AMD's Latest Desktop Processor Supports Precision Boost Overdrive

AMD's soon-to-be-released top-of-the-line desktop processor, the Ryzen 9 9950X, will come with support for Precision Boost Overdrive (PBO) overclocking. A sharp-eyed reader pointed out in the comments section of our Zen 5 Technical Deep Dive article that a footnote in one of the slides mentioned PBO support for the Ryzen 9000 series desktop processors, with the exception of the 9950X. Additionally, the company's presentation slide showcasing PBO on the Ryzen 9000 series only highlighted performance improvements for the Ryzen 9 9900X, Ryzen 7 9700X, and Ryzen 5 9600X, but not the 9950X. We reached out to AMD for clarification on this matter.

AMD responded to our inquiry and confirmed that the Ryzen 9 9950X does indeed support PBO overclocking. They stated, "Confirmed that PBO is supported with 9950X," just like the 9900X, 9700X, and 9600X, and acknowledged that there was an error in the footnotes. It would be highly unusual for AMD to disable PBO on a specific SKU, especially since all non-APU Ryzen processors in the past have supported PBO, not just select overclocking SKUs like the "K" models on Intel.