Intel Core i9-9900KS 8 Core and 16 Thread 5.0 GHz CPU Review – 5 Gigahertz Across All Cores For A Slight Premium

Test Setup

For testing, we used the latest Intel Core i9-9900KS which was sent to us by Intel. The Intel 9th Gen Coffee Lake Refresh family comes with a higher core count on the mainstream platform but prices are close to the predecessors in the same segment. The Core i9 SKU wasn't available last time but the Core i7 price matches around the same as what you paid for the Core i7-8700K. Both the Core i9-9900K and i9-9900KS were tested on the Z390 AORUS Master motherboard.

Intel Core i9-9900KS Test Setup:

Processor	Intel Core i9-9900KS
Motherboard	Z390 AORUS Master
Power Supply	ASUS ROG THOR 1200W
Solid State Drive	Samsung SSD 960 EVO M.2 (512 GB)
Memory	G.SKILL Trident Z RGB Series 32 GB (4 x 8GB) CL16 3600 MHz
Video Cards	MSI GeForce RTX 2080 Ti Lightning Z
Cooling Solutions	ASUS ROG Ryujin 240
OS	Windows 10 64-bit

Our test rig includes the Samsung 960 EVO 512 GB SSD that boots up our main OS while a 2 TB Seagate HDD is used for demonstration purposes for the Intel Optane memory. In addition to these, we are running an MSI GeForce GTX 2080 Ti Lightning Z graphics card, an ASUS ROG Thor 1200W power supply and 16 GB of G.Skill provided Trident Z Royal series memory which runs with a clock speed of DDR4-4000 MHz. For cooling, we used the ASUS Ryujin 240.

We won't be focusing on Intel's Core i9-9900KS architecture in this review since it is entirely the same chip as Skylake along with minor improvements. The Skylake / Kaby Lake architecture analysis can be seen in detail here. For overclocking, I made the following tweaks to the CPUs:

• Intel Core i9-9900KS @ 5.3 GHz With 1.350V (100 x 53)

You can find additional information about our hardware review process and ethics policy here.

9.2

WCCFTECH RATING

The Intel Core i9-9900KS is the fastest gaming processor on the planet, featuring 5 GHz across all cores, surprisingly lower power consumption, better temperatures and hitting AMD at their weakest spot.

Pros

• Fastest Processor for Gaming right now!
• All Core 5.0 GHz core clock out of the box
• Excellent Overclock Capabilities
• Excellent Multi-tasking Performance
• New STIM Packaging for cooler temps
• Lower power consumption than the 9900K

Cons

• Very high price (8 cores for $500 US+)
• High Temperatures when overclocked
• No PCIe Gen 4.0 Support
• Still 14nm

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