‘beginning and end’ of high-end gaming PC configurations 13th Gen Intel Core processors

Now is a very attractive time for a new PC for a fresh start in the new year and a generational change of gaming PC to enjoy a new era. In particular, next-generation graphics cards with differentiated features and performance from previous generations have appeared on the market, and next-generation DDR5 memory has now come down to almost the same price range as current DDR4 memory, reducing concerns about choice . Here, Intel’s 13th generation processor and core platform is the surest starting point for configuring these ‘next generation’ high performance gaming environments.

◇ Now is the right time for a ‘generational change’ of PC gaming

PC performance is the value and potential of a PC. In particular, high performance that supports the spectacular graphic expression of the latest games is the purpose and value of gaming computers. The latest technology emerges every year and the performance level of the PC gaming environment, which is constantly improving, is already a key competitive advantage that differs from other gaming platforms. In particular, ‘ray tracing’ and ‘artificial intelligence’ are seen as key differentiating technologies in the next generation gaming environment.

As the latest technologies that require high performance, such as ‘ray tracing’, are used for more realistic rendering in new games, the level of performance required for gaming computers is also greatly increased . In particular, the emergence of new large-scale games such as ‘Force Poken’ and ‘Hogwarts Legacy’ creates an important opportunity to raise the standard of PC gaming performance. Here, the emergence of gaming displays with higher resolutions and higher refresh rates further raises the level of performance required for gaming.

High-performance graphics cards for gaming, which have been difficult to buy in recent years, are also going through a generation shift to next-generation models with the stabilization of the market. Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 40 series or AMD’s Radeon RX 7000 series graphics cards have improved basic performance compared to the previous generation, as well as significantly improved ray tracing and tensor core performance, suggesting a new direction for the gaming graphics environment the next generation.

As the world in the game has a larger scale and finer details, the ‘capacity’ of the game inevitably increases. In addition, the memory capacity required for gaming also increases, and a higher operating speed is required. Higher performance SSDs are also required to load large amounts of data in a timely manner. Recently, with the advent of ‘storage direct’ technology which brings compressed data from storage to the memory of the graphics card and uses it, the bandwidth of the whole system is also an important part.

This year, even for gaming computers, ‘generation replacement’ is expected more than any other year. First of all, the graphics card market, which has failed to buy products properly in the past few years, has now returned to almost the previous level, and next-generation products with better functions and performance have appeared. In addition, the price of the next-generation DDR5 memory standard has now come down to a level similar to that of DDR4, greatly reducing the burden of choosing a new computer, and the price of high-capacity SSDs has also dropped significantly. .

In order to fully enjoy the benefits of this next generation gaming environment, it is recommended to use the latest generation of processors and platforms, the core of the PC. To achieve high performance in increasingly colorful and complex games, a high-performance graphics card is not enough, and performance is maximized when combined with a high-performance processor. This is because there are quite a few parts that the processor needs to process even in games, and basically the graphics card needs to receive tasks to be carried out through the processor.

Modern high-performance processors are also closely related to modern platforms. This is because the latest processors have a core controller built into the processor to connect memory or peripherals. In particular, replacing the processor and platform is essential for converting a memory specification to ‘DDR5’. In addition to graphics cards and expansion cards, the PCIe standard used to connect SSDs is also closely related to processor and platform configuration.

◇ ’13th Gen Intel Core Processor’ optimized for high performance gaming PC

For a high performance ‘gaming PC’, the selection criteria of the main components that affect PC performance need to be matched with ‘game’. ‘Gaming’ is one of the most complex tasks among the various tasks that can be done with a PC, and it is also a task with a unique character. The requirements for a ‘gaming PC’ for the latest games include a high performance processor for gaming, a graphics card, an appropriate amount of memory and an appropriate performance SSD, and the selection criteria for the ‘processor’ are particularly difficult.

Now almost every processor you can find on the market is a ‘multi-core’ processor with two or more cores. It is not difficult to find processors with up to dozens of cores. However, one of the representative areas that cannot properly utilize the increased number of cores is ‘gaming’. Due to the nature of the game, the room for parallel processing of internal tasks is limited, and ‘single core performance’ is considered to be a very important factor for high performance and responsiveness. Things have improved a bit lately, but almost every game out there can’t even make full use of 8 cores.

Accordingly, processors with the most advantageous conditions for gaming performance are not processors with a large number of cores, but ‘8-core’ class processors with high performance of individual cores. In general, when the number of cores of a processor is large, the performance of individual cores is generally reduced due to issues such as power consumption and heat generation. In this case, in gaming performance where not all cores can be used, processors with 8 or more cores may be at a disadvantage than 8 core class processors with relatively high single core performance.

In the case of Intel, since the 12th generation core processor, this ‘dilemma’ has been overcome with a hybrid core configuration. Intel’s ‘Hybrid Performance’ architecture includes a performance core for gaming or single-threaded applications and an efficient core that is advantageous for multi-threaded applications, and uses the performance core first. The 13th generation core processor has 8 performance cores, ideal for gaming from Core i7 or higher, showing the most satisfactory performance in gaming performance and multi-threaded performance.

The 13th generation Intel Core processor introduces an improved microarchitecture to the performance core and increases the number of epic cores across the product family, resulting in significantly higher overall performance. In particular, the Core i7 and i9 product families with performance core 8 are attractive for gaming computers. The 13th Gen Intel Core i7 family includes 8 Performance Cores and 8 Efficient Cores, the same configuration as the previous generation Core i9, providing attractive performance for gamers and creators. In addition, the 13th generation Intel Core i9 family includes 8 performance cores and 16 epic cores, providing the best gaming performance and workstation-class performance.

Another advantage of 13th Gen Intel Core processors and their underlying platforms is the wide selection of motherboards. The 13th generation core processor has platform-level compatibility with the 12th generation core processor and can be used on chipset-based 700 series motherboards for 13th generation core processors as well as chipset-based 600 series motherboards supports 12th generation core processors. The memory controller built into the processor supports DDR4-3200 and DDR5-5600, so you can choose the type of memory by selecting the main board.

Motherboards for 13th generation Intel Core processors come in a variety of combinations of chipset, memory and PCIe support. In the case of the chipset, it is safe to choose a B660/760 or Z690/790 among the 600 and 700 series. If you are thinking about overclocking or using multiple NVMe SSDs, we recommend the Z790, and if simple configuration is enough, we recommend the motherboard based on B760. In addition, the type of memory to be used and whether PCIe 5.0 is supported or not also affects the price, but you can choose according to your needs. Meanwhile, the latest graphics cards such as Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 40 series still use the PCIe 4.0 standard.

A high-performance ‘gaming PC’ for the latest games is not made using only expensive parts, but must have a ‘balance’ that matches the nature of gaming performance. When it comes to building a balanced gaming computer in many ways, choosing the PC’s central processor is an important first step in determining a balanced level of performance. When choosing a processor and platform, starting and completing a high-performance gaming PC configuration, a 13th generation Intel Core processor and platform is expected to be the most secure and satisfactory choice for the current and next-generation gaming environment.

Reporter Kwon Yong-man yongman.kwon@chosunbiz.com