Are we ever getting 6GHz CPUs?

Yogi · May 17, 2020

Next-gen console CPUs are significant improvements, which while good for gaming in general is worrisome if you like very high-fps gaming on PC.
We'll need 8-12 core 16-24 thread beasts running at 5-6GHz+ to have even a slight chance of keeping those 144+ framerates in next gen games as game makers start to make use of the new cpus while targetting 30-60fps.

Is there a heat/power issue with the 10nm, 7nm and smaller nodes that means we are saying goodbye to high clock speeds? Intel has struggled with 10nm, which Intel ~~themselves~~ has said themselves won't be a major node for them. It draws a lot of power and puts out a lot of heat at high clock speeds. AMD's 7nm runs hot and doesn't hit that high of a clock speed either. 14nm was doing it pretty easily but the smaller nodes seem to be an issue. Is this the end of super high clocks?

I want to keep playing at even 144+ framerates next gen, 90 will be so difficult to go back to in first person games and there's also the PS3 emulator that can unlock framerates, RPCS3 which needs high clock speeds - I need my 144+ wipeout HD.

Is this the end of high framerates?

Soulflarz · May 17, 2020

Framerates arent bad, your programs of choice aren't multithreaded efficiently. Thats a them issue, not a core speed issue.

Anyways, not any time soon, its a waste for them to try - crytek misbet on this future and its why crysis 1 still doesnt run notably better on newer cpus.

As cores go up and multithreading increases im not sute you *need* a 6ghz core from their perspective?

Max|Payne · May 17, 2020

The future is parallelism, not brute force.

Finaika · May 17, 2020

Maybe with PS6.

Reinhardt Schneider · May 17, 2020

If i want to heat myself on winter i'll use my heater

ThereAreFourNaan · May 17, 2020

CPUs hit 6GHz with OC'ing and extreme cooling a good while back.

5.0 GHz+ on Skylake cores is already pretty intense.

Iron Eddie · May 17, 2020

Gears 5 will have 120fps option, the team at Polyphony Digital talked about 120fps for Gran Turismo, so maybe we might see a slect few but it's baby steps. First we need more games at 60, not 30 being the standard.

Seems like CPU's in general have a tough time getting to 5GHz unless major overclocking is done.

aisback · May 17, 2020

If you're happy with less cores then it's more possible.

I think it'll be a while but with IPC improvements it doesn't matter as much

Yogi · May 17, 2020

I don't want 5 seconds of turbo hitting a little over 5GHz then throttling back down because it's about to melt. I want a constant 5.5GHz+ beast pumping out triple digit frames till the end of days.

Do I need to stock up on liquid nitrogen? What benefits are even going to come with future CPUs? Do I just buy a 9900K and call it a day?

Tell me they can fix it.

Onix555 · May 17, 2020

6Ghz is not physically possible on silicon processors at room temperature due to a whole list of physics issues that occur at the atomic level.
You have to go sub-zero to achieve that.

However it's not like we lack CPU performance in the first place, the major reason for a lot of low performance software is simply just inefficient code.
Most developers can tell you that they're not hired to do things in an optimised and smart manner; instead its "get out the door as fast as possible so we can make profit".

Pop-O-Matic · May 17, 2020

Raw GHz doesn't matter nearly as much as marketing would want you to believe. Even for a single-threaded workload, IPC and other factors weigh way more heavily for your performance than raw GHz. Besides, given how most AAA games emphasize graphics over everything else, you're more likely to be GPU bottlenecked than CPU bottlenecked.

EloKa · May 17, 2020

CPU clock speed isn't a good point of reference to determine the capabilities of a system. A CPU with 6GHz can have less performance than a CPU with 4GHz.
Btw teraflops are also a bad indicator as well. Clock speed and teraflops are just fancy marketing buzzwords to make you believe something is better than the other.

ThereAreFourNaan · May 17, 2020

Yogi said:
I don't want 5 seconds of turbo hitting a little over 5GHz then throttling back down because it's about to melt. I want a constant 5.5GHz+ beast pumping out triple digit frames till the end of days.

