Alder Lake#History

It was announced in November 2021 that Intel Alder Lake would use a hybrid architecture combining performance and efficiency cores, similar to ARM big.LITTLE. This was Intel's second hybrid architecture, after the mobile-only Lakefield released in June 2020. While the desktop Alder Lake processors were already on the market by January 2022, the mobile processors were not, although release was expected early that year. Starting cost were USD $289 for the Core i5-12600K. Gracemont was the name given to the efficiency cores, while Golden Cove cores were set for tasks such as gaming and video processing.{{cite web |last1=Loeffler |first1=John |date=January 28, 2022 |title=Intel Alder Lake: everything we know so far |url=https://www.techradar.com/news/intel-alder-lake-release-date-specs-and-price-everything-we-know |website=TechRadar |access-date=May 13, 2022}} First laptop tests were performed later that month, with PCMag positively reviewing the Core i9-12900HK, stating the H series represented "Intel's enthusiast line," with "the same hybrid designs" also in the P-series and U-series chips to come out later that year.{{cite web |last1=Westover |first1=Brian |date=January 25, 2022 |title=First Tests: Intel's 12th Gen 'Alder Lake' Core i9 Is the Laptop CPU to Beat |url=https://www.pcmag.com/news/first-tests-intels-12th-gen-alder-lake-core-i9-is-the-laptop-cpu-to-beat |website=PC Magazine |access-date=May 13, 2022}}

In April 2022, press reported on "hints" that Intel was working on Alder Lake-X.{{cite web |last1=Szewczyk |first1=Chris |date=April 11, 2022 |title=There are hints that Intel will return to the HEDT market with Alder Lake-X |url=https://www.pcgamer.com/there-are-hints-that-intel-will-return-to-the-hedt-market-with-alder-lake-x/ |website=PC Gamer |access-date=May 13, 2022}}{{cite web |last1=Liu |first1=Zhiye |date=April 16, 2022 |title=Intel Alder Lake-HX Leak: 16 Cores, 5 GHz Boost Clock |url=https://www.tomshardware.com/news/intel-alder-lake-hx-leak-16-cores-5ghz-boost-clock |website=Tom's Hardware |access-date=May 13, 2022}} Intel officially announced the HX processor series on May 10, 2022, including Core i5, Core i7 and Core i9 models, when Intel announced "seven new mobile processors for the 12th Gen Intel Core mobile family at its Intel Vision event.{{cite web |last1=Takahashi |first1=Dean |date=10 May 2022 |title=Intel unveils 7 new 12th Gen Intel Core HX mobile processors |url=https://venturebeat.com/2022/05/10/intel-unveils-7-new-12th-gen-intel-core-hx-mobile-processors/ |website=GamesBeat |access-date=May 14, 2022}} With the lineup based on Intel's desktop Alder Lake chips,{{cite web |last1=Duckett |first1=Chris |date=May 10, 2022 |title=Intel releases Alder Lake HX chips for mobile workstations and gamers |url=https://www.zdnet.com/article/intel-releases-alder-lake-hx-chips-for-mobile-workstations-and-gamers/ |website=ZDNet |access-date=May 14, 2022}} it was named the Alder Lake-HX series, or 12th-gen Core HX, with the Core i9-12950HX as the flagship and Intel's first 16-core chip designed for laptops.{{cite web |last1=Hachman |first1=March |date=May 10, 2022 |title=Intel propels laptops to 16 cores with ferocious new Core HX laptop CPUs |url=https://www.pcworld.com/article/698329/intel-adds-ultrapremium-12th-gen-core-hx-processor-for-gaming-laptops.html |website=PC World |access-date=May 14, 2022}}

{{Further|Golden Cove|Gracemont (microarchitecture)}}

File:Intel@intel7(10nmESF)@AlderLake@ADL-S(6P+0E)@i5-12400F@SRL5Z DSCx08 poly@5xExt.jpg

File:Intel@intel7(10nmESF)@AlderLake@ADL-S(6P+0E)@i5-12400F@SRL5Z DSCx12 poly@20xDIC+Lambda.jpg

