INTEL recently launched their Comet Lake-S series of desktop processors. A lot of questions have been raised with regards to the thermal output and performance of these processors, especially when they are running at the advertised and claimed base/boost clock speeds by INTEL.
Given the Core i9’s 250W peak power draw at stock settings (variable PL2), boosting heat transfer efficiency with the die is very important, especially if you are into “overclocking”, or you are a serious “hardcore” gamer.
With Comet Lake INTEL has made some minor design changes, when it comes to engineering, and with that the company is taking a new approach to manage the thermals. INTEL actually cramped more CPU cores with the entire Comet Lake lineup, but at a very high thermal cost.
Intel already moved from pTIM (polymer TIM, or thermal grease) with its Coffee Lake K-series processors to Solder TIM. STIM actually helps with the heat transfer between the die and heat spreader, while it can also lower the operating temperature. Lower temperatures can help during the CPU’s stock operation, enabling longer turbo boost durations.
With up to 10 cores now under the integrated heat spreader (IHS), Intel has decided to further bolster this approach by using a “thinner die” for the K-series Comet Lake CPUs.
But why did INTEL make the die and STIM thinner, and the heat spreader thicker ? It’s because of cost. Intel decided to keep the height of the heat spreader on all of its CPUs the same so that they’d be compatible with the existing CPU coolers. As per Intel these new processors are now better at power dissipation.
” One of the changes Intel made with Comet Lake S is that they thinned out the die. In other words, there is now less silicon on the die interfacing the actual “transistors” with the soldered integrated heat sink. Intel claims that this helps improves the thermal conductivity, allowing heat to better escape the whole package “.
The company is now lapping its own die to reduce the amount of insulative material between the transistors and the TIM. At the same time, Intel has also increased the amount of copper in its IHS to improve its thermal conductivity and performance. The reason to have a slightly thicker IHS is to keep the “Z-height” identical to allow for coolers to be re-used.
The overall Z-height of the of the CPU and IHS remains the same, but the actual silicon is being thinned on the die itself. This allowed the copper to be thickened on the IHS. Intel calls this new processor technology “Thin Die Solder Thermal Interface Material” (Thin Die STIM) and it will be used and supported on select 10’th Gen Comet lake S SKUs.
To maintain the “Z-height” dimensions, it makes sense to thicken the IHS (think of this as of how compatibility can be enabled between LGA 115x coolers and the LGA 1200 socket interface).
Intel has made this clear that it uses the ‘die-thinning’ technique on the K-series models, but there is no word on the rest of the Comet Lake-S CPU lineup. With Comet Lake, Intel created a “thin die”, and at the same time also increased the thickness of the IHS to compensate for this change.
They are allowing the heat to transfer from the Comet Lake CPU cores to the CPU coolers, which will allow the heat to move away from the CPU cores at a much faster rate. This should help with lower thermals and heat output. But it remains to been whether such design changes from INTEL can really help cool the i9-10900K, and other high-end Comet Lake processors.
Hello, my name is NICK Richardson. I’m an avid PC and tech fan since the good old days of RIVA TNT2, and 3DFX interactive “Voodoo” gaming cards. I love playing mostly First-person shooters, and I’m a die-hard fan of this FPS genre, since the good ‘old Doom and Wolfenstein days.
MUSIC has always been my passion/roots, but I started gaming “casually” when I was young on Nvidia’s GeForce3 series of cards. I’m by no means an avid or a hardcore gamer though, but I just love stuff related to the PC, Games, and technology in general. I’ve been involved with many indie Metal bands worldwide, and have helped them promote their albums in record labels. I’m a very broad-minded down to earth guy. MUSIC is my inner expression, and soul.
Contact: Email
Hey Metal Messiah is finally part of DSOG? Excellent news and congratulations man!
Thanks for your kind words and support, m8 !
Wish i could send my 8086k to Intel and then they can put proper toothpaste in it while keeping the warranty on
You really bought the 8086K for gaming ?
Mostly for MMORPG gaming. At that time i had no hope for AMD (3000 gave me hope) and there was no 9th gen yet.
Do i regret it? Not really, no issues with it, if something is lacking is the 1070ti for 1440p i have.
Would i wait now if given a chance? Yes, i think i could live with 4770k longer, only problem was that there was lighting which broke my GPU and made the mobo unstable and i could not find replacement boards in small Finland.
So i chose to change middway year
Hello again, speaking of Finland, wow what a beautiful country to be honest.
I’ve been to Helsinki and Oulu, when I hosted and attended METAL Shows over there, basically the old days of “Finnish Metal Expo”, and “Jalometalli Metal Music Festival”.
Very cool atmosphere, haha ! I also love Sweden, and Norway too much ! Lots and lots of extreme METAL bands and record labels.
My close friends from Finland. I know these guys pretty well. We all have split up though right now, since this is a very old band formed in 1992. I miss these guys !
https://www.metal-archives.com/bands/Nocturnal_Winds/1622
https://www.metal-archives.com/bands/Gates_of_Ishtar/619
Cool :), wait how old are you? You dont look that old in your profile picture.
I like melodic/power metal, i dont really listen Finnish metal apart from Dreamtale. More from Sweden like In Flames or Sabaton
Hey, I’m almost 34. But I still look young these days, LOL. But never mind my age since I’m still young, haha…:D
Anyways, I know about the band Dreamtale. Good vocals ! Even I like MELODIC Metal be it Power, Speed, Death or BLACK METAL !!
MY favorite genre is Black Metal. I also like Finnish FOLK Metal a lot ! Check out these videos.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bG-bK8e0agQ
These are all pure Finnish bands !
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEJfG83AY_g
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BhAN95VtaA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlWSNOEhCq0
This one is my favorite. It’s Melodic Black Metal though. Best Finnish band in my opinion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Z2RDaqYR6E
My favorite all time band is EMPEROR from NORWAY ! I also like IN FLAMES and Dark Tranquillity from Sweden !
Emperor are one of the Most extreme underground Black METAL bands to ever spawn !
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bj_g0hpVUKw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6BI4_NMxPb8
Thanks, sorry forgot to reply earlier. Have you tried band called Yousei Teikoku? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2f-24JiUsU
Glad I didn’t buy this room heater for my PC, lol. I think the entire Comet Lake lineup sips more power. I’m quite happy with my Ryzen 3600 ! runs like a breeze. Never overheats either.
that was some helpful article and information on Comet lake btw.
Intel is dying…
Nah, they’ll be back. I’ve never been a fan of their business practices, but they always find a way of making a comback. They’re too large and have too much money to stay down.
They are still stuck with their 10nm fab node though.
There is nothing stopping from from using TSMC and their 5 and 7nm nodes.
They’ll be back from the grave more like….On a serious note, I do think what you say might turn out true, but I’m not that optimistic when it comes to Intel.
But they do have the resources and R&D to match the competition.
They’ve been in this position before. It is how we got the Core series, and the Core2 series before that.
they are ‘already’ dead in the water.
???
Gratz MM keep it up!
Thanks for your kind words and support, m8 !
you gay bruh ?
Intel’s panic mode is amusing.
Congratulations Metal Messiah! If you remember a few days ago I already congratulated you for being FINALLY part of the DSOG staff! But you told me it wasn’t like that 🙁
Now I can finally give you my most sincere wishes …. it is clear to everyone here, that you are the backbone of this site!
I don’t know, without you, what the site would have been like in these years!
Congrats Man https://media3.giphy.com/media/xDpB3lRInUYla/giphy.gif
lol, You are toooooooooooooo kind bud ! ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?……….
Shrinking the die is so old school The new terms is called thinning the die .
?