– Why does clock speed matter on a CPU, and why do some top-tier CPU’s have lower clock speeds than some from nearly 10 generations ago?

Question

I have a good understanding of what clock speed is, but why does it matter?

For the second question, I was wondering since for example, the new i9-14900K has a base clock speed of 3.2 GHz, whereas my previous desktop CPU, the i7-4790K, had a base clock speed of 4.0 GHz. Why hasn’t this number steadily gone up thought the years?

In: Technology

Answer 1

Note that base clock is kinda irrelevant for newer chips. If the CPU is unloaded, it’ll go to a low-power state around 800MHz. For heavy single-core workloads, that i9 is going to be hitting 6GHz given some conditions are met, whereas the 4790k maxes out at 4.4GHz. For multi-core workloads, the i9 is still going to be well above 5GHz.

For another example, the i7 in my laptop has a base clock of 1.8GHz but boosts to 4.8 under load. The base clock really doesn’t tell me anything.