Question Looking for an ELI5 regarding efficiency and performance cores with intel?

[YouFilthyHippo]

I was noticing that 12th gen intel CPUs have perforamnce cores and efficiency cores. What is the point of this? Is it power efficiency? So your powerbill can drop by a whole 12 cents each month? Also, how can it be more efficient? Why wouldn't we just use all performance cores, and then just down clock them and in turn, drop power draw to be more efficient. If an application requires more performance, then the E-cores are now crippled if the P-cores are maxed out and more processing power is needed. Also, how does Windoze 10 manage which cores to use for which application. For the latest AAA games, the P-cores will be in order. For typing in notepad, only an e-core is needed. How does windows 10 decide?

I feel like this whole P-core and E-core concept doesn't actually do anything but make resource management more difficulty for the user. Who's dumb idea was this? And will we ever be able to buy Intel CPUs with only P-cores ever again?. I see a 14-core CPU with 6 P cores and 8 E-cores. What if I want 14 P-cores? Now what?

I think I need an ELI5 on this because it doesn't make any sense

 

[kanewolf]

I was noticing that 12th gen intel CPUs have perforamnce cores and efficiency cores. What is the point of this? Is it power efficiency? So your powerbill can drop by a whole 12 cents each month? Also, how can it be more efficient? Why wouldn't we just use all performance cores, and then just down clock them and in turn, drop power draw to be more efficient. If an application requires more performance, then the E-cores are now crippled if the P-cores are maxed out and more processing power is needed. Also, how does Windoze 10 manage which cores to use for which application. For the latest AAA games, the P-cores will be in order. For typing in notepad, only an e-core is needed. How does windows 10 decide?

I feel like this whole P-core and E-core concept doesn't actually do anything but make resource management more difficulty for the user. Who's dumb idea was this? And will we ever be able to buy Intel CPUs with only P-cores ever again?. I see a 14-core CPU with 6 P cores and 8 E-cores. What if I want 14 P-cores? Now what?

I think I need an ELI5 on this because it doesn't make any sense

I think, to fully benefit from E cores and P cores, Windows 11 is required. The scheduler has additional tweaks and "hints" to efficiently schedule between the two types of resources.

 

[TerryLaze]

Why wouldn't we just use all performance cores, and then just down clock them and in turn, drop power draw to be more efficient.

Because that is extremely wasteful, and you might not care that you only use a small percentage of your new fancy core that you spent a whole lot of money on, but for intel it's a huge difference in cost but also just material they have to come up with to make all the CPUs they need to make.
AMD has to resort to put one good and one not so good CCD into each CPU to make ends meet.

Also, how does Windoze 10 manage which cores to use for which application. For the latest AAA games, the P-cores will be in order. For typing in notepad, only an e-core is needed. How does windows 10 decide?

Intel worked with MS on a thread director for windows 11 to make smarter choices but in the end the coders need to provide correct affinity masks and thread priorities to make software run the best possible way.