Motherboard vendor ASUS began rolling out UEFI firmware (BIOS) updates to its Intel Z890 motherboards that contain Intel's 0x114 Microcode update for Core Ultra "Arrow Lake-S" desktop processors. The new microcode was touted as bringing in performance gains to gaming workloads across the board, with Intel saying that depending on the configuration, one could expect a "roughly 3-8% performance gain." The company said that motherboard vendors should begin releasing BIOS updates with 0x114 "starting January 2025," however, it seems like ASUS is ready with public "stable" (non-beta) BIOS updates with it. We use a ROG Maximus Z890 Hero in our "Arrow Lake-S" reviews, and so promptly grabbed the version 1203 BIOS from the ASUS website, and put it to the test. This also updates Intel ME (management engine) to v19.0.0.1827.

We added our performance testing numbers to our article from yesterday (December 19, 2024), where we had tested the Core Ultra 9 285K with the latest OS-level patches for Windows 11 24H2. Long story short, we do not notice any notable performance gains with the 0x114 microcode update. 0x114 was touted as providing users with additional performance gains after all the OS- and BIOS configuration related issues had been fixed. In its pre-brief from earlier this week, Intel said that the 0x114 microcode update represented additional performance gain opportunities that the company had discovered in the process of identifying and fixing the reasons why the processors fell significantly behind Intel's performance guidance in their launch reviews in October.

We recommend you to once again read our performance testing article from yesterday, we have updated the performance graphs with 0x114 microcode update numbers, and are in the process of providing additional commentary in the article. Here's a teaser:

Intel is significantly expanding its desktop Core Ultra 200 "Arrow Lake-S" lineup with new 65 W models along the sidelines of the 2025 International CES, but more importantly, it is bringing the "Arrow Lake" microarchitecture to the mobile space. The company is planning to launch at least 22 processor models this January, but not all of them are based on "Arrow Lake." Tom's Hardware reports that the lineup broadly revolves around the "Core 2-series" processor model numbering.

The Core Ultra 200H series consists of H-segment (conventional thickness notebook) processors in the 28 W to 45 W class, and are based on the "Arrow Lake-H" silicon. The Core Ultra 200HX series targets premium gaming notebooks and portable workstations, and consists of 55 W to 65 W class processors, including CPU overclocking capabilities on certain models. Things get interesting with the Core Ultra 200U series. These chips are based on the "Meteor Lake Refresh" silicon—an older microarchitecture—targeting the 7 W to 28 W segments for ultraportables. Lastly, there's the Core H 200 and Core U 200 series (no "Ultra" in the branding), which are based on the older "Raptor Lake" monolithic silicon, targeting mainstream notebooks.

The gaming performance of Intel's latest Core Ultra 200-series "Arrow Lake-S" desktop processors missed the mark by quite a bit, ending up slower than the 14th Gen Core "Raptor Lake" processors. Adding pressure to Intel is AMD's recent launch of the Ryzen 7 9800X3D, which extends the company's leadership in gaming performance, ending up to 12% faster than the top Core Ultra 9 285K at gaming (1080p). The company then announced that it has identified possible reasons why gaming performance of "Arrow Lake" ended up below expectations, and that it's working on a microcode-level update to the processor.

A discussion in the ASUS ROG Forums sheds light on what this microcode update could be. Allegedly, it's called the Intel 0x114 Microcode Update, and you can expect it soon in a beta UEFI firmware update from ASUS and other motherboard vendors, which makes it possible that we see a public release of the microcode either by yearend, or in Q1-2025. There's still no word on the extent of gaming performance gain from this microcode, but if we were to speculate, Intel wouldn't bother with such an update if it didn't at least bring "Arrow Lake" to the same gaming performance level as "Raptor Lake," if not higher.

G.SKILL International Enterprise Co., Ltd., the world's leading brand of performance overclock memory and PC components, in collaboration with ASUS ROG, has set a new overclocking world record for DDR5 memory frequency, reaching an unprecedented DDR5-12112. This DDR5 memory frequency world record is submitted by ASUS ROG extreme overclocker Safedisk, using G.SKILL Trident Z5 RGB DDR5 memory, ASUS ROG Maximus Z890 Apex motherboard, and Intel Core Ultra 9 285K desktop processor under LN2 extreme cooling.

