Intel Kills Extended Warranty Program for Overclocking

[AleksandarK]

Some time ago, Intel has introduced the Performance Tuning Protection Plan (PTPP), which was used as a warranty for any damage that has occurred during overclocking. Customers of PTPP, mainly buyers of Intel Core processors having a "K" tag were able to get a replacement processor whenever they damaged their CPU by overclocking it. When it comes to the pricing of such a service, typical plans were spanning from $19.99 to $29.99, depending on the processor you had. However, there will no longer be such a program, as Intel is discontinuing its PTPP extended overclocking warranty. The company has updated its site to refer to End-Of-Life (EOL) page displaying a quote below.

To PTPP Customers,
The Performance Tuning Protection Plan program has been discontinued.
As customers increasingly overclock with confidence, we are seeing lower demand for the Performance Tuning Protection Plans (PTPP).
As a result, Intel will no longer offer new PTPP plans effective March 1, 2021.
Intel will continue focusing on delivering amazing processors with tuning flexibility and overclocking tools like Intel Performance Maximizer and Intel XTU.
All existing plans will continue to be honored through the duration of the processor warranty period.
For questions, contact Intel Customer Support.
Note about the Intel Xeon W-3175X Processor
The Intel Xeon W-31 75X Processor is automatically covered for overclocking, No additional plan or activation code is required
Thank You,
PTPP Team

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[MaMoo]

Does this have anything to do with the Rocket Lake launch? Perhaps Rocket Lake is not as friendly to OC?

 

[Ravenmaster]

Lower demand for Intel processors is what they're seeing. Coz everybody is buying AMD

 

[dj-electric]

Lower demand for Intel processors is what they're seeing. Coz everybody is buying AMD

Seeing how Intel was able to claw back market share lately since AMD's stock was in a horrific state, idk how much truth there is in this statement.
Surely, if AMD's stock was better, Intel would not be in a better state.

 

[Toothless]

Lower demand for Intel processors is what they're seeing. Coz everybody is buying AMD

That's not anywhere close to why they would be closing the program. If anything they would want to keep it open to anyone buying their chips to keep that customer loyalty.

 

[DeathtoGnomes]

I think Intel might have ulterior motives for cancelling this program, wait and see what develops.

 

[jardows]

I think Intel might have ulterior motives for cancelling this program, wait and see what develops.

Probably money. Money is always the ulterior motive.
I imagine the program wasn't profitable enough for the overhead. Record-keeping, management, processors, and the like costing lots of money, while relatively few people signing up.

 

[maxfly]

I doubt it was actually used by anyone. The only way they would know you killed your proc from ocing is if you told them.

 

[Deleted member 185088]

I doubt it was actually used by anyone. The only way they would know you killed your proc from ocing is if you told them.

Apparently they could if they wanted to, according to Ian from Anandtech, Intel CPUs have "fuse bits" that trigger if the CPU goes beyond some limit.
To be honest I feel that OC is kinda dead, the CPUs push themselves quite well, there is almost nothing left, gone are the days when we could really push the CPUs. If memory serves, I had an e4300 at 1.8ghz that could easily reach 3.0ghz.

 

[qubit]

Why am I not surprised that this is happening. And don'tcha just love how they spin it as a benefit for the customer? Oh, glory!

 

[ZoneDymo]

so instead of stopping the practice of locking cpu's out of overclocking....they remove the warranty for overclocking.

nice....going....intel

 

[phanbuey]

Does this have anything to do with the Rocket Lake launch? Perhaps Rocket Lake is not as friendly to OC?

Good point -- probably a combination of this and new CEO.

 

[Hardware Geek]

Intel wouldn't be killing this if it was still profitable. As sales of the warranty decreased, I'm guessing their was a larger percentage of those who did buy it that burnt out their processors, as only those who intended to push their processors to the absolute limit were still purchasing the warranty.

 

[ThrashZone]

Hi,
Intel rma is fairly easy so doubt this is all that big of a deal.
If the chip doesn't have any physical damage on top or bottom and numbers match the box boom you're nearly done.

 

[ZoneDymo]

Hi,
Intel rma is fairly easy so doubt this is all that big of a deal.
If the chip doesn't have any physical damage on top or bottom and numbers match the box boom you're nearly done.

"boom, you're nearly done."

I love that part

 

[Vendor]

Lower demand for Intel processors is what they're seeing. Coz everybody is buying AMD

not true at all, intel still performs well despite being on 14nm and prices for their CPUs are much better in India compared to AMD that's why more people on budget are buying i3 10100f and i5 10400f instead of r3 3100 or r5 3600

 

[voltage]

amd doesn't provide extended warranties, so why should Intel. heck, amd would be out of business if they did.

