Question I9-9900KS: Do modern AAA games require enough processing power to activate turbo boost?

[Imacflier]

Hi, Guys.

This is a planning question. I already have the processor and will be using it, primarily, for gaming. I am trying to 'guesstimate" the CPU power and cooling requirements.

The I9-9900KS is a 127 watt TDP, 8 Core, 16 Thread processor with a 4 GHz base frequency and an all core 5 GHz turbo boost frequency.

My question: Since power and cooling requirements increase dramatically when in turbo boost;

How likely are modern AAA games to demand enough from the CPU that turbo boost will activate?
-Rarely,
-Occasionally,
-Often,
or
-Almost all the time?

Please note that I am limited to the 1151 socket and already possess the CPU and MB, so telling me to change to better/more modern hardware will not be particularly useful.

TIA,

Larry

 

[Lutfij]

People who bought into the i9's have been working with a 360mm AIO or a beefy air cooler.

 

[Imacflier]

People who bought into the i9's have been working with a 360mm AIO or a beefy air cooler.

Lutfij,​

Thanks for the reply, but I am asking a quite different question: how often will I need such a cooling solution:

The chassis I am using has a cooler which supports 125 watts. I am trying to estimate how frequently that will be inadequate.

Larry

 

[Eximo]

All the time, but that doesn't matter. The CPU tries to get things done as fast as possible, so it will maintain the highest boost that temperature allows when you exclude the power limit.

If you have a power target, simply set that up in the BIOS ahead of time. No surprises then.

Undervolting can also show great gains in performance, and starting with a high end CPU doesn't hurt.

 

[TerryLaze]

How likely are modern AAA games to demand enough from the CPU that turbo boost will activate?

High clocks and high number of cores do very different things for games and both are needed for almost all games.
That's why normally, for lightly threaded workloads(games) the CPU will boost two cores as high as possible and the rest only as far as they can go up to the power limit.
Get the CPU, check temps and power draw and if you think there is something wrong/suboptimal post again with that info.

Many many motherboards push the CPUs way higher than they should, so you should tell us your mobo model, if it is a z model it will probably push the CPU higher than allowed and make it be very hot/power hungry.

The chassis I am using has a cooler which supports 125 watts.

Unless you mean something else, the chassis cooler has very little to do with how well the CPU will be cooled, the CPU will need a CPU cooler, it doesn't come with one, if you already have one from a previous CPU, or if that's what you meant with chassis cooler, then try to find out the model and tell us, pics of it can't hurt if you can't find out.

 

[punkncat]

In a case like this, and considering you already have the hardware, "mess" around and find out. You will know pretty quickly whether your cooling and power supply solution are sufficient.

 

[Imacflier]

High clocks and high number of cores do very different things for games and both are needed for almost all games.
That's why normally, for lightly threaded workloads(games) the CPU will boost two cores as high as possible and the rest only as far as they can go up to the power limit.
Get the CPU, check temps and power draw and if you think there is something wrong/suboptimal post again with that info.

Thank you, I was unaware of those facts. Unfortunately, that leads me directly into the "try and see" mode I was trying to avoid.

 

[Imacflier]

In a case like this, and considering you already have the hardware, "mess" around and find out. You will know pretty quickly whether your cooling and power supply solution are sufficient.

Darn! I am sure you are right, though....I am not at all fond of cutting case sheetmetal, but messing around seems to be the best/only solution.

Thanks.

Larry

 

[TerryLaze]

I am not at all fond of cutting case sheetmetal

The what now?!
Maybe rewind and tell us everything from the beginning?
If you have a prebuild or something it might not even allow you to use a different CPU from what comes with it.

 

[MEMOFLEX]

Hi, Guys.

This is a planning question. I already have the processor and will be using it, primarily, for gaming. I am trying to 'guesstimate" the CPU power and cooling requirements.

The I9-9900KS is a 127 watt TDP, 8 Core, 16 Thread processor with a 4 GHz base frequency and an all core 5 GHz turbo boost frequency.

My question: Since power and cooling requirements increase dramatically when in turbo boost;

How likely are modern AAA games to demand enough from the CPU that turbo boost will activate?
-Rarely,
-Occasionally,
-Often,
or
-Almost all the time?

Please note that I am limited to the 1151 socket and already possess the CPU and MB, so telling me to change to better/more modern hardware will not be particularly useful.

TIA,

Larry

I had a 9900k @ 5ghz all core until recently and I can confirm that they run hot and love the wattage. Add in the fact that the 9th gen is getting a little long in the tooth - although still a capable processor - but it will need all that turbo boost to make it viable for modern AAA titles.

You may be able to get away with some undervolting as the KS should be a good bin but that is always trial and error finding where the silicone sweet spot is.

