Intel Raptor Lake CPUs May Support DDR5-5200 RAM Natively
A small but welcome platform perk.
A datasheet containing the full specifications of an industrial Thin Mini-ITX LGA1700 motherboard has surfaced as an interesting nugget of information about upcoming 13th gen Intel Raptor Lake-S (RPL-S) systems. The Mitac PH12ADI features an H610 or Q670 chipset, built for 12th Gen Intel Alder Lake (ADL-S) Core i9, i7, i5, and i3 processors up to 65W, and supports DDR5 RAM. Mitac highlights that if you build an Alder Lake system, you should choose DDR5-4800 RAM to populate the twin 262-pin SO-DIMM slots on this motherboard. However, the Mitac datasheet implies that Raptor Lake will support DDR5-5200 modules by default. Therefore, please add some salt to this early information as this Intel partner leak or slip-up could be an error.
Intel's 13th Gen Core processors supporting DDR5-5200 would be a small but welcome advance by default. It simply means that any tier of Raptor Lake system should be able to plug in DDR5-5200 modules and go without any further configuration step(s) and any explicit 'overclocking' support from the motherboard.
In our Intel Alder Lake RAM guide, considering DDR4 and DDR5 and the wide range of different latency values and speeds available, we weren't impressed by the potential performance boost in choosing DDR5 over DDR4 or the performance scaling of DDR5 RAM. Given this context, moving from the default of DDR5-4800 to DDR5-5200 is a minor upgrade. However, averaging our suite of performance tests on Alder Lake comparing DDR5-4800 and DDR5-5200 with equal timings, we saw a 1% performance benefit.
As well as the default support for faster memory, Raptor Lake CPUs on Intel 700-series chipsets could boost the maximum number of PCIe Gen3 and Gen4 lanes available. This is what might tempt you to upgrade to both a new processor and a new motherboard with Raptor Lake arrives.
There has been some talk about made for Intel 700-series chipset motherboards being DDR5 only. Indeed, AMD has already taken this route with its initial wave of Ryzen 7000 'Raphael' processors and AM5 socket motherboards.
We will have more facts about Raptor Lake processors, performance, memory support, and the new 700-series chipsets (e.g. Intel B760, H770 and Z790 motherboards) nearer launch, expected in Q4 this year.
Almost a year ago, Intel inadvertently confirmed that its 600-series chipsets would be suitable for two generations of processors – Raptor Lake, followed by Raptor Lake (12th and 13th Gen Core processors). We have taken this as a given ever since, and we expect that people owning Intel 600-series chipset motherboards today will be able to upgrade to Raptor Lake CPUs with at most a BIOS update being required.
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Mark Tyson is a news editor at Tom's Hardware. He enjoys covering the full breadth of PC tech; from business and semiconductor design to products approaching the edge of reason.
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mdd1963 Small jump upward from 12th gen's DDR5-4800, but, going up! (Most are looking to see DDR5-6400 become the new defacto 'DDR4-2133'- equivalent!)Reply -
InvalidError Reply
DDR4-2133 was the basement for DDR4 like DDR5-4400 is for DDR5.mdd1963 said:Small jump upward from 12th gen's DDR5-4800, but, going up! (Most are looking to see DDR5-6400 become the new defacto 'DDR4-2133'- equivalent!)
DDR5-6400 as the "defacto mainstream grade" at some point in the future would be more comparable to DDR4-3200/3600 today. -
InvalidError Reply
When DDR4 entered the mainstream starting with overpriced DDR4-2133 and ultra-expensive DDR4-2933, its advantages were disputable too. Fast-forward about four years, almost anything 3000 or less was priced about the same and most platforms that could overclock to 3000+MT/s showed decent scaling up to about 3200MT/s. Today, another three years later, pricing is pretty much flat for anything slower than 3200 and performance gains from faster memory are decent for the incremental price up to about 4000MT/s on CPUs that can run this speed without switching to higher clock ratios.Tom Sunday said:But yet I wonder if DDR5-6400 as talked about here will be a really felt difference or visceral advantage over DDR5 5200? Besides the hefty pricing difference between the two the resellers may charge us?
There may be little to no benefits to DDR5-5200 today just like there was little to no benefits to DDR4-2666 back when that was new. Give it four years and I have little doubt 5200 will start feeling inadequate just like DDR4-2666 did. -
zipspyder ReplyInvalidError said:DDR4-2133 was the basement for DDR4 like DDR5-4400 is for DDR5.
DDR5-6400 as the "defacto mainstream grade" at some point in the future would be more comparable to DDR4-3200/3600 today.
Thanks, I was wondering what would equate to DDR4 3200 or something higher in DDR5... -
InvalidError Reply
The target clocks for DDR5 are approximately double what they were for DDR4. DDR4 started at 2133 and got official updates up to 3200, DDR5 started at 4400 and will likely officially max out at 6400.zipspyder said:Thanks, I was wondering what would equate to DDR4 3200 or something higher in DDR5... -
peterf28 I just decided to keep my i5 2500K@4.8GHz, 16GB DDR3 2133MHz, 1070TI for one more year. It can run everything at 75-55 FPS/Hz. The Freesync monitor I bought extended the lifespan of my system for another good 4 years. Everything runs fluently inside the Freesync range, I do not even notice when FPS drops thanks to Freesync.Reply -
jp7189 Reply
It's really about absolute latency. DDR CAS latency measured in nanoseconds has been more or less the same for all generations. New generations tend to start off high and get better with time eventually settling around 8-10ns. DDR5 is currently around 16ns or roughly twice as slow as topend DDR4.zipspyder said:Thanks, I was wondering what would equate to DDR4 3200 or something higher in DDR5...
After DDR5 latency comes down to 10ns range the bandwidth benefits will make it a clear winner over DDR4.
Latency equals CAS/speed 2000 e.g. DDR4 3200 CL 16 is 16/32002000 or 10ns; DDR5 4800 CL 40 is 40/4800*2000 or 16.6ns.
DDR5-4800 CL 24 should have a small advantage. DDR5-6400 CL 32 is good stuff and is already available but it very expensive and not widely compatible with motherboards yet.