GPU Tuning 101

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(Edited)

The heat kills, and I say it sells the worst tickets for the afterworld. I'd much rather lay naked in a ton of snow and fool around to keep my body warm for as long as I can, than choose to spend a day under the scorching heat.

Whenever the temperatures hit above 35 °C to 40 °C here, you will literally feel all your soul and energy being sucked out of you. I surely feel it, and I'm the living proof. I can't withstand the extra bit of heat, my body is already abnormally warm, which explains me wearing no sleeve shirts and shorts during winter time.

So, keeping it cool is always the goal, or my soul will just be sucked out of me, as I lay in one spot, while the whole day goes to waste.


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In consequence, if my body wants to give up at around 40 °C, then what do my PC components go through during such conditions? Because these things reach to the point of 100 °C sometimes. And many people don't know, nor do they care, keeping PC components cool helps with better performance and longevity.

The same goes for any device, anything that falls under the category of Computing Devices.

I mentioned in my previous gaming post that these past few days I have been playing NFS Unbound, and I've managed to complete the story mode already.

It took a solid 20 hours in the last 10 days or so, you can put in more time, if you're a "perfectionist", wanting to complete every race, mission and challenge. But this being a story focused game, there's not many places and things to explore, so I'd rather breeze through it. And 20 hours on a racing game is a good offering, especially when you consider the price I paid for it and the whole package haha.

Now, even though the game was "fun", the PC metrics and heat it produced wasn't too cute to look at.


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My PC temps weren't too cool and happy whenever I was playing NFS Unbound.

Even with my optimized settings, which have both overclocked and undervolted GPU settings and profiles, this game was giving my PC a run for its money. The stats and temps you see above are idle temps, and we humans start become lethargic and can't function properly at these temperatures.

So, just think about the torture these components go through when they're hitting 60/70 degree Celsius, 60/70 °C is actually good, acceptable metrics, but sometimes they do go way above it.


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And that is why optimization and cooling is important.

I've tried my best by going with the classic air cooled setup for my PC, but it just wasn't enough.

The settings you see above are the default settings for both my CPU and GPU. I haven't touched my CPU yet, because it's keeping up well, but my GPU has gone through some serious tweaks. Fan tuning, overclocking, under-volting, you name it, over the past few months I've gone overboard with these settings.

I've applied my own settings and tweaks, and also tried out a few suggestions from Google and YouTube. So far, I must say that the effort has been worth it.


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Right now these are the settings you see above, from applying my very own personal profile and settings, to overclocks, under-volts, experimenting with AMD SAM, to setting different levels of fan curves. The results aren't game changing, but what it will do, is help keep my PC performing well, also with the GPU's cooling and longevity, while sometimes also boosting performance.

Now, this is an issue you can avoid with the very high end GPU models, the ones which have those THICC cooling systems and fans, but to me it's just not worth it.

Paying a few hundred dollars extra for a cooling system that's a tad bit better? I'd rather not. But, that's a local issue though, GPUs and their price tags are absurd over here, that's why people usually just have to go for the much available entry level options.


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Along with the GPU tweaking and all, in-game settings are important too. The Upsampler setting here was the game changer, you do lose a bit of "graphics" because of it, which makes the game look jittery, but at least your GPU stays really cool, hovering around the average temps.

The game already looks fantastic, so you don't need to worry much about the graphics and looks. Thus, it's a small tweak that will help by a ton, while outweighing the bit of graphics you may lose.


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The end result though?

The metrics on the left are with all default settings, the metrics on the right came after every little settings and tweaks that have been applied. The funny thing is, the FPS is actually higher after the settings have been applied, not only that, the FPS is stable too. No wonder I'm always getting much better frames compared to my friends, and they have PCs that are two to three times more powerful and expensive than my setup.

The GPU CUR TEMP is the original temperature metric, JUNC Temp is the hottest point on the GPU die, and you won't find this little info on Nvidia GPUs. JUNC Temps are always higher than the usual temps, but as long as it's below 110 °C then there's not much to worry about.


After trying out countless games over the past few months, NFS Unbound has really given my PC and GPU a run for its money. Having to take care of it was a bit of extra work, but whatever keeps my PC alive and running is always a top priority for me.

So, don't limit your performance, try out different settings and tweaks. If your components can juice out that extra bit of performance and stay stable and cool, then why not try it?

Yes, it's all quite technical, but you have to start somewhere. A few years ago even I didn't know shit about such tweaks and tricks. Yet, thanks to a few friends, a few YT tutorials and Google, I got the hang of it.

That's about it I guess. A little update, and hopefully a helpful tip.

I'm planning on posting a review on NFS Unbound and the current state of NFS. I love NFS and I used be quite the "pro", that's way before I stepped into the realm of FPS haha.

Be seeing you folks on the next one, singing out from here.

Cheers & GG 🥃☮️



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You have already completed Unbound, damn!! 🔥
Do that review fast, I was scrolling through your previous posts to see if you have done it already and at the end got to know that it's in the ' coming soon ' phase.

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It's only around 20 hours, and finishing the story mode first helps with online gameplay, so I had to.

The review is coming, very soon. 🔥

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