• Golden Cove performance cores ("P-cores")
• Dedicated floating-point adders
• New 6-wide instruction decoder (from 4-wide in Rocket Lake/Tiger Lake) with the ability to fetch up to 32 bytes of instructions per cycle (from 16)
• 12 execution ports (from 10)
• 512 reorder-buffer entries (from 352)
• 6-wide μOP allocations (from 5)
• TAGE-like directional branch predictor (with a global history size of 194 taken branches){{Cite conference |last1=Yavarzadeh |first1=Hosein |last2=Taram |first2=Mohammadkazem |last3=Narayan |first3=Shravan |last4=Stefan |first4=Deian |last5=Tullsen |first5=Dean |conference=2023 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (SP) |title=Half&Half: Demystifying Intel's Directional Branch Predictors for Fast, Secure Partitioned Execution |date=May 2023 |url=https://escholarship.org/content/qt4b03f24j/qt4b03f24j.pdf?t=s0yzr0 |publisher=IEEE |pages=1220–1237 |doi=10.1109/SP46215.2023.10179415 |isbn=978-1-6654-9336-9|s2cid=259255212 }}
• μOP cache size increased to 4K entries (up from 2.25K)
• AVX-VNNI, a VEX-coded variant of AVX512-VNNI for 256-bit vectors
• AVX-512 (including FP16) is present but disabled by default to match E-cores. On early revisions of microprocessors it still can be enabled on some motherboards with some BIOS versions by disabling the E-cores.{{cite web |last1=Cutress |first1=Ian |last2=Frumusanu |first2=Andrei |date=November 4, 2021 |title=The Intel 12th Gen Core i9-12900K Review: Hybrid Performance Brings Hybrid Complexity |url=https://www.anandtech.com/show/17047/the-intel-12th-gen-core-i912900k-review-hybrid-performance-brings-hybrid-complexity/2 |website=AnandTech |language=en |access-date=November 4, 2021}}{{Cite web |last=Alcorn |first=Paul |date=August 19, 2021 |title=Intel Architecture Day 2021: Alder Lake Chips, Golden Cove and Gracemont Cores|url=https://www.tomshardware.com/features/intel-architecture-day-2021-intel-unveils-alder-lake-golden-cove-and-gracemont-cores |website=Tom's Hardware |language=en-US |access-date=August 21, 2021}} Intel has physically fused off AVX-512 on later revisions of Alder Lake CPUs manufactured in early 2022 and onward.{{Cite web |last1=Alcorn |first1=Paul |date=March 2, 2022 |title=Intel Nukes Alder Lake's AVX-512 Support, Now Fuses It Off in Silicon |url=https://www.tomshardware.com/news/intel-nukes-alder-lake-avx-512-now-fuses-it-off-in-silicon |website=Tom's Hardware |language=en-US |access-date=March 7, 2022}}{{Cite web |author=zingaburga |date=May 11, 2022 |title=Enabling AVX-512 on Alder Lake |url=https://github.com/zingaburga/alderlake_avx512/wiki |website=GitHub}}
• ~18% IPC uplift.{{Cite web |last1=Cutress |first1=Ian |last2=Frumusanu |first2=Andrei |date=August 21, 2021 |title=Intel Architecture Day 2021: Alder Lake, Golden Cove, and Gracemont Detailed |url=https://www.anandtech.com/show/16881/a-deep-dive-into-intels-alder-lake-microarchitectures |website=AnandTech |access-date=October 30, 2021}}
• Gracemont efficient cores ("E-cores")
• Aggregated into 4-core clusters with a shared 2MB L2 cache
• 256 reorder-buffer entries (up from 208 in Tremont)
• 17 execution ports (up from 12)
• AVX2, FMA and AVX-VNNI
• Skylake-like IPC.
• New instruction set extensions:{{cite web |title=Intel® Architecture Instruction Set Extensions and Future Features: Programming Reference |url=https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/content-details/790021/intel-architecture-instruction-set-extensions-programming-reference.html |website=Intel |date=September 2023 |access-date=October 26, 2023}}
• PTWRITE
• SERIALIZE
• HRESET
• User-mode wait (WAITPKG): TPAUSE, UMONITOR, UMWAIT
• Up to 1 TB/s interconnect between cores
• Intel Thread Director (only for CPUs with P and E-cores), which is a marketing name for Enhanced Hardware Feedback Interface (EHFI). This is a hardware technology to assist the OS thread scheduler with more efficient load distribution between heterogeneous CPU cores. Enabling this new capability requires support in the operating system.
• Architectural last branch records (LBRs)
• Hypervisor-managed linear address translation (HLAT)
• Control-flow enforcement technology (CET), including support for indirect branch tracking (IBT) and shadow stack (SS)
• 4–30 MB L3 cache
• Cores:
• up to 8 P-cores and 8 E-cores on desktop
• up to 6 P-cores and 8 E-cores on mobile (UP3 designs)
• up to 2 P-cores and 8 E-cores on ultra mobile (UP4 designs)
• only P-cores feature hyper-threading

