The Core i9 Gaming Benchmarks Intel Commissioned Against AMD Are a Flat Lie
Intel — or to be precise, a company Intel hired to create a whitepaper on Core i9 gaming performance — has crossed that line. According to Forbes, Intel contracted with Principled Technologies to distribute a whitepaper containing various claims about gaming performance between Intel's upcoming Core i9-9900K and Core i7-8700K and the AMD Threadripper 2990WX, 2950X, and Ryzen 7 2700X. With AMD having surged into competitive positioning in the past 18 months and Intel taking heat from its 10nm delays, Chipzilla has every reason to push a narrative that puts it in the driving seat of gaming. But Intel is using this whitepaper to claim that it's up to 50 percent faster than AMD in gaming based on Ashes of the Singularity in particular, and that's where the problems start. The Intel results are somewhat higher than we'd expect, but the AMD CPUs — particularly the Ryzen 7 2700X — are crippled.
There are several problems with the AMD benchmarks as run by Principled Technologies. PT was careful to document its own configuration steps on both systems, which is why we know what, precisely, the company did wrong. First, the Ryzen systems were tested without XMP enabled. XMP is the high-end memory timing standard that enthusiast kits use to hit maximum performance and Ryzen gaming performance is often tied directly to its RAM clock and sub-timings. Using substandard timing could lower Ryzen's performance by 5-15 percent. Second, all of the benchmarks in question were run using a GTX 1080 Ti and a resolution of just 1080p. If you wanted to create a report tailor-made to Ryzen's weaknesses, that's the resolution you'd use. Unfair? Not necessarily — it's the most common resolution after all. But there's a reason we include 1440p and 4K results in our resolutions comparisons for gaming, and Intel/Principled didn't do so.
Third, Principled Technologies notes that it enabled "Game Mode" in AMD's Ryzen Master utility. The implication is that it did this on both systems. This can have serious side effects on how well an AMD system benchmarks. On Threadripper, engaging Game Mode cuts the CPU core count in half and enables NUMA to allow the remaining CPU cores to schedule workloads on the cores closest to the memory controllers. On Ryzen 7, clicking Game Mode just cuts the core count in half. That's why AMD's user guide for Ryzen 7 specifically states that Game Mode is reserved principally for Threadripper and that Ryzen customers shouldn't use it [...] the 50 percent performance gain that Intel claims for itself is exactly the kind of result we'd expect if the 2700X had been crippled by having its CPU neutered.
In addition to what is mentioned above, AMD's stock Ryzen 7 2700X Wraith Prism cooler was used for the AMD system while a premium Noctua NH-U14S cooler was used for the Intel system. This could allow the system to hit higher frequencies for longer periods of time.
See also: Intel Stands Behind Controversial Tests That Favored Its CPU Over AMD's
Previously: Intel Announces 9th Generation Desktop Processors, Including a Mainstream 8-Core CPU
Related Stories
Intel Announces 9th Gen Core CPUs: Core i9-9900K (8-Core), i7-9700K, & i5-9600K
Among many of Intel's announcements today, a key one for a lot of users will be the launch of Intel's 9th Generation Core desktop processors, offering up to 8-cores on Intel's mainstream consumer platform. These processors are drop-in compatible with current Coffee Lake and Z370 platforms, but are accompanied by a new Z390 chipset and associated motherboards as well. The highlights from this launch is the 8-core Core i9 parts, which include a 5.0 GHz turbo Core i9-9900K, rated at a 95W TDP.
[...] Leading from the top of the stack is the Core i9-9900K, Intel's new flagship mainstream processor. This part is eight full cores with hyperthreading, with a base frequency of 3.6 GHz at 95W TDP, and a turbo up to 5.0 GHz on two cores. Memory support is up to dual channel DDR4-2666. The Core i9-9900K builds upon the Core i7-8086K from the 8th Generation product line by adding two more cores, and increasing that 5.0 GHz turbo from one core to two cores. The all-core turbo is 4.7 GHz, so it will be interesting to see what the power consumption is when the processor is fully loaded. The Core i9 family will have the full 2MB of L3 cache per core.
[...] Also featuring 8-cores is the Core i7-9700K, but without the hyperthreading. This part will have a base frequency of 3.6 GHz as well for a given 95W TDP, but can turbo up to 4.9 GHz only on a single core. The i7-9700K is meant to be the direct upgrade over the Core i7-8700K, and although both chips have the same underlying Coffee Lake microarchitecture, the 9700K has two more cores and slightly better turbo performance, but less L3 cache per core at only 1.5MB per.
