Intel is getting ready to release Tiger Lake from its cage; however, the rowdy Core i7-1165G7 has already started flaunting its prowess in a SiSoftware benchmark.
Being a member of the 11th Generation Tiger Lake family means that the Core i7-1165G7 packs Intel's Willow Cove microarchitecture and Gen12 Xe graphics. The quad-core, eight-thread processor reportedly checks in with a 2.8 GHz base clock and 4.7 GHz boost clock. It's been known for a long time now that Tiger Lake will usher in 50% higher L3 cache per core in comparison to Ice Lake. The change is the SiSoftware benchmark spotted by @TUM_APISAK: The Core i7-1165G7 has 12MB of L3 cache compared to the 8MB of L3 cache on the existing Core i7-1065G7 Ice Lake processor.
On the graphics end, Gen12 is expected to arrive with 50% more execution units (EUs) in relation to Gen11. As a recap, Gen11 is limited to 64 EUs, meaning that Gen12 houses up to 96 EUs or 768 shading units. The exact configuration inside the Core i7-1165G7 is unknown. Nonetheless, the Core i7-1165G7 did seemingly beat AMD's Ryzen 9 4900HS and Ryzen 7 4800U (codename Renoir) on 3DMark Time Spy not so long ago. That's only one benchmark though; it remains to be seen whether Gen12 can really dominate Vega in real-world gaming.
| Processor | Cores / Threads | Base / Boost Clock (GHz) | L3 Cache (MB) | TDP (W) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ryzen 7 4800U | 8 / 16 | 1.8 / 4.2 | 8 | 15 |
| Core i7-1165G7* | 4 / 8 | 2.8 / 4.7 | 12 | ? |
| Core i7-1065G7 | 4 / 8 | 1.3 / 3.9 | 8 | 15 |
*Specifications are unconfirmed.
The Core i7-1065G7 processor reached a score of 378.63 Mpix/s on the processor multimedia test. With a score of 564.87 Mpix/s, the Core i7-1165G7 is up to 49.2% faster than the Ice Lake chip. As impressive as the Core i7-1165G7 looks, the quad-core Tiger lake processor is no match for the Ryzen 7 4800U.
The Ryzen 7 4800U is another example of AMD's proven combination of the Zen 2 microarchitecture and TSMC's 7nm FinFET node. It's hard for Intel to compete when the Ryzen 7 4800U brings eight cores and 16 threads to the table. The design helps push the Renoir APU ahead of the Tiger Lake part by up to 31.8%. Some might argue that the margin is underwhelming when you consider the fact that the Ryzen 7 4800U has double the number of CPU cores as the Core i7-1065G7.
Tiger Lake will introduce substantial changes, such as the move to the 10nm+ node, Thunderbolt 4 support, adoption of the Willow Cove microarchitecture, Gen12 Xe graphics and among others. Early rumors even suggested support for the PCIe 4.0 interface.
Intel has scheduled a virtual event for the press on September 2. The chipmaker didn't share the program, but we expect announcements on Tiger Lake and, perhaps, the Xe Graphics DG1, Intel's forthcoming discrete mobile GPU.
