Intel Core i9-9990XE OEM-only, Even Then it's a Lottery

[bajs11]

I've seen similar sentiments expressed by some of my clients. Ryzen has been hitting all the right notes for people who have upgraded from Intel systems. For that reason, I just don't see anyone but enthusiasts rallying around this CPU.


Exactly.

that have to be enthusiasts with very thick wallets
or a fearless spender with a credit card with no spending limit

 

[notb]

that have to be enthusiasts with very thick wallets
or a fearless spender with a credit card with no spending limit

Is it?
I live in Poland and i5-7500 costed me relatively as much as a 9900K would cost someone from Germany (based purely on salary differences).
And while I'm fine with my CPU, quite a lot of people in my country still buy the top components (including Intel HEDT and stuff like that). They're determined, they want top results. They pay the price.

And I'm pretty sure there are lots of people exactly as determined in Western Europe, Japan or USA, so what stops them from buying a 9990XE? Nothing.
It's a huge cost - obviously. They may not afford something else they wanted to buy: a bicycle, a trip to Africa or whatever. But that's about it. They don't have to be extraordinarily rich or extraordinarily bad at understanding credit card balance.

 

[efikkan]

Yeah, basically anyone in high-paying countries with a job can buy the tech gear they want if they just plan for it. And I do certainly see a trend of young enthusiasts overspending on hardware, but that's not what astounds me the most, it's the fact that people in general are spending "medium" amounts of money on tech carelessly, like young people buying a new iPhone "every year" and spending >$500 a year on phone charges. I'm all for spending appropriately for quality and intended use, and I have no issues in justifying spending thousands for a good workstation etc. But wasting thousands on a phone when a $150 phone will do the job?

But the other day I was shocked by an article in a newspaper, some high-school were boasting about their new e-sports class with each student getting a machine costing >$7000 a pop. I don't even understand how you build a gaming machine that expensive, and I seriously think they got royally screwed on that deal, and this was for playing like Dota 2 and CS…

 

[notb]

Yeah, basically anyone in high-paying countries with a job can buy the tech gear they want if they just plan for it. And I do certainly see a trend of young enthusiasts overspending on hardware, but that's not what astounds me the most, it's the fact that people in general are spending "medium" amounts of money on tech carelessly, like young people buying a new iPhone "every year" and spending >$500 a year on phone charges. I'm all for spending appropriately for quality and intended use, and I have no issues in justifying spending thousands for a good workstation etc. But wasting thousands on a phone when a $150 phone will do the job?

So imagine a situation in Poland, where you literally see builders and young policemen carrying iPhones. They may be the previous gen, but still cost above net monthly salary of these people. But you know... spread over 24 or 36 months it isn't that problematic (you just have to live with poor food and ease up on comforts... like books or... medicine... ;-)).

What I can say in defense of people paying a lot for smartphones: the lower models really suck. They're OK for calling and casual use of online services, but they're too slow even for regular web browsing. And while this may not be the case of me and you, for many a smartphone really replaced a PC.
My girlfriend's life literally turns around her phone. She wants it big and fast (the phone). But she uses it for music, movies, browsing, social media, studying, shopping... She only needs her laptop 2-3 times a week - for writing longer texts and occasional Sims or GTA.
So yeah: her phone may be twice as expensive as mine, but all her computers (phone + cheap Dell laptop) cost way less than all my stuff. And use less space.

It doesn't mean people that can't afford a laptop should buy an expensive phone (which they also can't afford), but if someone has the money then why not? If they can live with the small screen and touch keyboard, it's not a bad deal, really. And once you connect a BT keyboard and a TV, it's just perfect for most everyday task.

But the other day I was shocked by an article in a newspaper, some high-school were boasting about their new e-sports class with each student getting a machine costing >$7000 a pop. I don't even understand how you build a gaming machine that expensive, and I seriously think they got royally screwed on that deal, and this was for playing like Dota 2 and CS…

The only thing that comes to mind: public procurement. You may be able to buy a solid metal trash can for $20, but your town will pay $100. It's just how these things work.

 

[Jism]

I spend a lowzy 2500 euro on a system last week; still not finished. I was kind of tired of the many crashes, BSOD's and other shit (like noise) that came into account when brutally OC'ing the shit out of a outdated 8350 platform. Guess buying intented fast hardware gets you simply far better then buying low / midrange products and try to push it to high end.

