Intel’s Core Ultra 200S Plus Series out of the bag and as always, the chipmaker has given me the chance to review both variants: the Core Ultra 7 270K Plus and the Core Ultra 5 250K Plus. For this review, I’ll be looking at the former’s performance.
Off the bat and right out of the box, the 270K Plus is on a warpath to impress.
Specifications
What is interesting is that the 270K Plus actually isn’t all that different that the current flagship of Intel’s Arrow Lake generation, the Core Ultra 9 285K. No, really. Look at the spec sheet. It’s got 24 cores, comprising eight P-Cores and 16 E-Cores, and virtually identical base and boost clocks.
The main selling points or as Robert Hallock, Intel’s VP and GM of Enthusiast Channel Business puts it, “real magic” of the 270K Plus and 250K Plus is the new Direct-to-Device (D2D) instructions that delivers up to an additional 900MHz of performance, derived by the chipmaker’s new Binary Optimisation Tool.
Getting back on point, it’s also got the same Meteor Lake NPU, meaning that its AI-based performance is still limited to 13 TOPs. Also, it’s priced at US$299 (~RM1,182), making it way more appealing than its sibling, the Core Ultra 7 265K, that currently retails for RM1,399.
Testbench
Unfortunately, I don’t have a 265K in my inventory, but I’ll compare it to the 285K, the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X, and the 9850X3D. Why not the 9800X3D, you ask? Simple: I don’t have that CPU in my inventory at the moment either, and the 9850X3D was the most recent 3D V-Cache processor I had tested prior to this, which means that the metrics and data I obtained from it would be more relevant.
I’ve also updated the gaming benchmarks to run with my RTX 5090 FE in order to keep the results uniform. Oh, and just to keep things fair, the Binary Optimisation tool isn’t enabled, on account that the number of titles that it supports isn’t as extensive yet.
Benchmark, Temperatures, And Power Consumption
If there is one takeaway point from this review, it is that the 270K Plus is either on part with the 285K, pulling ahead in some scenarios. Sure, it’s a case of “win some, lose some” but throughout my review, it was practically toe-to-toe. And when I say toe-to-toe, I mean in the synthetic and real world tests, as well as the amount of power this CPU consumes.
That said, and on a sidebar, I noticed that the 270K Plus runs a little hotter than the 285K. It came close to hitting 100°C at full load, but I’m chalking it up to the Turbo mode that is part and parcel with all Intel CPUs.
At US$299, I daresay that the 270K Plus is essentially a cheaper version of the 285K, although at the publication of this review, Intel had yet to provide us with the local pricing for the CPU. Be that as it may, I believe it may actually end up costing less than RM2,000 when it goes on sale in a couple of days.
Getting back on point, the 270K Plus tends to be a little more aggressive in the synthetic benchmarks, but in gaming, it has no problem keeping up with the big boys, both from its team and the Red team. No, really, as I said about the 285K: it may only be a small handful of frames in difference, but those frames are offset by the fact its very enticing price tag.
Conclusion
Is the 270K Plus as good as the Ryzen 7 9800X3D or the more recent 9850X3D? All the signs and metrics are pointing towards yes, it is. Given the price tag Intel has slapped on it, it is now one of the better performance-per-ringgit components to consider.
AMD, if you’re reading this, I’m sorry: Intel is clearly coming for your crown, and this might just be the CPU that knocks you off the throne for this season. By comparison, your 9800X3D and 9850X3D CPUs now feel a tad more expensive.
The Core Ultra 7 270K Plus is Intel’s comeback kid.
As for the DIY PC enthusiast who – in this exorbitantly expensive market of PC components, brought about by what I think is the unwarranted gluttony of memory chips by AI tech companies – is still adamant on building a new gaming rig from scratch, and you’re looking for an option, I’m going to go out on a limb here and recommend this CPU.
To put it simply: Intel is very clearly back in the fight, and the 270K Plus is proof of that.
