Rumours have it that Intel’s Core Ultra 4000 Series, also currently known as Nova Lake, and more specifically, a 28-core desktop model paired with DDR5-8000 RAM will be faster than the blue chipmaker’s current Arrow Lake flagship, the Core Ultra 9 285K, with DDR5-6400 RAM.
The rumour comes by way of the prominent hardware leakster, Haze, who posted their rumour on X. Specifically, they say that there are two 28-core Nova Lake-S configurations, with a performance uplift over the current desktop CPU generation between 16% and 33%.
To break it down further, Haze says that Nova Lake is expected to deliver as much as 8% raw single-threaded performance without bLLC, short for big last-level cache, and 17% with bLLC. There is also reference to Intel Advanced Performance Extensions (APX), which Haze says would boost that performance further. 15% performance improvement and 20% higher gaming performance, as per slides created by Intel, allegedly.
Internal documents procured by Videocardz seem to suggest that the standard Nova Lake-S 28-core CPU with 285W PL1 would be the one to deliver the aforementioned 16% gaming performance uplift, while the 28-core DS configuration with an operating TDP of 296W is the one that should hit up to 33% higher gaming performance. Again, this benchmark is unverified and stems from an independent source.
But more importantly, and as mentioned at the start, these performance metrics were obtained with the two 28-core Nova Lake-S running with DDR5-8000 RAM speeds, right out of the box. For comparison, Arrow Lake reference systems peak at DDR5-6400 XMP, meaning that Nova Lake is configured to run with faster memory configurations.
In any case, it’s best to take these details with a hint of doubt. As Videocardz points out, these internal performance estimates were obtained back in August, and as we near the end of the year, there is a chance that Intel could have revised them.
(Source: Videocardz, X)
