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MagyarIntel Core Ultra 5 125H vs Intel Core Ultra 9 185H
Intel Core Ultra 5 125H
► remove from comparison
The Intel Core Ultra 5 125H is a mid-range Meteor Lake family chip that debuted in December 2023. This 1st Gen Core Ultra processor has come to replace 13th generation Core chips; it has 14 cores (4 + 8 + 2) and 18 threads at its disposal. Its Performance cores, of which there are 4, are HT-enabled and run at up to 4.5 GHz while its Efficient cores, of which there are 10 (8 main cores plus 2 extra ones found in the Low Power Island), run at up to 3.6 GHz. The 7-core Arc GPU, just out of the oven, serves as the integrated graphics adapter - this runs at up to 2.20 GHz - and there is a bevy of other brand-new technologies on offer as well, including the integrated AI Boost NPU with two Gen 3 engines for hardware AI workload acceleration.
Architecture & Features
Meteor Lake is a case of throwing everything at AMD (including the kitchen sink, yes) and seeing what sticks. With this product family, Intel intends to deliver higher CPU performance, higher GPU performance, higher hardware AI workload acceleration rates and longer battery life than what Raptor Lake chips were capable of. For those counting, that's four birds to kill with a single stone.
This generation of Intel Core processors features Redwood architecture P-cores and Crestwood architecture E-cores. Both come with slight architectural improvements over Raptor Cove and Gracemont respectively for slightly higher performance-per-clock figures; the interesting thing is that of the 10 E-cores, two are actually a separate cluster located on what Intel calls a "Low Power Island". Essentially, the latter is an SoC within an SoC that can stay active while most other parts of the chip are temporarily switched off to save power. The low-power E-cores run at up to 2.5 GHz. Intel hopes this approach will let it deliver unprecedentedly low power consumption figures when under low load, boosting battery life of laptops and tablets powered by Meteor Lake.
To build its Meteor Lake processors, Intel uses the Foveros technology (stacking several chips on top of each other). This is a cost-cutting measure more than anything else, as manufacturing several small dies on several different processes is so much cheaper than making a huge single die and hoping that there are no defects in it that will require disabling some parts of it.
Elsewhere, the Core Ultra 5 125H comes with 18 MB of L3 cache which is a significant reduction compared to the 24 MB that the 155H, the 165H and the 185H have. The processor has a very healthy number of PCIe 5 and PCIe 4 lanes for NVMe SSD speeds up to 15.7 GB/s; it supports RAM running at up to 7467 MHz (DDR5-5600, LPDDR5-7467, LPDDR5x-7467, to be specific - which is about as good as what 8040 series Ryzen chips have). Naturally, the 125H features built-in Thunderbolt 4 support and Intel CNVi Wi-Fi support. It is also worth mentioning that Intel chose to keep native SATA III support that AMD had removed from its Ryzen processors quite a while ago.
The 125H is compatible with 64-bit Windows 10, 64-bit Windows 11 and with many Linux distros.
Performance
While we have no way of knowing what the 125H will be like, as of December 2023, it's safe to expect the chip to be slightly slower than the Ryzen 7 7735HS (Zen 3 Plus, 8 cores, 16 threads, up to 4.75 GHz), as far as multi-thread performance is concerned.
Either way, real-world performance of the chip may vary significantly depending on how high the CPU power limits are and how competent the cooling solution of the system is.
Graphics
The 7-core Arc GPU running at up to 2.20 GHz is set to overshadow the Radeon 760M; just like the 8-core Arc GPU, this graphics adapter is set to be miles ahead of the aging Xe-series integrated GPUs. As long as one chooses to take Intel's word for it, that is.
A proper DX12 Ultimate graphics adapter, the Arc is no stranger to ray tracing and other modern technologies including AI frame generation (XeSS). It will let you connect up to four SUHD 4320p monitors and it will both HW-encode and HW-encode the most widely used video codecs including AVC, HEVC and AV1 in a fast and efficient manner.
Your mileage may vary depending on how high the CPU power limits are, how competent the cooling solution of your system is, how fast the RAM of your system is. The latter is really important; Intel stresses that for the Arc to deliver the best results possible, multi-channel RAM configuration is a must.
Power consumption
The Base power consumption, in the case of the 125H, is 28 W while its maximum Turbo power consumption is supposed to be within 115 W. A powerful cooling solution is a must for any system powered by this chip.
This Core Ultra 5 series processor is comprised of five small chips ("tiles") that are connected using Intel's Foveros technology. The tile containing main CPU cores is produced on the fairly modern 7 nm Intel process marketed as Intel 4 while most other tiles (the iGPU, the I/O die, ...) are built with TSMC's N5 and N6 processes. The base tile is built with the old Intel 22FFL process.
Intel Core Ultra 9 185H
► remove from comparisonThe Intel Core Ultra 9 185H is the top-of-the-line Meteor Lake family chip that debuted in December 2023. This 1st Gen Core Ultra processor has come to replace 13th generation Core chips; it has 16 cores (6 + 8 + 2) and 22 threads at its disposal. Its Performance cores, of which there are 6, are SMT-enabled and run at up to 5.1 GHz while its Efficient cores, of which there are 10 (8 main cores plus 2 extra ones found in the Low Power Island) run at up to 3.8 GHz. The 8-core Arc GPU, just out of the oven, serves as the integrated graphics adapter - this runs at up to 2.35 GHz - and there is a bevy of other brand-new technologies on offer as well, such as the integrated AI Boost NPU with two Gen 3 engines for hardware AI workload acceleration.
Architecture & Features
Meteor Lake is a case of throwing everything at AMD (including the kitchen sink, yes) and seeing what sticks. With this product family, Intel intends to deliver higher CPU performance, higher GPU performance, higher hardware AI workload acceleration rates and longer battery life than what Raptor Lake chips were capable of. For those counting, that's four birds to kill with a single stone.
