Intel investigating CPU instability issues after South Korean Tekken 8 players kick up a fuss: 'Intel is aware of problems that occur when executing certain tasks'

HardwareProcessorsIntel investigating CPU instability issues after South Korean Tekken 8 players kick up a fuss: ‘Intel is aware of problems that occur when executing certain tasks’When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.

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(Image credit: Future)

Intel Core i9 14900K CPU on a box and inside a motherboard socket.

Earlier this year, we reported that a division of Epic Games was claiming that the increasing number ofcrashes in games using Unreal Enginewas down to Intel’s high-end CPUs. The issue has spread further afield, with South Korean players ofTekken 8, developed on Unreal Engine 5, experiencing exactly the same problem and along with reports of chips failing within a few weeks of purchase, Intel is now officially investigating the matter.

News of this issue has been widespread (Videocardz,Ars Technica,Twitter) and as before, it mostly concerns Intel’s Core i9 processors, such as the 13900K, but plenty of other models also appear to be affected. If you own one of these and have experienced a game crashing, often generating a blue screen with ‘out of video memory’ error message, then you’re in good company.

The exact number of people with the issue is hard to estimate butZDNet Koreacontacted the chip giant to ask if it was aware of the reports. Intel’s reply makes it clear that there’s sufficient evidence to warrant a proper investigation:

“Intel is aware of problems that occur when executing certain tasks on 13th and 14th generation core processors for desktop PCs, and is analyzing them with major affiliates.”

Take theCore i9 14900K, for example. It has two power limits, PL1 and PL2, with the former being the maximum for long periods of time and the other just for a set number of seconds. Intel’sdatasheetsshow that the standard figures for these are 125 and 253 W, with a maximum current of 307 A permitted.

I’ve been using twoZ790 motherboards, from Asus and ASRock, and both of them ignore some or all of those limits with standard, out-of-the-box settings. In the case of the ASRock, you have the option to tell the BIOS what type of cooling solution you have—if you pick anything other than ‘air cooler’, the power limits are increased beyond the Intel values. The max current limit appears to be ignored at all times, unless you force it.

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Why would motherboard vendors do this? Intel’s CPUs, especially the top-end i9 models, have very high clock speeds, with the 14900K having a Max Turbo Frequency of 6 GHz. However, it can only reach that speed under very specific conditions, and for most of the time, it won’t run anywhere near that level. So to give it a better chance of doing so, most motherboard manufacturers let the CPU consume more power that Intel recommends, for longer periods of time, and often running with an increased voltage.

All of that transpires to push the processor beyond what it’s rated to cope with. Whether this is the specific cause of the crashing games is unclear at this moment, but I wouldn’t be in the least bit surprised if it was.

Your next machine(Image credit: Future)Best gaming PC: The top pre-built machines.Best gaming laptop: Great devices for mobile gaming.

Your next machine

(Image credit: Future)Best gaming PC: The top pre-built machines.Best gaming laptop: Great devices for mobile gaming.

(Image credit: Future)

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Best gaming PC: The top pre-built machines.Best gaming laptop: Great devices for mobile gaming.

You can force Intel’s limits for power, voltage, and current in almost all motherboards (or certainly in all those that we tested and used) and the one thing I always do in any Intel PC I set up is to ensure that almost all of them are adhered to. Depending on the use scenario, I’ll sometimes set the PL1 figure higher, but the rest I’ll either lower (to keep things cooler) or just use Intel’s values.

Not that one shouldhaveto be doing this, of course, and I hope that all of these problems force Intel and its motherboard partners to put safety and longevity before outright performance, when determining what the default BIOS values should be.

It won’t be of any comfort to those whose Core i7 or i9 has fried itself, if it does turn out to be related to BIOS settings, but hopefully all of this media attention will be the start of the end to such issues.

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