Windows 10’s 2H19 Update will deliver “Favoured Core” Awareness to boost single-threaded performance

Not all cores are created equal. That’s a fact of life. Like humans, CPU cores have their own quirks and differences, even if they seem identical. This is especially true for AMD’s latest Ryzen chips and Intel processors with Turbo Boost 3.0 technology. Both companies can offer CPUs with specific cores that offer boost clock speeds that are higher than their companions. 

With Microsoft’s 2H10 update for Windows 10, the OS will gain a new feature called “favoured core” awareness. This will allow Windows 10 to provide users with more performance by distributing work fairly to these faster processor cores. With this, Microsoft can help PC achieve higher levels of single-threaded performance in various workloads. This is great news for both gamers and workstation users alike. 

While processors are already able to use their “favoured cores” within Windows 10, there is a difference between using them and having an OS that’s aware of them. One offers an increase in the single-threaded performance of specific cores, while the other attempts to extract the maximum performance advantage of such a change. 

Moving forward, more processors will offer “favoured cores”. Competition is tight, and manufacturers will need to do what they can to gain an advantage over their rivals. This means that more CPUs will offer faster/favoured cores, especially within mobile systems. 

On the AMD-side, Windows 10 version 1903 already offers CCX awareness for Ryzen series processors. This new “favoured core” update will help to deliver further increases to AMD’s CPU performance, which is obviously great news for Ryzen users. Intel processors will also benefit from this change, especially as CPUs with Turbo Boost 3.0 and similar technologies begin to become more common.