NVIDIA GPU Boost

Dynamic GPU overclocking has finally arrived! With the introduction of NVIDIA GPU Boost, the GeForce GTX 680 will be able to dynamically overclock itself to meet the TDP and the game's requirements. As the following slide shows, NVIDIA admits that most games do not fully stress the graphics card, leaving a significant amount of headway, which they call a "boost opportunity".

The GeForce GTX 680 will still feature a rated clock speed, but it will now be called the Base Clock. This is the guaranteed minimum clock speed. However, the actual GPU clock speed will vary, depending on the application requirements and the power target. NVIDIA GPU Boost will dynamically ramp up the clock speed to meet the power target, thereby converting what would have been wasted power into higher clock speeds.

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 will ship with a standard GPU boost clock of about 5% (ignore what the next slide shows) but this may vary from vendor to vendor (who have the option of changing the amount of GPU boost). The boost clock speed will be stated in specifications and it refers to the average boost clock - the actual clock speed will vary, even going beyond.

Of course, NVIDIA GPU Boost will work in conjunction with overclocking to deliver even higher clock speeds. This slide is a bit misleading though. Overclocking the card will not actually increase the amount of GPU Boost. It will increase the base clock, while the amount of GPU Boost remains the same. Unlike overclocking, GPU Boost does not guarantee a speed bump. It will only increase the clock speed if there's any headroom left. It all depends on the power target.

NVIDIA claims the GeForce GTX 680 is plenty of overclocking headroom, with their samples hitting above 1.2 GHz. That said, with GPU Boost providing dynamic overclocking of about 10% on top of whatever overclocking you are doing, it doesn't really leave you all that much overclocking headroom. If you manually overclock to 1.2 GHz, GPU Boost is unlikely to do much, if at all.

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