Intel Core i9-9900K 9th Gen CPU Review: Fastest Gaming Processor Ever
Why you can trust Tom's Hardware
Shadow Of War & Project CARS 2
Middle-earth: Shadow Of War
Shadow of War leans heavier on graphics resources than host processing, so we don't see large deltas between the fastest and slowest CPUs. This is another reminder that most games are limited by your GPU, so plan accordingly if you're running into a bottleneck.
Project CARS 2
Although Project CARS 2 is purportedly optimized for threading, clock rates obviously affect this title's frame rates. Intel's per-core performance advantage pays big dividends in this title, but Core i5-9600K inexplicably trails the previous-gen -8600K. Repeated testing confirmed the results.
MORE: Best CPUs
MORE: CPU Benchmark Hierarchy
MORE: All CPUs Content
Current page: Shadow Of War & Project CARS 2
Prev Page Far Cry 5, GTA: V & Hitman Next Page Office & ProductivityStay On the Cutting Edge: Get the Tom's Hardware Newsletter
Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox.
Paul Alcorn is the Managing Editor: News and Emerging Tech for Tom's Hardware US. He also writes news and reviews on CPUs, storage, and enterprise hardware.
AMD 24.9.1 drivers mark the proper debut of universal Fluid Motion Frames 2 — along with improved geometric downscaling
Nvidia reportedly cancels development of dual-rack 72 GPU GB200 — analyst says the company intends to focus on single-rack offerings
AMD's dense Zen 4c cores go embedded — new EPYC Embedded 8004 series CPUs for compact and efficiency focused servers
-
dlim389 "The better the cooling, the better power consumption"? What?! This doesn't make sense at all. You meant the better the cooling, the lower the temperature.Reply -
siman0 "Redefine" at double the price of a 2700x it needs to do more than that. The price diffrence is more than enough to go up another GPU tier ie 1070ti to a 1080ti. Id rather have more pcie bandwidth and the ability to upgrade my cpu till 2020. The only way Id recommend a upgrade to something close is if you already have the motherboard. But even then Id say the 9700k.Reply -
s1mon7 Wait, so it performs within a spitting distance of the 2700x with DOUBLE the power consumption and price? Holy smokes, I thought Intel will be able to easily take on AMD after they launch their 8-cores. I have to say that these results were very surprising to me, since I believed in this being the ace up Intel's sleeve. This is really interesting, and a big win for AMD. The 9900K goes through twice the power just to squeeze out that extra clock speed edge to outperform the 2700x by a mere 10%, at double the price, mind you.Reply
Intel clearly needs 10nm and a new architecture to go back into the game. As is, I struggle to think of any reason to buy the 9900k. -
TCA_ChinChin Interesting chip from Intel, but if you are looking at CPUs from a performance per dollar point of view, its rather disappointing. The real disappointment is the 9700k which is more expensive than the 8700k but performs basically the same on average.Reply -
Adrian Ocampo As a gamer, why would I buy a 9700K when an 8700K trades blows with the 9900K in both gaming and productivity. It just doesn't make sense. Its like its just competing with its own product as this point. I would be better off buying an 8700K deliding it, put liquid metal and overclock to 5.0Ghz for a much lower price than a 9900K.Reply -
gfaiii Guys just as a heads up you should say second generation 1151 socket, these are NOT compatible with 200 series boards that have 1151 sockets (without modding)Reply -
sonichedgehog360 Ladies and gentlemen, Intel’s FX 9000 series.Reply
(By the way, I totally saw this coming what with the crazy clock speeds they were pushing.) -
Johnpombrio I was surprised on how well the i9-9900K did on stock clocks. I may not even bother with overclocking as it does well even without it and I may be able to use air cooling that way. Compared to my Kaby Lake i7-7700K, it definitely is a big step up. I already have the ASUS Strix Z380 mobo, 32GB Corsair Dominator Platinum memory kit and have preordered the CPU.Reply -
redgarl For the money, you can buy a motherboard, a CPU and a 1080 GTX for the same price as the 9900k with it's motherboard.Reply
Also, you tested this system on a 600$ motherboard... 600$ and a prenium cooling solution.
This system is above the 2000$ threshold compared to an AMD one barely hitting the 1000$.