Do I need to stock up on liquid nitrogen? What benefits are even going to come with future CPUs? Do I just buy a 9900K and call it a day?

Tell me they can fix it.

Don't focus on the clockspeeds too much - there will be new CPUs coming out without much new in the way of clockspeed increases, but which nevertheless increase CPU performance due to architectural changes. Zen 3 CPUs (Ryzen 4000 series) and Rocket Lake (Intel 11000 series) will be coming out either late this year or early next year based on a comination of current official, best guess and leaked information.

Rocket Lake will still be 14nm (to our knowledge, on at least some of the product stack), but will back port future architectures designed originally for 10nm. Gaming performance will likely be higher, but clock speeds may actually be lower in some cases! Zen 3 is expected to maintain similar (or maybe slightly higher) clocks while offering some IPC improvemnets too.

tuxfool · May 17, 2020

Yogi said:
I don't want 5 seconds of turbo hitting a little over 5GHz then throttling back down because it's about to melt. I want a constant 5.5GHz+ beast pumping out triple digit frames till the end of days.

Do I need to stock up on liquid nitrogen? What benefits are even going to come with future CPUs? Do I just buy a 9900K and call it a day?

Tell me they can fix it.

In case you haven't read anything anybody has said.

Raw frequency isn't an indicator of anything. Overclockers can take Bulldozer cores to 8Ghz on liquid nitrogen. At those frequencies, they're still slower than modern processors.

pswii60 · May 17, 2020

Clock speed is only part of the equation even with the same number of cores. IPC can still be improved further.

If you were to clock both the 3700x and 9900k at 4Ghz for example, the 9900k still pulls ahead:

lightchris · May 17, 2020

Yogi said:
I don't want 5 seconds of turbo hitting a little over 5GHz then throttling back down because it's about to melt. I want a constant 5.5GHz+ beast pumping out triple digit frames till the end of days.

Do I need to stock up on liquid nitrogen? What benefits are even going to come with future CPUs? Do I just buy a 9900K and call it a day?

Tell me they can fix it.

They can and will "fix it" the same way they have been doing for the last 15 years or so: More cores and/or more IPC (instructions per cycle).

CPUs may not be fast enough to do everything at >>100 fps the moment true next gen games arrive, but at most a few years later they likely will.

sir_crocodile · May 17, 2020

Not until we move to graphene processors

Which is no time in the near future.

Jegriva · May 17, 2020

Maxey said:
The future is parallelism, not brute force.

Yes, I thought we all discovered that after the Intel Prescott CPU.

Spinluck · May 17, 2020

Maxey said:
The future is parallelism, not brute force.

.

SmartWaffles · May 17, 2020

One of the most headscratching threads I've seen in a while. Those CPUs in the new consoles aren't even more powerful than any high end PC CPUs TODAY. And PC is already heading into more than 8C16T.

Deleted member 65994 · May 17, 2020

#BringBack1CoreCELLProcessors

KDR_11k · May 17, 2020

GHz growth stagnated many years back, turns out physics get really damn demanding at these speeds.That's why the development went towards more parallelism. But really, as long as developers target 30 FPS you can add any amount of power you want and they'll still just make the graphics prettier while keeping the framerate the same. If we dial back the graphics a bit we can get any framerate we want but that doesn't seem to satisfy the people who get to decide this tradeoff. For example if the current gen had maintained last gen graphics it could easily have hit very high framerates. Would you want that?

If you're looking for games that do prioritize framerate and resolution over graphical detail then try VR, you'll notice that the games are significantly uglier than flat screen games but you're wearing a high resolution, high refresh rate screen that demands perfect performance from the system.

RestEerie · May 17, 2020

If the past disaster of intel netburst architecture had taught us (which i personally live through it), t it's that the idea of getting better performance via pushing the maximum clockspeed is dumb.

Muad'dib · May 17, 2020

Parallelism is the future, but what about when it comes to emulation, don't Dolphin and RPCS3 benefit more from higher single core speeds? I can run Ninja Gaiden Sigma 1 perfectly on RPCS3 on my i7 4790, but Sigma 2 runs like a snail, everyone tells me your need a faster core CPU.

signal · May 17, 2020

They will never let us have such power.

