Intel vs. AMD Cache Wars: Core Ultra 9 144 MB Single Tile L3

Next generation Intel Core Ultra processors feature massive L3 cache capacities for improved gaming performance.

Hardware by Godrics01 on Apr 21, 2026

The hardwareThe hardware and software technology landscape is changing at an extremely fast pace, as manufacturers push the limits of growing data bandwidth, processing power, and graphical realism.

Recent advances in the industry by companies such as Intel and NVIDIA hint at changes in how systems manage memory, how CPUs use large caches to play games, and how light is simulated in real-time settings. These are some developments one should be aware of when planning to construct or upgrade a more powerful machine soon.

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The Risks of HUD DIM Memory

A consumer releasing new DDR5 memory type has some significant problems that you must be aware of before you can even lay a finger on it. It is referred to as HUD DIM, and it was recently announced by Intel, ASRock, and Team Group. Although it has already caught ASUS's attention, in general, it's new, and you are not going to like it.

HUD DIM is abbreviated as half unbuffered DIM, and half is the key term here, since it splits the sub-channels into two halves. See, DDR5 normally has two 32-bit sub-channels, resulting in an aggregate 64-bit data bus. What HUD does is essentially cut off one of the two sub-channels in the stick. It is almost as though one were to cut off the dual-channel memory in the real module itself.

You may be asking yourself, why in the world should memory makers make such releases? There are a couple of okay reasons. To begin with, you may combine and alternate the modules with various capacity-standard UDIMMs. For example, you can get a 24GB with an 8GB module and a 16 GB module. It simply has 3 sub-channels instead of 2.

They are also able to recycle modules that had a fault somewhere to be this new HUD DIM. They will naturally be cheaper and allow a wider variety of kits or greater upgrade options for system builders. We don't expect them to be cheap enough to justify the huge bandwidth drop. Essentially, when you come across a kit that appears to be extremely cheap, you have to know what it entails.

High Performance Desktop Dealings

Desktop gaming PCs are currently on sale, and you can save a lot of money. We are looking at systems featuring a Core Ultra 7, 265K, 32GB of 5200MHz memory, and a 5070 for just $1,599.99. These designs include luxury specifications for builders and hobbyists. Also, it is possible to get a free 128GB flash drive by visiting a particular retail store when it opens a new store or remodels in the US. All you need to do is complete the required forms and go to the actual premises to enjoy these savings and hardware deals.

Intel's Next Generation Gaming CPUs

The fastest gaming CPU ever looks set to be released by Intel. Intel is not fooling around with its next-gen CPUs, offering up to an impressive 288MB of L3 cache. The complete lineup, including names and specifications, is now available. Beginning with the top-of-the-line 52-core part. This one has 288 MB of special L3 cache.

In contrast, the new AMD 9950X3D has only 192 MB of total L3 cache. Bigger doesn't necessarily mean better in gaming. Still, Intel's design may help mitigate the latency costs of multi-chiplet setups.

This is followed by a 44-core part with an L3 cache of 264MB, and a 28-core part. This is where it becomes interesting since it is expected that Intel will label these two highest SKUs as HEDT, and, therefore, they will probably be priced rather high. It begins with the regular consumer high-end Core Ultra 9, which is a single tile, or in other words, would have an imaginary

144MB of L3 cache with a single chiplet. That is in comparison to the 9800X3D, which comes with just 96MB. This may simply mean that Intel would be left with the fastest gaming CPU on the market. Continuing, the 24-core version has 132 MB, and the 22-core version has 108 MB. Reports state that the Core Ultra 7 and 9 parts will be the D series, called Core Ultra 400D, and the two highest SKUs will be the DX parts.

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NVIDIA's Path Tracing Breakthrough

NVIDIA has just announced an unreal 2-3x performance improvement in full path tracing. It is known as ReSTIR PT Enhanced. NVIDIA asserts that this is a step towards the technology being production-ready. To see how this works, you have to know a little about path tracing. Ray tracing in games is relatively simple: it shoots rays of light to determine effects like shadows and reflections.

Path tracing uses that and even allows bouncing rays to hit more than once to produce light the way it does in reality. We are yet to be able to simply throw out millions of rays to achieve our ultimate image, so technologies such as ReSTIR have been created to enable pixels to communicate with each other and retain memory of what light was effective previously.

Final Thoughts

The current games mostly use ReSTIR GI and path tracing for global illumination or indirect light. In contrast, ReSTIR PT extends path tracing to all. With this new technology, it can now be used in games. They did this by reducing the computational cost of spatial reuse by half while preserving quality. They also combined local and global illumination in a single data pool, making it much more efficient.

In general, they achieved an average speedup of 2.74x over complex scenes. This is primarily software improvements, but we anticipate that Nvidia will find a means to make this connect to whatever their next-gen hardware will be. We should soon get full-on path tracing in games.

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