Intel 200S Boost is a new Intel technology that lets you overclock the memory subsystem without voiding warranty. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPmMsuZGvlM Intel 200S Boost: Introduction Hello and welcome to CheckPoint, a blog series for talking about specific overclocking topics in a shorter format. Today, I want to talk about a new Intel overclocking technology called “Intel 200S Boost.” This technology was made available to all Arrow Lake K processors running on an Intel Z890 motherboard, starting from April 22nd, 2025. The technology overclocks the memory subsystem, including the NGU, D2D, and memory frequency, up to 3.2GHZ, 3.2GHz, and DDR5-8000 respectively. Most importantly, the overclocking is covered by Intel’s warranty. After enabling Intel 200S Boost, the DDR5 memory bandwidth and latency improved by about 30%. And there’s more performance to be squeezed out of an Arrow Lake CPU without voiding its warranty. Let’s have a closer look. Intel 200S Boost: Explained The Intel 200S Boost program allows motherboard vendors and system integrators to use a subset of the overclocking features available on the Arrow Lake 200S Core Ultra 5, 7, and 9 K/KF processors, when paired with a Z890 motherboard. The goal is to increase system performance without voiding the warranty. Since it is still a form of overclocking, stability is not guaranteed, and results will differ from system to system. The 200S Boost program specifically enables for the creation of a motherboard BIOS option or profile that loads an OEM/ODM-tested set of “up to” values geared towards increasing performance on their platform. The “up to” values are specified by Intel as follows: Effectively, 200S Boost is an easy way to enable XMP 3.0 without voiding the warranty because, yes, enabling XMP still technically voids warranty. Voltages and frequencies exceeding these values fall outside the 200S Boost program. Furthermore, no other voltages may be adjusted from Intel defaults to remain covered by warranty. Lastly, the 200S Boost should be disabled by default as it requires an explicit opt-in from the user. OEMs and ODMs are expected to characterize what is possible with their boards and systems within the 200S Boost constraints and limit their BIOS profiles to what is achievable for each design. Most high-end motherboards will have no problem running DDR5-8000, but perhaps for the lower-end Z890 motherboards it might be a little tricker. Finally, the 200S Boost program also requires locking of the so-called Overclocking Mailbox to ensure that no further overclocking can be performed in BIOS or the operating system. Memory XMP/SPD The Intel 200S Boost program is specifically provided to motherboard vendors and system integrators to implement in the BIOS. However, since part of the specification revolves around memory configuration, memory vendors may also look to update their memory SPDs with compatible profiles. The specific memory configuration limits for the 200S Boost program allow for up to DDR5-8000 with 1.4V memory voltage. That means the higher speed XMP kits may fall outside this specification limit. For example, Corsair’s Vengeance RGB 48GB DDR5-9200 falls outside both frequency and voltage specification. It’s possible that memory vendors may use one of the five available XMP 3.0 profiles to add a 200S Boost compatible profile to their kit. Intel 200S Boost: Performance Improvement Now, let’s have a look at the performance improvement from enabling Intel 200S Boost. We’ll compare the performance against default settings and only having XMP enabled. The default configuration has the 2x24GB memory kit running at DDR5-5600. Platform Overview The system we're using consists of the following hardware. Note that I’m not using a discrete graphics, but instead will use the integrated graphics for running the 3D workloads. Benchmark Software We use Windows 11 and the following benchmark applications to measure performance. BENCHMARKLINKPyprime 2.0 32Bhttps://github.com/mbntr/PYPrime-2.xAI-Benchmarkhttps://ai-benchmark.com/Geekbench MLhttps://www.geekbench.com/Y-Cruncher 5Bhttp://www.numberworld.org/y-cruncher/3DMark Night Raidhttps://www.3dmark.com/Counter Strike 2https://store.steampowered.com/app/730/CounterStrike_2/PugetBench for Creatorshttps://www.pugetsystems.com/pugetbench/AIDA64https://www.aida64.com/ BIOS Settings & Benchmark Results Enabling the Intel 200S Boost technology is pretty simple. Upon entering the BIOS: Go to the Extreme Tweaker menu Make sure Performance Preferences is set to Intel Default Settings, and Intel Default Settings is set to Performance, then Set Intel 200S Boost to Enabled Now save and exit the BIOS. We re-ran the benchmarks and checked the performance increase compared to the default operation and with XMP enabled. The geomean performance improves by about 3% when enabling XMP-8000 and another 2 percentage points when enabling Intel 200S Boost. The biggest performance jump between XMP and 200S Boost is in AI Benchmark where we get an additional 5 percentage points higher performance with the faster fabric speeds. The AIDA64 memory bandwidth