News Intel announces an extra two years of warranty for its chips amid crashing and instability issues — longer warranty applies to 13th- and 14th-Gen C...

[PaulAlcorn]

Thanks, Paul! I would really appreciate it, if you could re-test Raptor Lake with Intel's microcode patch, once it's released. Please also adhere to their official guidelines for what settings people should use to avoid premature CPU failure.


I'm also seeing:

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Intel Core i7-14700K​

Overall Best CPU for Gaming — Alternate Pick​

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Intel Core i9-13900K​

Highest Performance Best CPU for Gaming - Alternate Pick​

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All three have the caveat, so I guess you indeed noticed them.

Yes, those aren't the primary pick for those categories, just alternates.

In regards to testing, yes, all Intel chips are currently undergoing re-tests (it is killing me, honestly) using Intel's new guidance. This is, of course, going to be reflected in upcoming Zen 5 reviews.

 

[YSCCC]

Boost power cosunmption is 106w (for 54 seconds) for T and 219w for the non k. Both way lower than the competition, even for those 54 seconds.

Single threaded workloads

Spoiler

https://tpucdn.com/review/intel-core-i9-14900k-raptor-lake-tested-at-power-limits-down-to-35-w/images/cinebench-single.png

https://tpucdn.com/review/intel-cor...power-limits-down-to-35-w/images/super-pi.png

Seems like they beat the competition in both ST and games, even capped as low at 95 or 65w.

https://www.anandtech.com/show/1869...review-ryzen-7000-at-65-w-zen-4-efficiency/11

For what real measurements the counter parts don't really look like eating more W than the RPLs, also FYI the now presumably "fixed" with intel extreme profile 14900k scores around 36-37k R23 marks, while the 7950X got 38k, I doubt the non-K version really competes well, also till now, we are still not sure if the T or non-K series are problem free by now, when it is now suspected/speculated that it is the transient spikes waking from C state to full throttle kills it, not the 253W use case.

By no measn AMD is perfect, they just don't F up so much, and when they did F up in the X3D melting case, they reacted promptly within a short while, not whole 2 generations. In chip industry for us better they trade blows every now and then so we have better service and better performance at lower cost, I chose the Alder lake back then due to it being faster than the Ryzen 5, no denial of that, then upgraded to 14900K since release coz I then can use the contact frame and undervolt in day 1 to prevent warping issue, together with the fact that I don't have to change board+ram and only spend on CPU to get 12 more E cores and much faster P cores for photo and video editing. By no means I am a AMD fanboy but seriously, sole performance in a few marks don't matter, especially those marks now have to take a huge bowl of salt, it looks very likely Intel have pushed the architecture too far and who knows after the final, real fix (if it ever really fixes), how much % will it be leaving on the table, a ton of people among release of Alder lake invested heavily on cooling to keep it below 100C and utilize their insane boost speed which, especially in Cinebench MT style runs circles around competitor, now ATM sticking to the last "fix" namely intel spec extreme profile, their performance goes from 41k to 36k, which is even slower than or on par of the 7950X in MT at 38k.

As said before, it is not that it is fastest or not, and not that every other company will F up in some time, it is how they handles the crisis, it will be really interesting to see how the extra warranty will have/not massive unstable yet denied RMAs

 

[YSCCC]

I have to wonder how difficult the warranty process will be. I've already had MASSIVE issues in trying to deal with Intel and their absolutely stupid outsourced tech/warranty support this year already. Now I imagine that, along with them also insisting on purchase receipts to make sure the CPU hadn't been resold.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MoJat2c07lU


Apparently not easy, since this gone viral random ppl complains about such unclear responses

 

[slightnitpick]

Now I imagine that, along with them also insisting on purchase receipts to make sure the CPU hadn't been resold.

From what I understand warranties transfer to subsequent owners, at least in the US. The receipt isn't to check for resale (which frankly isn't possible as many receipts don't have personally identifying information on them). It's because the warranty period begins on the day of sale. If you don't have a dated receipt then the warranty would default to the earliest possible day that the processor may have been sold to a customer. As of now, even without the 2 year extension, this isn't an issue for any of the 13th and 14th gen processors.

A second purpose of the receipt is to very that this was a direct purchase and not through a systems maker (who has the obligation to honor the warranty).

Edit: In the case of CPU warranties from Intel I think the above is wrong.

 

[TheHerald]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MoJat2c07lU


Apparently not easy, since this gone viral random ppl complains about such unclear responses

It's not easy if you don't want it to be easy. Their reply literally says that you will get at MINIMUM the same CPU or most lilkely better, and you can even choose the refund option. What is hard about it? What the hell, the intel hatred is just wild...

