At the end of last year, Intel released the 12th generation Core desktop processor based on a hybrid architecture design, also known as the product line code-named AlderLake-S. It has achieved huge improvements in performance and energy efficiency, reversed the market competition situation, and has been widely recognized by players. After this year's CES2022 exhibition, Intel pursued its victory and made a more comprehensive layout of its product line from desktop to mobile, and successively released 12th generation Core processors for notebook platforms.
Specifically, the 12th generation Core mobile processors also provide multiple segmented product lines: including the high-performance mobile H series for mainstream gaming laptops, the HX series for flagship gaming laptops and mobile workstations, the P series for performance-class thin and light laptops, and the U series for low-power thin and light laptops. Although
all belong to the 12th generation Core family, different series of product lines have been fully optimized according to the notebook computer form, heat dissipation capacity, power release and other requirements; among them, the new P series product line provides 6P-Core + 8E-Core specifications, with a total of 20 threads, setting a new standard for the high-performance thin and light notebook market. Of course, for modern thin and light notebooks and business notebooks, Intel also provides a product line code-named AlderLake-U.
AlderLake-U series includes two branches, 15W and 9WTDP. The 15W AlderLake-U is used to succeed the 11th generation Core TigerLake-UP3, targeting low-power thin and light notebooks and business notebooks at mainstream prices. It adopts a 50×25×1.3mm packaging method; as for the 9W AlderLake-U, it is used to replace the 11th generation Core TigerLake-UP4 and is specially optimized for fanless devices with lower power consumption. The package is more compact, with a volume of only 28.5×19×1.1mm.
Let’s look at 15WTDP’s AlderLake-U series, which also uses the Intel7 process and applies a hybrid architecture design. It can provide up to 2 GoldenCove microarchitecture P-Core + 6 Gracemont microarchitecture E-Core. When running in the Windows11 system environment, hardware-level scheduling can be performed through ITD. In terms of
peripherals: 15WAlderLake-U's memory controller supports DDR5-4800 and LPDDR5-5200, and is also compatible with the previous generation DDR4-3200 and LPDDR4x-4266, depending on the motherboard design of the OEM manufacturer; It supports two sets of PCIe4.0×4 for connecting solid-state drives , and the Thunderbolt4 controller also integrates 4 direct connections; in terms of chipset, the CNVIO module of the Wi-Fi6E network has also been inherited, and there are also 12 additional PCIe3.0 channels.
can be said to support IO, such as memory, hard disk, PCIe, network card, etc. AlderLake-U is also very powerful to provide good scalability, which is a great benefit for business notebooks and is conducive to subsequent installation and upgrades. It can also connect more devices when working on the move. For example, this HP 66 fifth-generation model provides two DDR4 memory slots and two M.2 interface PCIe4.0 solid-state drive slots, which can be easily installed, expanded and upgraded, and can further improve performance while reducing costs.
In terms of specific models, from the highest-end Core i7-1265U of the 15WA Alder Lake-U family to the mainstream-priced Core i5-1235U, their specifications are all 2P-Core + 8E-Core. The main differences are the base frequency, the highest core frequency, and the core display scale.
There are many tests on the 12th generation Core standard AlderLake-H series. In the first half of the year, the PConline evaluation room also conducted detailed tests on gaming laptops based on AlderLake-H. It can be said that thanks to the hybrid architecture design and the improvement in overall specifications, the performance of AlderLake-H is very powerful, surpassing the 11th generation TigerLake-H series in an all-round way and setting a new performance standard for gaming laptop platforms.
Reference link: "More powerful than expected, 12th generation Core standard voltage performance measurement"
So in the thin and light field, what will be the performance of the 12th generation Core AlderLake-U series? This time PConline found an HP 66 fifth generation equipped with Core i5-1235U as a test platform to take a look at the actual performance.
cool Rui i5-1235U parameters and other configurations of the test model
Let me talk about this HP Zhan 66 in detail Parameter information of the fifth-generation Core i5-1235U, which has 2P-Core + 8E-Core specifications, level 3 cache capacity of 12MB, maximum single-core turbo frequency of 4.4GHz, core display scale of 80EU, maximum turbo frequency power consumption of 55W, and supports Intel vProEssentials.
At the same time, the HP 66 fifth generation is equipped with 16GB capacity dual-channel DDR4-3200 memory, 512GB PCIe4.0 solid-state drive, 14-inch 1080P resolution IPS screen, 51Wh battery and other configurations. They are all the mainstream configurations of thin and light notebooks at this price range.
In addition, before the performance test, you need to take a look at the heat dissipation performance release level of the HP and 66 fifth generations. Conduct the AIDA64FPU single-bake stress test at a room temperature of 24°C. The HP and 66 fifth generations can make the Core i5-1235U run stably at 15W power consumption, which is exactly in line with the standard TDP of the Alder Lake-U series. The short-term peak power consumption can be close to 50W.
Since HP and the 66th generation are positioned more like business laptops, they need to better balance battery life and noise control, and the 15W AlderLake-U is a good combination with this set of molds.
