Intel processors crashing Unreal engine games (and others)

[jpiniero]

v/f curve, VIDs... the CPU will request lower voltages when forced to clock lower.

You would think so...

 

[coercitiv]

You would think so...

From the leaked Intel internal memo:

Factors contributing to this Vmin increase include elevated voltage, high frequency, and elevated temperature.

When you cannot directly control voltage, lowering clocks will also lower temps overall and indirectly lower voltage. Lower clocks will undoubtedly help limit the damage or delay the process.

 

[igor_kavinski]

I've got a buddy that recently spent a small fortune on an i9-14900HX, RTX 4080 laptop.

Must be a really LOUD laptop

 

[igor_kavinski]

If Intel denies laptop chips are also affected and his machine becomes unstable right after warranty expires, it's checkmate for him.

He should compress and decompress a 10GB file multiple times in quick succession, like DAPUNISHER informed us. If it passes, I think he's good. For how long, no bets!

 

[jpiniero]

From the leaked Intel internal memo:


When you cannot directly control voltage, lowering clocks will also lower temps overall and indirectly lower voltage. Lower clocks will undoubtedly help limit the damage or delay the process.

See what I am wondering is if the issue is that there's a bug and it's requesting too high of voltage outside of just clocks.

As for HX, I suspect the binning of the high end models is far better but the base model is garbage tier quality.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

This is what trying to sweep it under the rug gets you -

 

[bigboxes]

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Inspired by this one on PCMR in response to questions about raptor lake in PC build subs

One more for entertainment value while we wait for more news

EDIT: Most of the posts trending on PCMR at the moment are all covering this. Have fun with the Streisand Effect you incompetents at Intel.

A couple more of my own-

 

[lucas122478]

- They ran the simulation and found issues but just either ignored it due to time-to-market or competitive pressure, or management told the engineering team to swag an operating point where the issues wouldn’t crop up. Problem with that is the aging simulation is a statistical exercise: they likely wouldn’t have enough parts and rack time to re-verify at the actual swagged voltage: the entire point of the aging simulation is to go well beyond the actual points and tease out the errors without having to run millions of parts for months on end. Management must have known this and brought the part to market anyways.

If it is the latter, and most likely. It just reaffirms what we see every few years from another entity, that companies loyalties lie with their stockholders, not the customers.

The responses that I read that were supposedly from INTEL - I get the impression from their wordsmithing that this problem exists with mobile chips also. I don't have any recent GEN laptops to look at but is the max voltage for a mobile cpu different than a desktop cpu?

If less voltage is being fed to mobile cpus then the same process that effects desktop cpus then this may still effect mobile cpus just at a slower rate?

Keep in mind, unless they said elsewhere, they did not explicitly say no that this is not effecting mobile cpus. Whereas on other questions they did explicitly say no.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Keep in mind, unless they said elsewhere, they did not explicitly say no that this is not effecting mobile cpus. Whereas on other questions they did explicitly say no.

Let me catch you up, Lucas. They did indeed explicitly state laptops are not affected.

“Intel is aware of a small number of instability reports on Intel Core 13th/14th Gen mobile processors. Based on our in-depth analysis of the reported Intel Core 13th/14th Gen desktop processor instability issues, Intel has determined that mobile products are not exposed to the same issue. The symptoms being reported on 13th/14th Gen mobile systems – including system hangs and crashes – are common symptoms stemming from a broad range of potential software and hardware issues. As always, if users are experiencing issues with their Intel-powered laptops we encourage them to reach out to the system manufacturer for further assistance.”

I have little doubt this is another claim that will age like warm milk.

 

[DrMrLordX]

I have little doubt this is another claim that will age like warm milk.

Seems like the HX CPUs are affected. Anything below that in mobile is still a question mark.

 

[WelshBloke]

How's the UK handle it?

If somethings sold with a known fault and it fails based on that later it's still covered under the warranty regardless of when it fails. We have the EU to thank for thatn

 

[gdansk]

My question is: prior to this did nobody who experience anything not talk about it, somehow blamed themselves, or what?

If someone had told me about this before the RAD Game Tools support page I would have suspected their memory especially if over JEDEC speeds. And second that perhaps their motherboard was doing some automatic MCE.

I didn't suspect the CPUs.

 

[Ranulf]

If someone had told me about this before the RAD Game Tools support page I would have suspected their memory especially if over JEDEC speeds. And second that perhaps their motherboard was doing some automatic MCE.

I didn't suspect the CPUs.

Yup. As well, who has been bragging about how they can get higher ram speeds for the past 1.5 years or so? Intel and their customers, tech tubers et al.. I dunno, I saw all the hubub about ram speeds by overclockers and just thought it wasn't worth the hassle or cash last year. Now we have cpu's degrading even while running ddr5 at top end to middle ddr4 speeds.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Now we have cpu's degrading even while running ddr5 at top end to middle ddr4 speeds.