Atolm · May 17, 2020

We're not CPU-limited in 95% of cases. Only in emulators like Yuzu and even that made huge multi-threading improvements.

cw_sasuke · May 17, 2020

Computing power is a team sport not a one man show.

Midgarian · May 17, 2020

Maxey said:
The future is parallelism, not brute force.

That's been the case for a long time, but we never seem to reach that future.

Still not enough software that is built from the ground up to utilise multi-core properly.

Yogi · May 17, 2020

The thing is the consoles already have high core counts so the games will have parallelism in mind right...so we need the high core count AND high clock speeds to out perform their targets significantly? Unless the IPC that people are mentioning from architecture changes goes up significantly?

But the Intel dude said it's like playing russian roulette, you make a bet then 4 years later you find out whether or not you're dead. So we can't even count on that happening this gen. :/

Are people expecting the 4000 AMD series to outperform a 9900K or newer in pure framerate?

OzBoz · May 17, 2020

CPU speed is not a limiting factor in current games. I think it's still all about GPUs and bus speed.

Wariobenotware · May 17, 2020

I wish. It could help out emulation a ton.

lightchris · May 17, 2020

Did you guys saying that games aren't CPU limited read the OP? He's specifically talking about high-fps gaming (144fps). You need a powerful CPU for that even now (and even then it is not always possible).

Atolm · May 17, 2020

lightchris said:
Did you guys saying that games aren't CPU limited read the OP? He's specifically talking about high-fps gaming (144fps). You need a powerful CPU for that even now (and even then it is not always possible).

I watch a ton of vids weekly comparing and benchmarking CPUs and even in stuff like AC Odyssey the most limiting factor is the GPU.

Are people expecting the 4000 AMD series to outperform a 9900K or newer in pure framerate?

A bump of 10-15% IPC is expected along with 300-400mhz more for every processor is expected so they should pull ahead fairly easily.

Jebusman · May 17, 2020

We're up against the laws of physics here. You get way more performance per watt by adding more cores and dropping the clocks slightly, than by trying to pump the clock up significantly higher on fewer cores. I'd also imagine you get a lot more successes in the fab process than you would aiming for a high clock speed part, due to all the failures from high clock parts that run too far out of spec to sell as a viable product.

lightchris said:
Did you guys saying that games aren't CPU limited read the OP? He's specifically talking about high-fps gaming (144fps). You need a powerful CPU for that even now (and even then it is not always possible).

There's nothing inherent about high FPS gaming that requires clock speed over more cores. It's entirely up to the games/apps and how they were built, with many of them not designed to scale across that many cores. We can partially thank Intel for that as they stagnated for years releasing the same 4 core 8 thread parts with slight improvements didn't give devs much reason to target anything else. I would think going forward parallelization is a bigger focus as the industry moves to a model of more cores

Emulators at least still demand high clock speed over core count because the very tight timing requirements on the emulator's processes complicates scaling that workload across multiple cores, far more than it's worth for hobbyists to try and work around.

defaltoption · May 17, 2020

Yes but what's more important is that all programs including games start to fully take advantage of cores thrown at it because 6GHz will be much harder to achieve require a lot of power and cooling and take years to hit. We might even have to move to new materials to make processors before it happens.

tokkun · May 17, 2020

lightchris said:
Did you guys saying that games aren't CPU limited read the OP? He's specifically talking about high-fps gaming (144fps). You need a powerful CPU for that even now (and even then it is not always possible).

The OP's premise is that next-gen console games will be designed to be CPU-bound at 30-60 fps. The implied argument is that the only reason current games are not CPU-bound at low FPS on PC is because game developers are designing around current-gen console CPUs, which have much weaker CPU performance. The OP's argument assumes that when consoles have faster CPUs the new games will still be CPU-bound (and specifically frequency-bound) at low fps on these faster CPUs.

