Intel’s Performance Maximizer Offers One-Click Overclocking for Select 9th Gen Core CPUs

[Tsing]

Some people want more performance out of their processors but are too lazy to overclock. Intel understands that, which is why it has released the Intel Performance Maximizer (IPM) for automatic, one-click overclocking. IPM works with the following CPUs:

• i9-9900K
• i9-9900KF
• i7-9700K
• i7-9700KF
• i5-9600K
• i5-9600KF

According to a product brief, IPM doesn't just look at a processor's speed; it also examines its "individual performance DNA." The tool is also dynamic in that it adjusts performance over time.

Marketing materials suggest the tool can take the Core i7-9700K from 4.6 GHz to 4.9 GHz, which isn't a bad improvement for idle types. But manual overclocking, unsurprisingly, still wins.

This is quite evident in PC Perspective's i9-9900K benchmarks, which show IPM results falling short of manual OC.

As the benchmarks show, it's possible to achieve a further small increase in performance over the IPM result with just very basic manual overclocking, with larger increases obtainable via practice and experience in most situations. But if learning to manually overclock isn't an option, the Intel Performance Maximizer is arguably the best one-click solution of its type, as long as you have one of the few compatible processors, of course.

 

[AntiQuark]

I suppose it gives you the ballpark.

 

[Dan_D]

ASUS has been able to get pretty close with its AI Suite III. It's usually only about 100MHz off a manual overclock. I think ASUS' software generally has gotten too bloated and convoluted over the years, but has some amazing capability in it. I'll have to give this software a try and see what it can do on my 9600K.

EDIT: It's weird. There is a separate download for the 9900K. All others use the same one.