One of the fascinating options of Intel’s latest Core i9-14900K is its AI-assisted overclocking. Obtainable by the Excessive Tuning Utility (XTU), AI Help is billed because the pure subsequent step of automated overclocking. It makes use of AI to push chips additional relatively than counting on a predetermined checklist of checks that Intel already provides by XTU.
That’s the pitch, at the very least. However based on my very own testing, AI Help doesn’t do a lot of something.
Not solely does it present minimal profit by being restricted to the Core i9-14900K, it additionally exhibits the risks of haphazardly including AI in locations the place it doesn’t belong. That’s a disgrace, too, as a result of we’ve seen some clear examples of how AI can improve efficiency on PCs. AI Help doesn’t slot in that mould.
Too little to matter
Don’t get your hopes up for a giant efficiency increase out of AI Help. It takes about 45 seconds to run the characteristic in your PC, and Intel says XTU assessments functions throughout that window to find out the optimum overclocking settings. AI Help is meant to transcend what the automated overclocking in XTU provides, but it surely really produced similar outcomes.
The outcome: a whopping 100MHz increase throughout all cores. I ran the overclock by Cinebench R23, which produced a 1.5% enchancment in multi-core efficiency and a 1.6% enchancment in single-core efficiency. When testing an actual software, there’s no distinction in any respect. In our Handbrake transcoding benchmark, the AI Help overclock produced an similar outcome to a inventory Core i9-14900K.
I’ve by no means anticipated big efficiency positive aspects out of an automated overclocking characteristic, however what’s irritating is that the automated overclocking in XTU produced the very same overclock settings, together with similar efficiency. It’s not clear what AI is doing right here, however from my testing at the very least, it’s no higher than the in any other case restricted automated overclocking already current in XTU.
The appliance is the issue right here, and that’s true on two fronts. First is the Core i9-14900K. That is already a chip pushed to its absolute limits, because it’s basically a juiced-up model of last-gen’s Core i9-13900K. It doesn’t present an enormous efficiency raise, as you’ll be able to learn in our Core i9-14900K and Core i9-13900K comparability, so anticipating overclocking to do a lot — AI or in any other case — isn’t a good suggestion.
It’s additionally the appliance of AI to overclocking. You would think about how AI could possibly be helpful for automated overclocking — practice a mannequin on hundreds of various PC configurations and their elements and use these patterns to determine optimum settings — but it surely doesn’t appear like Intel is doing a lot with AI Help. I don’t know what’s occurring behind the scenes, however no matter it’s, it doesn’t seem too refined. And primarily based on the ultimate outcome, that also holds true.
Fallacious software
We’ve seen loads of examples of AI being utilized the place it shouldn’t be this 12 months, however the disappointing factor about AI Help is that it might work. It simply doesn’t do a lot proper now with the Core i9-14900K and Intel’s seemingly fundamental AI implementation.
AI can dramatically enhance the facility of a PC, and we have now a terrific instance of AI doing simply that: Nvidia’s Deep Studying Tremendous Sampling (DLSS). It began off as simply an AI-assisted upscaling software, but it surely has grown to use AI to border era and ray tracing denoisers, with all three working to enhance efficiency and the gaming expertise on PC.
DLSS and AI Help aren’t the identical factor, however DLSS is a first-rate instance of making use of AI to an issue and seeing tangible advantages from it. AI Help isn’t. It’s making use of AI in a state of affairs the place the efficiency positive aspects are already restricted, and doing so in a manner that doesn’t do something to enhance the efficiency or consumer expertise.
Intel has been pushing AI laborious, as has the remainder of the computing world. Its next-gen Meteor Lake chips include a devoted AI processor, although the one clear software for one is Home windows Studio Results. We now have AI-assisted overclocking, although the times of minor overclocks producing huge efficiency jumps are far behind us. And subsequent month, Intel is launching its next-gen CPUs for laptops with an occasion titled “AI In all places.” I’m not towards AI being in all places, but it surely must make sense.
AI Help in XTU sadly doesn’t. It could possibly be a terrific characteristic, notably for lower-end chips which have some headroom to spare. And it might carry AI into the fold in a spot the place it issues, provided that the mannequin behind the scenes is really delivering one thing you’ll be able to’t get with a one-click overclocking software. It’s potential we might see that sooner or later from AI Help, but it surely’s not right here now.
Editors’ Suggestions
