Intel is BACK. THIS IS NOT A DRILL. - Core Ultra 270K Plus & 250K Plus CPU Review

You might think the Ryzen 7 9850X3D is the best gaming CPU on the market, but as of today, that all does not change. But what if I told you that you could get 95% of its performance for 60% of the price? That is what Intel has bequeathed upon the land with their Ultra 7 270K Plus. God, who is naming these things? Anyways, take a look at this. In City Skylands 2, Intel's Ultra 7270K Plus outpaces both of their previous flagships and is nipping at the heels of the 9800 X3D. And what's even crazier is that the second chip that they announced, the Ultra 5250K Plus, is also a flagship killer. It beats AMD's 9950X. That's a $650 CPU. Oh, right. And I haven't even mentioned price. The 270K and the 250K are dropping at a mere $300 and $200, respectively. Prices that are actually lower than the launch prices of the CPUs they are meant to replace. It's crazy. And moving into Cyberpunk, the winning streak continues. Intel's 270K Plus is on the podium, while the 250K Plus outperforms the 14900K and the Ryzen 9950X. It just sits slightly underneath the 265K and 1% lows, but it actually has an edge in average FPS. But AMD's chips also have an edge in average frame rates, which is why I am again emphasizing the importance of 1% lows. Those are what indicates a smoother gaming experience. So, what's the catch with these chips? Are they power hungry or unstable? Is the price just too good to be true? It just might be. But what is good and also true is this in-depth review of Intel's newest CPUs and this segue to our sponsor. Hi. Sorry, this is all very new to me. I've never speed dated before. What's your name? Vessie Weekend Neo. Beautiful name. Where are you from? Oh, the link in the description. I've always wanted to go there. Tell me more. Continuing with our 1080p gaming results in F124, we see AMD's whole lineup fairing pretty well with the 9700X going above and beyond and overtaking the 270K Plus and the i94900K. The new 250K Plus trails the 9600X, although not by much. But Intel's dominance is seriously challenged in Counter-Strike 2, where their new high-end hotness only barely catches AMD's mid-range 9600X. At least Intel's new CPUs are outperforming their own team, except for the 14900 K. When we take all of our gaming tests into consideration, it would seem that Intel has fulfilled their marketing claim. The Ultra 7270K Plus is the fastest gaming CPU Intel's ever built. Even if it's not the fastest gaming CPU anyone's ever built, landing just 5% shy of AMD's 9800 X3D in 1% lows and 10% behind in average frame rate. But think of the price, the the the price. And the 250K is also an excellent value. It beats the 9600X by 5 to 10% or more depending on the game whilst demanding a very small price premium. But before you scream chill, let's address the elephant in the room and talk about why we didn't compare these new Intel chips to AMD's 9850 X3D, their more recent fastest gaming CPU. Unfortunately, we can't test every CPU on the market. So, we opted to represent the 9800 X3D instead of the 9850 X3D because more of you guys are currently running it. And it's also very close in performance to the 9850 X3D. And if we're being entirely honest, we did not expect Intel to compete at the very top of these performance charts. You got me, Intel. But if you are looking for even more data, keep an eye on ltlabs.com where we are always adding new tests to compare. So, what changes under the hood did Intel make to refresh their Aerrol Lake CPUs and get these impressive results? Well, first off, they bumped up the clocks all core boost on the PAE cores with the new processors. Sorry. Um, they also tweaked unccore frequencies. Uncore meaning everything that's not the cores. And they've improved die-to-do performance and IO frequency, meaning faster communication to the parts within the CPU and to the other components in your system, which allowed them to support higher speed memory. Oh, right. And there's just plain more CPU. Both of these new chips bring extra four ecores and some bonus shared cache along for the ride, which makes the naming of these CPUs really confusing. Why does the Ultra 7270K Plus have the same number of cores as the Ultra 9285K? And why is it performing better? Shouldn't the higher number CPU be better? I mean, at least like the 250K Plus actually has fewer cores than the 265K, so something makes sense there. But even there, in terms of performance, the 250K Plus is looking more like a replacement for the 265K rather than the 245K. So, like, what are they thinking with these names? It's tough to say, but the main thing Intel wants you to focus on is the plus. Apparently, this new convention is going to indicate that it's for enthusiasts. Intel, whatever you're paying your marketing division, it is too much. And whatever you're paying your engineers, it ain't enough. On to productivity. Intel made some big claims in their announcement about multi-core performance, saying that the 250K Plus has a 103% lead over the 9600X. Yeah, let's see if that's true. Jesus Christ. In Blender, the 250K Plus just pummel AMD's price competitors. And at the high end, the 270K Plus is neck and neck with the 9950X. In Cinebench, well, bow to your new multi-core king as the 270K Plus tops the charts with his brother Duke 250K Plus outperforming his counterparts. On the other hand, in single core performance, the higher boost on the 285K and 265K keep them positioned above their plus named heirs. If you're looking to decompress, you can relax