• Intel Xe-LP (Gen 12.2) GPU
• Up to 96 EU on mobile and 32 EU on desktop
• Up to 4 displays

• LGA 1700 socket for desktop processors.{{Cite web |last1=Subramaniam |first1=Vaidyanathan |date=May 5, 2020 |title=Intel 12th gen Alder Lake-S will use a larger LGA 1700 socket that may last for three generations |url=https://www.notebookcheck.net/Intel-12th-gen-Alder-Lake-S-will-use-a-larger-LGA-1700-socket-that-may-last-for-three-generations.463763.0.html |website=Notebook Check |access-date=September 17, 2022}}
• BGA1744 Type3 and Type4 HDI for mobile processors
• 20 PCIe lanes from CPU
• 16 PCIe 5.0 lanes
• {{0}}4 PCIe 4.0 lanes
• Chipset link - DMI 4.0 ×8 link with Intel 600 series PCH chipsets
• DDR5, DDR4, LPDDR5, and LPDDR4X memory support
• Up to DDR5-4800
• Up to DDR4-3200
• Up to LPDDR5-5200
• Up to LPDDR4x-4267
• XMP 3.0
• Dynamic Memory Boost
• Integrated Thunderbolt 4 and WiFi 6E support{{Cite web |last1=Larabel |first1=Michael |date=June 11, 2021 |title=Intel Alder Lake Thunderbolt/USB4 Support For Linux 5.14 |url=https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Alder-Lake-Thunderbolt-Linux |website=Phoronix |language=en-US |access-date=January 3, 2022}}
• Supported via PCH on desktop processors
• Directly supported by CPU on non-HX mobile processors
• No support on HX mobile processors, could be added via external controller

{{expand section|ADL-H/HX and ADL-N missing|date=October 2024}}

File:Intel Alder Lake-P SRLD9 i5-1240P.jpg

For the Alder Lake generation, Intel produced 4 different dies.{{Cite web|title=MSI confirms there are two die variants of Alder Lake-S desktop CPUs|url=https://videocardz.com/newz/msi-confirms-there-are-two-die-variants-of-alder-lake-s-desktop-cpus|access-date=2021-10-30|website=VideoCardz.com|language=en-US}} Each die has a different number of P-cores (P) and E-cores (E) and GPU Execution Units.

Alder Lake requires special support from the operating system due to its relatively unusual-for-x86 hybrid nature. For software unable to be upgraded, a UEFI-provided compatibility mode may be used to disable the E-cores; it is enabled by the user turning on scroll lock.

