Intel Alder Lake-HX: 16-core CPU w/ OC + PCIe 5.0 support for laptops

Intel will be officially unveiling its new "Alder Lake-HX" mobile CPUs at its "At Vision" event on May 10, which should deliver up to 16 cores with overclocking, PCIe 5.0 support, and more for laptops of the future.

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The new Intel Alder Lake-HX mobile CPU will see the company using the full desktop Alder Lake silicon on a BGA package, with the same BGA package size as the LGA desktop (45mm v 37.5mm). Intel has made some slight modifications on the height of the BGA package with Alder Lake-HX, down to 2.0mm from a thicker 4.4mm on the desktop.

Intel is also super-powering the new Alder Lake-HX mobile CPUs with a new class of 55W-powered "Enthusiast" CPUs for high-end gaming and workstation laptops. Intel will be boosting CPU core count, power, and more PCIe lanes. PCIe 5.0 is a big deal with Intel's new Alder Lake-HX laptops, the industry's first PCIe 5.0-enabled laptops.

• Read more: Intel Alder Lake-HX: 16-core mobile CPU for the 'Muscle' laptop market
• Read more: Dell Precision 7770 laptop: Alder Lake-HX + RTX 3080 Ti + 128GB DDR5
• Read more: AORUS 17X enthusiast laptop: Core i9-12900HX + GeForce RTX 3080 Ti GPU

Inside, we can expect 16 lanes of PCIe 5.0, 20 lanes of PCIe 4.0, and 12 lanes of PCIe 3.0 -- 48 PCIe lanes in total. Intel's current Alder Lake-H processors only have 28 PCIe lanes in total (16 lanes of PCIe 4.0 and 12 lanes of PCIe 3.0).

Intel is also putting a major focus on overclocking with its beasty new Alder Lake-HX processors, with support for both DDR 5 memory and XMP 3.0 overclocking profiles. The company is also introducing a new feature dubbed "Dynamic Boost Memory" with Alder Lake-HX.

All of the new Alder Lake-HX processors will support overclocking, no matter the model -- with the series also supporting Efficient-core overclocking, an updated Intel Speed Optimizer, and Extreme Tuning Utility.

The previous rumors are still solid it seems, with the flagship Core i9-12950HX rocking 16 cores and 24 threads, with up to 5.0GHz boost CPU clocks and 55W of base power (157W "Max Turbo Power"). At the bottom of the stack is the Core i5-12450HX with 8 cores and 12 threads at up to 4.4GHz, with the same power.