 

[motocros1]

i wonder if it has anything to do with 95C-100C being considered "normal"

 

[YSCCC]

i wonder if it has anything to do with 95C-100C being considered "normal"

I bet not, the Ryzen goes almost the same and finger crossed they didn't have the same issues judging till now, but maybe it's part of the issue and maybe another ton of issues, only time will tell.

 

[JRStern]

My buddy just called me, his one year old laptop just bricked, he hadn't heard the story yet. He has an appointment at BestBuy service tonight.

 

[thisisaname]

The two-year warranty extension applies to the boxed units found at retail, but Intel's statement says those with OEM systems should reach out to the manufacturer, hinting that we might also see extensions from OEMs.

Who is going to pay for that?

 

[jp7189]

Yes, those aren't the primary pick for those categories, just alternates.

In regards to testing, yes, all Intel chips are currently undergoing re-tests (it is killing me, honestly) using Intel's new guidance. This is, of course, going to be reflected in upcoming Zen 5 reviews.

Do you already have access to the mid-August BIOS update that is expected to drop?

 

[edwould4]

Wondering how they're handling laptops with soldered chips. Sounds like there might be a big fight between Intel and all the gaming box makers trying to figure out who pays for a whole new machine when the labor to replace the chips starts stacking up. I'm envisioning another 10K illegals with soldering irons cresting the horizon at the border. Almost bought a Dell 7630 with i9-13900HX and RTX 4070 for less than 1K about a week ago . Had it in the cart but got stalled out trying to make a Dell 10% coupon work. Finally got that to work and was ready to pull the trigger when the cart reset because the sale had expired. Asked Dell to give me the price because the coupon stalled me out and No, but but bu No, Sorry. That was before I read about the 'chip problem'. Thanks Dell, you can keep your roasted marshmallow maker. I'll be checking the tech hardware news from now on before I buy anything more expensive than a mouse pad.

 

[slightnitpick]

My buddy just called me, his one year old laptop just bricked, he hadn't heard the story yet. He has an appointment at BestBuy service tonight.

Was your buddy getting BSODs prior to this bricking? If not, this may be some other issue, possibly unrelated to Intel.

 

[JRStern]

RMA gets you a free replacement and 100 shares of stock.

 

[JRStern]

Was your buddy getting BSODs prior to this bricking? If not, this may be some other issue, possibly unrelated to Intel.

I lack details, but what are the odds.
I think he was using it to take a zoom yoga class ...

 

[slightnitpick]

I lack details, but what are the odds.
I think he was using it to take a zoom yoga class ...

I can't really find reliability data for laptops younger than the mid 2010s. Back then the rates were pretty crappy.

But anecdotally my wife's 2018 Thinkpad appeared to brick in the first year of ownership. I drove to a warranty service shop, pressed the power button, and was surprised to find that it booted up. The guy looked at it anyway and couldn't find anything wrong. And yes, I had tried powering it on again before the drive to no effect.

 

[YSCCC]

It's not easy if you don't want it to be easy. Their reply literally says that you will get at MINIMUM the same CPU or most lilkely better, and you can even choose the refund option. What is hard about it? What the hell, the intel hatred is just wild...

https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/cpus/intel-customer-bemoans-cpu-rma-process

yea and sure they do RMA with ease and is completely fine for all those cases and unclear, frustrating PR wordings...

 

[YSCCC]

I lack details, but what are the odds.
I think he was using it to take a zoom yoga class ...

More often laptop owners lack knowledge or even interst to trouble shoot, either you know how to do trouble shooting and search on web, or "it just crash/hangs" and ask your geek friend... But this time around say it's a M/B or SSD failure, intel will still be blamed for it coz it's the now famous 14th gen CPU

 

[TheHerald]

https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/cpus/intel-customer-bemoans-cpu-rma-process

yea and sure they do RMA with ease and is completely fine for all those cases and unclear, frustrating PR wordings...

And another great example of why facts don't matter when it comes to hating on Intel. So go read the reddit thread. This is what happened

Guy send 2 pictures to Intel, intel says they are remarked cpus and suggests him to take it to Microcenter instead. He did take them to Microcenter and they told him to clean the paste and resend the pictures to Intel. He did that and all was fine. Problem was that the AI recognition didn't work cause the cpu still had paste stains on it.

The problem has been resolved.

But don't let that stop you, keep at it.

 

[YSCCC]

And another great example of why facts don't matter when it comes to hating on Intel. So go read the reddit thread. This is what happened

Guy send 2 pictures to Intel, intel says they are remarked cpus and suggests him to take it to Microcenter instead. He did take them to Microcenter and they told him to clean the paste and resend the pictures to Intel. He did that and all was fine. Problem was that the AI recognition didn't work cause the cpu still had paste stains on it.

