Intel’s Raptor Lake processors have witnessed several recent leaks, including some gaming benchmarks and a hefty 6GHz overclock for the Core i7-13700K.
Let’s start with the game tests that were conducted by Extreme Player, a Bilibili-based leaker that streamed benchmarks for the Core i9-13900K a few weeks ago. This time around, the Core i7-13700K and Core i5-13600K were tested, though keep in mind all the usual caveats about these supposed early engineering (pre-release) sample chips.
The results have caused some concern – much like the previous 13900K spill – as, at first glance, some of the benchmarks look quite underwhelming. The scores are summarized in some graphs compiled by @harukaze5719 on Twitter (via VideoCardz (opens in new tab)).
Every time I see data like this, I think “how much improved in the end?” It’s hard to get an answer So I make my own chart what I want. The general conclusion is sufficient with this chart. But still need to maintain a critical attitude. pic.twitter.com/GNcCfVsZXDJuly 31, 2022
So the bottom line is that, at Full HD, the 13700K only witnessed gains of around 6% to 7% in average framerates across a selection of games (including Apex Legends, Far Cry 6, and Red Dead Redemption 2) in comparison. with the predecessor Alder Lago. The 13600K sample chip fared better with a jump of around 10% to 11% when compared to the 12600K.
Gains at 1440p were more modest for the two Raptor Lake processors at 4% to 5%, and at 4K this was even more the case, with improvements on the order of 2% to 4% (with GPU bottlenecks at 4K meaning no there was a difference between 12th and 13th gen CPUs with some games).
Some of these results, and some of the individual benchmarks, have met with a lukewarm reception as a result – and particularly the performance of the 13700K – but we shouldn’t get carried away by pre-release benchmarking as we’ll discuss shortly.
In addition, VideoCardz also identified (opens in new tab) another couple of leaks from an alleged Core i7-13700K sample CPU where the processor was overclocked to 5.8GHz and 6GHz respectively. In the latter – buckets of salt on hand – the Intel chip recorded a single-thread result of 983 on CPU-Z, beating a recent leak from the Core i9-13900K. Note, however, that the efficiency cores were disabled in this case, so only the eight performance cores were operational and therefore the multi-core result was low as expected (7814 points).
A second leak witnessed the 13700K reportedly running at 5.8GHz, this time with all cores (including efficiency ones) running, and it achieved a single-threaded score of 947 and multi-threaded output of 12,896. Even that 947 is 12% faster than the 12900K (at 5.2 GHz) on single-thread CPU-Z, so that’s impressive.
In other news, like tweettown (opens in new tab) In reports, Intel Raptor Lake laptop CPUs have been officially confirmed to be arriving before the end of 2022, according to Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger (as mentioned in a Q2 earnings call). The 13th-gen desktop processors will appear first and are expected to launch in late September, likely with an October on-sale date.
Analysis: Some mixed signals in Raptor Lake – but don’t get too worried just yet
We saw some fears and concerns being aired when leaked benchmarks surfaced for the 13900K recently, also from Extreme Player on Bilibili, indicating around 5% to 7% improvements in average framerates compared to its predecessor. It’s pretty much the same story for the 13700K here, but we have to keep a few key points in mind.
First of all, these are just leaks, and as with all pre-release sample chips, they won’t be as fast as the final product – and they’re also running with earlier BIOS versions for 13th-gen motherboards. . We’re not getting the full story, essentially, on the performance front – and the second leak (CPU-Z), showing a serious 13700K overclock, is entirely more promising anyway (although the same skepticism and caveats should apply to this). , naturally).
It’s really impressive to see the 13600K offering a 10% boost to games at this stage, as Raptor Lake is just a simple Alder Lake upgrade after all. What’s also worth noting is that the game’s benchmarks show some nice improvements in minimum frame rates – the lowest fps recorded, in other words – with 13600K and 13700K boosted in the 11% to 14% range. And ensuring that those dips at low framerates don’t end up as jagged as they do with their Alder Lake counterparts is a worthwhile benefit.
In short, we’re not going to take the wobbly bits of this latest leak too seriously, as for us, looking at the big picture of the Raptor Lake rumors – and leaks are coming fast lately – it still looks like Intel’s 13th generation is shaping up. up well enough.
We’ve said before that big gains are expected – and needed – from AMD’s next-gen Ryzen 7000 (Zen 4) processors, so the fight between the new Team Red and Team Blue CPU ranges promises to be fierce.
If performance is indeed a close thing, however, there could be other deciding factors, including price (obviously) and the maturity of the platform. By the latter, we mean that this is the last outlet for Intel’s current socket (Alder Lake), while Zen 4 will be the first incarnation for AM5 motherboards.
What this means is that those who buy a new PC with an AM5 mobo can expect to be able to directly upgrade to a future Ryzen CPU without having to change that motherboard – which won’t be the case with Intel’s following 14th-gen chips ( Meteor Lake, scheduled to arrive in 2023).
