Core i5-2500S: specs and benchmarks

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Aggregate performance score

Core i5-2500S
2011
4 cores / 4 threads, 65 Watt
2.13

Core i5-2500S provides poor benchmark performance at 2.13% of a leader's which is a 96-core EPYC 9655P.

Summary

Intel started Core i5-2500S sales 9 January 2011 at a recommended price of $75. This is a Sandy Bridge architecture desktop processor primarily aimed at office systems. It has 4 cores and 4 threads, and is based on 32 nm manufacturing technology, with a maximum frequency of 3700 MHz and a locked multiplier.

Compatibility-wise, this is LGA1155 processor with a TDP of 65 Watt. It supports DDR3 memory.

Primary details

Core i5-2500S processor market type (desktop or notebook), architecture, sales start time and pricing.

Place in the ranking1854
Place by popularitynot in top-100
Cost-effectiveness evaluation4.87
Market segmentDesktop processor
Power efficiency3.10of 100.00 (Core Ultra 7 164U)
Architecture codenameSandy Bridge (2011−2013)
Release date9 January 2011 (13 years ago)
Launch price (MSRP)$75of 17,906 (Xeon Platinum 8280L)

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

Performance per price, higher is better.

Detailed specifications

Basic microprocessor parameters such as number of cores, number of threads, base frequency and turbo boost clock, lithography, cache size and multiplier lock state. These parameters can generally indicate CPU performance, but to be more precise you have to review its test results.

Physical cores4 (Quad-Core)
Threads4
Base clock speed2.7 GHzof 4.7 GHz (Ryzen 9 7900X)
Boost clock speed3.7 GHzof 6.2 GHz (Core i9-14900KS)
Bus rate5 GT/s
L1 cache64 KB (per core)of 80 KB (EPYC 9965)
L2 cache256 KB (per core)
L3 cache6144 KB (shared)of 1152 MB (EPYC 9684X)
Chip lithography32 nmof 3 nm (Core Ultra 9 285K)
Die size216 mm2
Maximum core temperature69 °Cof 110 °C (Core Ultra 9 185H)
Number of transistors1,160 millionof 135,240 million (EPYC 9684X)
64 bit support+
Windows 11 compatibility-

Compatibility

Information on Core i5-2500S compatibility with other computer components and devices: motherboard (look for socket type), power supply unit (look for power consumption) etc. Useful when planning a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. Note that power consumption of some processors can well exceed their nominal TDP, even without overclocking. Some can even double their declared thermals given that the motherboard allows to tune the CPU power parameters.

Number of CPUs in a configuration1of 8 (Xeon Platinum 8454H)
SocketLGA1155
Power consumption (TDP)65 Wattof 3100 ‑ 4500 (Ryzen 7 7435H)

Technologies and extensions

Technological capabilities and additional instructions supported by Core i5-2500S. You'll probably need this information if you require some particular technology.

Instruction set extensionsIntel® SSE4.1, Intel® SSE4.2, Intel® AVX
AES-NI+
AVX+
Enhanced SpeedStep (EIST)+
Turbo Boost Technology2.0
Hyper-Threading Technology-
Idle States+
Thermal Monitoring+
Flex Memory Access+
FDI+
Fast Memory Access+

Security technologies

Processor technologies aimed at improving security, for example, by protecting against hacks.

TXT+
EDB+
Identity Protection+

Virtualization technologies

Supported virtual machine optimization technologies. Some are specific to Intel only, some to AMD.

VT-d+
VT-x+
EPT+

Memory specs

Types, maximum amount and channel number of RAM supported by Core i5-2500S's memory controller. Depending on the motherboard, higher memory frequency may be supported.

Supported memory typesDDR3
Maximum memory size32 GBof 6 TiB (EPYC 9654)
Max memory channels2of 12 (Xeon Platinum 9221)
Maximum memory bandwidth21 GB/sof 460.8 GB/s (EPYC 9654)

Graphics specifications

General parameters of a GPU integrated into Core i5-2500S.

Integrated graphics cardIntel HD Graphics 2000
Quick Sync Video+
Clear Video HD+
Graphics max frequency1.1 GHz
InTru 3D+

Graphics interfaces

Available interfaces and connections of Core i5-2500S's integrated GPU.

Number of displays supported2

Peripherals

Specifications and connection types of supported peripherals.

PCIe version2.0of 5.0 (EPYC 9655P)
PCI Express lanes16of 128 (EPYC 9655P)

Benchmark performance

Single-core and multi-core benchmark results of Core i5-2500S. Overall benchmark performance is measured in points in 0-100 range, higher is better.


Combined synthetic benchmark score

This is our combined benchmark performance rating. We are regularly improving our combining algorithms, but if you find some perceived inconsistencies, feel free to speak up in comments section, we usually fix problems quickly.

i5-2500S 2.13

Passmark

Passmark CPU Mark is a widespread benchmark, consisting of 8 different types of workload, including integer and floating point math, extended instructions, compression, encryption and physics calculation. There is also one separate single-threaded scenario measuring single-core performance.

i5-2500S 3390

GeekBench 5 Single-Core

GeekBench 5 Single-Core is a cross-platform application developed in the form of CPU tests that independently recreate certain real-world tasks with which to accurately measure performance. This version uses only a single CPU core.

i5-2500S 575

GeekBench 5 Multi-Core

GeekBench 5 Multi-Core is a cross-platform application developed in the form of CPU tests that independently recreate certain real-world tasks with which to accurately measure performance. This version uses all available CPU cores.

i5-2500S 1492

Gaming performance

Closest competitors

Core i5-2500S's performance relative to its closest rivals among desktop CPUs.


Core i3-4150 100.47
A10-7850K 100.47
Core i5-2500S 100
Core i7-960 99.06

AMD equivalent

According to our data, the closest AMD alternative to Core i5-2500S is Phenom II X6 1065T, which is nearly equal in speed and lower by 1 position in our ranking.

Here are some closest AMD rivals to Core i5-2500S:

A10-7850K 100.47
Core i5-2500S 100
A8-9600 98.12
FX-4350 98.12

Similar processors

Here is our recommendation of several processors that are more or less close in performance to the one reviewed.

Recommended GPUs

People consider these graphics cards to be good for Core i5-2500S, according to our PC configuration statistics.

These are the fastest graphics cards for Core i5-2500S in our user configuration statistics. There is a total of 845 configurations using Core i5-2500S in our database.

All comparisons with Core i5-2500S

Community ratings

Here is the rating given to the reviewed processor by our users. Let others know your opinion by rating it yourself.


3.7 101 vote

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Questions & comments

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