PBO on AMD CPUs: Optimize your performance in 3 simple steps! 🚀
Precision Boost Overdrive (PBO) 🚀 is a safe and easy way to boost your CPU performance on AMD Ryzen processors. By enabling PBO, you'll experience a modest but significant performance boost, with improvements dependent on your specific CPU model. To take full advantage of the benefits of PBO, we recommend investing in a good aftermarket heatsink ❄️ and a motherboard with high-quality VRMs 🔧, which will ensure improved stability and optimal temperatures during intensive use.
Overclocking a new PC can be intimidating. You might wonder if it's really necessary, but leaving untapped performance feels even worse. Luckily, if you have an AMD Ryzen chip, there's an easy way to get a performance boost without the hassle. 💻✨
What is Precision Boost Overdrive (PBO)?
AMD's Precision Boost (PB) technology allows Ryzen CPUs to dynamically increase clock speeds up to the maximum advertised speed on one or more cores, based on thermal headroom and current limits. Essentially, it's a fancy name for CPU performance boost. 🔝
Precision Boost Overdrive (PBO), as the name suggests, overrides key power and thermal parameters such as PPT (Package Power Tracking), TDC (Thermal Design Current), and EDC (Electrical Design Current). This allows your CPU to reach its maximum clock speed and maintain it for longer, but it doesn't necessarily increase clock speeds like a proper overclock would. ⏱️
When used this way, PBO offers a minor but very safe and hassle-free performance boost on almost any AMD CPU. It's the most you can get from PBO without digging into the BIOS. 🤓
Fortunately, PBO also has a built-in Auto OC (automatic overclocking) feature that gives you the option to override the maximum boost clock. It's an easy way to overclock your CPU, with PBO as a safety net. You can even undervolt your CPU with PBO's Curve Optimizer. I'll tell you more about how you can configure PBO for maximum gains later. 💡
Reasons why you should enable PBO
To state the obvious, enabling PBO provides a modest performance boost in games and other demanding applications with a single BIOS change. It's very convenient and easy to enable PBO on any modern AMD system. 🎮
However, actual performance gains depend on several factors, the most significant being the specific CPU model you have. For example, the Ryzen 9000 series is cooler and more efficient than the Ryzen 7000 series by default. In theory, enabling PBO on the 9000 series could offer larger performance improvements compared to the 7000 series, assuming you have a suitable CPU cooler and a decent motherboard. 🔥
That said, you can also increase your CPU's boost clock within PBO on any Ryzen chip to slightly improve performance. 🔼
The Curve Optimizer is also easy to use. It compensates voltage along the entire voltage/frequency curve, so you can use it to achieve a slight undervoltage without directly changing the voltages. This will make your CPU more efficient and cooler, and may even slightly increase its lifespan. ❄️
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What you need to enable PBO
While you can and should enable PBO even with a stock CPU cooler, you should really invest in an aftermarket cooler to get the most out of it. You don't need a liquid cooler; a high-quality air cooler like the Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE ARGB can provide the thermal headroom you need to push your CPU to its maximum. 🌡️
Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE ARGB
The Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE ARGB is an affordable yet high-performance CPU cooler that can easily keep temperatures under control for any consumer-grade processor. It features six heatpipes and a split heatsink design, combined with two 120mm ARGB fans for a premium look. 💎
You'll also need a good motherboard with a sufficient number of high-quality VRMs (voltage regulator modules). These components provide stable power to your CPU and are vital if you want to use advanced PBO configurations for higher clock speeds and lower voltages. 🔌
At the very least, you should have a motherboard with a B650 or B850 chipset, but an X670/X870 like the MSI MAG X870 Tomahawk WiFi Gaming Motherboard is ideal. 🛡️
MSI MAG X870 Tomahawk WiFi Gaming Motherboard
The MSI MAG X870 Tomahawk WiFi Gaming is a high-end AMD AM5 motherboard with all the latest features, including Wi-Fi 7, USB 40Gbps, PCIe 5.0, and more. It's perfect for enthusiasts who want to get the most out of their AMD systems through overclocking. 💪
You also need a decent power supply, as even a small glitch in the power delivery between it and the motherboard could result in stability issues when your system is drawing heavy power. It doesn't need to be a gigantic 1,000W PSU; something made by a reputable manufacturer that has enough power for your system is sufficient.
Don't just enable PBO; fine-tune it for even better gains
While you can get a lot out of simply enabling PBO and leaving it alone, you can get even more with a few simple tweaks. Some motherboards actually have PBO presets you can choose from, which are a step up from leaving PBO on automatic. 🆙
For example, my ASRock B650M PG Riptide gives me some options that lower the Tjmax (which reduces power consumption, heat and noise at the expense of performance) and apply a negative voltage shift across the Curve Optimizer. 🔧
However, I still prefer to adjust my PBO manually. For the purposes of this article, I ran a series of benchmarks using Cinebench and I found I got the best results with a +200MHz clock speed boost, the PBO limits set on the motherboard (Ryzen Master tells me it's 1,000 PPT, 180 TDC, and 250 EDC), Scalar set to Auto, and Curve Optimizer set to -30mV. 📈
You could go a step further by manually adjusting the PPT, TDC, and EDC values, but frankly, I don't think you'll be able to achieve much by doing so. Aside from the CPU, your motherboard is the limiting factor, so you can't go much beyond what the motherboard can supply. ⚖️
However, I recommend experimenting with the maximum CPU clock speed and undervolting through Curve Optimizer to find the optimal point of highest clock speed at lowest voltage for your system. You can also manually set the thermal throttling control to the maximum your CPU can handle. 🌡️
For example, my CPU has a TJmax of 95°C, but PBO sets it to 85°C, so if I set the thermal throttling control to 95°C, I'll let my CPU run hotter and reach higher speeds before throttling. ⚡️
So how much can you expect to gain from PBO? If my quick Cinebench tests with my AMD Ryzen 7 7700 are anything to go by, you can expect around a 10.9% improvement in multi-core performance and roughly a 2.5% in single-core tasks. Sure, the single-core gain could fall within the margin of error, but a Reddit user reported similar results when comparing PBO against the stock Ryzen 7 7700. 📊
PBO is a brilliant all-in-one package that provides AMD users with an effortless method to improve performance and potentially overclock and undervolt their CPUs. If you have a Ryzen chip and aren't using PBO, I highly recommend giving it a try, as long as you're aware of the small risks involved. 🤩
