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The Intel Core i9 processors are Intel's top-of-the-line options, offering high core counts and operating clock speeds. However, they are also incredibly expensive. It is worth noting that the i9 chips were only introduced recently in 2017, replacing the Core i7 chips as Intel's flagship option.
The question of whether gamers need these powerful processors depends on a variety of factors. This article will explore some of these factors.
The Intel Core i9 is way too excessive for gaming purposes
Before diving into the performance differences, let's check out the spec sheets of the two most recent Intel Core i9 processors, the 12th gen Alder Lake 12900K and the 13th gen Raptor Lake Core i9 13900K.
Specs
The Core i9 12900K features 16 cores, with eight high-performance 'P' cores and eight efficient 'E' cores. The E cores have a base clock of 2.4 GHz and can boost up to 3.9 GHz, while the P cores have a base clock of 3.2 GHz and can boost up to 5.2 GHz.
In comparison, the Core i7 12700K comes with 12 cores, eight of which are P cores. The chip has a maximum boost of up to 5.0 GHz.
Similarly, the Core i7 13700K and the Core i9 13900K are not far apart in terms of their on-paper specs. The Core i9 processor comes with 24 cores, while the i7 variant has 16 cores.
Performance differences in synthetic benchmarks
In synthetic benchmarks, the sheer power of the extra cores and clock speeds of the Core i9 chips is evident, and the processors are much faster than their Core i7 counterparts.
In Cinebench R23, we see an 18% performance difference between the Core i7 and i9 chips in multi-core performance. However, the single-core performance is not significantly different. The high-end variant only shows a single-core performance increase of about 8%
Performance differences in video games
In video games, the massive difference between the Intel Core i9 and i7 chips translates to a framerate difference of about 1-2%. In thorough testing done with an RTX 4090 GPU, YouTuber Testing Games got the following results with both CPUs.
Despite the massive gains in single-core and multi-core performance marks, the slight framerate differences are rather counter-intuitive. This is because games hardly utilize more than one or two cores.
Since the single-core performance of the Core i9 and Core i7 processors is similar, the difference in framerate between the two is not significant.
Conclusion
Thus, the Core i7 chips are sufficient for gaming. The latest i7 chips do not bottleneck any modern graphics cards. In addition, they are much more affordable than the Intel Core i9 and Ryzen 9 offerings, making them a more cost-effective choice for gamers on a budget.
The Intel Core i9 processors are designed for CPU-intensive tasks, and modern GPUs cannot fully utilize the capabilities of these chips in video games. Thus, opting for these high-end options is a waste of money if you primarily intend to use your PC for gaming.
