ASRock Highlights the benefits of its “Base Frequency Boost” tech

ASRock has been the most vocal about this new technique, calling it “Base Frequency Boost” (BFB) on many of their lates B36X and B460 series motherboards. 

Base Frequency Boost tinkers with the power states of Intel’s processors to allow’s Intel’s boost clock speeds to be maintained over long-term use cases. The basics behind the technique are that ASRock is upping the power limits of Intel’s processors to allow boost frequencies to be locked in place, seemingly indefinitely, upping the lower performance limits of Intel’s processors. In the case of Intel’s i9-10900, Cinebench scores can be boosted by 29% using this method, though Intel’s lower-end processors appear to benefit less from this BFB.   

While this isn’t overclocking, strictly speaking, it is circumventing the limits placed on Intel’s non-K series processors and lower-tier motherboards. Base Frequency Boost will also increase the power draw and heat output of Intel’s processors, making this technique similar to standard overclocking mechanisms in terms of impact.

AMD currently provides its customers overclocking support on both its B-series chipsets and higher-end X-series motherboards, as well as all Ryzen series desktop processors. This level of overclocking support is something that Intel has not matched thus far, which is a factor that makes ASRock’s Base Frequency Boost technology all the more exciting. 

When using Base Frequency Boost, ASRock users will be able to define a new “Base Frequency Boost TDP for their processor, allowing 65W processors to have their TDPs set as high as 125W. This technique allows Intel’s non-K processors to consume more power to help maintain their all-core boost clock speeds under load. 

The video below highlights how base frequency boost allows Intel’s non-K processor to achieve higher benchmark scores and framerates while gaming, both of which are welcome changes for Intel users.