basic" power consumption, and let's call it "optimism" about maximum power consumption.
Heating and energy consumption
It's time to check it all out under real-world load in Cinebench R23. Let the owners of small smartphone screens forgive me, but there is a lot of information in HwInfo64 and all of it is useful. On the left is Core i9-12900KF, in the middle is the hero of our video Core i9-13900KF, on the right is Ryzen 9 7950X. 12900K and 7950X have already been in previous reviews, so let's focus on the behavior of the new Core i9-13900KF.
The new product immediately boosts the frequency of all cores to 5 and a half gigahertz, the cores boil, after which the frequency drops by 100, occasionally by 200 megahertz. The power consumption is over 300 watts, which Intel's website decided not to mention at all.
Limits out of the box
Surely the processor works without limits? After listening to YouTubers and reviews, one might come to this conclusion, but it was in the 13th generation that ASUS decided to be cautious and set the PL1 limit at 253 watts even with Multi-Core Enhancement enabled.
Therefore, after 96 seconds of the 13900KF turbo boost window, a 253-watt diet begins: the temperature drops with a frequency that drops to a miserable paltry 4.9 gigahertz. Why did ASUS do this? A very strange step, considering that the 12th generation on the same motherboard is not limited in any way. It's very easy to remove this restriction and can be done in a couple of clicks in the Intel Extreme Tuning Utility program or in the BIOS to make sure and forget about this terrible modesty forever.
VRM its temperature work
If you thought that there was a betrayal here, I hasten to disappoint you: ASUS ROG Maximus Z790 HERO is not a case where some miserable 300 watts can overheat the power subsystem.
If after half an hour of hellish Prime95 Small FFT mode and 310 watts of power consumption, the VRM has only warmed up to 58 degrees, you can imagine how much room there is left for serious overclocking.
The power subsystem remains the same as the previous Z690 Hero: Renesas RAA229131 PWM controller and Intersil ISL99390 90-ampere DrMOS assemblies in a 20+1 phase parallel configuration. And at first glance, it may seem that the difference between the motherboards is only one USB port, and not even a 20-gigabit one.
However, the changes have taken place under the hood and have affected support for DDR5 memory with effective frequencies above 7 GHz: 32-gigabyte DDR5-7800 and even 8000 kits, which were recently announced by G. Skill recently announced, should run on Z790 boards without any problems.
Therefore, Z790 chipset motherboards are the only option at the moment for those who need an uncompromising system with an eye on ultra-fast DDR5 RAM.
And ASUS' ROG Maximus Z790 Hero is one of the best deals on the market for enthusiasts who don't need to overpay for even more expensive Apex and Extreme models. Other components of the test bench are on your screen.
Test results
With twice as many small cores on board, the Core i9-13900KF managed to snatch the victory from the Ryzen 9 7950X in the multi-threaded test, albeit by a small margin of 5 percent. In terms of performance per core, the result was even better - 9.5 percent advantage.
In Blender, Intel's new flagship is approaching the results of the top-end Ryzen 9 7950X. And this is in Blender, where AMD processors have traditionally won by a wide margin. Did small cores really prove to be worthwhile?
Let's check this in the Corona rendering: both flagships reached the finish line in the same 36 seconds. The fact that the previous flagship is one and a half times slower than the newcomer is already becoming a common sight.
In Geekbench 5, the new i9 exceeded my expectations at least in the multi-threaded test: 9 percent advantage over the top sixteen-core Ryzen 9. As you can see from the previous i9, the flagships of Intel's previous lines could not only outperform in multithreading, they existed in a different class.
The PCMark 10 results graphs look boring as usual, but wait a minute. The Ryzen 9 7950X still wins by 1 percent in a test that has always favored Intel processors.
But the results in 3D Mark Time Spy look inadequate compared to the previous review. This could be due to the buggy 22H2 update for Windows 11, drivers, the latest BIOS, or a combination of the above.
The benchmark from Puget Systems works correctly and its results show that the new Core i9-13900KF simply has no competitors for video editing and effects. Except for the K version with built-in graphics, which Adobe would love to have.
In video encoding, the 13th generation of Intel processors has received a serious performance boost, and the flagship Core i9-13900KF is no exception. By the way, it's worth recalling the results of the i7-13700K from the previous video, to which the top-end AMD Ryzen 9 7950X also lost.
The 13900KF also gained an equally serious boost in archiving with the 7-Zip program. Having broken away by a third in terms of compression speed and by half from its predecessor, it was unable to catch up with the 7950X, especially in terms of decompression.
