People who desire better performance on their laptops often ask the question; can you overclock a laptop? The answer is a resounding Yes! There are many reasons you should overclock your laptop, but sometimes it is not necessary, especially if the device is working at its optimal levels. Overclocking will extend the lifespan of a laptop’s processor by helping it keep up with the increasing demands of certain operations like software requirements. Since modern laptops are designed to run at higher temperature ratings than older ones, overclocking can help your device sustain its operations. This is the main benefit of overclocking your computer device.
What Other Benefits Can You Derive From Overclocking Your Laptop?
With overclocking, you can keep up with the latest game on your laptop. Older laptops with lower clock speeds can’t keep up since new games require faster processors alongside higher core counts. The speed of each core on the CPU is adjustable through overclocking; hence it will perform beyond the factory settings to keep up with new demands.
Another benefit of overclocking is that the best cooling system for your laptop can be identified. Though there are increased cooling requirements when you overclock your laptop, the faster a CPU runs, the more heat generated. For instance, if the CPU exceeds its safe operating temperature, it may start shutting down unless you find a better and more effective cooling solution.
In most cases, you may have to switch between air and liquid cooling to get your laptop cooler. Air cooling relies on a metal sink and cooling fans to push heated air away from the hot CPU. This process will then drive cooler air towards the CPU to lower its temperature.
Liquid cooling, on the other hand, pumps coolant to push through the engine block of your laptop, thus absorbing heat and carrying it away from the CPU. You can switch between these two types of cooling depending on which is more suitable. Manual overclocking, in particular, will give you more control over your laptop.
How To Overclock Laptop Manually
There are two ways of overclocking your laptop, and these are; manual or with software. If you are new to overclocking, perhaps a software option such as Intel Extreme Utility software is one of the ideal options.
Before you complete manual overclocking through BIOS, be sure to update the BIOS to the latest version available. This will help you get access to newly released updates from product manufacturers that will benefit your device.
Step #1: Establish the baseline performance
Measure the baseline performance for your laptop because it will help you compare the performance metrics of the device with overclocking performance. Please keep track of the benchmark score and compare it with your results after overclocking.
Step #2: Adjust the Performance Settings
You may want to begin the overclocking by adjusting the CPU core ratio, which is one of the central values determining CPU speed in a laptop. It would be best if you locate the section of the CPU that will allow you to adjust this setting first. You must exercise caution here by changing one setting at a time. Verify that changing a setting is successful before you move to another. This way, you will identify any issue and resolve it quickly before changing to another setting.
Adjust the CPU ratio upwards slowly and hen modify the voltage. Keep in mind that the higher the voltage, the more power it draws. Don’t forget to compare performance gains with the benchmark recorded earlier.
Step #3: Measure Your Performance Gains
To measure performance gains from overclocking, run the benchmark previously recorded with your baseline score. If performance has improved, then you have successfully overclocked your laptop’s CPU.
You may want to move on to system stability from here, but if the performance didn’t improve, you need to go back to BIOS and adjust the setting once again until you achieve the desired performance.
Step #4: Conduct a Stress Test
Your benchmark score reflects performance within a short time, but a stress test is for the stability of your device for more extended periods. You can choose software closely related to your laptop’s working to conduct the most reliable stress test.
You mustn’t turn up your CPU performance too much to avoid damages to your laptop; a steady increase is more important.
