Intel Rocket Lake-S Processors: Specifications Overview

Yesterday evening, the "blue" giant introduced its 11th Gen Core chips based on the new Rocket Lake-S architecture. While these new processors are still manufactured on 14nm nodes, Rocket Lake-S isn't just another Skylake refresh. Instead, it's a backport of the 10nm Sunny Cove architecture to the aging 14nm process.

Here are the key improvements in this generation of Intel Core processors:

Up to a 19% IPC (instructions per cycle) performance boost over Comet Lake-S.
Up to 50% better integrated graphics performance, jumping from Intel UHD (Comet Lake-S) to the new Intel Xe graphics architecture (Rocket Lake-S).
Intel® Deep Learning Boost and Vector Neural Network Instructions support hardware-accelerated AI inference, significantly boosting deep learning workloads.
Enhanced overclocking tools and features for more flexible tuning, performance, and usability.

The new Rocket Lake-S architecture delivers up to a 19% IPC improvement over the current Comet Lake-S (Skylake). Crucially, it also brings long-awaited AVX-512 support to the desktop segment.

However, there is a catch. Unlike 10th Gen Core chips, where Intel offered a flagship 10-core product, 11th Gen Core processors top out at just 8 cores.

Leading the new lineup is the flagship 8-core, 16-thread Intel Core i9-11900K. With clock speeds reaching up to 5.3 GHz and a 19% IPC uplift, this chip could help Intel reclaim the gaming crown, as the company highlighted in several slides.

For graphics, Intel went with its own advanced Xe architecture, giving the new 11th Gen Core lineup robust multimedia capabilities, from AAA gaming to high-definition streaming. Other platform features include DDR4-3200 support, 20 PCIe 4.0 lanes, and Intel Quick Sync Video (with 10-bit AV1 and 12-bit HEVC decoding and compression). The platform also adds improved high-definition display support with native HDMI 2.0 and HBR3, along with discrete support for Thunderbolt 4 and Intel Wi-Fi 6E.

You can check out the full lineup of the new 11th Gen Core processors below:

There's a catch, though. Unfortunately, Intel filled out the lower end of the 11th Gen Core lineup with older Comet Lake-S models. Everything below Core i5, specifically Core i3 and Pentium Gold, is nothing more than rebranded and slightly overclocked versions of previous-gen 10th Gen Core chips.

The new Intel processors will go on sale on March 30.