Discussion Intel Nova Lake in H2-2026: Discussion Threads

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MoogleW

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May 1, 2022
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If it requires a new, low volume motherboard to feed it power, which screams costly, is it any different to HEDT really? Just like a worse version because it doesn't have the big boy memory channels. I guess the current HEDT market doesn't really exist, as threadripper is too expensive for normal users, so that this is the new HEDT. Nothing about this so far seems to suggest mainstream to me.
We have threadripper and threadripper pro right? Intel can adopt something like tha with some platform differences between core X "extreme tier" and WS
 
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coercitiv

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Jan 24, 2014
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That's not a real market though
It's not even a real use case, there are multiple reasons to own and use multiple machines for work, play, data storage, comms etc. Cost is lower, overall reliability is higher, and management is orders of magnitude easier. (as @DrMrLordX already mentioned)

Bonus: rebooting your gaming machine does not cut network and storage access to your whole house.
 

511

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Jul 12, 2024
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It's not even a real use case, there are multiple reasons to own and use multiple machines for work, play, data storage, comms etc. Cost is lower, overall reliability is higher, and management is orders of magnitude easier. (as @DrMrLordX already mentioned)

Bonus: rebooting your gaming machine does not cut network and storage access to your whole house.
Unless it's your server which you game on
 

Fjodor2001

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Feb 6, 2010
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I think at this point it can go either way, with the big kahuna SKU getting a place with Z-series, W-series or both.

Let's not forget Intel made Kaby Lake X. It's purely a business decision.
Yeah, I agree it's still open what it'll be.

But I have a hard time seeing that Intel would not make it possible to run the 52C on mainstream motherboards (although with limited power). Because then it would be 24C/48T Zen6 vs 8P+16E+4LPE=28C NVL-S in review benchmarks for mainstream PCs, and the latter would lose by a big margin in MT perf.

Also, it would mean less sales of the 52C, since some people may not want to pay for the expensive HEDT motherboards.

One potential twist could be that the second best SKU (14P+24E+4LPE=42C) can be run on mainstream motherboards, but only the 52C on HEDT motherboards. That is if the 42C can win over Zen6 24C/48T in MT perf.
 

MoogleW

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May 1, 2022
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Yeah, I agree it's still open what it'll be.

But I have a hard time seeing that Intel would not make it possible to run the 52C on mainstream motherboards (although with limited power). Because then it would be 24C/48T Zen6 vs 8P+16E+4LPE=28C NVL-S in review benchmarks for mainstream PCs, and the latter would lose by a big margin in MT perf.

Also, it would mean less sales of the 52C, since some people may not want to pay for the expensive HEDT motherboards.

One potential twist could be that the second best SKU (14P+24E+4LPE=42C) can be run on mainstream motherboards, but only the 52C on HEDT motherboards. That is if the 42C can win over Zen6 24C/48T in MT perf.
What I saw was that select motherboards are needed to get the FULL performance of 52c SKU

 

MoistOintment

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Jul 31, 2024
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Yes I would love to know for what you would use that many cores for. Other than Cinebench or rendering.


Come on give me something useful like music or audio production

Can't speak for him, but my typical usecase for my home PC is a mixture of gaming and Adobe Premiere. I recognize I'm in a niche, but high core count client parts without having to step up to workstation that may negatively impact gaming (and my wallet) are the parts I'm interested in.
 

coercitiv

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Can't speak for him, but my typical usecase for my home PC is a mixture of gaming and Adobe Premiere. I recognize I'm in a niche, but high core count client parts without having to step up to workstation that may negatively impact gaming (and my wallet) are the parts I'm interested in.
Do you expect to see a significant uplift in performance for your workflow with 48c vs. 24c? I know from experience that relying solely on something like Puget Bench scores does not necessarily tell the whole story for a given use case, so I'm genuinely asking if you expect to see strong scaling in your projects.
 
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Hulk

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Oct 9, 1999
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Do you expect to see a significant uplift in performance for your workflow with 48c vs. 24c? I know from experience that relying solely on something like Puget Bench scores does not necessarily tell the whole story for a given use case, so I'm genuinely asking if you expect to see strong scaling in your projects.
I do a quite a bit of DAW work as well as video editing and photoshop. As much as I want more cores "just because," I'm quite sure the extra cores aren't going to increase the performance of application I use outside of running Cinebench and other benchmarks, unfortunately. Looking at the core loading on my 9950X there is already a lot of performance left on the table. The only time I could see using more cores is when I'm multitasking a couple of those applications at the same time. But truthfully, it is hard to max out with 16/32.

I don't know? Perhaps as core counts increase maybe software developers will make greater efforts to use them? We've been there before and that waiting game generally doesn't pan out as we hope, or at best takes years and years to see even small improvements.

On the otherhand better ST performance, whether it comes from increased IPC, frequency, or a combination of both will directly translate into increased performance in every application.
 
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MoistOintment

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Do you expect to see a significant uplift in performance for your workflow with 48c vs. 24c? I know from experience that relying solely on something like Puget Bench scores does not necessarily tell the whole story for a given use case, so I'm genuinely asking if you expect to see strong scaling in your projects.
Maybe. AFAIK, Premier can use as many cores as you have for export, and I export multi-hour long footage that takes easily 3 - 4 hours currently on my 3700X.

Whether I go NVL-S vs Zen6X3D depends entirely on what the benchmarks show. If they're within 5% of each other in gaming, but one is, say, 15% faster in Premier Exports, then I'll go with the later.


285K vs 9950X3D is functionally tied in HEVC Encoding, but 9950X3D is much better in gaming, so if I were to purchase today, I'd go 9950X3D. But I'd just rather wait because both next gen is gonna see proportionally larger uplifts in this category than in gaming
 
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Hulk

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Maybe. AFAIK, Premier can use as many cores as you have for export, and I export multi-hour long footage that takes easily 3 - 4 hours currently on my 3700X.

Whether I go NVL-S vs Zen6X3D depends entirely on what the benchmarks show. If they're within 5% of each other in gaming, but one is, say, 15% faster in Premier Exports, then I'll go with the later.


285K vs 9950X3D is functionally tied in HEVC Encoding, but 9950X3D is much better in gaming, so if I were to purchase today, I'd go 9950X3D. But I'd just rather wait because both next gen is gonna see proportionally larger uplifts in this category than in gaming
You would notice a very significant increase in performance across the board in moving from a 3700X to either a 9950X or a 285K. Higher IPC, higher frequency, and double the cores.

I have a 9950X so of course I think it's a great processor but honestly in terms of gaming unless you are running a 5090 at lower resolutions I doubt you'd be compute limited when gaming. While AMD is significantly ahead in gaming, it's not like you can't game with Intel. Of course if you are super into keeping up the 1% low frame rates and getting the absolute best gaming experience possible nothing currently available comes close to the AMD v-cache enabled CPU's.

But if you are good for now then yes, I'd wait for the next gen of processors to see what they will bring to the table. I will probably go Zen 6 just for the ease of not having to get a new motherboard. Nova Lake would have to really put a hurting on Zen 6 for me to consider it.
 
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511

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If you are buying new i would rather go with Nova if the leaked Platform spec is true and we have Razer Lake Planned as successor to Nova