Essay: Intel Core I9-9900K Processor Architecture And Performance Study.

Research on a new (or relatively new) parallel processor (MultiCore CPU, GPU etc) architecture with cutting edge. The processor could be a product already on the market, or could be something with mature research results.

Your project should study and present the following information associated with the processor of your choice:

1. General information of the product (processor name, model, clock rate, etc.)  
2. Features of this product (architecture design, performance, comparison with other similar products etc.)
3. Cutting-edge technology used in the processor such as multithreading, multicore, multi-level caches or any other advanced CPU design technologies used in this product – focus on one such technology only.  
4. Your summary and conclusion (your own evaluation of this product based on your knowledge in the field of computer architecture).

Features of the Intel core i9- 9900k

A computer processor or the central processing unit is the complex electronic circuitry within the computer that helps in carrying out the specific instructions of a computer application or program. The processor makes use of basic arithmetic, logic, input/output, controlling as well as operations that are instruction specific in nature. In parallel processing programs are processed by allocating them to multiple processors in order to get a task completed in lesser time.

This report will highlight the different advancements and features of a latest multicore processor form Intel. It is known as the Intel core i9- 9900k. It is an octacore parallel processor with a base clock rate of 3.6GHz and a boost clock rate of 5.0GHz. The L3 cache memory is 16MB with a thermal design power equivalent to 95W. It is one of the fastest and widely used processors of the recent times. The features and performance-based study of the processor will be further studied in the following paragraphs.

The Intel i9-9900k processor comes with a list of exciting features. It is among two of the first of its kind mainstream octacore processors for Intel the other being Intel Core i7-9700K. It has the highest count of thread in the lineup of coffee lake refresh, which is at 16. This also translates to the hyper-threading quality of performance that has the ability to outpace the Ryzen series of 2nd generation processors from AMD.

The AMD Ryzen 7 2700X processor also has eight-cores as well as 16-threads. Its base clock and boost clock speed rates are of 3.7GHz and 4.3GHz respectively whereas Intel’s i9 chip starts at a base frequency of 3.6GHz and boosts up to a maximum of 5.0GHz using a single-core. It may also use a 4.7GHz clock speed through six to eight cores.

The Intel i9-9900K also helps in integrating all these cores and threads together under clock speeds higher than 400 MHz. It integrates them into chips that has the same 95-watt package of thermal power as earlier Coffee Lake processors. The Intel i9-9900K also runs a complete 10-degrees centigrade cooler than the earlier Core i7-8700K or the Intel Core i7-8086K processors. It does this using its new soldered and integrated heat spreader interface, which is a very exciting feature of this processor. The i9-9900K will also be fully compatible to work with the preexisting Z370 motherboards.

Intel’s recent Core i9-9900K processor puts on a promising competition and exceeds the performance of the similar processors for AMD. Intel’s core i9 chips redefines processing power by maximizing the results obtained for a single core as well as multi core. The gains processor obtained from the 9900K are above any other its mainstream and helps Intel’s i9-9900K processors achieve a higher position in the Cinebench scores and a better position of competitive advantage in the markets. The massive increase in the processing power helps in providing the fastest video encode times ever seen in Handbrake (Dyakonova et al.). It has been found that the gaming benchmarks have shown even at the same stock settings as of the earlier Intel Core i7-8700K, the new i9-9900K delivers the same frame rates while playing games, even though it has two fewer cores and four lesser threads than the earlier version.

Performance of the Intel core i9- 9900k

While playing games that are CPU-intensive, for instance, Total War: Warhammer II, the processor as well as the motherboard did not recognize the Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 Ti processor, which later caused in multiple blue-screens issues and computer crashes (Shen, Paul and Lipasti). The Nvidia RTX 2080 Ti did not even allow games like Shadow of the Tomb Raider to start and it returned errors like lack of enough resources for running the game at 1080p and errors related to maximum settings of quality.

                                 Figure 1: Performance of the Total war game for different processors (Saha et al.).

The industry standard architecture that is used in the Intel i9-9900k chip is x86-64 (x86) with a microarchitecture called Coffee Lake. The platform that is used in designing this chip is also Coffee Lake and it is a 300 series chipset. It is Octacore and delivers superfast speeds in playing high computer games. The name of the core that is used is Coffee Lake R that has a core family 6 and model number 158. It uses a core stepping P0 and a process of 14 nm. The CMOS technology with a word size of 64 bit is used. The architecture is designed to accommodate 16 threads with a uniprocessor CPU in order to delivers high speed processing (Jarus and  Mateusz). The maximum memory that is supported by this chip is 64 gigabytes.

                                              Figure 2: The packaging structure of i9-9900k chip (Rohr and David).

Figure 3: comparison among different processors (Bernabe, and Sergio).

                                     Figure 3: Range of frequencies for the i9-9900k chip (Pennycook and Simon).

