Intel’s Top 24-Core “8+16” Raptor Lake CPU Die Pictured In Full Wafer Shot, Coming Soon To 6 GHz Core i9’s
Intel has invited tech media from all around the globe to IDC (Intel Design Center) based in Haifa, Israel. Today, the tech and press community was invited over to the FAB28, a leading fabrication plant that is responsible for making Intel’s next-gen Raptor Lake CPUs. The bleeding-edge fab is located in Kiryat Gat, Israel, just a few kilometers south of Tel Aviv. There, Intel made press hold wafers of their next-gen Raptor Lake silicon.
— Intel News (@intelnews) September 13, 2022 The wafer that was shown features the full Raptor Lake-S Desktop CPU die that comprises 8 P-cores based on the Raptor Cove cores and 16 E-cores based on the updated Gracemont cores. Combined, you get up to 24 cores and 32 threads. We can see clearly on the wafer that each die has a total of 8 E-Cores which are bright yellow and then we have the bigger P-cores that are in a slight brown hue and appear bigger. Each of the four E-cores makes up to form a cluster and there are four such clusters on the die compared to just two clusters on the Alder Lake CPUs. Each of the four clusters also appears bigger and we can also see a slightly increased size of each P-core.
— Andreas Schilling 🇺🇦 (@aschilling) September 14, 2022 It is estimated that for 13th Gen Raptor Lake CPUs, Intel is going to feature 2 MB L2 / 3 MB L3 cache per Raptor Cove core while each Gracemont Cluster will feature 4 MB L2 and 3 MB L3 cache. That’s going to give us 36 MB L3 cache across all cores, 16 MB (2x8) for P-cores & 16 MB (4x4) for E-cores. Intel Raptor Lake & Alder Lake CPU Cache Configurations (Rumored):
Raptor Lake P-Core L3 - 3 MB (3 x 8 = 24MB) Alder Lake P-Core L3 - 3 MB (3 x 8 = 24 MB) Raptor Lake P-Core L2 - 2 MB (2 x 8 = 16 MB) Alder Lake P-Core L2 - 1.25 MB (1.25 x 8 = 10 MB) Raptor Lake E-Core L3 - 3 MB (3 x 4 = 12 MB) Alder Lake E-Core L3 - 2 MB (2 x 2 = 4 MB) Raptor Lake E-Core L2 - 4 MB (4 x 4 = 16 MB) Alder Lake E-Core L2 - 2 MB (2 x 2 = 4 MB) Raptor Lake Total Cache (L3+L2) = 68 MB Alder Lake Total Cache (L3 + L2) = 42 MB
In delidded die shots, we have seen that the 13th gen Intel Raptor Lake CPUs feature a slightly bigger die measuring 23.8 x 10.8mm or 257.04mm. For comparison, the Alder Lake top-die measures 20.4 x 10.2mm or 208.08mm2. This is an increase of 24% in die area which makes sense since the new CPUs will pack more Gracemont E-Cores and will also get bigger L2/L3 caches than the 12th Gen parts.
Intel 13th Gen Raptor Lake Core i9-13900 (24/32) H0 Die - 257.04mm2 Intel 12th Gen Alder Lake Core i9-12900K (16/24) H0 Die - 208.08mm2
The Intel Core i9-13900K is the flagship Raptor Lake CPU, featuring 24 cores and 32 threads in an 8 P-Core and 16 E-Core configuration. The CPU is configured at a base clock of 3.0 GHz, a single-core boost clock of 5.8 GHz (1-2) cores, and an all-core boost clock of 5.5 GHz (all 8 P-Cores). The CPU features 68 MB of combined cache and a 125W PL1 rating that goes up to 250W. The CPU can also consume up to 350W of power when using the “Extreme Performance Mode” which we detailed a few hours ago here. Intel is expected to unveil its 13th Gen Raptor Lake CPU on the 27th of September during the Innovation event with a retail launch planned for October 2022. The CPUs will be rocking some insane speeds of up to 6 GHz and will be featured on the 700-series platform while offering backward compatibility on 600-series motherboards.