The problem has been resolved.

But don't let that stop you, keep at it.

yea, that message of you can still send back but we might not return or refund if it don't pass our own tests is fully warranted in the first place.

And this all only happens after that reddit post appeared, so who knows if it's someone monitoring the reddit page seeing it will turn sour and decided to just settle it. Don't let it stop you to be a fan also, and remember don't switch to others anytime soon, just stick with intel

 

[TheHerald]

yea, that message of you can still send back but we might not return or refund if it don't pass our own tests is fully warranted, don't let it stop you to be a fan also, and remember don't switch to others anytime soon, just stick with intel

They never said we might not return or refund if they don't pass our tests. They said they won't if its remarked

Which makes sense, since remarking is a fraud.

So again, the heck is your issue here?

 

[TheHerald]

Don't let it stop you to be a fan also,

Im a fan and won't stop anytime soon. A fan of facts.

If i google "Denied RMA X" if X being any company on the planet, how many threads will i find? There are many reasons for a company to reject RMA, and you pointing out one or two cases (out of hundreds of RMAs done daily) is absolutely insane. What makes it more insane is that neither of these 2 cases you managed to find were denied, lol.

To a normal non biased person both these cases reinforce the idea that Intel will go above and beyond to honor the RMA. Not even joking. I'm sleeping better today after reading these 2 cases then I did yesterday. Basically all I have to do is provide a clean picture of the CPU and I'll receive the same or better CPU that fits my motherboard as a replacement. That's F-A-N-T-A-S-T-I-C.

 

[YSCCC]

Im a fan and won't stop anytime soon. A fan of facts.

If i google "Denied RMA X" if X being any company on the planet, how many threads will i find? There are many reasons for a company to reject RMA, and you pointing out one or two cases (out of hundreds of RMAs done daily) is absolutely insane. What makes it more insane is that neither of these 2 cases you managed to find were denied, lol.

To a normal non biased person both these cases reinforce the idea that Intel will go above and beyond to honor the RMA. Not even joking. I'm sleeping better today after reading these 2 cases then I did yesterday. Basically all I have to do is provide a clean picture of the CPU and I'll receive the same or better CPU that fits my motherboard as a replacement. That's F-A-N-T-A-S-T-I-C.

Lol, that's not a fan of facts, only a fan of "facts" that aligned to your mindset, I bet everyone were, btw you only sleep better? I ate better and get happier after more of these issues arise and seeing their stock plumets! it means at least in short term they will honor more of their RMA when we put online, and that others will be aware of the issues that is coming if they don't do good CS, the world just gets better.

I suggest you to improve your sleeping further watching the "timeline" part of GN here,

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6vQlvefGxk

it sure they are going above and beyond, and I did learn a lot of how to deal with RMA beside just bringing the CPU back to dealer for a better result though

 

[TheHerald]

Now let's check some actual data from one of the biggest workstation sellers, and their opinion of the situation. Puget always preconfigures their systems, they don't ship them out with the default motherboard configurations.

Spoiler

Now let's see what impact using non default settings has on the CPUs failure rates.

Spoiler

Conlusion, as long as you are not running the crazy mobo defaults, buy Intel for stability. AMD pushed way too high to get performance parity resulting in huge (double vs 13/14th and triple vs 12th gen) failure rates. Stay away, right?

 

[YSCCC]

Now let's check some actual data from one of the biggest workstation sellers, and their opinion of the situation. Puget always preconfigures their systems, they don't ship them out with the default motherboard configurations.

Spoiler

Now let's see what impact using non default settings has on the CPUs failure rates.

Spoiler

Conlusion, as long as you are not running the crazy mobo defaults, buy Intel for stability. AMD pushed way too high to get the high resulting in huge (double vs 13/14th and triple vs 12th gen) failure rates. Stay away, right?

Ok, this surely brings me peace of mind, that the vendor is not liable to make sure the board partners enforce their spec as default setting is perfectly fine, since someone with deep knowledge will do their own time consuming tests and find that spec (which was not released with the CPU in any easily accessible manner), and that customers are expected to go into advanced BIOS day one and tinker with like 20+ settings to keep it with low failure rate, thanks to be such a reliable tech company

 

[TheHerald]

Ok, this surely brings me peace of mind, that the vendor is not liable to make sure the board partners enforce their spec as default setting is perfectly fine, since someone with deep knowledge will do their own time consuming tests and find that spec (which was not released with the CPU in any easily accessible manner), and that customers are expected to go into advanced BIOS day one and tinker with like 20+ settings to keep it with low failure rate, thanks to be such a reliable tech company

I cannot speak for anyone else, but since I never run default settings on any CPU, wouldn't you say that I should stick with Intel if I cared about stability?