Power Testing
On this page, we are going to investigate the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K and Intel Core Ultra 5 245K power draw. We are going to do this multiple ways, we are going to look at both the CPU Package Power, as well as the Total System Wattage (from the Wall). In addition, we are going to look at full-load Wattage and temps in Cinebench R23, pushing all cores, and we are going to look at Wattage and temps while Gaming, measuring CPU package power. The Total System Wattage tests (from the Wall) are run with a KILL-A-WATT meter. CPU package power and temps are read with HWiNFO64.
CPU Package Power – Cinebench R23
In this first graph, we are running a stress test, pushing each CPU to its maximum potential in all-core load in the Cinebench R23 multi-core test for 10 minutes. CPU package power is being read from HWiNFO64. In this graph, we can see that the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K and Intel Core Ultra 5 245K do show a package power difference between “Balanced” Power Mode profile and “Best Performance.”
The Intel Core Ultra 9 285K does seem to be consuming less power than the Intel Core i9-14900K, however, it isn’t a massive difference. We see around a 20-25W power difference with this full-load, all-core stress test. This shows that there is an efficiency improvement, but it isn’t enough to compete with the AMD Ryzen 9 class CPUs. The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X, in this same power test, uses 55-60W less power than the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K.
The Intel Core Ultra 5 245K does show an improvement over the Intel Core i5-14600K, with about a 28-43W less power demand depending on the Win11 Power Mode profile. This is, however, more power than the Ryzen 7 9700X and 9600X by 68-83W higher power demand. Therefore, the Ryzen 7 9700X and 9600X are more power efficient, even the 7800X3D and 7950X3D for that matter.
CPU Package Power – Gaming
For this one we are running a game, in this case Cyberpunk 2077 with a manual in-game run-through. This is CPU package power reported by HWiNFO64. Once again, we see a difference in power usage depending on the Win11 Power Mode profile on the 285K, but not the 245K as much. The Intel Core Ultra 9 285K does use less power than the Intel Core i9-14900K, about 30-40W less power, so that is an improvement in power utilization, but as we saw in the benchmarks a much lower performance also.
The Ryzen 9 9950X used about the same power as the 285K in the Balanced profile, so those are almost on par with gaming power usage, the 9950X is a little less. The Intel Core Ultra 5 245K does use about 55W less power than the Intel Core i5-14600K when gaming, but again we also saw its performance. This is on par with the 7950X3D in power, but the 7950X3D is way faster in performance. The Ryzen 7 9700X and 9600X also use way less power while gaming.
What’s more impressive though is the Ryzen 7 7800X3D and 7950X3D, which just smash the power savings, and provide the highest performance in the game.
Total System Power – Cinebench R23
This one is interesting because we are measuring total system power, taken at the wall with a Watt meter. This is the total system Wattage running a stress test in Cinebench R23, therefore pushing all cores, full-load. If you were say, rendering all day long, this would show what the system Wattage would be pulling.
We can see that the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K results in less total system Wattage, with 39W less power than the Intel Core i9-14900K, which is about a 10% difference. The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X uses even less power than the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K saving 28W more power. This is about a 10% difference as well.
The Intel Core Ultra 5 245K does have a pretty big savings over the Intel Core i5-14600K at 60W less power, or a large 31% difference. However, the AMD Ryzen CPUs clearly take the lead in efficiency with the Ryzen 7 9700X and 9600X, or 7800X3D.
Idle Power
We also wanted to show total system Wattage at idle, because we did find the results interesting, so we are just passing this along. It seems the AMD Ryzen platform/CPUs did run at a consistently higher idle Wattage just upwards of 100W from the Wall, with the system just idling, doing nothing. This is much higher than the Intel Core i9, i7, and i5 which used the least amount of power idling at just around 70W. The Intel Core Ultra 200S series was somewhere in the middle, idling with higher Wattage than the previous generation, but still much less than the AMD Ryzen platform. This is perhaps something AMD needs to work on.