Power Consumption Overview
Power Consumption Overview
An overview of power consumption confirms what we saw on the previous page. Comparing the two new processors to other CPUs and APUs shows the magnitude of Intel's optimizations.
Unfortunate outliers, such as AMD’s FX-9590 (under load) or the FX-4350 (at idle) are just one piece of the puzzle. If you're wondering why the Core i7-5960X looks almost like a low-power processor by comparison, remember that most of these CPUs operate close to their sweet spots, whereas AMD's larger FX models and a few Intel CPUs don't run efficiently, even at their stock settings.
There are a lot of CPUs in the charts that follow, spanning a wide range of the performance (and power consumption) spectrum. As you can see, Intel's two new processors consume a lot less power than the previous models at idle, which makes for a great start.
Broadwell sets new power consumption standards for gaming with a discrete graphics card as well. The reason for this is the Iris Pro's almost nonexistent draw. Other CPUs with on-die graphics engines tend to lose some power through them.
The two new processors do well, even under full load and with a fully active IGP. They consume significantly less power than comparable older models, in spite of providing equal or better performance.
Bottom Line
Intel's previous-gen and AMD's current architectures drive home how impressive the Broadwell design is, and how far Intel has come with it. Although integrated graphics is often derided, we're seeing the company's emphasis on dedicating more resources to graphics paying off in a big way. Based on our power consumption results, Intel's balance of host and graphics processing is a resounding success.
