How to Optimize Monitor for Gaming 2022. How to optimize gaming monitor

When data is written to or deleted from the hard drive, the files become fragmented and physically spread over the entire drive. Disk fragmentation will lead to a significant drop in performance – especially for games – as the hard drive will have to collect all fragmented parts before it can process the entire file.

Best Monitor Settings for Gaming: Recommend Settings that will provide you best Gaming Experience

You are here to read this article, which means you are looking for the right setting for your monitor that will give you the best gaming experience. In this article, we are going to tell you about the best gaming monitor settings that you can use to get better picture quality when playing on the monitor.

If you’ve purchased a new monitor, you may be dealing with image correction or colorization issues that are common to new monitors due to their default settings. Now the question is what are the best monitor settings for your gaming experience or how to adjust your monitor settings.

Don’t worry, we’re here to guide you about the best monitor settings you can use and apply to get the best picture quality. Please read the full article below and adjust your monitor settings accordingly.

Select Native Resolution

All monitors vary in resolution depending on screen size and refresh rate, so it’s best to choose the best resolution that suits your monitor to get the best quality. To check your monitor’s native resolution and set the best one, follow these steps:

  • Find the settings options from the beginning, and then tap system settings (Maybe it is not displayed on the screen as it differs by Windows).
  • If the above option is not good, you can also find display settings by right-clicking on the home screen and selecting display settings.
  • Now with the display settings open, scroll the screen and find the Resolution settings option available on the screen.
  • Click on the slider and select the resolution that is marked (recommended), this is the native and best resolution for your monitor.
  • Tap Apply to save your changes.

Your monitor may use a better resolution than recommended, but the text will not be as sharp and the screen may be small, centered on the screen, with black edges or stretched. This can be a big problem, so it is imperative that you select Recommended for the best gaming monitor settings.

Recommended resolutions depending on the size of the monitor screen:

Monitor screen size Recommended resolution settings
19 inch monitor with standard aspect 1280 × 1024
20 inch monitor with standard aspect 1600 × 1200
20-inch and 22-inch widescreen monitors 1680 × 1050
24 inch widescreen monitor 1920 × 1200

If your monitors are of the same make and model, you can probably skip this section – when you plug them both in, Windows should automatically extend your desktop horizontally. Just adjust the stand of each monitor to make it fit perfectly and go racing.

Optimize Your Monitor Settings for Maximum Performance

Your computer monitor settings can have a huge impact on its performance. Sometimes the default settings can be too bright or too dark for our eyes, so we need to change them.

We’ll cover how to optimize your monitor settings for maximum performance and give you a short tutorial on how to do that.

This is an important topic as not all monitors are created equal in brightness, contrast and color quality. Some monitors even come with presets that we don’t have to mess with if they’re not perfect for our eyes and preferences. This guide explains exactly what to look for when purchasing a new monitor.

Getting Started with Optimized Gaming Monitor Settings

how-to-optimize-game-monitor-settings

Monitors are sometimes optimized for games, but not always. There are a few things you can do to optimize your monitor for games. You’ll want to avoid using a display with too much flickering, use a G-Sync compatible monitor and use DisplayPort over HDMI or VGA.

Making sure your monitor is optimized for gaming is important as it will give you the best possible gaming experience.

Too much brightness and not the right contrast can cause headaches and eye strain, and dark screens can make the game boring and uninteresting.

Parameters for the best monitor settings for gaming

Getting the best gaming monitor doesn’t have to be complicated. Nevertheless, you will want to know what all the different settings are before you start adjusting them.

Here is a detailed list of gaming monitor settings you should consider:

1. Resolution

Screen resolution refers to the visual dimensions of the display in pixels per inch. The selected display resolution determines the clarity of the images.

Higher resolution translates to clearer, high-quality displays, while lower resolution results in blurred images. For Full HD displays, the resolution is 1080p or 1920 × 1080 pixels.

The best resolution for games depends on your preferences. If you’re looking for amazing graphics go for 3840 × 2160 (aka “4K”), but 1920 × 1080 is the perfect choice if you value gaming performance.

What is 4K resolution?

Ultimately, the best resolution really depends on the size of your monitor and the distance you are viewing it from. More on that in a moment.

Here are the steps to adjust the resolution of your monitor:

  1. Go to the “Control Panel” on your computer
  2. Go to “Appearance and Personalization”
  3. Click “Adjust screen resolution”
  4. Move the slider to the desired display resolution

2. Optimal Viewing Distance

The optimal viewing distance may not be the “setting”, but it has a huge impact on the overall gaming experience.