The record-breaking achievement of DDR5-12112 demonstrates the exceptional memory overclocking performance of the latest Intel Core Ultra 200 K-series desktop processors, Z890 motherboards, and G.SKILL DDR5 memory. The overclock record has been submitted to HWBOT and CPU-Z. Refer to the following links and screenshot to see the record submission: HWBOT | CPU-Z Validation.

iBUYPOWER, a leading system integrator specializing in high-performance custom and pre-built gaming computers, announced today the availability of Intel's latest Intel Core Ultra 200S series processors across its line of gaming PCs. Starting today, those interested in experiencing the latest in AI augmented desktop gaming can now integrate an Intel Core Ultra 200S series processor into an iBUYPOWER system backed by its extensive warranty that offers three-years labor and two-years parts for comprehensive post-purchase support.

The new Intel Core Ultra desktop processors are designed for a great gaming performance with AI at the forefront and industry-leading compute, at significantly lower power for desktop PCs, as iBUYPOWER customers with the new CPU can fully optimize their PC experience by offloading various tasks, auto-framing the Neural Processing Unit (NPU) for smooth game streaming, and accelerating creative tasks - all of which is powered by three AI accelerators built into the processor to keep the user's data protected and private. This new generation of desktop processors also comes equipped with 20 CPU PCIe 5.0 lanes, 4 CPU PCIe 4.0 lanes, support for 2 integrated Thunderbolt 4 ports, Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3. Intel Killer Wi-Fi delivers supercharged wireless performance and enables seamless, immersive online gameplay through application priority auto-detection, bandwidth analysis and management, and smart AP selection and switching.

As a quick follow-up to last week's "Arrow Lake-S" de-lidding by Madness727, we now have a line-up of a de-lidded Core Ultra 9 285K "Arrow Lake-S" processor placed next to a Core i9-14900K "Raptor Lake-S," and the Core i9-12900K "Alder Lake-S." The tile-based "Arrow Lake-S" is visibly larger than the two, despite being made on more advanced foundry nodes. Both the 8P+16E "Raptor Lake-S" and 8P+8E "Alder Lake-S" chips are built on the Intel 7 node (10 nm Enhanced SuperFin). The "Raptor Lake-S" monolithic chip comes with a die-area of 257 mm². The "Alder Lake-S" is physically smaller, at 215 mm². What sets the two apart isn't just the two additional E-core clusters on "Raptor Lake-S," but also larger caches—2 MB of L2 per P-core, increased form 1.25 MB/core, and 4 MB per E-core cluster, increased from 2 MB/cluster.

Thanks to high quality die-shots of the "Arrow Lake-S" by Madness727, we have our first die-area estimations by A Hollow Knight on Twitter. The LGA1851 fiberglass substrate has the same dimensions as the LGA1700 substrate. This is to ensure the socket retains cooler compatibility. Using geometrical measurements, the base tile of the "Arrow Lake-S" is estimated to be 300.9 mm² in area. The base-tile is a more suitable guideline for "die-area," since Intel uses filler tiles to ensure gaps in the arrangement of logic tiles are filled, and the chip aligns with the base-tile below. The base tile, built on an Intel 22 nm foundry node, serves like a silicon interposer, facilitating high-density microscopic wiring between the various logic tiles stacked on top, and an interface to the fiberglass substrate below.

AMD is allegedly announcing its Ryzen 7 9800X3D processor on October 25, with availability in the first week of November 2024. This according to leaky taps among Chinese tech forums with a track record of getting such details right. We've been hearing about an October launch of the 9800X3D in late-September, which puts the announcement just a month after the 9800X3D's early launch first hit the radar. We've since seen a couple of performance or specs leaks, such as this one, which talks about a significant increase in clock speeds over past generations of X3D processors, this one which points to its Cinebench scores, and this one, which confirms a 5.20 GHz all-core boost frequency. Perhaps the biggest leak of them all, which is quasi-official, as it comes from a major PC hardware manufacturer, is this one, with some performance testing. When you cross-reference these numbers with Intel's first party gaming performance claims for its upcoming Core Ultra 9 285K "Arrow Lake-S" processor, you get the hint that AMD is set to win this round for gaming performance.

