In a growth certain to disappoint lovers, it seems that Intel’s ‘locked’ Non-Ok Thirteenth-Gen Raptor Lake fashions aren’t overclockable just like the previous-gen Alder Lake chips. We verified that the previous-gen non-Ok chips can nonetheless be overclocked, however sadly, the newer Thirteenth-Gen fashions can’t. Based on our trade contacts, it would not seem like the state of affairs will change any time quickly.
Intel’s Twelfth-Gen Alder Lake processors got here with an surprising shock — the locked non-Ok fashions had been overclockable regardless of Intel’s continued coverage of limiting overclocking to its dear Ok-series fashions. Positive, Intel launched an announcement warning that overclocking the locked Non-Ok chips may injury them, however you could possibly nonetheless overclock them at will on sure motherboards.
Intel by no means formally unlocked the Non-Ok chips — overclocking was solely doable as a result of the corporate issued an early pre-release microcode to OEMs throughout the growth cycle that by accident allowed manipulating the chips’ BCLK setting, thus enabling overclocking. Intel disabled that function in its ultimate go-to-market public variations of the chip microcode, however artful motherboard makers created BIOSes that might nonetheless load the older microcode both manually or routinely when a person adjustments the BCLK setting.
Thus, overclocking the Non-Ok chips got here to be. Practically all of the motherboard distributors used this tactic to unlock the chips, however they initially restricted the function to costly Z-series boards that solely supported DDR5 reminiscence. Utilizing that costly gear with the value-centric locked chips did not make sense, just about relegating locked-chip tuning to excessive overclockers.
Nevertheless, MSI and Asus finally made a number of B660 fashions that supported DDR4 reminiscence, just like the MSI B660M Mortar Max we used to check for this text and the ROG Strix B660-G and -F Gaming motherboards. These boards introduced the promise of inexpensive locked-chip overclocking to the lots, Intel’s needs be damned.
Picture 1 of 2
As you may see above, the hack nonetheless works with the Alder Lake Core i7-12700 on the B660M Mortar Max motherboard with the most recent BIOS. We have circled the setting that means that you can allow the outdated “Non Ok OC” microcode that Intel by accident let slip, thus partaking BCLK overclocking.
Sadly, that very same microcode would not work with the Raptor Lake chips — as you may see within the second picture, the choice to make use of the outdated microcode disappears while you set up the 13700 on the identical motherboard.
For Raptor Lake, we’re advised that Intel merely did not make the error of issuing a pre-release microcode with the function unlocked, so motherboard makers haven’t got a model to allow BCLK overclocking on locked chips.
So Intel principally stopped the follow by not making the error of giving the motherboard makers a gap. Finally, overclocking Non-Ok chips did not exit with a bang — it was extra of a whimper.
A minimum of for now. Intel and its motherboard companions have lengthy engaged in a cat-and-mouse recreation whereby the motherboard distributors allow overclocking once they should not, like they did the final time round with Skylake in 2016 after which with Alder Lake, or allow options like AVX-512 that they should not, like when Intel needed to kill twice earlier than it was actually disabled. So it is possible that non-Ok overclocking may return, though we’re advised it would not look probably with Thirteenth-Gen Raptor Lake.
All of it is a dangerous search for Intel because it assures its chips are locked down from overclocking. Positive, Intel has taken at the very least one step in the proper path just lately by enabling reminiscence overclocking with locked chips on B-series motherboards. Nevertheless, the corporate’s nonsensical determination to lock the SA voltage prevents you from gaining a lot further efficiency with inexpensive DDR4 reminiscence, so it is solely the slightest of enhancements.
Intel’s overclocking segmentation practices have earned the corporate billions by milking lovers for each greenback to allow overclocking. In the meantime, AMD permits it freely on nearly all of its chips and platforms. AMD presently suffers from excessive pricing on its lower-end motherboards, however the locked overclocking options from Intel may go away it weak on the low finish of the market if AMD’s board pricing improves.