It refers to the distance of the monitor from the seat, which provides the best view without eye strain.

Games can be exciting and addictive, meaning you’ll likely spend hours behind your screen doing what you love.

However, sitting too close to the monitor may be harmful to the eyes, so adhere to the recommended optimal viewing distance.

The ideal range depends on the size of your monitor and the resolution you have set. The rule of thumb is to sit 1.5 times the size of the monitor away.

For example, if your monitor is 40 inches, you should sit 60 inches (about 5 feet) apart.

Here’s a great image showing the best screen resolution considering both display size and viewing distance!

optimal viewing distance for games based on resolution and display size

3. Refresh Rate

Screen resolution and refresh rate are almost synonymous.

In layman’s terms, the refresh rate determines the “smoothness” of your displays. Indicates the number of times the monitor can refresh the images per second.

Standard monitors have a refresh rate of 60 Hz, while high-end gaming monitors offer up to 240 Hz. While a higher refresh rate provides a smoother display, most games perform optimally at a refresh rate of 120Hz.

The reality is that as you get faster and faster refresh rates, it becomes harder and harder to even tell the difference. The transition from 30 Hz to 60 Hz is an extremely noticeable improvement. But going from 120 Hz to 240 Hz? Not so much.

Other ways to calibrate the best monitor settings for gaming

If you don’t want to go to the hassle of tweaking individual monitor settings, there’s an easier way out. You can calibrate the gaming monitor using the on-screen menu (OSD.

Most modern monitors have an integrated menu that allows you to adjust basic functions.

The settings panel has a dedicated gaming menu where you can change the display mode and resolution.

You can also activate features such as overdrive to eliminate ghosting, faint blue light to prevent eye strain, and black equalizer to change the monitor’s black levels.

To access the OSD settings, press the menu button on the side or front of the monitor and use the + or – buttons to the desired settings.

However, sitting too close to the monitor may be harmful to the eyes, so adhere to the recommended optimal viewing distance.

The Best Settings for G-Sync

Even with G-Sync on, you may need to adjust a few additional settings to get the optimal experience. Open the game settings and make sure it’s set to the maximum refresh rate. Even if you set Nvidia’s drivers to 144Hz, some games may still default to 60Hz in their own display settings, so you’ll want to tweak that up.

You’ll also get the best results by using the exclusive full-screen mode on your games, so use it if you can. Finally, if you find that your game’s FPS is dropping too far – going beyond the G-Sync compatible range – you may want to lower your graphics settings to increase FPS in difficult scenes.

Also, take a look at the higher end of the monitor refresh range. If you’re running at 200fps in a game, but your monitor is only 144Hz, G-Sync won’t be active – and the game will default to whatever Vsync behavior you’ve selected in the game’s settings. This means you’ll go back to screen stuttering and tearing (with V-sync off) or increased input lag (with V-sync on) during easy-to-render scenes.

To fix this, you can set a frame rate limiter for each of your games to keep them below the maximum refresh rate of your monitor. Nvidia tells me it’s best to keep this a few percent below the maximum – so if you have a 144Hz monitor, set the limiter to 141 or lower. It would be best to do this in-game; Call of Duty: Warzone and Overwatch and, for example, have FPS limits in the video settings, while Counter-Strike: Global Offensive requires a console command to enable the same feature. Do a Google search to see what your game supports.

If your game doesn’t have a framerate limiter, you can add it in the Nvidia Control Panel. Click Manage 3D Settings, select the Program Settings tab, select your game from the drop-down list, and set the Maximum Frame Rate option in the list.

Nvidia says this should ensure optimal results; no extra delay, no stuttering, and no tears. However, some gamers – including me – have noticed a tear even with these settings, especially at the bottom of the screen. If that happens, you’ll want to enable Vsync along with G-Sync and a frame rate limiter.

You can do this by enabling Vsync in the game or by enabling it in the Nvidia Control Panel for that particular game (whichever game is better, try both if you run into problems). Having G-Sync, Vsync, and frame rate limiter operating in tandem should eliminate any tearing, without introducing input lags like you usually see in Vsync.

Finally, to minimize lag, you can also enable Nvidia Reflex mode (if available in game settings) or low latency mode (in Nvidia control panel program settings for your game). This will give you the lowest latency possible – but bear in mind that the latter setting doesn’t work for DirectX 12 or Vulkan games, so may not always be an option.

We could write books about how this fascinating technology works, but hopefully these few settings should get you where you need to go. As always, things can vary from monitor to monitor, from game to game, so you may need to adjust your settings if you run into problems. However, they should fit most of the ideal scenarios to ensure smooth gameplay with no tears in sight.