The Intel i9-9900k octa core processor makes use of different kinds of innovative technologies such as multithreading, multicore as well as multi-level caches. Combining the benefits from all these technologies, the chip yield extremely fast processing speeds, which can be seen especially while playing CPU consuming high end games. In the following paragraphs, the multi-layered operation of the chip will be explained further in details to help the reader have a clear understanding of the multi-layered operations in the cache memories within the chip.

Architecture design of the Intel core i9-9900K chip

The CPU cache is an area of fast memory that is located on the processor. Intel smart cache is the architecture that is used in the Intel i9-9900K processor that allows the cores to share information and gain access to the last level cache which is L3 (Johnson and  Bradley). It allows dynamic allocation of the memory for the remaining blocks in order to ensure that the transmission of the data is smoothly carried out even when the system underperforms due to lack of voltage or even when the system gets heated up after extremely long hours of operations.

Working in multi layers of cache is one of the most important potential of the i9 9900K processor. The octacore processor series from Intel have made their past appearances on the SiSoft Sandra database that has always been a choice of the designers for its reliability. The guidelines set by the SiSoft leak makes sure that the Intel i9-9900K processor has 16 MB L3 cache memory for all its operations. Some of the important Intel technologies such as the Intel Optane memory as well as Intel Optane SSD are supported in this chipset. Thunderbolt version three is also supported in the Intel i9-9900k Chipset.

                                Figure 4: The cache working of the i9-9900k chipset (Marwedel, Peter and Goossens).

The Intel 19-9900K processor operates in three major layers. The L3 cache memory is 16 megabytes. The first layer or L1 is divided into two sub layers each having sub memory of 256 kilobytes. Each of these smaller blocks of the first memory layer are 8 way set associative in nature which address to 8 different pins in the chip to transmit data. The second layer of the chip, which is L2, has a memory of 2 Megabytes and it is four way set associative in nature. This division of the memory blocks of the Intel i9-9900K processor further enables the tasks to be subdivided into finer blocks within the chip. This allows complex tasks such as rapid changes of frame rates on the screen while playing CPU consuming games, much more efficient and faster (Kirk, David and Wen-Mei). The lags that are often experienced in the games are counter attacked by the operations of the L2 cache memory within a very short span of time.

Intel comparison with other similar processors

The last layer that is the L3 layer has a cache memory of 16 MB that has the capacity to store the buffer image of the data that is used while running high-end CPU consuming applications such as games. This is one of the most interesting part of the multi layered operation of the Intel i9-9900K processor since it is 16 way set associative in nature and can greatly speed up the systems speed even at times when the CPU is heated due to long hours of playing of games. This feature has ensured that the temperature balancing feature of the Intel chipsets of the earlier versions have further been innovated and incorporated in the i9-9900k chipset (Marwedel, Peter and Goossens). The layer 3 also ensures that the two 8 Mb blocks are used to store back up data in the cache memory even when the processor shuts down due to power failure or any other reasons.

Therefore, it can be summarized from the above repot that in this ever evolving and changing technological trends of the markets, there are different kinds of computer processors that are being invented. There are different kinds of processors that are available in the open markets and they are designed to cater to the specific technological needs of the end users. There are different kinds of applications of the high-end processors such as NVidia, Intel as well as AMD processors that are releasing their latest range of high end gaming processors to ensure the best quality service for the end users. Some of the most popular processors that are presently the main market players this age of technology are the AMD Ryzen 2700X, Intel Core i7-9700K as well as the NVidia GeForce GTX 1080. They are high yielding processors that deliver high speed of operation for the computers and they have different kinds of hardware as well as software requirements. They are available I the market in different prices. They are also available for sale online in the different ecommerce websites. Users which always refer to stay updated with the latest processors and graphics cards and are always updated with the recent trends of technology in the market also often sell their older apparatus and purchase the latest ones. The Intel i9-9900k processor also has the Intel inbuilt technologies such as Intel optane. It also makes use of the techniques of soldering instead of its traditional past solution that it used in the earlier processors for connecting the different chips and pins of the processor.

Innovative technology used in Intel i9-9900K chip

It can be concluded that considering all the different kinds of aspects of the processors that are seen in the market presently the market leader is the Intel i9-9900K considering its different aspects and technological benefits. Even though it has only one disadvantage of its extremely high cost for the common person to afford, yet its advantages are more to compensate for its single disadvantage in the market. Even though the market price of the i9-9900k Intel processor is quite high and competitive in the market it is worthy of its cost. It remarkable improved the overall speed and performance of the system and ensures that high CPU utilizing programs and applications run smoothly on the computers. Through the i9-9900k processor, Intel has been able to compete with itself by providing a processor that is better than its own processors of the earlier series. The i9-9900s series of processor has shown remarkable improvement from its earlier Intel Core i7-9700K version thereby allowing the users to have the flexibility to choose from a wide range of products depending on their use of the systems.

References:

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