There are many reasons why this may turn out to be a false premise:
- Games will likely want to continue supporting lower-end hardware for years after the new consoles release. This includes both current-gen consoles as well as lower-spec PCs, like laptops.
- Designers may want to offer 120 fps on consoles now that they have HDMI 2.1, so they may not want to design around being CPU bound at low framerates.
- Developers simply might not come up with enough work for the CPU to do for it to be the bottleneck at low fps
- Game engines may be good enough at parallelism that frame rates are not frequency-bound in low ranges. In this case it may be good enough to just have more cores, and you can already buy CPUs like the 3900X that have 50% more cores than the consoles.

Pargon · May 17, 2020

It's really weird to see so many people saying that games are not currently CPU-limited, and repeating that "parallelism is the future" when that completely ignores the realities of currently-released games. The majority of games I've played this generation have been limited by the CPU (Ryzen 1700X).
Add me to the list of people that is very concerned about the impact that games being built for 30 FPS on Zen 2 hardware is going to have for high frame rate gaming.

Maple · May 17, 2020

sir_crocodile said:
Not until we move to graphene processors

Which is no time in the near future.

Imagine if this ever became a reality. 500+ Ghz clock speeds.

Orayn · May 17, 2020

Did OP time travel from 2005? Every new generation of CPUs since Conroe has had large enough improvements in IPC that raw GHz numbers haven't been a focal point for quite a while.

Overall CPU demands will definitely increase as we progress through next gen, yes, but the remedy to that isn't necessarily some specific clock speed range.

Decarb · May 17, 2020

There seems to be a physical barrier for getting the speeds beyond 6Ghz on air or even water.

Vexii · May 17, 2020

Yogi said:
Next-gen console CPUs are significant improvements, which while good for gaming in general is worrisome if you like very high-fps gaming on PC.
We'll need 8-12 core 16-24 thread beasts running at 5-6GHz+ to have even a slight chance of keeping those 144+ framerates in next gen games as game makers start to make use of the new cpus while targetting 30-60fps.

Is there a heat/power issue with the 10nm, 7nm and smaller nodes that means we are saying goodbye to high clock speeds? Intel has struggled with 10nm, which Intel ~~themselves~~ has said themselves won't be a major node for them. It draws a lot of power and puts out a lot of heat at high clock speeds. AMD's 7nm runs hot and doesn't hit that high of a clock speed either. 14nm was doing it pretty easily but the smaller nodes seem to be an issue. Is this the end of super high clocks?

I want to keep playing at even 144+ framerates next gen, 90 will be so difficult to go back to in first person games and there's also the PS3 emulator that can unlock framerates, RPCS3 which needs high clock speeds - I need my 144+ wipeout HD.

Is this the end of high framerates?

If you think we're going to ever get cpus with all cores boosting to 6GHz in our lifetimes I think you've got the wrong idea 😋

Parallel processing is the future, not only because a distributed workload is more efficient, but it's also so much easier to achieve than brute-forcing that kind of power through a single die

It isn't the raw clock speed that's going to push your frame rates, and that dream died back in the late 2010s. It's the reason Crysis still runs like dogass on modern CPUs. It wasn't built with the future of MT in mind.

LuckyLocke · May 17, 2020

EloKa said:
CPU clock speed isn't a good point of reference to determine the capabilities of a system. A CPU with 6GHz can have less performance than a CPU with 4GHz.
Btw teraflops are also a bad indicator as well. Clock speed and teraflops are just fancy marketing buzzwords to make you believe something is better than the other.

They're not just that. There's an actual meaning to what the clock speed is. And in the same actual architecture, clock speed does provide you with information on which CPU is more performant. But they are numbers that are easy to market to the general public so there's a bit too much importance given to them that's for sure.

Pargon · May 17, 2020

Vexii said:
Parallel processing is the future, not only because a distributed workload is more efficient, but it's also so much easier to achieve than brute-forcing that kind of power through a single die

It's easier for hardware. It's far more difficult for software. That's why most games are still bottlenecked by a single main thread.

Firebricks · May 17, 2020

Frequency is only a part of the performance equation. You have other factors like IPC that matter significantly as well.

Deleted member 25042 · May 17, 2020

OP's concern regarding high frame rate gaming is warranted though.
When devs target 30fps on consoles with Zen 2 CPUs, and make full use of them, what do you think you'll need to get 120+ fps on PC?

wiggler · May 17, 2020

Why do you need 6 GHz the human eye can't see more than 60 Hz!