Intel's new Core Ultra processor model nomenclature is significantly different from the Core i7 series that held for 14 generations, since its 2008 debut. The desktop Core Ultra 2-series "Arrow Lake-S" desktop processor family is led by the Core Ultra 9 285K, which is positioned as a successor to the Core i9-14900K. The choice of numbering the top SKU "285K" instead of something like the "290K," which even caused the top Core Ultra 7 SKU to be numbered the "265K," raises a few questions. The biggest of these is if Intel is creating room for a near-future SKU to go with "295K."

In the classic Intel Core series nomenclature, the digit following the first two, designates a position in the product stack. For example, in the i9-14900K, "14" points to the processor generation, followed by "9" as the top-spec SKU. If you wind the clocks back to the 10th Gen Core "Comet Lake," there was a top-spec Core i9-10900K, but there was also a Core i9-10850K. Both the i9-10900K and the i9-10850K are unlocked 10-core/20-thread parts with identical TDP, set apart only by their stock clock speeds. Could it be possible that the Core Ultra 9 285K is a distant descendant of the i9-10850K, and that Intel's top "Arrow Lake-S" part is the "295K?" Momomo_us recently dug out an inconspicuous Intel Support webpage listing out Core Ultra desktop processors without an included fan-heatsink. This is very likely a typo, but the page mentions a "295K" SKU instead of the Core Ultra 9 285K. This caused us to wonder if the "295K" is being reserved for an i9-14900KS successor.

MSI OCLab made some groundbreaking disclosures about the gaming performance of upcoming AMD Ryzen 9000X3D processors. It looks like AMD is set to dominate the Intel Core Ultra 2-series "Arrow Lake-S" desktop processors in gaming performance, if these numbers hold up. In the games that MSI tested, namely "Far Cry 6," "Shadow of the Tomb Raider," and "Black Myth: Wukong," the "8-core 9000X3D" processor, or the Ryzen 7 9800X3D, is found to be 11% faster on average than the Ryzen 7 7800X3D. The "16-core 9000X3D" processor, which is expected to be the Ryzen 9 9950X3D, is an impressive 13% faster than its predecessor, the Ryzen 9 7950X3D.

Normally we'd expect bigger gen-on-gen gains for the 8-core part than the 16-core part, but the 16-core 9000X3D pulling ahead by that much over its predecessor hints at the possibility of AMD either giving it significantly higher clock speeds, or the rumor about AMD deploying both 3D V-cache on both its CCDs could be true after all. The 9950X3D could end up roughly on-par with the 9800X3D if this turns out to be true, given that the gaming performance delta between the 7800X3D and 7950X3D is roughly that much—2-3 percentage points. Intel earlier this week officially announced the Core Ultra 2-series desktop processors. As part of the announcement, the company put out some first-party gaming performance numbers, which put the top Core Ultra 9 285K either on-par with the Core i9-14900K, or faster by 2-3%, which means it should land behind even the 7950X3D in gaming performance, and AMD is set to dominate Intel in gaming performance with the 9000X3D series.

MSI proudly introduces the next generation of motherboards, designed to pair seamlessly with Intel brand-new Core Ultra Processors. The Z890 MEG Series, MPG Series, MAG Series, and PRO Series motherboards are designed to harness the power of Intel's latest technology, delivering enhanced AI computing efficiency compared to previous generations. These boards provide exceptional performance with advanced features, MSI innovations, premium components, and improved connectivity. But what truly sets them apart is their user-friendly DIY solutions, empowering you to take control of your computing experience. Built with gamers, creators, and all users in mind, MSI's Z890 motherboards offer the very best in computing power. On launch, there will be 5 models available, which are the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K, Intel Core Ultra 7 265K / 265KF, and Intel Core Ultra 5 245K / 245KF processors.

With the introduction of MSI's Z890 motherboards, designed to push performance boundaries and with a completely redesigned, more intuitive BIOS, users can now maximize motherboard performance with ease. Powered by MSI's Ultra Engine, memory design optimization enables overclocking up to 9200+ MT/s across the entire Z890 motherboard lineup. And with the returning of the MEG Z890 UNIFY-X, built with overclocking in mind, takes memory frequencies even higher, reaching up to 9600 MT/s. The Z890 motherboards incorporate a number of powerful features like AI Boost with the ability to overclock the NPU further for AI enhancement capabilities, Game Boost, Performance Preset, enhanced XMP Memory Profiles, and Memory Try It!, allowing users to elevate their system's performance to new heights.

