Intel’s Core i9-13900K consumes insane power. You can tame it

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Both Intel and AMD extract a heck of a lot from every watt, as demonstrated by the range of performance these chips show when we manually power limit them to specific wattages. In the case of the Core i9-13900K, it still can outperform its predecessor even when its power limit is significantly dropped. Just look at it when constrained to a maximum of 85W—it still performs about the same as the 12900K at its default max turbo power of 241W.

On Team Red’s side, the Ryzen 9 7950X outperforms the Core i9-13900K when constrained by equal power limitations. In fact, not only does the 7950X at 65W handily beat the 13900K at 65W, but it almost bests the 13900K when the latter is set to 105W.

That’s good info for enthusiasts looking to tinker with their system’s power consumption and temperatures. But is the Core i9-13900K a power hog when you’re running it at stock?

Core i9-13900K power usage in different workloads

Intel Core i9-13900K total power draw w/ power limit variations v2

Gordon Mah Ung / PCWorld

Intel Core i9-13900K power benchmarks

Gordon Mah Ung / PCWorld

Intel Core i9-13900K power benchmarks

Gordon Mah Ung / PCWorld

When you compare the two flagship chips purely on the basis of power consumption (and not how much performance you get while under manually set limitations), calling a winner gets a little more complicated. At stock settings, the Core i9-13900K typically consumes less power in single-threaded tasks, while the Ryzen 9 7950X pulls significantly less electricity during multithreaded tasks. In lightly threaded tasks, like Adobe Lightroom or the two games we tested, it’s more of a tie.

The fun part is how much energy the chips draw when power limited. Notch down the Core i9-13900K to 105W or 65W, and it goes lighter on power consumption than the 7950X with the same limits. It may get outperformed by the 7950X at those TDPs, but you won’t be paying extra in electricity costs.

Intel Core i9-13900K power benchmarks

Gordon Mah Ung / PCWorld

Intel Core i9-13900K power benchmarks

Gordon Mah Ung / PCWorld

The takeaway from this? A little elbow grease can help you find your sweet spot for maximizing eye-popping performance while minimizing the hit to your monthly bills. We demonstrated the effects of power limiting here, but you should be able to achieve similar results via undervolting or even temperature limiting as well. And you’ll always still have a reserve of extra performance in the tank if you want to let your chip run wild and free.

But no one will be buying the Core i9-13900K (or the 7950X) solely on the basis of power efficiency and power draw. The more appealing chip will depend on your energy concerns relative to your performance needs—and for most folks, the face-melting speed of Intel’s best chip will be well worth the cost of keeping it running at stock.

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