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If your monitors are of the same make and model, you can probably skip this section – when you plug them both in, Windows should automatically extend your desktop horizontally. Just adjust the stand of each monitor to make it fit perfectly and go racing.

Study Your Shortcuts

The beauty of multiple monitors – especially when compared to ultra-wide and ultra-wide monitors – is the ability to “dock” windows to the edge of each display, making it easy to view multiple windows at once. While you can always drag windows and resize them with the mouse, it’s tedious and time-consuming.

That’s why Windows 10 has a few shortcuts that can help, including:

Win + Left and Win + Right: Snap the active window to the left or right side of the current monitor. You can press the keys again to move it between monitors, or you can snap it back to its original position.

Win + Up and Win + Down: Maximize or minimize the current window. If the window is currently snapped, this will also resize the window from its snapped position.

Shift + Win + Left and Shift + Win + Right: Move the active window to the next monitor without snapping it to the edge.

Shift + Win + Up: Maximize the window vertically, which is especially useful if you don’t have the taskbar in the secondary screen.

Win + House: Minimize all windows except the one you are working on to avoid distractions. Press it again to restore all windows.

Most of these shortcuts work when you only have one monitor, but the more monitors you add, the more useful they become.

Fix That Wandering Cursor

While triple monitors allow you to cover the game on all displays – using the Nvidia Surround or AMD Eyefininity settings – dual monitors don’t work that well for super-wide games as the crosshair would be right on the monitor bezels. However, you can play on one monitor with an animation, chat window, or GPU monitor on the other.

Most games can run this way without problems, but you may find that in some cases your cursor may “drift” to the second monitor while you are still in the game. It happened to me in many titles, including The Witcher, Doom, and Metro: Last Light.

Fortunately, one enterprising developer decided to fix this with a tool called Cursor Lock and in my experience it works beautifully. Run the program, check the Open program box, and then enter the path to the game’s EXE file. This will create a new shortcut to use.

Now, when you start the game with this shortcut, the cursor should remain “locked” in the game window unless you exit Alt + Tab. If that doesn’t work, your game may require a few additional options, which you can learn about in the video tutorial Cursor Lock.

You are here to read this article, which means you are looking for the right setting for your monitor that will give you the best gaming experience. In this article, we are going to tell you about the best gaming monitor settings that you can use to get better picture quality when playing on the monitor.

Configuring Color Depth

Configuring a monitor’s color depth is critical to being able to display high dynamic range content, but even on an SDR monitor, proper configuration will allow for rich, well-mixed colors to be displayed. Here’s how to get the most out of it.

If you are using a 4K, 144Hz panel, you may notice that the output color depth value has decreased. If this happens, set it back to the highest setting, then change the Output Color Format to YCbCr444 (this will change the output dynamic range to “Limited”). Click on apply again. If the color depth continues to change, lower the Output Color Format to YCbCr422.

  • Color depth shortcut: Right-click on the desktop -> Nvidia Control Panel -> Display -> Apply these settings -> Use NVIDIA color settings -> Color drop-down menu
  • Color depth shortcut: right click on the desktop -> AMD Radeon Settings -> Display -> Color depth and pixel format

How to Enable HDR in Windows 10

After you configure your computer to display HDR colors, you need to enable it in Windows 10. To do this, open the Start menu and select Settings. From there, click on System and then View (you can also search for “HDR” from the Start menu to get there quickly). If you have more than one monitor, make sure the current display is selected, then scroll down to the Windows HD Color section and set “Play HDR games and applications” to On. Now click on the Windows HD Color Settings link just above that toggle.

Scroll down there. In the “Display Abilities” section, you should see a couple of options related to HDR content. One or more of them should say “Yes” if you have an HDR capable monitor. At the bottom of the page, toggle to turn on “Play HDR games and applications” and “Stream HDR video”. Depending on the capabilities of your monitor, only one of them may be available.

  • HDR shortcut: Start Menu -> Settings -> Display -> Windows HD Color Settings

Seen as a problem with console games compared to PC games, FPS boosting is a win for PC gamers – you can’t tweak the console that’s in your hands. The FPS tips in this article are intended to show you how to increase FPS and speed up your computer for games .

How to boost FPS: advanced techniques

From overclocking your GPU to learning all the advanced tweaks for settings, there are a few powerful changes you can make to take your framerate to an elite level on your gaming PC:

Overclock your graphics card

More than insufficient RAM or a struggling CPU, your GPU is almost always a bottleneck that causes stuttering or poor gameplay. To improve performance and increase FPS, move the graphics card above the default speed setting by overclocking.