knowing that these new chips also perform well in 7zip, even if they are a step below royalty. But in pretty much every workload, the plus CPUs are either fighting for the top spot or absolutely dominating in price to performance. Except in Photoshop, where there is a clear platform preference for AMD. But outside of that, Intel has stolen back the productivity crowd, especially considering price to performance. So don't ignore them if you're doing any sort of productivity work in addition to your gaming. Let's say this in a way Twitch streamers can understand. Intel is value maxing and absolutely pricemoging AMD. That's crazy. After several generations of power- hungry CPUs, Intel slayed the power efficiency dragon with Aero Lake. But CPU refreshes often result in power consumption increases. So, was that dragon really a hydra? Well, in gaming, power usage on the 250K Plus and 270K Plus has increased by 10% or more compared to their nonplused brethren, but on the whole have a lower average and max power consumption than AMD's chips in F-124. And Intel's doing this while being pretty competitive in performance, too. In Cinebench, we can see that Intel is still happy to let their chips let loose with power to really maximize performance, even if it comes at the cost of efficiency. But still, Intel might make up the difference by having quite good idle power draw, especially compared to AMD. And this well-managed power curve on the new chips translates to well-managed thermals on our Arctic Liquid Freezer 3mm clad test benches. And even when drawing full power, they perform well under their rated max temp. Remember, the TJ Maxx for these CPUs is 5° compared to AMD's 95. And the crazy thing is that if you really want to push your chip or if you're just like heinously thermally constrained, Intel will let you set your temperature budget to 115° C and still honor the warranty. That's awesome. Also kind of scary. It sounds great so far. Yeah. But there's still more to talk about. Intel has a few tricks up their sleeves and it's in the form of software enhancements. Yeah, we love that. The Intel binary optimization tool or IBOT is part of their application optimizer software and Intel considers this to be a core part of their long-term performance strategy. Basically, what it does is analyze the functions being called by an application and redirects the call to a function that's better optimized for Intel hardware. Intel wants to make it very clear that they're not changing the work that's being done or skipping any steps, but it's kind of like switching from using a kit of different screwdrivers to a convenient multi-bit screwdriver from ltstore.com. It does all the same work, just more efficiently and sexier. Intel claims improvements as high as 20% depending on the game when you're using ibot, but we didn't see anything like that in our testing. There's a clear uplift when compared against the baseline condition and Intel's current version of application optimization, but it's nothing to write home about. For safety, we checked to see if ibot was increasing power consumption. It doesn't seem to outside of maybe the added power consumption of running your games that little bit faster. performance is enhanced, but it's not by a lot. And IBOT can be a nuisance to enable in their utility. And also, like it all depends if those programs that you use are being optimized. So, who knows? It could be a really big deal or just another unused setting in your driver software. Oh, and uh bad news for all 349 of you who bought this generation of Intel CPUs. Intel is making no promises on bringing these optimizations to their non plus CPUs. Bummer. This is some pretty new stuff. So, let us know in the comments if you'd like to see a more in-depth look at IBOT in an upcoming video. Just like Intel, though, no promises. All righty, let's talk about pricing. It's incredible. Assuming that this pricing will exist in the real world and that Intel isn't just taking a page from AMD's 9070 XT playbook. 599 XT599 fake price and my gut says that this pricing is too good to be true, but if it isn't, AMD will need to respond. Whether that's by raising the performance bar with a generational refresh that actually does something, looking at you, the 9850X3D, or by slashing retail pricing of their current lineup, or both. I just hope that these great prices and products from Intel are not just here to score headlines in a time where no one can afford to build a computer anyways. It's just so performative. By the way, ladies, I've been getting really into matcha lattes and claro. What a talent. And I listen to uh I Know Why the Cage Bird Sings on Blinkist because, you know, I'm an ally. And also, I'm segueing to our sponsor. So, Vessie Weekend, Neo, uh, what do you do for fun? No way. I also love long walks in cities, mountains, forests, and other environments regardless of weather conditions. Oh, Vessie Weekend, Neo, you are so funny and may I say, stylish as well. This might be a bit forward, but you just look so lightweight and breathable, but ah, I don't know. I lead a pretty busy lifestyle and and I need someone that can Oh, sorry. Did you just say you're built to be 100% waterproof? That's exactly what I'm looking for in a shoe. I'd love to see you again. How can I reach you? At vessie.com/ltt for 15% off, 30-day returns, free shipping, and a one-year warranty. Got it. That's a weird phone number, but I like weird. Thanks for watching this video. Check out our review of the 9850 XVD to see more about the bestest CPUs in the game.