Noctua today confirmed that all its CPU coolers and mounting-kits that support Intel LGA1700 also support the new LGA1851 socket of the upcoming Core Ultra desktop processors (Series 2), also known under the code name Arrow Lake-S. Mounting upgrade kits for older heatsink models that do not yet support LGA1700 and LGA1851 will be provided to customers free of charge.

"We have offered free-of-charge mounting upgrade kits to our customers ever since AMD introduced AM2 in 2006, and we're proudly continuing this tradition with the upcoming Intel Core Ultra Series 2 processors and their new LGA1851 socket", says Roland Mossig (Noctua CEO). "While all our current multi-socket coolers already support LGA1851 out of the box and don't require any updates, customers will be able to upgrade most older coolers at no additional cost, so even the very first Noctua coolers from 2005 can be used on the latest Intel processors!"

Some of the first images of a de-lidded Intel Core Ultra 9 285K "Arrow Lake-S" processor surfaced on the web, confirming a disaggregated chiplet-based processor design. Intel pivoted to chiplet based processors with its Core Ultra "Meteor Lake," allowing it to build specific IP blocks of the processor on different foundry nodes, ensuring the ones that don't need the most advanced nodes can make do with slightly older ones, thereby maximizing Intel's yields for that advanced node. The die shot reveals a similar level of disaggregation to "Meteor Lake" than that of the more recent Core Ultra 200V "Lunar Lake" mobile processor.

With "Lunar Lake," Intel had re-aggregated a few things. "Lunar Lake" only has two tiles—SoC tile and I/O tile. The 3 nm SoC tile contains the CPU complex, a large iGPU, and a large 40 TOPS-class NPU, all sharing die-space with the memory controllers, and PCIe root complex. The smaller 6 nm I/O tile contains the PHYs of the various I/O interfaces. The "Arrow Lake" chip appears to have a similar degree of disaggregation as "Meteor Lake." We can spot at least five tiles sitting on top of the Foveros base tile. The picture has no annotation for the various tiles, but recent reports by Moore's Law is Dead and Jay Kihn shed some light on what these could be.

According to the latest PassMark benchmarks, the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K is the highest-performing single-thread CPU. The benchmark king title comes as PassMark's official account on X shared single-threaded performance number, with the upcoming Arrow Lake-S flagship SKU, Intel Core Ultra 9 285K, scoring 5,268 points in single-core results. This is fantastic news for gamers, as games mostly care about single-core performance. This CPU, having 8 P-cores and 16 E-cores, boasts 5.7 GHz P-core boost and 4.6 GHz E-core boost frequencies. The single-core tests put the new SKU at 11% lead compared to the previous-generation Intel Core i9-14900K processor.

However, the multithreaded cases are running more slowly. The PassMark multithreaded results put Intel Core Ultra 9 285K at 46,872 points, which is about 22% slower than the last-generation top SKU. While this may be a disappointment for some, it is partially expected, given that Arrow Lake stops the multithreaded designs in Intel CPU families. From now on, every CPU will be a combination of P and E-Cores, tuned for efficiency or performance depending on the use case. It is also possible that the CPU used inn PassMark's testing was an engineering sample, so until official launch, we have no concrete information about its definitive performance comparison.

The leaks and rumors surrounding Intel's upcoming Arrow Lake desktop CPU line-up are starting to heat up, with recent rumors tipping the existence of the Core Ultra 9 285K as the top-end chip in the upcoming launch. A new set of Geekbench 6 scores spotted by BenchLeaks on X, however, suggests the Core Ultra 9 285 non-K variant of this CPU might lag its Ryzen 9 counterparts significantly.

The Geekbench 6 test results, which were apparently achieved on an ASUS Prime Z890-P motherboard, reveal performance that falls short of even the current-generation AMD Ryzen 7 9700X, never mind any of the Ryzen 9 variants. The Geekbench 6 multicore score came in at an unimpressive 14,150, while the single-core score was a mere 3,081, falling short of the likes of the AMD Ryzen 7 9700X, which scored up to 19,381 and 3,624 in multi- and single-core tests, respectively. However, there appears to be more to this story—namely an odd test configuration that could heavily skew the test results, since the "stock" Intel Core Ultra 9 285K scores significantly higher in the Geekbench 6 charts than this particular 285 seems to.