Intel also announced refreshed 8 to 18 core high-end desktop CPUs, and a new 28-core Xeon aimed at extreme workstation users.
Related:
Intel Teases 28 Core Chip, AMD Announces Threadripper 2 With Up to 32 Cores
AMD Threadripper 2 Available Starting on August 13
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @04:35AM
Don't be mean to intel, they don't even have a CEO.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @05:07AM (9 children)
Why even allow half the cores to be disabled on the budget processor? Sounds like shit drivers. If I had that, and saw game mode, I'd turn it on as well thinking it would improve performance, not reduce it.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday October 10 2018, @05:26AM (3 children)
Exactly which of the processor is the "budget" one?
No, seriously, I genuinely asking for something I don't know about.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Wednesday October 10 2018, @06:19AM
Ryzen processors seem to cost between $US 99 and $US 899, so "budget" must mean "under $300"
https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_st?keywords=AMD+Ryzen&rh=n%3A172282%2Ck%3AAMD+Ryzen&qid=1539151958&sort=price-asc-rank [amazon.com]
I suspect the firmware enabling "game mode" is standard across all the processors, but only does "good things" on threadripper models.
Old GMH cars had 'ecoboost', which was a primitive exhaust gas recirculation system. It helped emissions, but crippled the performance so badly that people revved the hell out of the engines, thus negating any improvement (except under test). Removing the piping and re-tuning made them use less fuel under normal conditions.
For AMD, Using one firmware likely saves $0.03 per unit..
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:26AM (1 child)
Ones without hyperthreading, or whatever AMD calls it.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:34AM
Both companies use the same style of hyperthreading since AMD released Ryzen.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 4, Informative) by RamiK on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:30AM (2 children)
it's a load-specific scheduling consideration: Most games aren't that well optimized and don't benefit from more than a couple of threads so giving them fewer, but dedicated, cores reduces context switching and, ultimately, improves performance.
I believe this is still common place with recent Unity engine titles. Especially independent ones.
compiling...
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:49AM (1 child)
IIRC, Game Mode was always intended for Threadripper, because some games would not react well to 16 cores (or 32 threads). Although not that many titles had issues.
Incidentally, Threadripper 2's 24- and 32-core variants have slower memory/PCIe access for half of the cores [anandtech.com]:
So, Game Mode is not for Ryzen... right? Except that the rumor mill thinks that AMD will release a 💥mainstream🔥 16 core Ryzen next year since they will probably double the amount of cores per CCX with "7nm" Zen 2.
One more thing: The Game Mode on Threadripper was originally described [anandtech.com] as disabling one of the two dies. Threadripper 2 has either 2 or 4 dies. Ryzen just has 1 die. So is Game Mode on Ryzen just disabling cores on the same die? Maybe the setting doesn't actually do anything with single-die Ryzen and the shady company is in the clear on that point. It would be nice to get clarification on that.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @02:33PM
Intentions aside, the reason it was kept around for everyone else was because it's useful for some games regardless. There plenty of reddit posts of people trying it out and reporting improved FPS in older games and you can probably just try it yourself and see.
(Score: 2) by JustNiz on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:55PM (1 child)
I'm thinking it must be because Ryzen has far more of a heat problem than Intel.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:53PM
"must be" ? Nope. It's Intel that runs hot now.
https://www.reddit.com/r/intel/comments/60fnm4/temperature_concerns_i7_vs_i5_vs_ryzen/ [reddit.com]
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Spamalope on Wednesday October 10 2018, @05:18AM (6 children)
So, can we have the press question management at Principled and Intel about Intel stock options trading based on release of the skewed report? Some sort of wife beater questions like 'Will management commit to ending pump and dump options trading based on the release of these inaccurate reports?'. You know, something to discourage this stuff via the SEC.
Also, if you have to name the company Principled, odds are you don't have any.
(Score: 3, Touché) by c0lo on Wednesday October 10 2018, @06:06AM (1 child)
FTFY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:10AM
"Take the money and say whatever they want you to say" is a principle.
Groucho said it best [youtube.com]
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:46AM (1 child)
"Soggy [soggy.jobs]."
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @11:47AM
Man: Well, what've you got?