The P-cores and E-cores on early versions of Alder Lake CPUs reported different CPUID models. This has caused issues with digital rights management systems that perceive the P-cores and E-cores as being separate computers, and falsely enforce license restrictions preventing a particular piece of software from being executed on more than one device at a time. Intel published a list of PC games it identified as having this compatibility issue, and stated that it was working with publishers to develop patches. Some of the games were identified by Intel as only having this bug on Windows 10, and functioning correctly on Windows 11 (with some of them dependent on Windows 11 patches scheduled to be released in November 2021).{{Cite web |last=Orland |first=Kyle |date=November 5, 2021 |title=Faulty DRM breaks dozens of games on Intel's Alder Lake CPUs|url=https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2021/11/faulty-drm-breaks-dozens-of-games-on-intels-alder-lake-cpus/ |website=Ars Technica |language=en-US |access-date=November 5, 2021}}{{Cite web |last1=Kan |first1=Michael |date=November 5, 2021 |title=Intel: These 50+ PC Games Are Incompatible with 'Alder Lake' CPUs Due to DRM |url=https://www.pcmag.com/news/intel-these-50-plus-pc-games-are-incompatible-with-alder-lake-cpus-due |website=PC Magazine |language=en-US |access-date=November 6, 2021}} ExamSoft similarly stated that its monitoring software for educational assessments (such as the bar examination) was similarly incompatible with Alder Lake CPUs due to checks detecting virtual machines.{{Cite web |last1=Roth |first1=Emma |date=July 13, 2022 |title=Intel's 12th Gen CPU can't handle the Bar exam |url=https://www.theverge.com/2022/7/13/23209784/intel-law-students-12th-gen-processor-bar-exam-examplify-examsoft |website=The Verge |language=en-US |access-date=July 14, 2022}}

This problem has been fixed in a microcode update. The P and E cores now return the same CPUID when both are enabled. A different CPUID is reported when E-cores are disabled and only P-cores are enabled. The AVX-512 instruction set extension is implemented in the P-cores but disabled due to incompatibility with the E-cores.{{cite web |title=How to detect P/E-Core in Intel Alder Lake CPU? |url=https://stackoverflow.com/questions/69955410/how-to-detect-p-e-core-in-intel-alder-lake-cpu/72245739#72245739 |website=Stackoverflow |access-date=15 May 2022}} Hackers have shown that it is possible to enable the AVX-512 instructions on the P-cores when the E-cores are disabled and an old microcode version is used.{{cite web |author=Zingaburga |date=May 1, 2020 |title=Enabling AVX-512 on Alder Lake |url=https://github.com/zingaburga/alderlake_avx512/wiki#enabling-avx-512-on-alder-lake |website=GitHub |access-date=May 15, 2022}}

There are minor differences between the behavior of the two cores with regard to an undefined overflow flag in certain bitwise operations.{{cite web |title=Game Dev Guide for Alder Lake Performance Hybrid Architecture |url=https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/developer/articles/guide/alder-lake-developer-guide.html |website=Intel |language=en-US |access-date=September 17, 2022}}

Alder Lake's CPU topology has performance implications, especially for gaming environments where the developers are not used to NUMA setups. Microsoft added support for Intel Thread Director (ITD) in Windows 11.{{Cite web |last=Hruska |first=Joel |date=August 14, 2020 |title=Intel Makes it Official: Hybrid CPU Cores Arrive With Alder Lake |url=https://www.extremetech.com/computing/313803-intel-makes-it-official-hybrid-cpu-cores-arrive-with-alder-lake |website=ExtremeTech |language=en-US |access-date=February 15, 2021}} A wide variety of inputs, including whether a process' window is in the foreground, feeds into the ITD.{{cite web |last1=Cutress |first1= Ian |title=Intel 12th Gen Core Alder Lake for Desktops: Top SKUs Only, Coming November 4th |url=https://www.anandtech.com/show/16959/intel-innovation-alder-lake-november-4th/3 |website=www.anandtech.com}} The ITD can function to a lesser extent with the OS providing less or no cooperation.{{cite web |title=Scheduler Alder Lake není všemocný, Intel počítá s optimalizacemi vývojářů |url=https://diit.cz/clanek/scheduler-alder-lake-neni-vsemocny-intel-pocita-s-optimalizacemi-vyvojaru |website=diit.cz |language=cs |access-date=November 7, 2021}} Support in Linux is merged in kernel 5.18{{Cite web |last1=Larabel |first1=Michael |date=February 6, 2022 |title=Intel HFI To Premiere In Linux 5.18 For Improving Hybrid CPU Performance/Efficiency |url=https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Intel-HFI-For-Linux-5.18 |website=Phoronix |language=en |access-date=February 11, 2022}} but this alone is not sufficient until the kernel gets hints from userspace in order to schedule tasks to run on certain types of cores. Windows 10 version 21H2 and later Windows 10 has support for Intel Thread Director, but such support is limited.{{Cite web |title=Is Windows® 10 Task Scheduler Optimized for 12th Generation... |url=https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/support/articles/000091284/processors.html |access-date=2024-07-28 |website=Intel |language=en}}