Worse, gaming servers failing at RAM running below 5600 MT/s!

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Worse, gaming servers failing at RAM running below 5600 MT/s!

Intel told them 4400 is in spec so deal with it. Some of these Intel people are AMD's employees of the month. Intel FAFO by messing with employee pay, benefits, and job security. I am not surprised Pikachu that some would maliciously comply in return.

I got around to listening to that Digital Foundry conversation. So John has blinding brand loyalty something terrible. Has only used Intel going back to the 90s when he was a punk kid. Talks about his Skylake X PC being super hot running unstable garbage, then moments later talks about how Intel has always been great for him. And how he'll wait and see how the new core ultra stuff does. That attitude is how we got here. Users claiming Intel just works while their expensive Skylake X system was anything but. SMDH. Gaslighting yourself can be a good thing, if it helps you beat addiction, get in shape, stuff like that. When you do it because your amygdala activates over material possessions you've failed yourself.

 

[Turbonium]

I got a 13600KF and I'm worried. Should I be?

This sucks. Intel sucks.

 

[igor_kavinski]

I got a 13600KF and I'm worried. Should I be?

Just keep installing the BIOS updates and hope for the best. Run a few reliable benchmarks before and after the update to see how much performance you lost. On Saturday, I updated an office Dell i5-12500 to the latest "critical" BIOS. It seemed OK in MT but went from almost 725 in CPU-Z ST benchmark to barely 699 so Intel's new guidelines are to restrict turbo clocks.

 

[Turbonium]

Just keep installing the BIOS updates and hope for the best. Run a few reliable benchmarks before and after the update to see how much performance you lost. On Saturday, I updated an office Dell i5-12500 to the latest "critical" BIOS. It seemed OK in MT but went from almost 725 in CPU-Z ST benchmark to barely 699 so Intel's new guidelines are to restrict turbo clocks.

Isn't the only relevant BIOS update the one that's due next month?

EDIT: sorry, I meant microcode update.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Isn't the only relevant BIOS update the one that's due next month?

Yeah but the current "critical" one may reduce any potential damage by limiting boost clocks if your particular CPU is vulnerable to degradation. But I remember that you were after really boring stock and stable performance so maybe your CPU is already running at pretty sane voltages and speeds. Still, since it seems you just care more about a working system, I think it wouldn't be a bad idea to update to the latest BIOS now. The Dell system I updated didn't become unusable. A normal person wouldn't notice the difference.

 

[Turbonium]

Yeah but the current "critical" one may reduce any potential damage by limiting boost clocks if your particular CPU is vulnerable to degradation. But I remember that you were after really boring stock and stable performance so maybe your CPU is already running at pretty sane voltages and speeds. Still, since it seems you just care more about a working system, I think it wouldn't be a bad idea to update to the latest BIOS now. The Dell system I updated didn't become unusable. A normal person wouldn't notice the difference.

So is it only susceptible to degradation if it has the oxidation problem? Or does the excessive voltage (ring bus) do that on its own? I'm curious.

And yeah, I value stability above everything else.

I've used the system for over a year now doing video rendering and similar stuff, and Source/Source 2 engine gaming, with no issues, fwiw. Nothing too intense.

 

[lakedude]

So is it only susceptible to degradation if it has the oxidation problem? Or does the excessive voltage (ring bus) do that on its own? I'm curious.

Depends on if you want to trust what Intel is saying.

Intel claims the oxidation is an old problem that has already been solved.

Watch Wendell's videos analyzing data independently from Intel and see what you think after that.

I think Intel isn't telling the whole truth.

 

[coercitiv]

So is it only susceptible to degradation if it has the oxidation problem? Or does the excessive voltage (ring bus) do that on its own? I'm curious.

Both oxidation and excessive voltage lead to degradation. Oxidation also acts as a catalyst for excessive voltage degradation, leading to even faster CPU death. Your 13600KF isn't safe and has probably aged faster than it should have. The good news is these lower SKUs also degrade slower than the top bins, so you can update BIOS and wait and see what Intel does next.

The one thing I would advise anyone with a 13th/14th gen CPU would be to make sure their important data is backed up on another system. System instability can be very subtle in the beginning, most users may not even notice something is wrong until it starts having stronger symptoms like app crashes and BSODs. However, data corruption can happen even during early stages.

 

[adamge]

I imagine the patch will be more aggressive than normal on suppressing voltage (and if need be clocks) to stop the crashing.

This sounds like a case for... *wait for it* ...Artificial Intelligence!

 

[In2Photos]

TechSource built a new computer because his brand new $10,000 water cooled 14900K PC keeps crashing.