From Kaby Lake to Core Ultra, we revisit Intel's flagship CPUs to see how a decade of design choices shaped performance, power, and ultimately, how the company lost its lead.
How Intel Got Into Trouble: We Test the Last Decade of Intel Flagship CPUs
How Intel Got Into Trouble: We Test the Last Decade of Intel Flagship CPUs
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2027 will be a really interesting year in terms of next gen CPU and GPU.
Just like Intel, AMD is making big changes to their CPUs with Zen 6 and they also have the first gen multi-die GPUs coming out too to compete with Nvidia (if only they don't flounder the software side).
I doubt I'll upgrade to Zen6 since I already have the 9800x3D, but if rumors of Zen7 are true then AM5 will have a long life too and I'll be able to just pop in a new CPU alongside the next next gen GPU.
Just like Intel, AMD is making big changes to their CPUs with Zen 6 and they also have the first gen multi-die GPUs coming out too to compete with Nvidia (if only they don't flounder the software side).
I doubt I'll upgrade to Zen6 since I already have the 9800x3D, but if rumors of Zen7 are true then AM5 will have a long life too and I'll be able to just pop in a new CPU alongside the next next gen GPU.
gamerk2
Posts: 1,609 +2,046
"For the first time since the Pentium 4 era in 2002, Intel has removed simultaneous multithreading, previously known as Hyper-Threading. "
Incorrect, since Core didn't have Hyperthreading.
Incorrect, since Core didn't have Hyperthreading.
amstech
Posts: 2,801 +1,963
Intel currently has 76.1% market share for desktop CPU's and still dominates the market. Gamers make up a very small portion of the CPU landscape. By the time AMD's Ryzen performed well it was too late, an 8700K still is more then enough power for your average workstation. Those corporate relationships by real workers and technicians like myself matter, not out of touch CPU tests.
In the real world its very easy to see through a reviewers out of touch approach and bias, and its comical that they think otherwise. Nvidia completely dominating the GPU market and consumers taking reviewers recommendations with a grain of salt is so fullfilling. Hey atleast youre getting lots of views.
In the real world its very easy to see through a reviewers out of touch approach and bias, and its comical that they think otherwise. Nvidia completely dominating the GPU market and consumers taking reviewers recommendations with a grain of salt is so fullfilling. Hey atleast youre getting lots of views.
Anton Longshot
Posts: 493 +789
Lovely and well-written article.
For my most recent build I carefully chose an i9-9900KF - the F version (no graphics) because supposedly it's a better chip - that choice bit me in the butt when my graphics card died on me - smart moves sometimes turn out differently.
I'm happy I picked this one - even now it still kicks buitt, relatively spoken. With the current hardware drama in full swing it's unlikely I can build something new any time soon, but the 9900 will remain relevant for a long time I think.
One little pang of regret: I had the opportunity to go Xeon with a similar clock rate for the same kind of cash. Decided against it because the new build was going to replace my old main box and I needed be sure it would work for me. Even now I sometimes think "You should have gone Xeon you little weasel!" Hahaha.
For my most recent build I carefully chose an i9-9900KF - the F version (no graphics) because supposedly it's a better chip - that choice bit me in the butt when my graphics card died on me - smart moves sometimes turn out differently.
I'm happy I picked this one - even now it still kicks buitt, relatively spoken. With the current hardware drama in full swing it's unlikely I can build something new any time soon, but the 9900 will remain relevant for a long time I think.
One little pang of regret: I had the opportunity to go Xeon with a similar clock rate for the same kind of cash. Decided against it because the new build was going to replace my old main box and I needed be sure it would work for me. Even now I sometimes think "You should have gone Xeon you little weasel!" Hahaha.
Before Epyc, AMD's server share was close to nothing. In 2026, about 29%. Desktop, about 36%. It is fair to say that they will continue to rise on the present course. In terms of the "holy grail" CPU metric, performance per watt, AMD has been in the lead since at least Zen 3.