is pretty similar comparing 200S Boost and XMP, but the latency improves quite significantly by enabling 200S Boost. Further Tuning Without Voiding Warranty Of course, it’s entirely possible to squeeze even more performance out of your system without voiding the processor warranty. For example, we can tune the memory timings or adjust the Turbo Boost 2.0 power limits. ASUS Memory Preset For adjusting the memory timings, I often rely on the ASUS Memory Presets. ASUS Memory Presets is an ASUS overclocking technology that provides you with a selection of memory tuning presets for certain memory ICs. The presets will adjust the memory timings and voltages. On the ASUS ROG Z890 Apex motherboard (BIOS 0041) there are 8 presets available for Hynix 2x16GB and 2x24GB memory. I loaded the Hynix 8600 2x24GB profile for my testing. This memory profile also sets the memory voltage to 1.5V, which would fall outside the 200S Boost specification. So, to comply with the program while keeping the optimized memory timings, I save with the memory preset, then go back into the BIOS and re-enforce the 200S Boost setting. Then, go into the DRAM timings sub-menu and manually set the timings from the current values. After a reboot you can verify the voltage is back to 1.4V which falls within the 200S Boost specification. I’m using a beta BIOS, however, so it’s possible that in retail BIOSes the 200S Boost limits will be enforced when enabling the memory presets. Finetuning the memory timings gives us another 1.5 percentage point geomean performance improvement. The biggest improvement is in PyPrime where we see more than 6 percentage points improvement. Intel Turbo Boost 2.0 Power Limits Intel Turbo Boost 2.0 Technology allows the processor cores to run faster than the base operating frequency if the processor is operating below rated power, temperature, and current specification limits. The ultimate advantage is opportunistic performance improvements in both multi-threaded and single-threaded workloads. The turbo boost algorithm works according to an EWMA formula. This stands for Exponentially Weighted Moving Average. There are three main parameters to consider: PL1, PL2, and Tau. Power Limit 1, or PL1, is the threshold that the average power will not exceed. Historically, this has always been set equal to Intel’s advertised TDP. Very importantly, PL1 should not be set higher than the thermal solution cooling limits. Power Limit 2, or PL2, is the maximum power the processor is allowed to use for a limited amount of time. Tau is a weighing constant used in the algorithm to calculate the moving average power consumption. Tau, in seconds, is the time window for calculating the average power consumption. If the average power consumed is higher than PL1 the CPU will reduce the CPU frequency. Intel defines three power profiles for the Arrow Lake processors: baseline, performance, and extreme. The Baseline profile is provided for systems or motherboards with inadequate power delivery requirements to meet the performance profile. You can typically find it referenced as “Intel Default Baseline Profile.” The Performance profile is recommended by Intel as the default profile for most systems. In particular, high-end motherboards or gaming systems. You can typically find it referenced as “Intel Default Performance Profile.” The Extreme profile is provided as guidance to system designers or motherboards that intend to support overclocking. This profile is not validated by Intel and while that means you’re running out of spec, since it’s not overclocking it doesn’t void warranty. The default settings must be in place on the first boot, after a BIOS update, or when a new CPU is installed. When users change the default settings, there should be a BIOS warning informing the users that the settings deviate from the Intel default settings. An easy ASUS MultiCore Enhancement option on ASUS motherboards allows you to unleash the Turbo Boost power limits. Set the option to Enabled – Remove All Limits and enjoy maximum performance. Unleashing the power limits gives us another 2 percentage point geomean performance improvement. The biggest improvement is in AI Benchmark with the integrated graphics where we see more than 3 percentage points improvement. Intel 200S Boost: Outro The Intel 200S Boost technology is an interesting addition to the Arrow Lake overclocking toolkit. It’s not revolutionary in the sense that we can’t do this on our own, but it’s significant because it’s overclocking that’s covered by warranty. That’s possibly a first from Intel and, if successful, opens up for more aggressive POR configurations in the future. I’ll be using the Intel 200S Boost option in future Arrow Lake SkatterBencher guides instead of enabling XMP because, well, 200S Boost also enables XMP but adds extra fabric speed too. The first guide I’ll try it out will be either the Arrow Lake integrated graphics or Core Ultra 5 265K guide. Alright, that’s it for this CheckPoint – let me know if you have any ideas in the comments below, and see you in the next one!
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