Arrow Lake's desktop chips are here, and we're looking at the flagship Intel Core Ultra 9 285K today. While the mid-range Core Ultra 7 265K tops out at 20 cores, the flagship hybrid big.little processor adds another four E-cores, for a total of 8 P-cores and 16 E-cores. That's also a total of 24 threads because Arrow Lake is the first Intel processor family in a long time not to feature Hyperthreading on any cores. With a max boost of 5.7GHz and higher base clocks than its predecessor, the Core Ultra 9 285K should somewhat balance out the minor hit to performance from the removal of those virtual threads.
There are some genuinely good advancements on this CPU, like more cache, better integrated Arc Xe2 Graphics with 64 EUs (although without the dedicated XMX cores for XeSS), and an impressive boost to performance per watt. That last point isn't quite at the level that AMD's latest Ryzen processors are at, but this is the first CPUs from Intel's big architecture shift, and it will improve as the process matures. Intel's 13th and 14th-gen CPU families were both hard to tame for thermals, and I'm glad to say that the Core Ultra 9 285K fares much better in this regard, even if it does mean a minor regression in some other areas. It's not a bad CPU by any means, but I can't help but wonder what could have been if Intel hadn't needed to redesign to fit TSMC's node instead of keeping it in-house.
About this review: Gigabyte supplied XDA with samples for this review and neither Gigabyte nor Intel had any input to its contents.
Intel Core Ultra 9 285K
- Cores
- 8P / 16E
- Threads
- 24
- Architecture
- Arrow Lake
- Process
- TSMC N3B
The Intel Core Ultra 9 285K has flipped the script on Ryzen, but in the worst way for Intel at this time. While it's powerful for productivity tasks, it has relatively lackluster gaming performance, which will hurt sales to enthusiasts.
- Impressive thermals compared to last two generations
- Peak productivity performance even without Hyperthreading
- High speed DDR5 support
- Powerful integrated GPU
- Weak gaming performance
- Needs new motherboard and RAM
- High memory latency
Price, specs, and availability
The Intel Core Ultra 9 285 K's $630 MSRP will hurt your wallet almost as much as the price of the motherboard you'll need to install it on. That's if you can find one in stock because, as of the time of writing, Newegg was the only source with non-scalped pricing, and they were out of stock. This is the enthusiast flagship of this generation, though, so a high price tag is expected. The other two CPUs that launched with it are more affordable and also mostly available. It's also slightly under the competition's flagship from this generation, which is nice to see in this age of ever-increasing prices.
Intel Core Ultra 9 285K
- Socket
- FCLGA1851
- Cores
- 8P / 16E
- Threads
- 24
- Base Clock Speed
- 3.7 GHz / 3.2 GHz
- Boost Clock Speed
- 5.7 GHz / 5.5 GHz
- PCIe
- 5.0
- Cache
- 36MB L3 + 40MB L2
- RAM support
- DDR5-6400
- Graphics
- Intel Graphics
- Architecture
- Arrow Lake
- Process
- TSMC N3B
- TDP
- 125 W
- Power Draw
- ~250 W
- Price (MSRP)
- $599
What's good with this Arrow Lake Core Ultra 9 285K
The sweeping architectural changes bring some welcome news
Intel's Arrow Lake is a sweeping redesign of the architecture used in the last few generations of "Core i" processors. Now they're known as Core Ultra, but the name change is only a minor part of the whole. A larger focus on AI features is generally less important for the desktop family, as the NPU inside isn't anywhere near as powerful as the mobile processors. What you do get is support for much faster DDR5 RAM speeds, although this can't quite offset the latency penalty of the new tile design and slightly slower ring bus. Intel promised lower power draws, and we certainly noticed that in some tasks, but the big news here is that thermals are at manageable levels for what seems like ages.
Intel promised lower power draws, and we certainly noticed that in some tasks, but the big news here is that thermals are at manageable levels for what seems like ages.
It wouldn't be befitting of a flagship CPU to test it on anything but a premium motherboard, and the Gigabyte Z890 Aorus Master fits the bill. At $500, it's on the higher end without going into the enthusiast range, and it's got everything you'd want to see from a quality motherboard. The power delivery system is solid; it stays cool, and there's a ton of connectivity, BIOS Flashback, and other premium features. The best part? No more tiny screws for things like the M.2 slots, as everything is using quick-release clasps. We put the CPU through our usual suite of benchmarking utilities and real-world emulation, and a selection of games that we've used for GPU testing so we had easy points of reference for how the CPU performed. Everything was set to default, with two exceptions. DDR5 speed, which was set to 8,933MT/s at CL42 by Gigabyte's Aorus AI Snatch utility, and Windows 11 power settings, which were set to Best Performance instead of Balanced.