Good catch -- you’re right
, the Core/Core 2 era briefly dropped Hyper-Threading. We’ve updated the line to reflect that more accurately.Theinsanegamer
Posts: 8,782 +17,870
A decade ago Intel had a 98% desktop market share. Their domination has been slipping for years.
Gamers also spend a TON on CPUs. What do you think has higher margins, a 9800x3d or a $90 core i3 that businesses buy?
If the market didnt matter....the K series wouldnt exist.
And dont forget that AMD commanded 39% of revenue while making up only 27% of shipments.
However AMD's purported efficiency lead isnt that clear. Panther lake destroys AMD in energy efficiency, as did lunar lake. On desktop Arrow Lake has made significant strides in improving efficiency as well, they havent caught AMD yet but its a far cry from the raptor lake VS 7800x3d days.
Lew Zealand
Posts: 2,949 +4,027
The corpo world has bulk delivery contracts for Dell/Lenovo/etc. to deliver the same thing with the next gen number every year, and that's been Intel for decades. Our org does the same, still buying those Ultra 3/5/i3/i5s every year because it ain't broke, so nobody fixes it. That AMD (or Intel) might be 10 or even 20% better at any time is irrelevant because performance is also irrelevant.
Corpo buys Intel because it isn't bad. It doesn't buy Intel because it's good, and that's a problem. Same as buying a 9700 XT because it isn't bad. It isn't! But compared to a 5090 it's performance also isn't good.
And when it comes to individuals spending their money for the best PC they can build, AMD's been consistently increasing their CPU market share for close to a decade now because they're better or offer more, easily seen anywhere that sales numbers are released like Amazon in the US, a pretty big market. Currently the top 12 sellers are AMD CPUs and the 13th CPU is: Thermal Grizzly contact frame. The Core i5 12600KF is #14. Intel is outsold by a contact frame.
If you need more reminders of where Intel is, have a look at Steam CPU trends: this month 55% Intel, 45% AMD; in 2019 it was 82% Intel, 18% AMD. Existing installed base counts a lot here but that makes it obvious that Intel lost their sales lead with the quad core stall thanks to no AMD competition and following 14mn+++ roadblocks.
Intel's current CPUs are finally competitive again and next gen looks promising, competition is always best. We'll see how long it takes to update consumer opinion.
amstech
Posts: 2,801 +1,963
In the real world and outside of enthusiasts groups, no one cares about performance per watt at all. Nobody. In my 20+ years of being a real IT tech in the medical field working for massive hospitals and now working for ITS in NY, its never been mentioned once. Saving $20 annually because a chipset consumes less power is something literally no real world company cares about.
amstech
Posts: 2,801 +1,963
Steams results are clearly not a reflection of the real world and gamers make up a very small portion of the market which is why AMD owns less then 24% of the desktop CPU market in Q2 of 2026.
AMDs rise has been due to pricing MUCH more so then performance. Both companies offer great overall production and speed. I'm on the board for selecting refresh equipment and our latest HP Elitebook 645 G11s with Radeon chipsets got chosen due to price and SSD size, not CPU abilities or performance. Any i5 is more then enough for your workstations. AMDs strength is bang for the buck, thats, BY FAR, the number one reason, followed by Ryzens solid architecture, they have gained.
I like AMD, theyve done well and its nice to see Intel forced to respond. But lets keep everything in perspective, journalists and reviewers of hardware don't have the slightest clue of how this all unfolds on the real world. If they did they would be making much more $$$ being actual technicians.
amstech
Posts: 2,801 +1,963
Because they work just fine.
This comment is extremely out of touch with reality and just further proves my point. The only folks saying that Intel hasn't been competitive are closed off reviewers and niche journalists living in their bubbles.
Yes, they are commanding a higher price, thanks to their excellent product.
Indeed, the picture is shifting, and Intel has executed well, curtailing power consumption considerably. I'm glad of it; their recent CPUs have been genuinely exciting. Of late, AMD has smacked of complacency, not to mention greed.
