The Intel Core i9-13900KS Review: Taking Intel's Raptor Lake to 6 GHz
by Gavin Bonshor on January 27, 2023 10:00 AM ESTGaming Performance: 720p And Lower
The reason we test games in CPU reviews at lower resolutions such as 720p and below is simple; titles are more likely to be CPU bound than they are GPU bound at lower resolutions. This means there are more frames for the processor to process as opposed to the graphics card doing the majority of the heavy lifting.
There are some variances where some games will still use graphical power, but not as much CPU grunt at these smaller resolutions, and this is where we can show where CPU limitations lie in terms of gaming.
We are using DDR5 memory on the 12th and 13th Gen Core parts, as well as the Ryzen 7000 series, at the following settings:
- DDR5-5600B CL46 - Intel 13th Gen
- DDR5-5200 CL44 - Ryzen 7000
- DDR5-4800 (B) CL40 - Intel 12th Gen
All other CPUs such as Ryzen 5000 and 3000 were tested at the relevant JEDEC settings as per the processor's individual memory support with DDR4.
Civilization VI
World of Tanks
Borderlands 3
Grand Theft Auto V
Red Dead Redemption 2
F1 2022
Hitman 3
Total War: Warhammer 3
When it comes to raw processor performance in gaming, lower resolutions showcase the ability best of all. In the case of the Core i9-13900KS and Core i9-13900K, both processes, as expected, are very competitive against each other. Sometimes, the higher-clocked KS SKU comes out on top, and sometimes it doesn't.
There can be some weight put on the fact in some cases, the Core i9-13900KS hits thermal limits much more easily, even with a premium 360mm CLC cooler that we are using. In World of Tanks at 768p, the Core i9-13900KS bridges the gap to the fast yet older Core i9-12900KS, which seems to benefit from a mixture of IPC, core frequency, and core count.
Looking at our Borderlands 3 results at 360p, the Core i9-13900KS plows through the test with flying colors, although the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D and its 96 MB of 3D V-Cache make it competitive. This is relevant as AMD plans to release the updated Ryzen 7000 X3D SKUs very soon.
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erinadreno - Friday, January 27, 2023 - link
No.nandnandnand - Friday, January 27, 2023 - link
Practically useless, even at 720p. Looking forward to 7000X3D.Kangal - Friday, January 27, 2023 - link
Sure, the i9-13900KS can be seen as "the best"......but it's hard to justify it for the real-world when there's the Intel Core i5-13600k right there! You're paying half the amount and using less power, to achieve a very impressive score right up there with the best.
I guess even more impressive is the AMD r7-7700 which trades blows with that chipset in performance, competitively price, uses significantly less power, and most importantly has a long support (AM5) period.
I wish we continue to see this trend, with the luxury products making it clear to show how good the mid-high range products have become. In some parts this is a correction in the market due to new competition. Consumers rejoice!
Andresen - Friday, January 27, 2023 - link
A very expensive and fast cpu is testet with some very slow memory. I don’t see the point in doing that. The slowest memory rated as DDR5-5600 in my local webshop is CL40 and the most commen is CL36 and I could choose CL28. CL46 is not an option. I’m not in the market for this cpu, but if I were I would combine it with DDR5-7200 at CL32. If memory overclocking is not an option, then I would use DDR5-5600 CL36.Makaveli - Friday, January 27, 2023 - link
Have to agree with you on this. No one buying this CPU is going to be pairing with the DDR5-5600 memory.Andresen - Monday, January 30, 2023 - link
I forgot to add, that apart from my minor critics regarding choice of memory, that it is nice that AnandTech makes these thorough reviews. I don’t think I can find such quality reviews anywhere else for pc-class hardware.Great_Scott - Wednesday, February 1, 2023 - link
The reviews are great, although I can't imagine there's a single hand-built Ryzen PC in existence that's using memory at JEDEC timings.It was interesting to see how the Ryzen 7950X was able to keep up in a large number of tests.
GeorgeV - Saturday, February 11, 2023 - link
Honestly, I wish these high end CPUs were tested at the speeds they can run 128GB of RAM at. From what I've seen around the web, these tested RAM speeds are higher than either can manage reliably when all 4 dimms are filled.jospoortvliet - Monday, February 13, 2023 - link
Well Andresen thinks it should be faster you think slower. I guess they did it right?DanNeely - Friday, January 27, 2023 - link
"*We changed the motherboard to the GIGABYTE Z690 Aorus Master as the MSI MPG Z790 Carbon WIFI we used for our previous 13th Gen Core series reviews refused to play ball. We don't like to make these changes lightly, but we weren't able to source another Carbon in time for this review"Did it fail outright, or still work for other chips but choke on this extra-power hungry one?