Either way though you will likely need a half decent Air cooler or AIO to keep temps reasonable.

Can you confirm what case you have and what resolution you are looking to game at?

 

[Imacflier]

The what now?!
Maybe rewind and tell us everything from the beginning?
If you have a prebuild or something it might not even allow you to use a different CPU from what comes with it.

Hmmm, well I had planned to say all this in a build thread, but you were kind enough to respond...and asked, so you deserve a summary (Even my summaries tend to be awfully long. A hangover from writing proposals for the Dod, I suppose) at least.

After I finished up with the TVPC I discussed in an earlier thread, I have a complete....and unneeded....HP EliteDesk 800 G5. Together with most all of the parts required already on hand I see a pathway to making a decent gaming PC.

Until the invaluable information I received in this thread, I thought I could manage it all within the confines of the 7" x 7" x 1 1/2" chassis, with an external video card over m.2. I still think I can make it work by adding a 120mm case fan....and intend to give it a try.

The planned parts list:
Chassis: HP EliteDesk 800 G5
CPU: I9-9900KS TDP= 127 Watts @ base frequency of 4 GHz, lots more in turbo boost at 5 GHz
RAM: 32GB DD4 (should I use 64 GB?)
System Drive: 4 TB NVME
GPU: ASUS RTX 3070 Phoenix converted to single fan
CPU cooling solution: HP makes a CPU heatsink which is internal to the chassis and rated at 125 Watts.
Although this probably would be adequate at base frequency, it clearly falls short
in turbo boost. This heatsink is cooled by what appears to be a laptop fan! Which
leads to:
Auxiliary cooling: I plan on cutting a circle on the top of the chassis and mounting a Noctua NF-P12 (120mm x 24mm).
PSUs: For the CPU I plan on a 300 Watt ac adapter from Alienware. For the GPU, a 240 Watt ac adapter from Dell. Both have the correct plugs for their intended use.
System Mounting: I will use an oversized legal clipboard of 16" x 9". This will fit in front of my keyboard on my pullout keyboard shelf.

Except for the RAM, I have all of these parts in my parts drawer....and except for the gumption to begin!

Other than the state of my sanity, I solicit your opinion of the Preliminary Design.

Once I begin, I plan to start a new thread in Systems repeating most all what what I said here. Or do you advise that I just continue in this thread?

Thanks again to all who have been kind enough to contribute,

Larry

​

 

[uWebb429]

@Imacflier

Intel CPUs are designed to use as much turbo boost as possible and run as fast as possible, all of the time. Don't let this scare you.

Intel turbo power limits are infinitely adjustable. If you want the CPU to consume less power and produce less heat, all you have to do is lower the turbo power limits. You can run your CPU however you like. The amount of turbo boost used will be adjusted automatically.

If you set both turbo power limits to 125 Watts, when the CPU reaches this power level, it will slow down so it does not exceed 125 Watts. You can adjust power consumption to however much cooling you have available

Here is an example using ThrottleStop. Both turbo power limits are set to 125W. Enabling the Clamp option ensures that power consumption will never exceed this limit. As soon as this limit is reached, the CPU will slow down as much as necessary so it does not exceed 125 Watts.

If you think 100W would be better, set the power limits to 100 Watts. I like using ThrottleStop because it allows you to make adjustments while in Windows. ThrottleStop has access to the Clamp options which most BIOS versions do not have.

 

[Imacflier]

I had a 9900k @ 5ghz all core until recently and I can confirm that they run hot and love the wattage. Add in the fact that the 9th gen is getting a little long in the tooth - although still a capable processor - but it will need all that turbo boost to make it viable for modern AAA titles.

You may be able to get away with some undervolting as the KS should be a good bin but that is always trial and error finding where the silicone sweet spot is.

Either way though you will likely need a half decent Air cooler or AIO to keep temps reasonable.

Can you confirm what case you have and what resolution you are looking to game at?

Sorry, I missed answering you my over long Preliminary Design post above.
I plan on 1440p, on a 49" monitor. The monitor is up to dealing with 4k, but the rest of the hardware clearly is not!

Thanks for the comment,

Larry

 

[DSzymborski]

The hardware being used for this is not particularly well chosen for this challenge. But assuming that's this *is* the challenge, I'm not sure I'd give the six-to-eight year old HP motherboard a long life shoving in a 9900KS it wasn't designed for, and cutting a hole in the case for a 120 mm *case* fan is unlikely to help much. If this is the approach, I'd cut the hole in the case to enable putting on an appropriate tower cooler, with the heat sink sticking out the hole in the case entirely.

(I assumed I could find someone doing this approach in a minute and I was wrong; it took me about 15 seconds!)