Fair enough; PPW doesn't matter in the real world and corporate sector. But this being a tech site, engineering excellence matters. And indirectly, it does have an effect on the real world: failing this metric caused the downfall of the Pentium 4 and Bulldozer. From an engineering point of view, it's not about saving money on someone's electricity bill today, but how the far the design will eventually go.
Lew Zealand
Posts: 2,949 +4,027
Ah I see, you're an individual arguing from a corporation's perspective. Please explain what relevance that has to a review of Intel CPUs for gaming which is what this article is about. What's the point of defending billion dollar companies by running the discussion off-toipc?
"Just fine" is good enough for the corpo world but fails when individuals are spending their money. Very clearly as Amazon's sales ranks show.
The reality I see and am posting about is lower Intel CPU sales to consumers. If you're arguing that then yours is the comment out of touch with reality.
Intel's current CPUs are slower than previous 13th and 14th Gen, barely better than 12th Gen. And those 13th and 14th Gen CPUs had failure problems in the attempt to realize those gains. You could claim they are still competitive as they're certainly not slow, but that's not good enough in the consumer world where we expect improvement every gen with no problems. Intel CPUs have a negative reputation as a result of that (again, see CPU sales) and hopefully for them the current and future gens make reputational gains with consumers.
"Just fine" is good enough for the corpo world but fails when individuals are spending their money. Very clearly as Amazon's sales ranks show.
The reality I see and am posting about is lower Intel CPU sales to consumers. If you're arguing that then yours is the comment out of touch with reality.
Intel's current CPUs are slower than previous 13th and 14th Gen, barely better than 12th Gen. And those 13th and 14th Gen CPUs had failure problems in the attempt to realize those gains. You could claim they are still competitive as they're certainly not slow, but that's not good enough in the consumer world where we expect improvement every gen with no problems. Intel CPUs have a negative reputation as a result of that (again, see CPU sales) and hopefully for them the current and future gens make reputational gains with consumers.
Megalomaniac
Posts: 1,155 +1,222
I currently have the 285k and 5090 with 64GB DDR5. Runs like a charm in all possible games.
amstech
Posts: 2,801 +1,963
They still own 76.1% of desktop CPU market share.
No one cares about niche hardware reviews.
Thats reality.
amstech
Posts: 2,801 +1,963
According to whom? Niche hardware reviews, a small portion of PC gamers and out of touch journalists? AMD would have more then 23% desktop market share if would you say is true. Ryzen has been around several years now....still less then a 1/4 % of the real world market.
No one cares.
Plenty of AMD chipsets, GPU's and CPU's have had issues to.
This crap doesn't decide the real world market. If it did, AMD would own more then a measly 23% of desktop CPU market share.
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Lew Zealand
Posts: 2,949 +4,027
Yet here you are caring about a gaming review, defending Intel to the last while trying to shift the topic away from the subject of the review: Intel's lackluster gaming progress.
More defending Intel to the last while ignoring this review of Intel's stagnant gaming progress.
Wait, are you still here caring about Intel's disappointing gaming ontology in this review, now shifting to whataboutism? I thought nobody cared that AMD holds the top 12 places in gaming CPU sales on Amazon, but it seems you do.
guillejp
Posts: 307 +309
amstech
Posts: 2,801 +1,963
Intels gaming progress?
In the last 20 years theyve had the best gaming CPU up until the X3D chips released 3-4 years ago.
Im not here to defend Intel, im here to reiterate the truth outside of the obvious echo chambers that don't coincide with reality. Once you leave your echo chambers, god forbid, you might here an opposing opinion! Ohh no!
I would make some comments on your perspective, and ask if you work for Intel, but Techspot pulled my comment with out notice or explanation, so I would only be speculating on their motivation.
Having said that, as with the other individual, you can't have a rational discussion with people who cherry pick their statistics and ignore the shortcomings of their (insert item/company/etc. here).
