Intel has finally lifted the lid on its new Alder Lake 12th generation processors, and the performance gains are looking good for gamers.
The chips will be shipping to buyers from November 4th 2021 in new PCs and are also available as standalone items, though availability is limited.
We asked the expert, technical consultant/guru Alex Theodossi from Alpha Beta PC, for the lowdown in our latest monthly video interview, which you can watch above.
“The biggest change with the new processors is moving over to the DDR5 platform, which offers a lot better bandwidth and power, especially for large-scale applications, gaming and video editing. So DDR5 is looking good – if you can get hold of it,” Alex said.
“We did some internal benchmarking on engineering samples and I was incredibly impressed with the performance increases, especially with single-threaded applications. It’s a nice step up on what I feel has been kind of a plateau since the 9-series.
“I think if you’re looking at building a PC right now and you’ve got gaming in mind, I think right now Intel is the way to go with the new Alder Lake processors, in terms of performance.”
Alex Theodossi, Alpha Beta PC
“I’d say the Intel 12th gen processors offer a performance increase of 12 to 13%. I don’t have any brand loyalty, I buy what is the best or the fastest, it doesn’t matter if it’s AMD or Intel.
“They do beat AMD’s processors in a lot of things. There’s a solid 10% difference between the Intel i9 12900K and the AMD 5950X for example, easily.
“I think if you’re looking at building a PC right now and you’ve got gaming in mind, I think Intel is the way to go with the new Alder Lake processors. I think people will be very happy with them. I have no alliegance to Intel or AMD, but the Intel is the one to go for in terms of performance right now. I’m excited to see AMD’s response.”
In terms of price, DDR5 is about 40% more expensive than the existing technology – Eurogamer has listed more Alder Lake tech specs including prices ranging from around $264 to $589.
Thanks to our partner Alpha Beta PC – Visit https://www.alphabetapc.com & use code ENUK08 to get £50 off when you spend over £500. Get more expert gaming PC advice from Alpha Beta PC on the Esports News UK Hardware Corner.
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Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.