Frankly, you'd get far better performance going all-in on jank rather than taking ineffective half measures. Forget the case entirely, since it's going to be a mess with a bunch of external parts anyway, so the case serves little purpose. Build this PC like a test bench and stuff it into a cardboard tray. Vivisection the power button off the case if you have to. Then you can at least mount a proper cooling solution and use the GPU normally in the PCIE, and can use a proper PSU with the GPU at least. No, I wouldn't intentionally try and make a machine like this on my own initiative, but it's the best approach to getting something that works halfway properly with this Island of Misfit Toys collection of parts.

 

[Imacflier]

The hardware being used for this is not particularly well chosen for this challenge. But assuming that's this *is* the challenge, I'm not sure I'd give the six-to-eight year old HP motherboard a long life shoving in a 9900KS it wasn't designed for, and cutting a hole in the case for a 120 mm *case* fan is unlikely to help much. If this is the approach, I'd cut the hole in the case to enable putting on an appropriate tower cooler, with the heat sink sticking out the hole in the case entirely.

(I assumed I could find someone doing this approach in a minute and I was wrong; it took me about 15 seconds!)

Frankly, you'd get far better performance going all-in on jank rather than taking ineffective half measures. Forget the case entirely, since it's going to be a mess with a bunch of external parts anyway, so the case serves little purpose. Build this PC like a test bench and stuff it into a cardboard tray. Vivisection the power button off the case if you have to. Then you can at least mount a proper cooling solution and use the GPU normally in the PCIE, and can use a proper PSU with the GPU at least. No, I wouldn't intentionally try and make a machine like this on my own initiative, but it's the best approach to getting something that works halfway properly with this Island of Misfit Toys collection of parts.

My goodness! Of all the replies I have seen this is certainly among the least useful....indeed I do not understand why you even posted it.

You would have been much better served to at least understand the hardware you are so negative about.

For example: The EliteDesk 800 series were offered by HP with the I9-9900.
This series does not HAVE a PCIE slot, thus REQUIRING a PCIE over M.2 solution.
The cooling solution you offered defeats entirely the purpose of the chassis I intend to use and certainly will not fit on a keyboard tray.
Btw, a "proper" cooling solution is one that works.


At the very least you could have explained how these "Misfit Toys collection of parts" are incompatible with one another or will fail to generate the performance I require.

Larry

 

[DSzymborski]

An I9-9900 is not an I9-9900KS. If you really think there's no difference involved when there's an increase of about an entire GHz of clockspeed and a doubling of power to a SFF proprietary motherboard, it says a lot about the success of the project. In addition, HP released versions of this model with a PCIE slot; you never indicated that this was one of the versions without. Nor did you indicate that the keyboard form factor was an absolute necessity, to the extent that you'd sacrifice the usefulness of this build in order to maintain that exact size and shape.

In any case, I have little desire to play Cassandra, so best of luck to you.

 

[thestryker]

I think the first thing you should do is make sure the 9900KS is actually supported by the motherboard. OEM machines have really weird restrictions sometimes and since that CPU came after the 9900/9900K it's possible it won't be supported.

Secondly the 9900KS doesn't particularly make sense for a build like this currently I doubt there would be much of a benefit unless you're playing exclusively older or light load games. The biggest advantage of the 9900KS is that it can maintain maximum boost frequencies, but that also takes power. If you're set on using the 9900KS then doing what uWebb429 said above is important because you don't want the CPU heat throttling which it will do without a proper power limit.

 

[alexbirdie]

Somehow I do not understand the deeper sense in such a construction.

It will never be a "decent gaming PC" with a 9900KS and a 3070 GPU for "1440p, on a 49" monitor". Some old games may run, but that is it. No modern AAA-games.

 

[Imacflier]

Somehow I do not understand the deeper sense in such a construction.

It will never be a "decent gaming PC" with a 9900KS and a 3070 GPU for "1440p, on a 49" monitor". Some old games may run, but that is it. No modern AAA-games.

Is the limiting factor the CPU or the GPU? And, if possible, why?

Please advise!

Larry

 

[MEMOFLEX]

Is the limiting factor the CPU or the GPU? And, if possible, why?

Please advise!

Larry

I would argue the GPU's 8gb of VRAM will be the biggest limiting factor at 1440p for newer titles.

 

[Imacflier]

I would argue the GPU's 8gb of VRAM will be the biggest limiting factor at 1440p for newer titles.

Thank you so very much. A nicely justified critique for a change!

Still, there are sufficient reasoned issues identified previously, that I am going to make a dramatic change and implement a much different design, although still using the I9 and the EliteDesk 800 mini G5.

Look to Systems, for "Emptying the parts drawer and designing a gaming computer" in the next day or so...

