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Base clocks on Intel CPUs appear to be decreasing each generation. Why?

Soldato
Joined
30 Jun 2019
Posts
8,065
TDP is basically a guarantee that the CPU will consume no more power than for example 65w/125w at base clock speed... So, clock speeds above this point will require increasing amounts of power and voltage for each 100mhz (or at least, that is my assumption).

Generally, the unlocked K chips have the highest base clocks.

For the 9th Gen, there's the 8 core 9900KS, with a base clock of 4.0ghz and a tdp of 127w.

For the 10th gen, the 8 core 10700K has a base clock speed of 3.8ghz, tdp = 125w. Also, the 6 core 10600K has a base clock of 4.1ghz, at the same tdp of 125w.

The 11th gen was bad in a lot of ways, but also had lower base clock speeds at a tdp of 125w than the last 2 generations.

For the 12th gen, the 8 P core 12700K has a base clock of 3.6ghz, with a tdp of 125w. The higher spec 8 P core 12900KS has a lower base clock of 3.4ghz at 150w!
That is despite the more advanced, more transistor dense 10nm fabrication technology.

So, am I correct in thinking that the 13th generation is likely to have similarly low base clock speeds, for the same or higher rated tdp?

Is the reason partly due to the generational increases in L3 cache (and L2 in the future)?
 
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My impression is that Intel's 10nm process (used in the 12th and 13th generation) hasn't helped them to increase base clocks at a tdp of ~125w.

I just found an article that suggests upto a 40% improvement in power usage, depending on the voltage, for Intel's 7nm EUV ('Intel 4') process.

Graph here:
intel-4-780x439.jpg


The graph suggests that at 1.1v, Intel's new 7nm EUV process will allow a base clock of ~3.65ghz at a normalised power usage of ~3.9x. Intel's 10nm process appears to be limited to a base clock of around 3.3ghz, at a normalised power usage of around ~4.6x. They can push it up a bit higher, at the cost of efficiency.

Intel mentions optimization of their new process at high voltages (1.3v or higher), so it sounds like there could be a possibility of base clocks near to 4.0ghz, hopefully at a tdp of ~125w.

Full article here:

Considering that the 8 core Ryzen 5800X has a base clock of 3.8ghz, and 12 core 5900X has a base clock of 3.7ghz both at a tdp of 105w, I'd say it's pretty likely that Zen 4 equivalents (on the new 5nm EUV process) will overtake these and run at a base clock of 4.0ghz or more, at a similar tdp.

So, Intel will have some catching up to do in 2023.
 
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I definitely don't think lower base clocks is a deliberate move from Intel. If people want lower idle clocks, they can set that themselves in the BIOS with relative ease.

Or, just buy a 12900 or 12700 instead, these have significantly lower base clocks and a tdp of just 65w. the 'T' variants of the CPUs have even lower base clocks and tdps of just 35w.

Like the graph above shows, Intel's most recent 10nm process starts to show increased power usage at around 3.3ghz. So, I think this is the limitation. I would guess that they put the base clock up as high as it will go, before a tdp target is reached, such as 125w, or in the case of the 12900KS, 150w.
 
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It's interesting to compare Intel's last few generations to the Zen series, in general, AMD have managed to maintain or slightly increase the base clocks, from the first generation, but the first couple of generations did use the less advanced 14nm and 12nm processes.

It does look like Intel's 7nm EUV process will be a big deal for Intel, it will help them to achieve efficiency at clocks near to 4ghz, so desktop CPUs should struggle significantly less if overclocked to 5.0ghz on all cores. Also, lower power devices and laptops might be able to run at 3.0-3.5ghz at lower tdps like 45-55w.

Meteor Lake will almost certainly have more L2 and/or L3 cache, so they will need an improved process to help reduce higher power consumption from this.

I think the E-Cores probably only use another 20 or 30 watts. If you compare the i5 12600 to the 12600K, there's only a 33 watt difference in the turbo boost power rating, with the 12600 boosting slightly lower.
 
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Its completely arbitrary, they could write 95 watts on the box if they wanted to, which would be a true statement, at 2.8Ghz. The more cores they add the lower that base clock needs to be if what they want to do is advertise it as a 125 watt CPU.
I think the tdp is supposed to show that you can get power efficiency out of a CPU upto a certain clock speed. For example, with the 12900K, you can limit it to 125w (PL1 and PL2) and still get around 99% (on average) of the CPU's performance, at least in games:

Limiting PL1 and PL2 to 190w will apparently result in close to 100% performance...

I think Intel has muddied the waters a bit by putting the tdp of the 12900KS at 150w though... They probably think no one will run this CPU at it's base clock anyway.
 
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I think based on the (quite limited release of) Tiger Lake 10nm desktop CPUs, we can conclude that Intel gained no advantage in base clock speed on 10nm, compared to 14nm:

The 6/8 core unlocked chips both have a base clock frequency of just 3.3ghz.
 
The 13900K (or high end CPU) has a base clock of just 3.0ghz, according to this:

The TDP is apparently 125w:
2022-07-13_19-48-48-1480x738.png


That would be the lowest base clock for an unlocked mainstream desktop CPU (i3/i5/i7) in probably 10 years or more.

Maybe they will improve increase it a bit more, before release?
 
The 12 core 7900X (Zen 4) will apparently have a base clock of 4.7ghz, at 170w!
Link here:

The 7700X has a base clock of 4.5ghz at a tdp of just 105w.

Miles better than the 12900KS base clock, of 3.4ghz at 150w.

The 7700X looks like it could be one of the most power efficient desktop CPUs available, if these rumours are correct.

Update - The 7600X is rumoured to have a base clock of 4.7ghz, at a tdp of 105w, so it too appears to be a very power efficient processor. Details here:

And it looks like it will only cost ~£200 inc VAT.

If the TDPs are correct, the max power usage for the 7600X and 7700X (operating at turboboost speeds > 5ghz) should be 105 x 1.35 = 141.75w.
 
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So, it looks like the base clocks for the 13th gen are going to be even lower than their counterparts in the 12th generation series:

12900K base clock =3.2ghz. 13900K baseclock = 3.0ghz.
12700K base clock =3.6ghz. 13700K baseclock = 3.4ghz.
12600K base clock =3.7ghz. 13600K baseclock = 3.5ghz.
 
It's OK, but some P-Core power efficiency appears to be lost.

3ghz for the 13900K isn't really a desirable base clock, at 4 and 5ghz, the power usage will increase disproportionately.

It looks like Intel is offering a lot of E-cores even on the 13th gen i5s, if there's specs are reliable. So, good multithreaded performance even at the low-mid end. It would be good to see more models without E-cores though, at a reduced price.
 
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