 

[cadaveca]

This program was good, but I don't know very many people have ever used it. I have spoken to only a true handful of people over the years other than myself that used it, and I tried to get people to buy it all the time. Maybe if I stuck at pushing it it would have stuck.

 

[ZoneDymo]

amd doesn't provide extended warranties, so why should Intel. heck, amd would be out of business if they did.

Idk man hd6950 still going strong today

 

[DeeJay1001]

Does anyone actually kill their CPUs? I've been overclocking CPUS and running them at what many forums would call "risky" settings for over 10 years now and have never even had a CPU become unstable let alone outright dead. From tape mod overclocking a Q6600 to setting the non-exotic cooled HWbot record on a Ryzen 5 1600. I pretty much tried to kill that 1600 yet it continues to run at 4.1ghz all core everyday in my hand me down PC. Despite countless thermal shutdowns and borderline negligent voltage, It hasn't skipped a beat in over 2 years.

Maybe I've been lucky but I just dont see dying CPUs as a concern for the common power user who pushes the OC a tiny bit.

 

[cadaveca]

Maybe I've been lucky but I just dont see dying CPUs as a concern for the common power user who pushes the OC a tiny bit.

I've killed several, but usually within the first few months, or OC degrades over time, usually for me, after pushing memory OC. But yes, it is rare since stability testing guides are so prevalent, and how people OC is fairly standard and protected by board BIOSes too.

 

[GerKNG]

Lower demand for Intel processors is what they're seeing. Coz everybody is buying AMD

i had 4 Ryzen CPUs and at the moment i got rid of all of them.

cache hierachy errors, crashes ,reboots, unstable at stock speeds, USB Issues, NVME Issues, 50 billion bios updates to fix issues and when you remove the powerlimit they don't consume much less than a 10900K.


yeah the ipc bump is great but it's a complete mess of a hardware pre alpha.

 

[skizzo]

Intel wouldn't be killing this if it was still profitable. As sales of the warranty decreased, I'm guessing their was a larger percentage of those who did buy it that burnt out their processors, as only those who intended to push their processors to the absolute limit were still purchasing the warranty.

wow, someone who used logic and common sense in a response on here! good job!

Intel is a business in the business of making $$$, not CPUs, GPUs, desktops, laptops, etc. Their business is to make money, as is all businesses. If this was a profitable program, imagine a single executive giving the "OK" to end a profitable program? They wouldn't!

The one exception I can think of is if the resources required to run a still profitiable program were better suited for other uses. For ex, they profit $100K/month with this program, but if they axe it and move those resources to another program, the new program could be profiting $500K/month. So it would make more business sense to close the old program and put all resourses on the new one that is raking in the bigger bucks. Obviously I just pulled random numbers out my rear for the example! But the point is valid

 

[15th Warlock]

I've been overclocking CPUs since I had my old 486DX 66MHz running at 100MHz by using a heatsink with a fan and changing the jumpers in my motherboard, that was back in the early 90s, in my anecdotal experience, and through dozens of CPUs spread over almost 30 years of OCing every single processor I ever got my hands on, I have never killed a single CPU.

I've seen performance degradation over time, probably due to electro migration but other than that, I think every single CPU I've overclocked would still run today. Heck I still have my trusty i7 2600K running at 4.5GHz in an emulation dedicated box in my house, in it's heyday that processor hit 5GHz at insane voltages while under water cooling, but now it's running at a much lower OC, I got that processor over 10 years ago and it's still chugging along!

The point I'm trying to make is, it would take some extreme OCing to kill a CPU, at least in my experience, idk the statistics, like Dave mentioned, the program probably wasn't even used that much.

That might be part of the reason Intel killed the program, but only someone with inside knowledge of the real numbers being this program, would be able to give us an answer.

That's all I can add from my own experience, anyone here ever made use of this program? I'm curious.

 

[evernessince]

Seeing how Intel was able to claw back market share lately since AMD's stock was in a horrific state, idk how much truth there is in this statement.
Surely, if AMD's stock was better, Intel would not be in a better state.

"Claw back marketshare"

This implies that Intel has actually earned it when in fact Intel's windfall is more the result of demand being much higher than normal and AMD being completely out of stock.

AMD has held a majority of the top selling CPU spots at retailers worldwide throughout the pandemic. Intel selling CPUs when people have no choice but the least desirable product on the shelf, in this case Intel, is not something to be touted. The last thing Intel's marketing department needs is another way to spin a crappy situation.