Intel Core i9-12950HX, Core i7-12850HX, Core i5-12600HX Geekbench scores sound the death knell for Rembrandt and Apple silicon ^↺

Multiple reports from earlier talked about Intel working on new Alder Lake processors for laptops. One of the SKUs, the Intel Core i9-12900HX, made quite an impression on Geekbench with its single and multi-core performance matching high-end desktop parts. Some of its siblings have also shown up on the benchmarking platform, namely the Intel Core i9-12950HX, Core i7-12850HX and Core i5-12600HX.

The 12-core, 16-thread Intel Core i5-12600HX is the only SKU of the lot that doesn't offer an increased core/thread count over its non-HX counterparts. It scores 1,622 and 8,065 on Geekbench's single and multi-core tests. The single-core result is on par with other Alder Lake Core i5 parts, but the multi-core score is a tad low. One can chalk this down to the processor in question being an engineering sample. Other specs include base/boost clocks of 2.5/4.5 GHz and 18 MB of L3 cache.

Thankfully, the Intel Core i7-12850HX performs on par with its Core i7 equivalents, with a single-core score of 1,778 and a multi-core score of 12,041. It has two additional CPU cores (16C/24T, presumably with eight performance and eight efficiency cores) and 25 MB of L3 cache. Performance-wise, it is miles ahead of the AMD Ryzen 9 6900HS (1,547/9,208) and even trades blows with Apple's crown jewel: the M1 Max (1,738/12,637).

Interestingly enough, the Intel Core i9-12950HX is unable to keep up with the Core i9-12900HX mentioned earlier. Its Geekbench performance is, at best, marginally better than that of the Core i7-12850HX. Despite the obvious handicap in performance, it is one of the fastest laptop chips around, with a score of 1,861/13,711 (single/multi-core). It is also a 16-core, 24-thread part, but it ups the L3 cache to 30 MB.

The Intel Core i9-12950HX, Core i7-12850HX, Core i5-12600HX Geekbench listings also reveal an interesting tidbit about the processors. They seem to be using an LGA1700 CPU socket, the same one used by Alder Lake desktop parts. This detail indicates that some HX series processors could be desktop parts repurposed for a laptop form factor. Their base TDP could be set at around 55W but will likely draw a lot more under load.

Lastly, the Lenovo laptop running the Intel Core i9-12950HX packs an ungodly amount of RAM (128 GB), indicating that some the processor could be earmarked for workstation-grade machines and paired with appropriate GPUs from Intel/AMD, but gaming laptops using the CPUs don't seem implausible. Until last year (2021), Intel launched its H45 parts after the rest of the product stack, usually in May/June. Hence, it would be reasonable to assume that the Alder Lake-HX processors will be launched around that time.

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