Core i9-12900K Destroys Ryzen 9 5950X By 38% In Ashes of the Singularity

Intel 12th Generation Alder Lake
Intel 12th Generation Alder Lake (Image credit: Expreview)

Intel's 12th Generation Alder Lake processors will soon see the light of day this Fall 2021. It appears that the flagship Core i9-12900K (via HXL) may give AMD's Ryzen 9 5950X a run for its money in gaming, according to the latest Ashes of the Singularity benchmarks. The hybrid chip had previously bested the Ryzen 9 5950X in Geekbench 5, too.

Thanks to early retailer listings, the Core i9-12900K's specifications are already out there. The Alder Lake processor is expected to wield 16 cores in total, eight high performance Golden Cove cores and eight energy-efficient Gracemont cores. The 125W chip's other specifications include 30MB of L3 cache, a 3.2 GHz base clock and 5.2 GHz boost clock.

AMD's Ryzen 9 5950X, on the other hand, sports 16 Zen 3 cores with simultaneous multithreading (SMT) at 3.4 GHz with a boost clock speed of 4.9 GHz. The 105W processor also has 64MB of L3 cache at its disposal. On paper, AMD's chip seems to have the advantage since it's working with full-fledged Zen 3 cores whereas the Core i9-12900K has to work with just eight Golden Cove cores.

Core i9-12900K Ashes of the Singularity Benchmarks (Image credit: Oxide Games)

At the time of writing, there were 11 Core i9-12900K submissions in the Ashes of the Singularity database. The benchmark doesn't expose the complete specifications for the graphics card so we're unsure if the Core i9-12900K and GeForce RTX 3080 waere overclocked or whether they were under exotic cooling or not. Take the results with a pinch of salt. Furthemore, we don't know whether the user tested on Windows 11. Remember that Microsoft's next-generation operating system comes with an improved scheduler that's particularly optimized for Alder Lake.

The Core i9-12900K with a GeForce RTX 3080 scored 14,000 points with the High 1440p preset. By contrast, the Ryzen 9 5950X and a GeForce RTX 3080 scored 10,100 points with the same graphics preset and resolution. The Core i9-12900K outperformed the Ryzen 9 5950X by 38.6%. Both systems were using version 3.10.191346.0 of the benchmark tool so it should be a fair apples-to-apples comparison. Nevertheless, we have to highlight that fact that it's improbable that both users are using the same GeForce RTX 3080 so the actual performance margin between the Core i9-12900K and Ryzen 9 5950X could be bigger or smaller.

Despite its heterogeneous nature, the Core i9-12900K appears to pack a punch. However, Ashes of the Singularity is just one benchmark so it's too early to declare a winner. It'll be interesting to see whether the Core i9-12900K can recover the gaming throne for Intel as AMD practically has the best CPUs for gaming right now.

Gaming is good and all, but the Core i9-12900K has a tougher job ahead of it. The Alder Lake chip will have to prove whether it can hang with AMD's Zen 3 core-heavy Ryzen desktop chips in terms of application performance, which is more important for many consumers.

Alder Lake will launch this Fall 2021, but there are strong rumors that an announcement is allegedly scheduled for the Intel Innovation event, which runs from October 27 to 28.

Zhiye Liu
RAM Reviewer and News Editor

Zhiye Liu is a Freelance News Writer at Tom’s Hardware US. Although he loves everything that’s hardware, he has a soft spot for CPUs, GPUs, and RAM.

  • wiscovitch
    Got those scores/links backwards, took me a few reads to figure that out ;)
    Reply
  • Giroro
    There are now 15 results, covering a wide range from 5100 to 15900. (@1080)

    It seems pretty obvious somebody named foxed.in is experimenting with extreme overclocking.
    Exotic cooling should be assumed.
    Reply
  • Makaveli
    Giroro said:
    There are now 15 results, covering a wide range from 5100 to 15900. (@1080)

    It seems pretty obvious somebody named foxed.in is experimenting with extreme overclocking.
    Exotic cooling should be assumed.

    lol get out of here with your facts better to fan the flames for the fan boys with Destroys in the title
    Reply
  • helper800
    Makaveli said:
    lol get out of here with your facts better to fan the flames for the fan boys with Destroys in the title
    I honestly hope Intel comes out swinging that hard, it would be interesting to see an AMD response to a ~20-30% deficit.
    Reply
  • watzupken
    helper800 said:
    I honestly hope Intel comes out swinging that hard, it would be interesting to see an AMD response to a ~20-30% deficit.
    Alder Lake will be released/ announced in the next month or 2, so no need to hope. It is what it is by now.
    In my opinion, the numbers are looking way too optimistic here. I don't have any facts, but it is no joke to offer a significant double digit % IPC improvement. While the 38% here is no reflective of all workload, it is still a big number.
    Reply
  • helper800
    watzupken said:
    Alder Lake will be released/ announced in the next month or 2, so no need to hope. It is what it is by now.
    In my opinion, the numbers are looking way too optimistic here. I don't have any facts, but it is no joke to offer a significant double digit % IPC improvement. While the 38% here is no reflective of all workload, it is still a big number.
    Agreed, its a lot, but here's to hoping for some actual innovation.
    Reply
  • spongiemaster
    Giroro said:
    There are now 15 results, covering a wide range from 5100 to 15900. (@1080)

    It seems pretty obvious somebody named foxed.in is experimenting with extreme overclocking.
    Exotic cooling should be assumed.
    Who wastes their time using exotic cooling with the 3rd fastest card from a GPU maker? Anyone with the resources for sub zero cooling is going to be using a 3090.
    Reply
  • hotaru251
    so intels new gen vs amd's old gen. would be kind of sad if it didnt beat it?

    However I doubt tis as simple as it seems. Extremely unlikely such huge improvement over the last (especially on a 1st gen hybrid chip). Something is likely going on unknowingly.


    I do hope Intel has a good chip, but if it seems to ogood to be rue...it usually is.
    Reply
  • hasten
    Makaveli said:
    lol get out of here with your facts better to fan the flames for the fan boys with Destroys in the title
    There are no facts in his/her response... sure reads like opinions based off observations to me, but who am I to let your personal fanboyism get in the way of rational thinking. (And 39% is destorying, but pinch of salt cause lack of details, remember thats in the story you obviously read).

    How about before we bring up the word fact we wait until its released and independently tested. 39% would be fantastic for the market, AMD has gotten away with a "marketing" uptick in pricing on the CPU line and for good reason. Intel needs a win to push further innovation from AMD or expect that marketing uptick to continue. This generation is starting to feel eerily similar to the netburst vs Athlon leading to core architecture battle of yesteryear.
    Reply
  • Rdslw
    well its the point why people were pissed on intel for staying 14nm for so long. This could be +-10% back in 2017.
    they allowed AMD to bounce back, but this kind of horsepower 3 years back would be incredible.
    Reply