Intel Core i9-11900KF plunges past 5 GHz on Geekbench but multi-core cramp leaves it out of its depth against AMD's Ryzen 7 5800X and Ryzen 9 5900X

Another Rocket Lake-S chip in the form of the Intel Core i9-11900KF has been found on Geekbench, courtesy of Leakbench. The 8-core, 16-thread part is unlocked (“K”) and has no active iGPU (“F”). In combination with a Gigabyte Z490M board, the i9-11900KF has a publicly listed maximum frequency of 5.10 GHz here. However, the JSON file reveals the processor actually got to 5.289 GHz, with 5.3 GHz being the reported maximum single-core boost for this CPU. The Intel chip is at an early stage of stepping level 1, and the listing records the 16 GB memory as dual-channel DDR4 SDRAM @1066 MHz. Windows was used as the operating system.

The single-core score is respectable enough on 1,681 points, although compared to other recent Rocket Lake results, more could have been expected. For instance, the Intel Core i9-11900K has scored over 1,900 points on Geekbench 5. The score for the i9-11900KF leaves it just +0.96% and +0.72% ahead of the scores that we managed in our initial tests of the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X and Ryzen 9 5900X, respectively. However, the Rocket Lake part really struggles in the multi-core discipline and pulls out 6,974 points, which is a long way behind the Zen 3 rivals. The fellow 8-core, 16-thread Ryzen 7 5800X is over 62.80% ahead while the Ryzen 9 5900X, with its 4-core advantage (12C/24T), is a massive +86.26% beyond the Rocket Lake CPU in our first tests with the Vermeer parts. If you look at the median scores we have collated since that first review (see chart below), you can see that the Ryzen 5000 chips are still strong performers.

At the moment, this appears to be the only Intel Core i9-11900KF record on Geekbench, so one could hope that the middling multi-core result can be attributed to a combination of early drivers, entry-level board, and average RAM support, among other things. The i9-11900K has recorded respectable multi-core results, so more can likely be expected from the KF-variant in future. The AMD Ryzen 5000 chips have a TDP advantage here (105 W vs. 125 W), and the potential pricing also leaves the currently hard-to-find Zen 3 processors looking more attractive. The Ryzen 9 5900X has an MSRP of US$549 and the Ryzen 7 5800X has a price tag of US$449, although retailers have listed them at prices over US$100 higher. An alleged price leak for the Rocket Lake-S parts has the i9-11900KF at about €500 without VAT (US$606) and around the €600-mark including VAT (US$727), depending on the retailer.

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