Thanks again, and,

Warm Regards,

Larry

 

[EzzyB]

Hi, Guys.

This is a planning question. I already have the processor and will be using it, primarily, for gaming. I am trying to 'guesstimate" the CPU power and cooling requirements.

The I9-9900KS is a 127 watt TDP, 8 Core, 16 Thread processor with a 4 GHz base frequency and an all core 5 GHz turbo boost frequency.

My question: Since power and cooling requirements increase dramatically when in turbo boost;

How likely are modern AAA games to demand enough from the CPU that turbo boost will activate?
-Rarely,
-Occasionally,
-Often,
or
-Almost all the time?

Please note that I am limited to the 1151 socket and already possess the CPU and MB, so telling me to change to better/more modern hardware will not be particularly useful.

TIA,

Larry

They aren't bad. I've been using a 9700K for almost 5 years now. It's supposed to be 3.6ghz with 2 cores boosting to 5.0. It's essentially just a 9900K without hyper-threading.

With a Noctua D-10 air cooler it's been running at all-core base 4.9ghz since the day I got it. (One single blue screen at 5.0 all-core so I dialed it back that one notch.) This with ZERO power tweaking, it's running factory voltages. So, "Turbo" on this machine is just a core going from 4.9 to 5.0. The CPU honestly doesn't care what the freq is very much, the heat and power usage is much more related to the load.

So, the answer is, all the time. Yes it will bump the cores up to Turbo freqs during gaming, but it's not a terribly hard CPU to cool. A top of the line air cooler or a middling AIO will be fine. Just make absolutely sure it can work with Socket 1151 before buying. It's hard for me to estimate power usage for you without knowing the GPU you are using, but for my 9700K + 5070 Ti an 850W power supply is more than adequate and would probably be fine for the 9900 as well unless you're getting into more powerful GPUs.

 

[alexbirdie]

Is the limiting factor the CPU or the GPU? And, if possible, why?

another thread from thread creator:

[SOLVED] - What is the optimum GPU to pair with an I9-9900KS?

Hi, Guys I am upgrading a system to be used primarily gaming, but also CAD and rendering and acting as the host for my LAN. The type of games I am interested in are Elden Ring, Fortnight, GTA, Shadow of the Tomb Raider. I am limited to an 1151 socket so I will be using the 'best available'...

forums.tomshardware.com

 

[geofelt]

I think you are hoping for an answer that is not there.

The HP elite desk 800 G5 is a low profile proprietary chassis that does not have the room to install a cpu cooler with any decent sized radiator.
And, the motherboard is proprietary so that it will not fit in any normal ATX case.
If you can run without a case, it would be possible to install a sufficiently good cooler that would get the most out of the i9-9900KS chip. OK in some households, but not good with kids or cats around.

The i9-9900KS is designed to run at 100c. Unfortunately, without sufficient cooling it will throttle, greatly reducing the cpu capability.

 

[EzzyB]

The hardware being used for this is not particularly well chosen for this challenge. But assuming that's this *is* the challenge, I'm not sure I'd give the six-to-eight year old HP motherboard a long life shoving in a 9900KS it wasn't designed for, and cutting a hole in the case for a 120 mm *case* fan is unlikely to help much. If this is the approach, I'd cut the hole in the case to enable putting on an appropriate tower cooler, with the heat sink sticking out the hole in the case entirely.

(I assumed I could find someone doing this approach in a minute and I was wrong; it took me about 15 seconds!)

Frankly, you'd get far better performance going all-in on jank rather than taking ineffective half measures. Forget the case entirely, since it's going to be a mess with a bunch of external parts anyway, so the case serves little purpose. Build this PC like a test bench and stuff it into a cardboard tray. Vivisection the power button off the case if you have to. Then you can at least mount a proper cooling solution and use the GPU normally in the PCIE, and can use a proper PSU with the GPU at least. No, I wouldn't intentionally try and make a machine like this on my own initiative, but it's the best approach to getting something that works halfway properly with this Island of Misfit Toys collection of parts.

I recently bought my grandson his first gaming PC. It was built by a local reseller from used parts. The motherboard was actually from a Dell workstation (about the same size as that HP.) Still he had bought a new case and fit the Dell motherboard into it, slapped a 650 watt corsair PSU in and, hey, not bad. It's a 10700, 32GB RAM and an, unfortunate, GTX980 for just a few hundred dollars. I replaced my 1660 Super so I'll toss that in this weekend. Will work for a starter 1080 gaming rig for a 9 year-old.

My point is that maybe one shouldn't just assume you can't get that MB into another case if that's all you have to work with. I certainly didn't expect that Dell logo when I fired that machine up.