Intel Core i5 12600K / Core i9 12900K "Alder Lake" Linux Performance

With JPEG XL image encoding performance using the de facto libjxl library, here was an example of Alder Lake performing very poorly and stemming from finding itself running on the E cores rather than performance P cores. With limited deviation between runs, this behavior was reliably happening.

AOM-AV1 video encoding was another area where Alder Lake unexpectedly struggled and again appeared to be due to E core interference.

The dav1d AV1 decoder was performing terrific with the Core i9 12900K and Core i5 12600K processors. Intel's flagship 12th Gen Core processor is now able to outperform the Ryzen 9 5950X by a wide margin.

In this case, the Alder Lake processors were even leading in performance-per-Watt.

The Core i5 12600K was leading in value for this dav1d video decoding benchmark.

With Intel's own OSPray ray-tracing engine, the Ryzen 9 5950X managed to still outperform the Core i9 12900K processor but generationally was a large leap from Rocket Lake to Alder Lake.

Similarly, Intel's Embree software as another oneAPI component was still finding the best performance on the 32-thread Ryzen 9 5950X.