Intel's flagship Alder Lake-S processor has already been pushed to new heights. Earlier this week, we reported that the Core i9-12900K had reached 6.8 GHz, 1.5 GHz higher than its 5.3 GHz stock boost clock speed. As a result, the processor scored 11,669 points in Geekbench 4 single-core and 11,669 points in the Geekbench 5 version, along with 93,232 and 26,649 points in the corresponding multi-core benchmarks.
Now, @TUM_APISAK has shared a CPU-Z screenshot showing the Core i9-12900K at 7421.68 MHz, or 7.42 GHz for short. As the screenshot below shows, the clock speed was achieved with a 74x multiplier and a 100.29 MHz bus speed combined with a 1.275 V core voltage.
Tom's Hardware did not publish the core voltage it used to reach 6.8 GHz, so we cannot compare the two. However, the website used LN2 to maintain 6.8 GHz, so we imagine this was needed for 7.42 GHz, too. Sadly, @TUM_APISAK has not published any benchmark results with the Core i9-12900K at 7.42 GHz, if that is even possible.
Ultimately, we suspect that extreme overclockers will push the Core i9-12900K even harder in the coming months. As it stands, the CPU-Z world record stands at 8794.33 MHz with an AMD FX-8350; the Core i9-12900K will probably not be troubling that any time soon.