Chip-giant Intel (INTC -0.69%) has managed to keep pace with rival AMD on raw performance in the PC central processing unit (CPU) market over the past few years, but that feat came at a cost. Intel's previous three generations of desktop PC processors -- Alder Lake, Raptor Lake, and Raptor Lake Refresh -- were all built on the Intel 7 manufacturing process.
Intel 7 is derived from the company's 10-nanometer (nm) process, which was famously delayed for years. In order to deliver enough performance using inferior manufacturing tech, these chips needed to use far more power than the competition.
In benchmarks run by Anandtech earlier this year, Intel's last-generation flagship 14900K chip used about 70% more power than the comparable 7950X CPU from AMD. This is a problem for multiple reasons.
First, for anyone building a PC, a power-hungry CPU could require a pricier power supply and a more expensive cooling solution, especially if a GPU is involved. Second, Intel ran into instability issues with its two Raptor Lake families, causing some chips to be permanently damaged. The excessive power usage was likely a factor.
Alder Lake, Raptor Lake, and Raptor Lake Refresh helped Intel hold its ground in the PC CPU market, but Intel had pushed power consumption about as high as it could reasonably go. With Arrow Lake, officially known as the Core Ultra 200S series, the company has shifted its focus back to power efficiency.
A giant leap forward in efficiency
Intel chose to use an advanced manufacturing process from TSMC for Arrow Lake, much like it did for its Lunar Lake laptop chips. Arrow Lake was originally meant to be manufactured on the Intel 20A process, but the company decided to shift resources to Intel 18A, instead. Intel uses its Foveros advanced packaging tech for Arrow Lake, but otherwise, the chip is outsourced.
A combination of using the TSMC process and architectural improvements has yielded enormous power-efficiency benefits. Arrow Lake is capable of delivering the same performance as Raptor Lake Refresh while using half the power. In productivity use cases, like video calls and office applications, power consumption drops as much as 58%, compared to Raptor Lake Refresh.
In gaming workloads, the flagship Arrow Lake chip delivers roughly the same performance as its predecessor, on average, while consuming substantially less power. Depending on the game, Intel's numbers point to a reduction in total system power usage as high as 165W. A typical gaming PC may use around 600W total, so that's an enormous reduction.
Lower power consumption also means less heat. Intel points to an average temperature reduction of 13 degrees Celsius, compared to Raptor Lake Refresh in gaming workloads. For those building a gaming PC, high-end Arrow Lake chips can be paired with less-expensive coolers and cases, compared to Raptor Lake Refresh, since there's much less heat to dissipate.
Erasing AMD's advantage
While Arrow Lake isn't quite a slam dunk, mostly because the chips don't deliver much in the way of performance gains for gaming, Intel has managed to greatly reduce or eliminate the huge gap in power efficiency between its chips and those from AMD. Arrow Lake also delivers performance gains across a wide array of applications, although we'll have to wait for third-party reviews later this month to get the full picture.
Intel has kept AMD to minimal share gains in the desktop PC CPU market over the past few years thanks to Alder Lake, Raptor Lake, and Raptor Lake Refresh, although the crash in PC sales following the pandemic muddles the picture a bit. As PC sales recover, Arrow Lake should put Intel in a strong competitive position.
