The Ice Lake Benchmark Preview: Inside Intel's 10nm
by Dr. Ian Cutress on August 1, 2019 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
- Intel
- GPUs
- 10nm
- Core
- Ice Lake
- Cannon Lake
- Sunny Cove
- 10th Gen Core
Gaming Results (15W and 25W)
One of the biggest changes to the Ice Lake design is in the integrated graphics – Intel is now giving more focus and more die area to graphics, something it has arguably been neglecting for several years now. With Ice Lake, we move to a Gen11 graphics architecture, which is almost like the previous Gen9.5 but now with added support for variable rate shading (VRS), moving from 24 EUs to 64 EUs, and memory support up from LPDDR3-2133 to LPDDR4X-3733.
World of Tanks is a very CPU driven benchmark, and having the extra frequency of the 25W processor does help here. We're getting a sizeable uplift from Whiskey Lake, due to the extra EUs and memory frequency.
Our Final Fantasy test seemed to regress in 25W mode, although still within the noise. This test is still GPU bound, so adding the extra TDP to the CPU didn't actually help much. However, comparing to the Whiskey Lake integrated graphics, we've got over a 2x speedup.
Similarly with Civilization, with what is normally our 'IGP' settings, we are still GPU limited here.
One of Intel's newest features is Variable Rate Shading.
If developers add the option, soon to be an easy checkbox in Unity and Unreal, the game can decide to control the rate at which it shades pixels, from calculating every pixel down using one result across a 4x4 grid, to save compute power. Currently the only way to test this is with the 3DMark functional demo.
The new VRS test in 3DMark is designed as a feature test to show the potential uplift effect from enabling variable rate shading within a game. In both 15W and 25W modes, the data saw a good uplift, and we seemed to get more out of the 25W mode than the 15W mode.
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andrewaggb - Thursday, August 1, 2019 - link
I'm glad you did the benchmarks. At this point everybody knows intel has manufacturing problems and that availability will be extremely limited for these parts. It's nice to know they have updated designs in a working state and that even with limited clock speeds they're pretty fast. I'm disappointed intel isn't simultaneously releasing these parts on 10nm and 14++++ but hopefully that's because they are more confident about their future roadmap.eastcoast_pete - Thursday, August 1, 2019 - link
I think they ran out of space to fit any more "++++" after the 14 nm.StormyParis - Thursday, August 1, 2019 - link
Don't they have cross-licensing with MS, allowing them to use '#' for 3+ '+' ?brunis.dk - Friday, August 2, 2019 - link
Tell me why i need to prepare months in advance? It's great you get a paper launch product in hand. But to me it's still a paper launch. What's different here from you just releasing the benchmarks on availability day? If i was in the mood for a new cpu/mobo purchase i would start saving up and buy whatever is best on the day. Agree with brakdoo!Kvaern1 - Saturday, August 3, 2019 - link
Blink if someone is forcing you to read AT articles and you need help.close - Tuesday, August 6, 2019 - link
@Kvaern1, your point that people should not criticize. So you can either applaud or move along? If nobody ever calls you out for anything then when do you learn? Pointing out something like a paper launch coming from a manufacturer with a history of deception is no without merit.Now whether this applies to this article is a different matter. But your low quality sarcasm response and the "only open for praise" attitude shows some troubling mediocrity.
eva02langley - Friday, August 2, 2019 - link
Ian, those companies do things like that for a reason. IMHO, they want to make the public believe that 10nm is a reality, when in fact it is still a fairy tale. Intel knows that the frequency drop, the yield and the price doesn't worth the trouble to switch to 10nm. Sure, they told investors that 10nm exist and they are releasing products to claim this, but in reality, 10nm will be just there so Intel doesn't need to admit to investor that 10nm is a fiasco. If they did, the price of the stock will lose significant value and it would affect the public perception of the company.This is what I can take from this whole thing.
Klimax - Friday, August 2, 2019 - link
Is sky blue in your world or is it some version of red? You may have had point a year or two back...0ldman79 - Friday, August 2, 2019 - link
Uh...They reworked the entire 10nm process to get it going.
This isn't impossible, it is expensive and time consuming.
They've spent the $$$ and at least a year working on it.
It is hardly unheard of that the single most successful tech company on the planet figured out a problem.
close - Tuesday, August 6, 2019 - link
@0ldman79 "the single most successful tech company" - that's the overstatement of the millennium. And of course I'm no stranger to overstatements.