Winning the bulk sales race for contract sales and commodity products is NOT the commanding metric. This will include a few corrections to some other statements made earlier. Intel was the king because they had the better product back in the day. This was less about Intel, then it was AMD's monumental blunder with Bulldozer. It's funny to see people arguing that efficiency doesn't mater when all of the Intel fans beat AMD senseless over Bulldozer's power draw, and that was THE only thing that mattered then. When Intel made the 13-14 gen space heaters, it was "Intel has much higher clocks, what's the problem?" Being the high volume winner in commodity corporate PC's it the equivalent of being the tallest of the midgets. High end gaming rigs are a niche market, but "gaming" isn't. It also has the benefit of being having better margins. Last, their server side is in the same shape as their CPU sales. They've been losing market share for years, and that's where the big margins are at. And they completely abandoned the HEDT/Workstation market to Threadripper. We'll see if their latest offerings stick, or if Zen 6 Epyc and Threadripper keep them down.
Zen is NOT the first time AMD has made headway into the server side. Opteron had gained a solid foothold in that area until the aforementioned Bulldozer put an end to that too.
RDNA 5/UDNA is NOT AMD's first chiplet GPU. That honor belongs to the Zen 3 7800-7900 GPUs. The original RDNA 3 replacement was also supposed to be chiplet based, but was deemed too expensive to produce and thus we got the 5700 style reset with the RDNA 4.
I've been against the politicization of the comments here almost since I started posting here years ago, and have cited wccf Tech comment section as the low point of common discourse, which it is. Having said that, I will give them credit for one thing, they don't pick and choose which comments to remove.
Billybobjoey
Posts: 276 +429
Crazy how much intel has stagnated in gaming performance since 2022. Is the extra ~30 fps at 1080p medium going to matter to most people? No, I'd imagine people with higher end components are GPU bottlenecked at higher resolutions with higher settings. But clearly people do hear "AMD is better for gaming performance" from reviewers and it's showing in the steam hardware survey.
It would be nice to be able to recommend an Intel CPU again for someone who's primary focus is gaming, and they're starting to get there with the pricing of the Ultra 5 250K Plus (god they need to get their naming scheme under control, nothing was wrong with the old one). Fingers crossed Nova Lake is a turning point for them, but we'll have to wait and see.
It would be nice to be able to recommend an Intel CPU again for someone who's primary focus is gaming, and they're starting to get there with the pricing of the Ultra 5 250K Plus (god they need to get their naming scheme under control, nothing was wrong with the old one). Fingers crossed Nova Lake is a turning point for them, but we'll have to wait and see.
dznmdrwutmynamiz
Posts: 20 +24
Imagine having nothing better to do than argue over which 9-digit company is your bestie.
Lew Zealand
Posts: 2,949 +4,027
You're tilting at imaginary windmills. This is a review of Intel's Gaming progress ups and downs over the past decade or so, yet you imagine it as an echo chamber. If this was a review of Intel's Xeon progress, would that also be an echo chamber because gaming wasn't included? Of course not, it would merely be a targetted review like this one.
The world is wider than what you imagine others are doing.
LimyG
Posts: 596 +267
This is a well researched tested and written article.
Top notch! Thanks Steven.
P.S. Amazon jp mislabled the i9-9900ks as the regular "k" version. I told them after I bought and had it in hand. (Was planning on buying the "F", until I found their little mistake. Heh Heh)
They actually thanked me, didn't try to charge me more or swap for the regular version! A sweet lucky Bargain
Anyway, It's a well binned chip. Been running at 5.21GHz since I bought it a month after the binned "ks" were released. Still going strong. For gaming (I have H.T. Off) 8 real cores at 5.21GHz is even now, all these years later pretty good.
Top notch! Thanks Steven.
P.S. Amazon jp mislabled the i9-9900ks as the regular "k" version. I told them after I bought and had it in hand. (Was planning on buying the "F", until I found their little mistake. Heh Heh)
They actually thanked me, didn't try to charge me more or swap for the regular version! A sweet lucky Bargain
Anyway, It's a well binned chip. Been running at 5.21GHz since I bought it a month after the binned "ks" were released. Still going strong. For gaming (I have H.T. Off) 8 real cores at 5.21GHz is even now, all these years later pretty good.
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