In cryptography, the Ryzen 9 7950X can barely catch up with last year's Core i9-12900KF, let alone Intel's new flagship. The 13900KF is a quarter ahead of its rival in encryption and decryption.
Uncharted 4 on PC can't be faulted for optimization. Full HD, everything is on ultra. No jerks or dropouts - smooth high frame rate even in dynamic scenes. The PC port is based on the original engine and it is unlikely that Sony console owners will ever see similar FPS values. The Ryzen 9 7950X and last year's flagship from Intel show the same results, the new 13900KF breaks away from them by an average of 20 frames.
A Plague Tale Requiem doesn't let the RTX 4090 or our top three GPUs rest easy. And this is without raytracing! We had to turn on DLSS in Performance mode to prevent the video card from being overpowered, and here the new i9 is in the lead again. The advantage over its predecessor and competitor is significant: up to 20 percent in the average frame rate and in terms of very rare events.
Tests in games
Cyberpunk 2077, 1080p, ultra-rays, DLSS Quality and a typical picture emerges: The Ryzen 9 7950X is fighting with last year's i9, while the 13900KF is ahead. In terms of average framerate, the gap is not huge, but a 20 percent advantage over AMD's flagship in terms of minimum FPS is a lot. The temperatures and power consumption of the flagships are definitely flagship - you can't do without a powerful SRO even in games.
In the Guardians of the Galaxy benchmark, Intel-based systems were haunted by friezes that did not disappear with each new run. The 7950X also had some freezes, but not as significant. You can forget about the normal performance of very rare events. But in terms of the average frame rate, the gap between 13900KF and its competitor is an impressive 23%.
In Hitman 3, AMD processors show their best side. The Ryzen 9 7950X wrested the victory from the Core i9-13900KF in all indicators, albeit by a margin of 4 percent in average FPS. The top-of-the-line Ryzen 9 is also significantly better in terms of smoothness: 8% and almost 28% advantage in terms of rare and very rare events, respectively.
Assassin's Creed Valhalla, Very High graphics settings preset. No revelations: The Ryzen 9 7950X falls just a little short of the results of the Core i9-12900KF, let alone the newcomer. But the victory of Core i9-13900KF cannot be called a landslide either: A 10% advantage in average and minimum frame rates doesn't exactly stir the imagination.
Far Cry 6, Full HD, ultra settings with DXR shadows enabled. To put it mildly, this is not the best part of the optimization franchise, but the lag between the top AMD processor and the newcomer is nothing short of inadequate. 30% on the average frame rate and on rare events? This should not be the case, as evidenced by tests in other games and work programs.
Speaking of other games. Red Dead Redemption 2, the settings slider is as far to the right as possible. The game loves red processors and Ryzen 9 7950X delivers almost 20 frames more than the latest Intel competitor. We could see a similar balance of power in this game in previous videos. This is a great result and an important victory for AMD processors powering the upcoming GTA 6.
And finally, the benchmark of the latest installment of Lara Croft. We don't know if anyone is playing this game right now, but the CPU test is definitely good. 1080p, the highest graphics preset with RT shadows enabled, and here the new Intel top leaves no chance for either its predecessor or the 16-core top from AMD, which it outperformed by an impressive 25 percent.
Conclusions
Regardless of our conclusions, the Core i9-13900KF should be the top seller in the top segment, especially when paired with the RTX 4090. Perhaps the Ryzen 9 7950X could perform better on Windows 10, but we doubt that this will help it win back the title of fastest gaming processor.
And the Core i9-13900KF fully deserves this status, because compared to its predecessor, it has seriously strengthened its position not only in games but also in work software, becoming a universal top. However, this came at a high price. If a year ago, reviews scolded 12900K for its temperatures and appetite, today boiling water on the top of the line is a common sight on both Intel and AMD processors.
But potential buyers of the best and fastest are unlikely to care, so Intel has chosen the right strategy if AMD's AM5 socket processors don't prevent them from dominating the top sales. So AMD has only one way out: lower prices.
Where to buy the i9-13900KF processor
Such a powerful and complex CPU should be purchased from professionals who specialize in components. Consumers can find such a processor in the Artline online store. Customers are offered favorable prices and a guarantee. By choosing 13900KF, users can be sure that they are getting a high-quality processor. It will be relevant for a long time, which will allow you to run the most resource-intensive games and programs.