I like the raw speed and silence my computer has now (3x rads). Kind of needed to adapt to the silentness a few days long lol.

 

[efikkan]

Guess buying intented fast hardware gets you simply far better then buying low / midrange products and try to push it to high end.

Yes, the days of buying cheap hardware and overclocking it to match expensive hardware are gone. I remember the days of overclocking Celerons and Durons for some insane gains, but overclocking today is purely a sport requiring extreme cooling etc., and not really something you want for a usable machine. CPUs today are already pushed to the point where they need a lot more voltage to scale any further. Some still choose to do a light overclock of the base or push the all core turbo to the max turbo, but anything beyond that usually gets crazy. Personally I've completely given up on overclocking, a ~5% gain is really not worth it for heat, noise, crashes, file corruption, loss of warranty and shortened lifespan. And obviously it's not smart for any productive machines. I've seen how crazy they can behave when compiling code, and I'm not doing that again.

Good luck with your new machine.

 

[bajs11]

Yeah, basically anyone in high-paying countries with a job can buy the tech gear they want if they just plan for it. And I do certainly see a trend of young enthusiasts overspending on hardware, but that's not what astounds me the most, it's the fact that people in general are spending "medium" amounts of money on tech carelessly, like young people buying a new iPhone "every year" and spending >$500 a year on phone charges. I'm all for spending appropriately for quality and intended use, and I have no issues in justifying spending thousands for a good workstation etc. But wasting thousands on a phone when a $150 phone will do the job?

But the other day I was shocked by an article in a newspaper, some high-school were boasting about their new e-sports class with each student getting a machine costing >$7000 a pop. I don't even understand how you build a gaming machine that expensive, and I seriously think they got royally screwed on that deal, and this was for playing like Dota 2 and CS…

exactly!
Even if one can afford something doesn't mean he/she would waste their hard earned money to buy it.
I am using a Samsung Galaxy A5 2017 which i bought for around 200 euros/ 220 USD but i know plenty of my coworkers have 800+ euro/usd iphones
I know i can also easily afford a 1500 USD RTX 2080Ti (one of the better ones cost at least that much where i live) and i9 9900K
but i choose not to upgrade my old i7 4790k and gtx 1080
the latter is because i personally think the higher end rtx cards are still way overpriced and the Haswell i7 is still good for my 60fps monitor especially at higher resolutions than 1080p

Do you know which school it was and how do i come into contact with them?
I want to sell them gaming rigs with RGB components from ram to ssds for only $6500

 

[FCG]

I don't get it.
Why not just disable 4 cores on the i9-9980XE.
This will allow for higher clocks and a per-core basis.
More shared L3 cache and same or better potential than the 14c variant.
Overclocking closes the gap.
Who pay's attention to TDP when going to top clocks?
This whole concept has gone off the rails.
Whoa be it to anyone who pays for this monstrosity.

 

[notb]

Why you are defending this insane product?

That's quite simple. Because I like it! :-D
1) It's just fantastically powerful.
2) This is a HEDT platform. And I think both Intel HEDT and Threadripper make no sense (have no sensible practical use) other than showing what the consumer lineup might get in 2-3 years.
And with that in mind, if I had to choose a single CPU from everything we have today, that would become my 2022 buy, 9990XE might be it. Of course I assume it would use the future node and architecture - hopefully staying below 200W and cost around $500-600. ;-)

You see, I would like processors to offer the best single-thread performance available and then add more cores, not the other way around. It's just a better approach.
This way you get no penalty when using a sequential program, but benefit from all the cores in parallel computing.

I'm looking forward to proper next gen CPUs (using different materials) with, hopefully, just 1 or 2 threads.

 

[Ruru]

That's quite simple. Because I like it! :-D
1) It's just fantastically powerful.
2) This is a HEDT platform. And I think both Intel HEDT and Threadripper make no sense (have no sensible practical use) other than showing what the consumer lineup might get in 2-3 years.
And with that in mind, if I had to choose a single CPU from everything we have today, that would become my 2022 buy, 9990XE might be it. Of course I assume it would use the future node and architecture - hopefully staying below 200W and cost around $500-600. ;-)

You see, I would like processors to offer the best single-thread performance available and then add more cores, not the other way around. It's just a better approach.
This way you get no penalty when using a sequential program, but benefit from all the cores in parallel computing.