If synthetic benchmarks were the only thing that would set one CPU apart from another, the Core Ultra 9 285K would be an easy recommendation. It pulled some of the best benchmark scores we've seen, but it is application-dependent and does get surpassed in some tasks. One place it excels is in video rendering, with a new record in our Handbrake testing that is significantly faster than anything else. That's without using the Xe iGPU, which might actually make things a little faster. Like the Core Ultra 7 265K, there's some funkiness going on, but whether that's down to Windows, microcode, or other BIOS features, we couldn't narrow it down. We'll definitely revisit things if we hear updates from Intel about performance fixes, but as it stands right now, it's still a good CPU, if not the class-leading performance that enthusiasts have come to expect from Intel.
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What's not so good vs the rest of the market
Intel has lost the gaming crown (for now)
When Intel launched Arrow Lake, it showed gaming performance slides with the Core Ultra 9 285K either slightly behind or slightly ahead of the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X. Now, I don't have that particular CPU on hand, but I do have the 12th-gen Intel Core i9-12900K that I used to review the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 Super FE, so I put the two head-to-head. The bad news for gamers is that Arrow Lake failed to impress.
It wasn't even close, with the only game that performed slightly better being the GPU-limited The Last of Us: Part 1. Now, the benchmarks I have for the i9-12900K use 5,600MT/s RAM, while the Core Ultra 9 285K uses 8,933MT/s RAM here. No matter what other title I fired up, from Cyberpunk 2077 to Forza Horizon 5, the Core Ultra was behind, sometimes significantly. For less-demanding titles, that won't matter as much, but for the titles pushing the medium forward, it struggles.
If synthetic benchmarks were the only thing that would set one CPU apart from another, the Core Ultra 9 285K would be an easy recommendation.
Now, we all knew gaming performance was going to take a hit this generation. Intel told us as much, but I didn't realize it would be so much. Maybe if it was paired with a 4090 or RX 7900 XTX, the performance wouldn't matter as much, but flagship processors are supposed to be good at gaming. That's the marketing push we've been fed for decades, and maybe it's time that got rewritten.
What is being rewritten this generation is efficiency. The Core Ultra 9 285K uses significantly less power than the i9-14900K it's supposed to replace in the lineup. That's a good thing, and in my opinion, a worthwhile trade for the performance hit. Gone are the days of 100C+ desktop flagships from Intel. The Core Ultra 9 285K has a 250W TDP when under boost, and it just overshoots that with a 260W full-package draw when at 100% utilized. That keeps a Delta-T temperature of just over 65C, even in a 24C room. Under 90C on an Intel "9 series" desktop processor? I'll take that any day of the week, especially since it is under an air cooler. It'll likely perform even better on AIO coolers, and that's something we'll explore soon with some AIO cooler showdowns.
Should you buy the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K?
You should buy the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K if:
- You're building a new PC from scratch and want to use Intel.
- You want the latest from Intel.
- You want manageable thermals.
You shouldn't buy the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K if:
- You already have a powerful CPU from either AMD or Intel.
- You desire the most efficient processors available.
- You want to build the most powerful PC.
I'm going to echo my colleague Rich Edmonds here, in that this feels like Intel's "Ryzen 1000 moment." The move to chiplets with decoupled I/O and RAM controllers has brought some similarities in odd behavior in both synthetic and real-world testing. The good news is that some of those issues are likely fixable in software and BIOS updates, and what is an already-good CPU could be nearly great. I don't think it's going to surpass Ryzen this generation, or perhaps even the next iteration, but it's the right move for Intel, which has relied on process improvements and increasing voltages for performance gains in recent years.
Under 90C on an Intel "9 series" desktop processor? I'll take that any day of the week
If you absolutely have to build a new system right now that needs to have Intel inside, the Intel Core Ultra series is the only CPU to recommend right now. They fix the thermal issues of the last two generations while keeping similar performance levels. They absolutely are among the best CPUs Intel has produced, and I can't wait to see what comes with Arrow Lake mobile chips and the next generation of desktop chips in a year's time. It's just a hard sell right now in this current state, just like how the Ryzen 1000 was. Once the bugs have been squished,, it becomes a much easier CPU to recommend, and we'll revisit things as updates come out.
Intel Core Ultra 9 285K
- Cores
- 8P / 16E
- Threads
- 24
- Architecture
- Arrow Lake
- Process
- TSMC N3B
The Intel Core Ultra 9 285K has flipped the script on Ryzen, but in the worst way for Intel at this time. While it's powerful for productivity tasks, it has relatively lackluster gaming performance, which will hurt sales to enthusiasts.