Even 420 AIO may not be enough to cool upcoming 6.2GHz Intel 14900KS that draws over 400W

In the middle of October, Intel released its 14th Gen desktop CPU lineup. It was not as exciting since this was a refresh of 13th Gen (Raptor Lake) with higher clocks or, in some instances, additional cores.

We reviewed the Core i9-14900K and the Core i5-14600K, and although we were quite impressed with the performance, we also realized that Intel was pushing a lot of power through these chips to keep up or get past AMD's 7950X3D, as the Ryzen is generally much more efficient.

In our review, we noted that the 14900K consumed 253W during Cinebench 2024. Even the i5 was more thirsty than the 7950X3D despite being slower, though it is far more affordable too (currently retailing at $300).

As is the tradition with Intel, the company is now planning to launch its KS part, which is a pre-overclocked, pre-binned SKU that runs at 5+ GHz out of the box. The alleged specifications of the i9-14900KS have leaked and apparently, Team Blue is looking to release this part at 6.2GHz, which is higher than the max turbo thermal velocity boost (TVB) frequency of 6GHz on the 14900K.

The leak was picked up by Twitter (now X) bot Benchleaks from the OCCT base.

As you can see in the image above, the processor has put on a score of 2383.50 and has a global rank of 1577. However, the score for this chip is not the interesting part. As stated above, it is the specifications of the upcoming chip that are more interesting.

According to HWiNFO data picked up by the OCCT website, the i9-14900KS reports a maximum turbo clock of 6.2GHz on its fastest two P-cores (Performance cores). Meanwhile, the rest of the P-cores report a multiplier of 59 or 5.9GHz. Meanwhile, the 16 E-cores or Efficiency cores are all rated at 4.5GHz, which is 100MHz higher than the E-cores on the 14900K.

Meanwhile, the maximum power draw reported under CPU package power shows nearly 410W and even the average power is over 330W, which is nearly 30% more than the 14900K's and over twice that of the Ryzen 7950X3D.

Hence, a user who buys this is probably going to struggle to cool it down with traditional cooling. Even a 420mm AIO (All in One) liquid cooler is likely not going to be enough, and custom and exotic cooling may be necessary.

Source: OCCT via Benchleaks (X / Twitter)