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CoffeeLakeFeature

When Intel launched Coffee Lake last summer, information technology led with a relatively anemic lineup of desktop and mobile parts. The visitor is changing that today, and with a vengeance. Starting today, if you like Coffee Lake, there'southward a great deal more than of Coffee Lake to like, including new Core i9 CPUs available in mobile for the kickoff time always.

All told, Intel is launching 11 new mobile CPUs, new Optane branding, a bevy of new desktop chips, and new chipsets. We've rounded the new cores for desktop and mobile upwards in the slideshow below; you lot can click on each slide to magnify it.

At the superlative of the stack you've got the Core i9-8950HK, an unlocked CPU with a four.6GHz standard Turbo Heave frequency and a 4.8GHz Turbo Boost using what Intel is calling "Thermal Velocity Boost." This is a new, college-clocked single-cadre frequency that volition only kick in if the CPU is running below 53C.

Every bit is typically the case, the Core i9 on mobile is a very unlike beast than its desktop counterpart. On desktops, the i9 family packs features similar four memory channels. In mobile, it'south nonetheless a dual-channel configuration. This, forth with the lower TDP inherent to mobile fries, will likely limit scaling to some caste. Only the Cadre i9-8950HK is unlocked; the Core i7-8850H's partial unlock allows for DRAM overclocking and a 400MHz CPU overclock, but non more.

Nosotros can't say much more than that almost how the Core i9-8950HK volition scale because Intel continues its execrable policy of refusing to reveal turbo frequencies, claiming that this information is "proprietary to Intel."

There'southward no question that there are specific details of Intel'southward CPU implementations that are proprietary to Intel, merely the idea that its core frequencies qualify under that label is just absurd. Intel has had no problem letting its motherboard vendors change Turbo frequencies at will. Vendors will commonly attempt to ready a maximum all-core turbo frequency that corresponds to the highest defined single-cadre frequency Intel offers, even when this tin can easily cause stability problems.

These settings matter and they vary from chip to chip. Pretending that this information is somehow proprietary is zip but a dodge to avoid releasing information that consumers might use to brand more informed choices.

Moving on from the Core i9 — Intel'south new 28W chips all feature higher-terminate EDRAM graphics solutions with 128MB of EDRAM. Both the Core i5 and Core i7 CPUs in this family unit are quad-core / eight-thread, just they're notwithstanding Coffee Lake, not Kaby Lake refresh parts. In these CPUs, the EDRAM cache is finer serving as an L4 cache and tin be used for more than than just graphics workloads.

Finally, there's a new range of desktop chips, mostly filling holes in the before Coffee Lake lineup. Unfortunately, Intel continues its trend of selling lousy integrated GPUs into this space. If you're trying to trounce the desktop graphics cost crisis with an integrated solution, the Ryzen 5 2400G remains the merely plausible pick.

New Chipsets

Intel is besides launching new chipsets with these processors, though in that location'south going to be a split between users who bought Z370 and the newer hardware. If you bought a Z370, yous accept no USB iii.i Gen 2 ports from Intel and no integrated onboard Wi-Fi provided by the PCH. If y'all buy a new lath using the H370, Q370, B360, or H310 chipsets, yous'll get both of these features.

Anandtech has additional chipset details and a breakup of the rather confusing mode Intel'southward 8th generation CPUs are carve up between 14nm+, 14nm++, and an as-yet-unknown 10nm refresh from Cannon Lake. This is one area where Intel has unaccountably gone downhill in the past 12 months — from its Xeon branding to its 8th-generation superfamily of parts, Intel seems to be trying to find its basis.

1 last matter to tidy up: Systems equipped with Optane will now feature a + subsequently their proper name. Cadre i9+, Cadre i7+, etc. vPro support is also now called out on the badge besides.

The expert news for Intel buyers is that these fries are well-positioned, even if the branding is sometimes a bit uncertain. While at that place are a few places where we'd take preferred to meet updates, like a GT3e graphics configuration in a socketed desktop CPU, almost anyone upgrading to Coffee Lake is going to get a significant performance boost from doing so. Whether information technology's thanks to college cadre frequencies, cadre counts, or new features like integrated Wi-Fi for desktops, Coffee Lake's overall feature set is strong.