Core i9 9900ks special edition has a slower ipc than the 9900k

The new Intel Core i9 9900KS appears to have a lower IPC performance than the i9 9900K. Clock by clock, the older chip will provide higher IPC performance than the expensive special edition processor that aspires to become the world's best gaming CPU. As can be seen in the tests carried out by Tom's Hardware.

Intel Core i9 9900KS has lower IPC performance than i9 9900K

We have recently learned that this chip can reach 5.2 GHz on all cores with a slight change in voltage.

Apparently, the new 9900KS processor uses a new R0 stepping, compared to the P0 stepping of the i9 9900KS chip. This means, on the one hand, that it is not the same silicon as we would have expected, but that it is a new silicon based on the same architecture, but with internal changes. What is commented (speculates) is that this processor already comes with some patches or mitigations for security flaws Meltdown, Fallout, etc.

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To test the relative IPC of Coffee Lake's two eight-core CPUs, they were both set to a solid 3GHz clock speed, checked the memory frequency, and released a bunch of CPU benchmarks to both processors.

Performance results

The results show that there is "IPC regression" at many of the benchmarks, and only a few show that the 9900KS performs better than or the same as the 9900K. The difference is relatively small, and in most cases the impact is less than 1%, although there are specific cases where they reach more than 5%.

It is not ruled out that the current motherboard firmwares may not be taking advantage of 100% of this new processor. It's a posibility.

Either way, there is no noticeable difference between the two chips at the same clock speed. It is difficult to recommend this processor, unless we find it at a price equal to or less than a 9900K. Currently the 9900K can be found in Spain for around 590 euros.

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