Nvidia caps the power available to its RTX 5090 Mobile GPUs at a relatively low 175W, but one tech enthusiast has managed to push its limit all the way up to 250W. After applying this wholly software-based modification, and a few subsequent tweaks, gaming performance increased by up to 30%, with synthetic benchmarks going even further.
YouTuber GizmoSlipTech shared the results in a recent video, showcasing an XMG Neo 16 gaming laptop running the likes of 3DMark Steel Nomad and more with an RTX 5090 Mobile pulling 250W. If that wasn’t enough, the system was also feeding 80W to its Ryzen 9 9955HX3D CPU, for a combined power consumption of 330W between CPU and GPU alone.
A “third-party vibe coder” provided the applications necessary to circumvent Nvidia’s software power limits, and GizmoSlipTech has not disclosed any details beyond this broad description. However, the YouTuber has stated that they’d be open to providing more detail as “this process gets more refined.”
For the moment then, all we have are the benchmark numbers. While running at 43% above stock TDP doesn’t net equally proportionate performance gains or efficiency improvements, the results are still impressive. For starters, this extra wattage allows for a seemingly stable 350MHz GPU clock boost, while an extra 2,000MHz (effective) is added to the VRAM frequency, the former of which required some adjustment to the GPU voltage curve in MSI Afterburner in service of stability.
All these tweaks combined resulted in frame rate improvements of 20.4% in Rainbow Six Siege, rising to 21.7% in Cyberpunk 2077, but The Witcher 3 saw the largest gains at 29.7%. Meanwhile, 3DMark Steel Nomad scores improved by a whopping 41.16%.
Of course, this sort of mod isn’t possible on every gaming laptop. The XMG Neo 16 in question here has an external water cooler attached, keeping both its CPU and GPU from thermal throttling despite the increase in watts. However, this is still an impressive feat, as GizmoSlipTech pushes the cooling setup beyond its maximum rated specification of a combined 250W across CPU and GPU.
I’m not sure I’d be at all comfortable with pushing my expensive system so far above factory power limits, especially via vibe-coded software, as doing so will almost certainly void any warranty. Still, it’s always exciting to see flagship hardware running beyond stock specification, and I’m curious to see how much further this mod can go.