I'm looking forward to proper next gen CPUs (using different materials) with, hopefully, just 1 or 2 threads.

Go ahead and waste ur money... I don't even answer anymore.

 

[lexluthermiester]

1) It's just fantastically powerful.

No it isn't. The benchmarking Puget Systems have done showed the the 9990XE is only slightly better than the 9980X and not worth the greatly added expense. It also performs only marginally better than the 9940 until you OC the 9940 and then the performance is within a statistical margin of error. The 9990XE exists only for elitist bragging rights, nothing more. Smart people will buy the 9980 or better the 9940 and OC.

Why not just disable 4 cores on the i9-9980XE.
This will allow for higher clocks and a per-core basis.

That is an assumption. Silicon lottery is still a factor, though very much less so with these cherry-picked dies for the 9990XE.

 

[notb]

No it isn't. The benchmarking Puget Systems have done showed the the 9990XE is only slightly better than the 9980X and not worth the greatly added expense.

Oh come on. You're smarter than that.
First of all: who's talking about being worth? Clearly, all these "enthusiast" CPUs aren't worth the price you'll have to pay. I'm talking about performance, not value.

And the difference is huge.
https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/Photoshop-CC-2019-Intel-Core-i9-9990XE-Performance-1346/
Even in a benchmark that averages scores from different tasks, 9990XE is over 10% faster.
Only some of the tasks will benefit from higher clocks (and some tasks are GPU-oriented). This means single-thread performance scales with clocks and you can't really expect more in this case.
And is 10-15% a lot? What do you think? Is a non-overclocked 7700K faster than 7700?

It also performs only marginally better than the 9940 until you OC the 9940 and then the performance is within a statistical margin of error. The 9990XE exists only for elitist bragging rights, nothing more. Smart people will buy the 9980 or better the 9940 and OC.

Of course an 9940X overclocked to 9990XE clocks will have similar performance. Isn't this kind of obvious?
The whole point of 9990XE is that you don't have to overclock.

 

[Deleted member 158293]

Intel's marketing is working quite well here apparently.

 

[lexluthermiester]

First of all: who's talking about being worth?

Everyone but you.

Clearly, all these "enthusiast" CPUs aren't worth the price you'll have to pay.

By "all" do you mean the the "X" series entirely? Cause I have to disagree with that. The 9940 is very much worth the price of admission if you have a usage scenario for it.

I'm talking about performance, not value.

Again, you're the only one. And if you can afford one and what the bragging rights, get one. No one's stopping you.

Even in a benchmark that averages scores from different tasks, 9990XE is over 10% faster.

Until you OC one of the other models, then the difference falls within a statistical margin of error.

Is a non-overclocked 7700K faster than 7700?

Semantics

Of course an 9940X overclocked to 9990XE clocks will have similar performance. Isn't this kind of obvious?
The whole point of 9990XE is that you don't have to overclock.

Exactly. Bragging rights, nothing else.

 

[notb]

Everyone but you.

Which would make me the only person in this thread that has both feet on the ground?

By "all" do you mean the the "X" series entirely? Cause I have to disagree with that. The 9940 is very much worth the price of admission if you have a usage scenario for it.

One can point out a scenario for every existing CPU. That's not proving anything.
Yes, I'm not hiding with my distaste for Intel HEDT and never have. It's a solution in need of a problem. Same with Threadripper.
Some say it's a product for "prosumers" - a moment when the obvious issue comes around...

Until you OC one of the other models, then the difference falls within a statistical margin of error.

... you can't expect the target "prosumer" group to do any kind of overclocking.
If a normal person wants a faster CPU, they buy a faster CPU. That's why there are so many variants in Intel's lineup.

You can only expect PC enthusiasts to do any kind of overclocking.
Seriously, if someone is into editing video, that's what he focuses at (especially if he's doing it professionally).
He may not even know what CPU clocks mean.
You can't say 9990X is basically the same as 9940X because you can (and are willing to) overclock.

Semantics

Not at all! :-D
I'm sure that if this was a discussion about games, people would be like "woooow, 10% more fps!"
But since it's about Photoshop, you've just ignored the difference.