Five to ten years ago, overclocking could potentially harm your hardware. But now most of the current systems will shut down before they suffer any damage. Besides, we are dealing with a slight overclocking of the graphics card by no more than 15% to quickly improve performance, which can greatly improve the gaming experience.

On my purpose-built gaming PC, I picked up the Nvidia RTX GeForce 3090 about 15% above the factory clock:

Screenshot of MSI Afterburner showing GPU overclocking in Windows 10

Overclocking the Nvidia RTX GeForce 3090 GPU on a Custom Gaming PC.

On my main laptop, a 2016 MacBook Pro with Windows 10 and a Radeon 460 Pro GPU, I overclocked the GPU by 100MHz and overclocked the RAM by 300MHz.

Overclocking speeds up the GPU, but it also puts a load on all your hardware, not just your CPU or GPU – which raises the temperature inside your PC. My desktop and laptop both turn up both the temperature and the temperature by 5 ° Celsius – which is significant, but within safe limits. Always follow safe GPU overclocking practices by trying it yourself. The same goes for CPU overclocking – slow and steady wins the race.

By using 3DMark TimeSpy for benchmarking, I found that overclocking my system as described above resulted in a 10% performance increase, from 17,018 points before overclocking to 18,591 later.

Upgrade your graphics card

After upgrading to a 4K projector, I noticed that my old gaming PC really couldn’t keep up with the higher resolution. While The Witcher 3 performed decently in Full HD, my two GeForce 970 graphics cards (in SLI mode) struggled with 4K resolution, which is basically four times the resolution of 1080p.

Only thanks to the Nvidia Pascal graphics processor from the 2016/2017 generation, we obtained the graphics power that allows rendering 4K games with mass fluidity of 60 FPS and higher. But even in 2022 and beyond, you’ll need high-end GPUs like the GeForce RTX 3090 or Titan RTX to support this type of performance and optimize your PC for gaming at this level.

If 1440p or 1080p is enough for your gaming needs, you’ll see a significant increase in frames per second thanks to a much cheaper GPU. And if you’re currently building your own Windows 10 gaming PC, you can choose the perfect graphics processor for the way you play.

Moving from a GeForce RTX 2080 GPU to a GeForce RTX 3080 can dramatically improve FPS.

According to Nvidia’s tests, switching from GeForce RTX 2080 to GeForce RTX 3080 significantly increases FPS. Source: Nvidia

Bonus: improve gaming performance on your laptop

Here’s the good news – if you’re a laptop gamer, you can use most of the tips above to boost your framerate and optimize your laptop for gaming. While many laptops are unable to handle aftermarket GPU upgrades, you can enable Windows 10 Gaming Mode, update your graphics drivers, and in most cases upgrade your RAM and swap your hard drive for a super-fast SSD.

Here are some additional FPS tips and boosters to improve your laptop’s gaming performance:

Optimize your power settings for performance

Maximize your laptop’s gaming performance by giving it all the power it needs to increase FPS. Optimize your power options by clicking the battery icon in the system tray and dragging the slider all the way for the best performance. This will shorten your battery life if your laptop isn’t plugged into an external power source, but as long as you’re using it you’ll be fine.

You can optimize the gaming performance on your laptop by setting the battery to the best performance.

Keep your laptop cool

The hotter your laptop is, the worse its performance becomes: a hot laptop will try to regulate its temperature on its own, slowing down performance. Here’s how to cool your laptop for more consistent, high-performance and less stress on sensitive internal components:

Clean your laptop’s fans and vents. As dust builds up, the laptop cannot evacuate hot air as efficiently. Regularly clean your laptop physically and organize the air vents to keep it cool. If you’re feeling brave (and don’t mind voiding the manufacturer’s warranty), you can open your laptop and clean its fans directly.

Don’t put this on your lap. The word “laptop” is misleading. Place your laptop on a smooth, flat surface so that air can circulate underneath it. If it’s on your lap, on a rug or blanket, you’ll strangle it.

Plug it in. When your laptop is running on battery power, it can get warm – especially if you’ve optimized your power settings for performance. Whenever you can, connect your laptop to an external power source.

Use a Cooling Platform: An external cooling base blows cool air underneath the laptop to improve airflow. You can buy one for a relatively cheap price and connect it directly to your laptop via USB.

Use a performance-boosting app

There is a whole world of software out there that will automatically optimize your laptop for top performance. AVG TuneUp allows you to easily make many effective performance tweaks, including putting programs running in the background to sleep to free up RAM and uninstalling unnecessary software that clogs up space. Try it out with a 30-day free trial to boost FPS on your gaming laptop.

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