Waitress: Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam; spam bacon sausage and spam; spam egg spam spam bacon and spam; spam sausage spam spam bacon spam tomato and spam;
Vikings (starting to chant): Spam spam spam spam...
Waitress: ...spam spam spam egg and spam; spam spam spam spam spam spam baked beans spam spam spam...
Vikings (singing): Spam! Lovely spam! Lovely spam!
Waitress: ...or Lobster Thermidor au Crevette with a Mornay sauce served in a Provencale manner with shallots and aubergines garnished with truffle pate, brandy and with a fried egg on top and spam.
Wife: Have you got anything without spam?
Waitress: Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Wednesday October 10 2018, @11:39AM
"Being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell people you are, you aren't." -- Margaret Thatcher
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @02:47PM
In their defense, Systemd was already taken.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @01:18PM (1 child)
https://www.semiwiki.com/forum/content/7753-real-race-superiority-tsmc-vs-intel.html [semiwiki.com]
While SemiWiki is focused on the manufacturing side, it does also comment that the AMD vs Intel comparison is finally coming down to architecture as TSMC's 7nm is comparable to Intel's 10nm processes.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday October 10 2018, @05:49PM
Keep in mind that TSMC will lead with deep ultraviolet (DUV) "7nm" chips before switching to extreme ultraviolet (EUV) a year or so later.
https://www.anandtech.com/show/13445/tsmc-first-7nm-euv-chips-taped-out-5nm-risk-in-q2 [anandtech.com]
Article author calls these advantages not significant but every bit counts.
The chart on that article says that TSMC's "5nm" process will allow area reduction of 45%. It would be crazy if AMD doubled core counts on DUV "7nm", and doubled them again on "5nm" (resulting in 32 cores per die, 128 cores for 4-die Epyc).
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2, Disagree) by JustNiz on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:15PM (3 children)
Extremetech have always been totally biassed AMD fanbois. If this article was written by absolutely anybody else I'd trust it far more.
Their 1st claim that XMP wasn't enabled on AMD absolutely does not agree with the setup process that is described in the whitepaper itself.
It clearly shows the MSI Z390-A PRO (AMD Ryzen 2990WX) had XMP turned on, and both it and the ASUS PRIME X299-DELUXE (Intel i9 9900k) were configured to identical memory clocks (DDR4-2666).
was that the test was done with a 1080ti at only 1080 res, but it makes perfect sense to get the GPU out of the performance bottleneck as much as possible, if you really want to isolate and compare just CPU performance.
Their 3rd claim seems bizarre enough to be unlikely that AMD processors actually give worse gaming performance if you set "Game Mode" in the AMD utility, but if true, I don't see that being anyone else's fault than AMD's, and just another reason to avoid AMD processors.
(Score: 5, Informative) by tibman on Wednesday October 10 2018, @09:00PM
Oh! you said if absolutely anyone else wrote the article you'd trust it far more? Here you go:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonevangelho/2018/10/10/the-company-behind-those-controversial-intel-i9-9900k-benchmarks-responds/#1d93674225c6 [forbes.com]
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/first-intel-core-i9-9970k-gaming-benchmarks-published-by-intel-appear-to-be-misleading/ [dsogaming.com]
https://wccftech.com/principled-technologies-replies-controversy/ [wccftech.com]
https://www.techspot.com/article/1722-misleading-core-i9-9900k-benchmarks/ [techspot.com]
https://www.techpowerup.com/248355/intels-9th-gen-core-gaming-benchmarks-flawed-and-misleading [techpowerup.com]
https://www.kitguru.net/tech-news/featured-announcement/damien-cox/press-criticises-intel-for-misleading-comparisons-between-core-i9-9900k-and-ryzen/ [kitguru.net]
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday October 11 2018, @09:18PM
Principled Technologies Retesting Ryzen Amid 9th Gen Core Controversy [tomshardware.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday October 11 2018, @09:26PM
The mode is intended for Threadripper chips since some older games don't respond well to 16 cores.
I haven't heard of a rash of AMD users or reviewers accidentally turning on Game Mode and complaining about it. But somehow a company hired by Intel manages to turn this on and put out flawed benchmarks, while everyone else's benchmarks are under EMBARGO. Hmm...
Get a clue.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday October 11 2018, @09:17PM
https://www.tomshardware.com/news/intel-amd-gaming-benchmarks-controversy,37912.html [tomshardware.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]