A previous leak indicated that Intel’s Arrow Lake-H processors would include a mix of three different CPU core architectures: Lion Cove (P-core), Skymont (E-core), and Crestmont (LP E-core). However, a Geekbench listing of the Core Ultra 9 285H suggests otherwise. Intel is expected to introduce Arrow Lake-H, Arrow Lake-HX, and another Raptor Lake refresh at CES 2025.
The flagship Arrow Lake-H processor appeared on Geekbench where it scored 2,665 (single-core) and 15,330 (multi-core). It appeared alongside a Dell laptop with 64GB of DDR5-6400 memory, indicating it could be a workstation-level SKU. The Core Ultra 9 285H has 16 CPU cores in a 6+10 configuration, with a P-core clock boosted to 5.4 GHz. However, the processor seems to run out of steam a lot and doesn’t perform at the advertised boost clock at all.
As a result, the Core Ultra 9 285H is just 6% faster than the Meteor Lake-based Core Ultra 9 185H Meteor Lake-based Core Ultra 9 185H (2,506/13,972) in single-core performance and 9% in multi-core performance. It is significantly slower than the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 which obtained 2,857 and 15,221 points in the same benchmark. Interestingly, even the Lunar Lake-based Core Ultra 9 288V beat it in single-core performance.
While performance will undoubtedly be better at launch, the Core Ultra 9 285H doesn’t appear to be a big improvement over Meteor Lake. Hopefully it will be offset by an increase in energy efficiency, something that has been in Intel’s sights since the launch of Lunar Lake earlier this year.