Joking aside, CPUs are fast as hell, but big budget open world games have never really been high frame rate friendly. For 60 fps, the CPU has to update every entity actively being simulated, and maybe some rough simulation that aren't immediately around the player. Simulation requires doing physics, updating every animated vertex of a model, and handle anything the player decides to do in 16.67 milliseconds for 60 fps.

The only games that jive with really high fps (120+) are games with fairly limited simulation and graphics to let both CPU and GPU shred frames. Like CS:GO, Valorant, etc, which high fps greatly improves gameplay.

Will big budget and open world games ever hit those frame rates? I doubt it, as long as they're pushing complex simulation and beautiful shiny graphics, I don't think we'll see those games ever go higher than 60 fps, if that. But consoles will always be balancing power and budget, so you'll always be able to buy a PC that can brute force better performance.

Orayn · May 17, 2020

Marmelade said:
OP's concern regarding high frame rate gaming is warranted though.
When devs target 30fps on consoles with Zen 2 CPUs, and make full use of them, what do you think you'll need to get 120+ fps on PC?

I don't think that most 30 FPS games will be purely CPU bottlenecked and be at 100% utilization all the time.

If anything next-gen games will be less likely to be limited by the CPU and more by the massive GPU demands of doing 4K resolution with a bevy of new effects like ray tracing and the stuff we saw in the Unreal 5 demo.

gozu · May 17, 2020

Yogi said:
Is this the end of high framerates?

Yes. This is basically the end of high frame-rates.

CPUs evolve so slowly nowadays that single-core performance will barely double in 7 years, by which time the console generation is over as it is driven by multi-core GPUs which are still quadrupling in power every console gen with cores in the thousands, compared to CPUs with cores in the tens.

We never thought about this but it was always inevitable this would happen if the Ghz race came to an end. Sure, we got some mileage from fancier prediction algorithms combined with more L1/L2/L3 cache but the single-core improvement curve is flatlining with no disruptive technology in sight to save us.

So I anticipate that only in 7 years, when the PS6 is around the corner, will we be finally able to reliably run every console game at double the original framerates (30FPS -> 60FPS and 60FPS -> 120-144FPS).

ThereAreFourNaan · May 17, 2020

Orayn said:
I don't think that most 30 FPS games will be purely CPU bottlenecked and be at 100% utilization all the time.

No, but there are open questions regarding how much optimization they're going to be doing for PC ports if it's pretty easy for them to meet their CPU budgets at 30hz on console. Like situations where they've decided on a 33ms frame budget, they easily hit that target on CPU, do they really put in the extra miles to dramatically enhance CPU performance just so it can hit 70+ on PC? Sometimes yes, but I wouldn't expect that to always be true.

Games becoming increasingly parallel also doesn't mean "arbitrarily parallel". Like if I have a 16 core Zen 3 CPU, that's going to smoke the PS5's CPU in synthetic benchmarks for sure, but just how widely threaded are everyone going to make their games if the most they ever have access to on console is 14 threads? Will they make it scale well to 32 threads? Sometimes yes, but presumably the answer will also often be no. And if we're only seeing scaling maybe up to 20 threads, and per-core performance is only 30-40% higher, then doubling the framerates of the console should be doable, but what about quadrupling it like we often want to do in 2020 for people on these displays?

None of these things concern me for the first ~12 months or so of the new generation. Everything multiplat will still be built around the weaksauce jaguars. But after that, we'll see increasingly beefy CPU requirements for high refresh gaming (120hz+). A fair few games even today struggle to get these framerates taking the PS4/XBO into account - when they get left behind, those requirements will only climb.

Vexii · May 17, 2020

Pargon said:
It's easier for hardware. It's far more difficult for software. That's why most games are still bottlenecked by a single main thread.

Yes sorry I didn't make that very clear, it's definitely easier for hardware.

I wasn't too aware of games still mainly utilising a single main thread however, which is interesting to note.

Are we ever getting 6GHz CPUs?

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