When people are buying new computers for their sudden Work/Study from Home needs, PC Gamers also get an excuse to upgrade. For the ones who are not sure about the software they require, we bring to you a list of Free PC Software Utilities for Gamers that we at Gawking Geeks use as a staple.
GPU-Z – GPU Validation and Info
We start the list with TechPowerUP GPU-Z, it is a software tailored to inform you about every minuscule detail about your Graphics Processor like BIOS version, age, and transistor count as well as the more general stuff like VRAM clock, GPU base clock, and GPU boost clock. Every field also has a neat popup that tells you about the field once you hover over it.
For overclocking enthusiasts and people concerned with thermals, the advanced tab tells you about current and maximum power limits to help you decide what target you should expect to achieve by overclocking the GPU. It also provides a good baseline of a power draw outline, how hot the card would run before it would throttle back? It also provides you with information about the different GPUs that you have installed may be in a multi-GPU setup or the secondary integrated GPU in case of laptops running hybrid GPUs. The sensors tab informs you about the fan speed, temperatures and the reasons of GPU throttling (if it is) under ‘PerfCap Reason’.
HWMonitor – Best system monitor.
CPUID HWMonitor is a versatile system monitoring tool that tells you about a lot of stuff that is going on with your system. The UI divides each parameter under 3 readings, min-max, and current readings, making the time of the app launch as a reference point. It is an informative utility that tells you all about the sensor readings of your motherboard, CPU, Disks, GPU, and even batteries in case of laptops. It reads all the sensors that the Motherboard houses to give you accurate readings for Voltages across the motherboard, fan speed, and Temperature. Also, utilization for the CPU, Storage, and GPU is also reported in the same way. Unfortunately, RAM monitoring is only limited to the utilization of total Memory available.
Unigine Valley – Best DX11 GPU BM for testing
Arguably the best DirectX 11 burn test to safely check the stability and performance of your GPU. DX11 is preferred because it has mature support to utilize every single stream processor present on the GPU. It also supports tessellation and high levels(decent) of anti-aliasing to help you get a more realistic scenario. No benchmark is a wholly accurate representation of in-game performance, but Unigine Valley is close as it can get. The windowed mode lets you work with other monitoring utilities whilst the benchmark is running for enhanced accuracy.
MSI Afterburner – Best Tuning software for GPU and Game Overlay for FPS etc
People who are into Gaming PCs for long swear by the tuning features of this app when it comes to GPU tuning and monitoring. It helps you overclock your GPU automatically or manually using the parameters you can change and set if you know what you are doing. The latest version of MSI Afterburner features OC Scanner for RTX 20 series graphics card. OC Scanner is an automated function that will find the highest stable overclock settings for your card. Giving you a free performance boost for a smooth in-game experience; thanks to higher FPS. It also tells you about the system stats with charts and graphs which could be exported to other formats for statistics and logging. It also has a handy overlay for 3D applications that provides varied yet informative (graphical and numerical) readings of the system stats. The overlay is way more informative than other in-game overlays but also comes with many customization options for overlays like changing colours for graphs, fonts, and even the size of the graphs.
OBS Studio – Opensource Screen Recording and Live Streaming app.
OBS might not be stranger to everyone but, it is popular and has matured over time. This is the best opensource alternative to any paid software that lets you record your screen and live stream to popular platforms like Twitch or YouTube. The auto-setup wizard lets you adjust the settings automatically to match the proper requirement for each platform. The processing is top-notch and it does not take a hit on performance while recording or streaming. The usage is a little tedious but, there are a ton of tutorials to help you in this. If you have an NVIDIA graphics card, then you might want to check out this article: Use the NVIDIA’s proprietary utility to record and share your gameplay.
With this, we conclude our pick of the top Free Software Utilities for Gamers. If you have more options to include then please let us know in the comments below. If you liked our recommendations, then a follow-on Instagram would be much appreciated.