The CPU family no longer features Intel SGX which is a requirement for playing UltraHD Blu-Ray discs.{{Cite web |last1=Tyson |first1=Mark |date=January 15, 2022 |title=Alder Lake Systems Can't Play UHD Blu-rays |url=https://www.tomshardware.com/news/alder-lake-systems-arent-able-to-play-uhd-blu-rays |website=Tom's Hardware |language=en-US |access-date=2022-01-21}}

• All the CPUs support up to 128 GB of DDR4-3200 or DDR5-4800 RAM in dual channel mode{{Cite web |title=Products formerly Alder Lake |url=https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/codename/147470/products-formerly-alder-lake.html |website=Intel}} and up to 256 GB of DDR5 after a BIOS upgrade.
• All the CPUs support 16x PCI Express Gen 5 and 4x PCI Express Gen 4 lanes, but support may vary depending on motherboard and chipsets.
• Models without the F suffix feature any one of the following integrated UHD Graphics GPUs, all with base frequency of 300 MHz:
• UHD Graphics 770 with 32 EUs,
• UHD Graphics 730 with 24 EUs,
• UHD Graphics 710 with 16 EUs.
• By default, Alder Lake CPUs are configured to run at Turbo Power at all times and Base Power is only guaranteed when P-Cores/E-cores do not exceed the base clock rate.
• Max Turbo Power: the maximum sustained (> 1 s) power dissipation of the processor as limited by current and/or temperature controls. Instantaneous power may exceed Maximum Turbo Power for short durations (≤ 10 ms). Maximum Turbo Power is configurable by system vendor and can be system specific.
• CPUs in bold below feature ECC memory support only when paired with a motherboard based on the W680 chipset.{{Cite web |last=Bonshor |first=Gavin |date=March 9, 2022 |title=The Intel W680 Chipset Overview: Alder Lake Workstations Get ECC Memory and Overclocking Support |url=https://www.anandtech.com/show/17308/the-intel-w680-chipset-overview-ecc-for-alder-lake-workstations |website=AnandTech |access-date=2022-04-14}}
• By default, Core i9-12900KS achieves 5.5 GHz only when using Thermal Velocity Boost.{{Cite web |title=12th Gen Intel Core i9-12900KS Launches as World's Fastest Desktop Processor |url=https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/newsroom/news/12th-gen-intel-core-i9-12900ks-worlds-fastest-desktop-processor.html |website=Intel |language=en-US |date=March 28, 2022 |access-date=March 28, 2022}}

{{Row hover highlight}}

• desktop processors repurposed for mobile usage.
• features UHD Graphics GPU with 32 EUs (i5-12450HX only has 16 EUs)
• CPUs in bold below feature ECC memory support only when paired with a motherboard based on the WM690 mobile workstation chipset.

These CPUs feature 35 W minimum assured, 45 W base and 157 W maximum turbo power consumption.

These CPUs feature 35 W minimum assured, 45 W base and 95 W (Core i5) or 115 W (Core i7/i9) maximum turbo power consumption.

These CPUs feature 20 W minimum assured, 28 W base and 64 W maximum turbo power consumption.

These CPUs feature only E-cores and have 6MB of Smart Cache.

These CPUs feature only E-cores and have 6MB of Smart Cache.

Most of these processors are identical to the corresponding Alder Lake-H and Alder Lake-U processors (without the L suffix) listed above.

These CPUs feature 35 W minimum assured, 45 W base and 65 W maximum assured power consumption.

These CPUs feature 12 W minimum assured, 15 W base and 28 W maximum assured power consumption.

• Intel Core
• Intel Lakefield
• Sapphire Rapids, Intel's 4th generation Xeon server processors based on Golden Cove microarchitecture and Intel 7 process
• List of Intel CPU microarchitectures
• LGA 1700 Socket

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