Theoretical performance test
Let’s take a look at the performance of the Core i5-1235U through some commonly used test software. The
Cinebench series is a common benchmark software developed based on Cinema4D and used to test the processor's rendering capabilities. It has been updated to the R23 version along with Cinema4D.
In the R20 version, the HP and 66 fifth-generation equipped with Core i5-1235U scored 629pts in single-threading and 3094pts in multi-threading. The latest R23 version of
was tested with a single-core score of 1645pts and a multi-core score of 7465pts.
It can be said that in the Cinebench series tests, compared with the 4-core 8-thread low-power processor equipped with the previous generation TigerLake-UP3 (such as Core i5-1135G7), the new Core i5-1235U performed better in both single-threaded and multi-threaded . This reflects the IPC efficiency improvement of P-Core and the additional contribution of 8 E-Core to multi-threaded performance.
3DMark is an independent CPUProfile project, used to test the performance of the processor under different threads and to better correspond to different types of game loads. In this test, the Core i5-1235U has a 1-thread score of 931 and a maximum thread score of 3810, which is also stronger than the previous generation Core i5-1135G7 with the same positioning.
V-Ray is a rendering software developed by the professional renderer development company CHAOSGROUP and is one of the most popular rendering engines in the industry. Using the 5.0 version of Benchmark for testing, the HP and 66 fifth generation equipped with Core i5-1235U scored 4181vsamples. The results are also excellent, once again proving the superiority of the hybrid architecture design.
Productivity test
Of course, both Cinebench and V-Ray are theoretical tests of multi-threaded rendering, and are not typical usage scenarios for all thin and light laptop users. The cross-platform processor testing software CrossMark includes three parts: productivity, creativity and responsiveness. It has similar testing logic to SYSmark25 produced by BAPCo and can more accurately reflect the daily usage scenarios of PC users.
Judging from the results, the overall score of HP and 66 fifth-generation equipped with Core i5-1235U is close to 1300. Looking at the sub-projects, productivity, creativity and responsiveness also all performed relatively well.
PCMark10 application performance test simulates daily PC use by running Office and Edge scripts, and tests the performance of these application scenarios. Judging from the results, the overall score of the HP 66 fifth generation equipped with Core i5-1235U is 10071, which proves that its single-threaded and multi-threaded performance is very balanced and can meet the needs of efficient office work.
ULProcyon uses the running script of Adobe related software to provide photo editing benchmark tests and video editing benchmark tests.
The photo editing benchmark uses Adobe Lightroom to import, process and modify selected images, and Adobe Photoshop for image editing and layer adjustment. The fifth generation HP and 66 equipped with Core i5-1235U and integrated Iris Xe core display scored 4843 in this project.
In the video editing test, use Adobe Premiere Pro for video export.In this test, as well as the encoding and decoding acceleration of the Iris Xe core display, the HP Battle 66 fifth generation scored 1907, which is also a relatively good performance.
core display performance test
As for the core display, the Core i5-1235U also integrates the 80EU Iris Xe, which has not changed much compared to the previous generation Core i5-1135G7. This time, 3DMarkFireStrike and TimeSpy were used for testing, and the results were basically in line with expectations. Of course, considering that this HP 66 fifth generation is equipped with DDR4-3200 memory, if you switch to LPDDR4x-4266, DDR5-4800 and LPDDR5-5200, with higher bandwidth, the performance of the core display may also be better.
Battery life
For thin and light notebooks, performance is certainly very important, but considering the real usage scenarios of the majority of users, especially the needs of business people for mobile offices, battery life is also an important factor affecting the user experience.
Therefore, the Alder Lake-U product line has also been specifically optimized for battery life. Let’s take this HP 66 fifth generation as an example. When setting 50% screen brightness and connecting to a Wi-Fi network, PCMark10 was used for battery life testing. The results show that it can last for 12 hours. It can provide longer battery life, which is more conducive to mobile office use without plugging in.
Summary
Alder Lake-U series is a very important product line in the 12th generation Core. As the latest generation of low-power processors, on the basis of continuing the hybrid architecture, through P -The reasonable number of Core and E-Core configurations achieves an ideal balance of single-threaded performance and multi-threaded performance at low power consumption. It is a great improvement compared to the previous 11th generation Core TigerLake-UP3, and further promotes the development of traditional low-power thin and light notebooks. After this test, it can be concluded that whether it is for audio-visual entertainment or various office scenarios, HP and 66 fifth-generation equipped with Core i5-1235U can provide users with high efficiency and long battery life.
also meets the business office needs of large enterprises. Many models in the Alder Lake-U series support Intel vPro, which can provide out-of-the-box, hardware-level security functions and the latest collaboration technologies, such as support for AMT technology and some virtualization security functions, memory protection features, remote management, etc.; thanks to the powerful security, manageability and stability support of the new generation vPro platform, it is also a big plus for the enterprise's IT management department.
At CES2020 next year, Intel will further promote the development of hybrid architecture. It is expected that the new 13th generation Core Raptor Lake-U series can go further in terms of performance and energy consumption ratio, providing users with a better thin and light notebook experience.
