We see disappointing CPUs in every generation, but few are truly bad enough to earn a spot among the worst processors of all time. Here's a look at them.
The list of the best processors is constantly shifting, with AMD and Intel constantly duking it out for a top slot. Although both companies have released some fantastic CPUs, they’ve put out plenty of duds as well. And some of those have gained infamy among the worst CPUs of all time.
The Core i9-11900K was the last stand for Intel’s 14nm process node, a process that Intel managed to squeeze marginal improvements out of for nearly seven years. The Core i9-11900K was a breaking point. It was using the dated process, but it actually featured less cores than the previous-generation Core i9-10900K. Intel shrank its flagship from 10 cores to only eight, and it increased power demands.
Let’s back up for a moment. The FX-9590 actually uses the Piledriver architecture, which is a revision of the original Bulldozer design. Piledriver isn’t a huge improvement. It fixed some of the dire issues with Bulldozer, particularly scheduling tasks on its massive array of threads. The FX-9590 took the more efficient architecture and dialed up the clock speed as high as it could go, resulting in a chip that consumed 220 watts.
Intel Core i7-7740X Intel’s Core i7-7740X isn’t necessarily a bad processor, but it sure is a confusing one. Years ago, Intel maintained a list of X-series CPUs for a high-end desktop platform. The company has abandoned HEDT for the last several generations — though AMD is keeping it alive with Threadripper 7000 — but it used to be a cornerstone of Intel’s lineup. The company maintained two separate platforms.
Adding to the troubles for Intel was AMD’s new Ryzen chips. Just a few months before the Core i7-7740X released, AMD introduced its fiercely competitive Ryzen 1000 CPUs, which offered higher core counts and a lower price compared to the Intel competition. Rebranding the Core i7-7700K on a more expensive platform just came off as tone deaf at the time. Intel was doing nothing to address its slipping position against AMD, and in fact, it was asking enthusiasts to spend even more.
AnandTech summed up the story nicely, writing: “If you were looking for a changing of the guard today, it’s just not going to happen.” In a later review, reviewer Anand Lal Shimpi called Phenom “the biggest disappointment AMD had ever left us with.” At the time these CPUs were released, they were seen as a stopgap. Intel released them promising higher clock speeds down the line, which Pentium 4 eventually delivered. The range still saw its fair share of issues, however. The most pressing was Intel’s decision to use RDRAM instead of DDR SDRAM. Due to manufacturing complexity, RDRAM was more expensive than DDR SDRAM. It was such a big concern that Intel actually bundled two sticks of RDRAM with each boxed Pentium 4 CPU.
There were never high expectations for the E-240. It released on AMD’s Brazos platform, which were low-power chips looking to compete with Intel’s Atom options. Even then, the E-240 was behind when it released. The standard for Atom when the E-240 released was two cores, and even AMD’s more powerful options in this range, such as the E-300 and E-450, featured two cores. The E-240 was focused on budget notebooks, but even by that standard, it was years out of date when it released in 2011.
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