The Intel Core i7-10870H is a higher-end, octa-core processor of the Comet Lake product family. The Hyper-Threading-enabled processor was unveiled in 2020. It is designed for use in large gaming laptops and DTRs; its CPU cores run at 2.2 GHz (base clock speed) to 5 GHz (max. Boost frequency). The all-core Boost frequency sits at 4.2 GHz.
Core i7-10870H is slightly inferior to Core i7-10875H in that the former has a 100 MHz lower base clock speed, 100 MHz lower Boost clock speed and no support for Intel's proprietary security features: vPro, TXT, SIPP.
Last but not the least, this H-class processor features the 24 EU UHD Graphics 630 iGPU.
Architecture
Comet Lake is a yet another revision of the dated Skylake architecture (much like the previous Coffee Lake, Whiskey Lake, Kaby Lake product families) for similar feature set and performance-per-MHz figures.
Still, 10th Generation Core processors have their advantages. The upgraded memory controller is one such advantage; it can officially host memory clocked at 2,933 MHz, an upgrade over the 2,666 MHz limitation of the outgoing Coffee Lake product family. Intel recommends using no more than 128 GB, for reference.
The 10870H is manufactured on Intel's third-gen 14 nm process. The octa-core CPU is compatible with Thunderbolt 3; it has sixteen PCI-Express 3.0 lanes for connecting discrete graphics cards, SSDs and other devices. Four PCI-Express 3.0 lanes allow for read/write rates of up to 3.9 GB/s provided a suitably fast NVMe SSD is used.
Please note this isn't a user-replaceable CPU. It gets soldered permanently on to the motherboard (BGA1440 socket interface) and is thus pretty much impossible to replace.
Performance
The average 10870H in our database is close to the Ryzen 5 5600H and the Core i9-9980HK, as far as multi-thread banchmark scores are concerned. The i7 thus is absolutely capable of handling any task that requires significant processing muscle, as of late 2021.
Thanks to its decent cooling solution and a long-term CPU power limit of 95 W, the MSI GE76 Raider 10UH is among the fastest laptops featuring the 10870H that we know of. It can be about 30% faster in CPU-bound workloads than the slowest system built around the same chip in our database, as of August 2023.
Graphics
The Intel UHD Graphics 630 is an old acquaintance of ours; this 24 EU iGPU was used in many H-class Intel Core processors of previous years, like a Core i7-9750H.
In the case of 10870H, the UHD Graphics runs at 350 MHz to 1,200 MHz. It will let you use up to 3 displays simultaneously. The highest resolution supported here is 4K (4096 by 2304 pixels). This graphics adapter will happily hardware-decode VP9, AVC, HEVC, MPEG-2 and other popular video codecs; the latest AV1 codec did not make the list.
UHD Graphics 630 was not made for gaming; it is not fast enough to handle most triple-A titles of 2019 and 2020, even if you set the resolution to 1024 x 768 and select the lowest quality preset possible.
Power consumption
The i7-10870H has a 45 W TDP (also known as the long-term Power Limit). Laptop makers are allowed to reduce that value somewhat, the lower limit being 35 W, with clock speeds and performance taking a hit as a result. As far as short-term loads are concerned, the CPU will happily consume 70 or even 100 W when Boosting, making quality active cooling solution a must.
This 10th generation Intel chip is manufactured on one of the old 14 nm Intel processes for low, as of late 2022, energy efficiency.
The Intel Core i3-N305 is an entry-level mobile CPU for thin and light laptops from the Alder Lake-N series. It was announced in early 2023 and offers no performance cores and 8 efficient cores (E-cores, Gracemont architecture). The chip does not support HyperThreading and clocks with up to 3.8 GHz (single core, 3 GHz all core Turbo). The performance of the E-cores should be similar to old Skylake cores (compare to the Core i7-6700HQ). All cores can use up to 6 MB L3-cache.
Performance
The performance depends on the cooling and TDP settings and should be somewhere similar to the old Alder Lake Pentium 8500 (1 performance core, 4 efficiency cores, max. 4.4 GHz and 8 MB L3-cache). The multi-threaded performance should be quite good with the 8 cores but will suffer due to the low TDP. Single thread performance will suffer due to the missing P-cores and relatively low boost clock speeds.
Features
The Alder Lake-N chips only support single channel memory with up to DDR5-4800, DDR4-3200 or LPDDR5-4800. The chip also supports Quick Sync and AV1 decoding (most likely same engine as in Alder Lake). Furthermore, Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2 are partly integrated (but no Thunderbolt). External chips can be connected via PCIe Gen3 x9 (via the PCH).
The integrated graphics adapter is based on the Xe-architecture and offersall 32 EUs (Execution Units) operating at up to 1.25 GHz. In addition to the single channel memory, the gaming performance is very limited of the iGPU.
Power consumption
The i3 has a base power consumption of 7 W and is therefore even suited for fanless cooling. The CPU is built with a further improved 10nm SuperFin process at Intel (called Intel 7).
Average Benchmarks Intel Core i7-10870H → 100%n=23
Average Benchmarks Intel Core i3-N300 → 44%n=23
- Range of benchmark values for this graphics card - Average benchmark values for this graphics card * Smaller numbers mean a higher performance 1 This benchmark is not used for the average calculation
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