This generation of Intel Core processors features Redwood architecture P-cores and Crestwood architecture E-cores. Both come with slight architectural improvements over Raptor Cove and Gracemont respectively for slightly higher performance-per-clock figures; the interesting thing is that of the 10 E-cores, two are actually a separate cluster located on what Intel calls a "Low Power Island". Essentially, the latter is an SoC within an SoC that can stay active while the rest of the chip is turned off to save power. The low-power E-cores run at up to 2.5 GHz. Intel hopes that this approach will let it deliver unprecedentedly low power consumption figures when under low load, boosting battery life of laptops and tablets powered by Meteor Lake.
To build its Meteor Lake processors, Intel uses the Foveros technology (stacking several chips on top of each other). This is a cost-cutting measure more than anything else, as manufacturing several small dies on several different processes is so much cheaper than making a huge single die and hoping that there are no defects in it that will require disabling some parts of it.
Elsewhere, the Core Ultra 9 185H comes with 24 MB of L3 cache and a very healthy number of PCIe 5 and PCIe 4 lanes for NVMe SSD speeds up to 15.7 GB/s. vPro Enterprise and business-centric features such as the Remote Platform Erase are onboard as well. It supports RAM running at up to 7467 MHz (DDR5-5600, LPDDR5-7467, LPDDR5x-7467, to be specific - which is about as good as what 8040 series Ryzen chips have). Naturally, the chip also features built-in Thunderbolt 4 support and Intel CNVi Wi-Fi support; fascinatingly enough, Intel chose to keep native SATA III support that AMD had removed from its Ryzen processors quite a while ago.
The 185H is compatible with 64-bit Windows 10, 64-bit Windows 11 and with many Linux distros.
Performance
If one chooses to trust the official Intel performance data, then the 185H is not a whole lot faster than the Ryzen 9 6900HX (Zen 3 Plus, 8 cores, 16 threads, up to 4.9 GHz), as far as multi-thread performance is concerned. This isn't a ground-breaking result but let's just wait for our in-house testing results instead of jumping to conclusions.
Either way, real-world performance of the chip may vary significantly depending on how high the CPU power limits are and how competent the cooling solution of the system is.
Graphics
The 8-core Arc GPU running at up to 2.35 GHz is slated to be a proper alternative to the mighty Radeon 780M. The thing is about as fast as the GTX 1650 (Laptop) and the RTX 2050 (Laptop) to represent some seriously solid performance gains over aging Xe-series integrated GPUs. If one chooses to take Intel's word for it, that is.
A proper DX12 Ultimate graphics adapter, the Arc is no stranger to ray tracing and other modern technologies including AI frame generation (XeSS). It will let you connect up to four SUHD 4320p monitors and it will both HW-encode and HW-encode the most widely used video codecs including AVC, HEVC and AV1 in a fast and efficient manner.
Your mileage may vary depending on how high the CPU power limits are, how competent the cooling solution of your system is, how fast the RAM of your system is. The latter is really important; Intel stresses that for the Arc to deliver the best results possible, multi-channel RAM configuration is a must.
Power consumption
This mighty Core Ultra 9 series processor has a "base" power consumption of 45 W, while its Turbo power consumption is not supposed to exceed 115 W. A powerful cooling solution will be needed to sort out this chip's hot temper.
The 185H is comprised of five small chips ("tiles") that are connected using Intel's Foveros technology. The tile containing main CPU cores is produced on the modern 7 nm Intel process marketed as Intel 4 while most other tiles (the iGPU, the I/O die, ...) are built with TSMC's N5 and N6 processes. The base tile is built with the old Intel 22FFL process.
| Model | Intel Core Ultra 5 125H | Intel Core Ultra 9 185H | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Series | Intel Intel Meteor Lake-H | Intel Intel Meteor Lake-H | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Codename | Meteor Lake-H | Meteor Lake-H | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Series: Intel Meteor Lake-H Meteor Lake-H |
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| Clock | 3600 - 4500 MHz | 3800 - 5100 MHz | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| L3 Cache | 18 MB | 24 MB | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Cores / Threads | 14 / 18 4 x 4.5 GHz Intel Redwood Cove P-Core 8 x 3.6 GHz Intel Crestmont E-Core 2 x 2.5 GHz Intel Crestmont E-Core | 16 / 22 6 x 4.8 GHz Intel Redwood Cove P-Core 8 x 3.8 GHz Intel Crestmont E-Core 2 x 2.5 GHz Intel Crestmont E-Core | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| TDP | 28 Watt | 45 Watt | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Technology | 7 nm | 7 nm | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| max. Temp. | 110 °C | 110 °C | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Socket | BGA2049 | BGA2049 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Features | DDR5-5600/LPDDR5-7467/LPDDR5x-7467 RAM, PCIe 5, Thr. Director, DL Boost, AI Boost, vPro Essen., MMX, SSE, SSE2, SSE3, SSSE3, SSE4.1, SSE4.2, AES, AVX, AVX2, AVX-VNNI, FMA3, SHA | DDR5-5600/LPDDR5-7467/LPDDR5x-7467 RAM, PCIe 5, Thr. Director, DL Boost, AI Boost, vPro Enterprise, RPE, MMX, SSE, SSE2, SSE3, SSSE3, SSE4.1, SSE4.2, AES, AVX, AVX2, AVX-VNNI, FMA3, SHA | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| iGPU | Intel Arc 7-Cores iGPU ( - 2200 MHz) | Intel Arc 8-Cores iGPU ( - 2350 MHz) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Architecture | x86 | x86 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Announced | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Manufacturer | ark.intel.com | ark.intel.com |
- Average benchmark values for this graphics card