Tweak Windows and ALL Graphics drivers

[Dr.Flay]

After you have read the thread on tweaking your UT settings, you may well want to tweak your Windows driver settings.
Here is a list of the extras you can use to unlock the power of your graphics card.

Older nVidia users (up to GeForce 500 series) should install nVidia’s own “System Tools” package for access to extra motherboard and GFX options (very useful for nForce motherboards).
http://www.nvidia.com/object/nvidia_system_tools.html
Find ideal settings for your nVidia card.
http://www.geforce.com/optimize/optimal-game-settings

First make sure ALL your Drivers are up-to-date, including Motherboard chipset, sound and DirectX
https://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id=8109
http://www.intel.com/p/en_US/support/idyp

Manufactures own tweak tools
Asus GPU Tweak
http://support.asus.com/download.aspx
MSI Afterburner
http://event.msi.com/vga/afterburner/download.htm
EVGA Precision
https://www.evga.com/precision/
Zotac Firestorm
http://www.zotac.com/z-zone/zotac-firestorm.html

ATI users should get RadeonPro
http://www.radeonpro.info
or ATItool
http://www.techpowerup.com/atitool/
Check the beta forum link for the newer version
Or ATI Tray (Access more options than you can believe!)
http://www.guru3d.com/article/ati-tray-tools-/
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/ ... Tray_Tools
Or GPUTool
http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/Tweaking/

Both nVidia and ATI users can also use RivaTuner
http://www.guru3d.com/index.php?page=rivatuner&menu=8

If you have a laptop, or a card that you cannot install new generic drivers from nVidia or ATI (only the manufactures old installers work).
Then you NEED the “Mobility Modder” or “FLEM” utility to update.
nVidia - http://www.hardwareheaven.com/nvmodtool.php
ATI - http://www.hardwareheaven.com/modtool.php
ATI – http://digitalflem.mydiscussion.net

If you don't have an nVidia or an ATI card, or even have an ancient GFX with no modern support, then do not worry I have the tool for you
PowerStrip (Actually, you should all get this one anyway)
http://entechtaiwan.com
Pre-historic GFX chips can also be configured with version v2.78 (95/98/NT/2000).
http://entechtaiwan.com/util/ps2.shtm
*3dfx, Number Nine, Cirrus Logic, Rendition, S3, and Tseng Labs.
GMABooster will unlock mobile intel chipsets to run at full desktop speed.
http://www.gmabooster.com
You can find more help at http://gma500booster.blogspot.it
Intel have 2 overclocking tools
http://www.intel.co.uk/content/www/uk/e ... ssors.html

USEFULL TWEAK TOOLS
Cacheman - You can use it for free, but the auto-optimise is disabled. It will give you a dynamic drive caching system. Access to many windows registry options. and (my personal holy grail) memorised task priority settings. The context sensitive help file in this prog will teach you more windows info than you can believe!
http://www.outertech.com

Speedfan - This totally free tool allows you to change your bus speed via software (If you get it wrong, just reboot and everything is back to normal) in increments of 1 MHz! You set a "High speed" and a "normal/low speed". You can literally over-clock your PC to within 1MHz of it's life
This does not seem to upset UT the same way as hardware based variable processor speed changes
http://www.almico.com
NOTE: severe overclocking can slow your PC instead of speeding it up!

Notebook Hardware Control (NHC)
Take complete control of your laptop/notebook.
Ideal if you lack the original OEM control software after a re-install, or just want something more flexible.
You can for example disable all the CPU speeds you don't want, and lock it to a single speed.
http://www.pbus-167.com

SpeederXP - This is an odd tool. As far as I can tell, this seems to adjust the timing of Windows instead of hardware, and can unlock insane speeds from your PC.
It may well play havoc with UT's timing, so don't push the slider all the way up. The site seems to have had a dodgy history, but I can find no issue with the actual software, and I have used it occasionally for 3 or 4 years.
http://www.speederxp.com
https://www.mywot.com/en/scorecard/speederxp.com (includes my report)

Xteq X-Setup - The mother of all tweak utillities! This prog is now totally free as the parent company closed, but it provides an unbeatable interface and framework for tweaking windows and other software. All the scripts are viewable/editable. You can even make your own (some UT specific tweaks could be easily created for example)
http://www.xteq.com

Autopatcher - Get all Micro$oft (and more ) updates in an offline installation package, that will install updates without the need of registration or WPA or WGA (Great for system admins like me).
http://www.autopatcher.com

PC Decrapifier - You have a laptop full of stupid utilities supplied by the manufacturer, but don't know what you can get rid of ? Then visit this site.
http://pcdecrapifier.com

SlimWare Utilities Good alternative to PC Decrapifier. These use cloud based decision making. Also the driver updater is worth checking out.
https://www.slimwareutilities.com

jv16 PowerTools - The only registry cleaner worth downloading. I have been using this prog since its previous incarnation of "Regcleanr", way back on Win95. It is simply the best. It will do far more than just clean your registry !
http://www.macecraft.com
http://www.macecraft.com/registry_clean ... rison2010/ - comparison with 176 other products

Auslogics Disk Defrag - Excellent free and pro disc defrag utility.
http://www.auslogics.com

Defraggler and CCleaner - Excellent free disc defrag and clean-up tools
http://www.piriform.com

System Ninja - Another excellent system tweaker and remover of unwanted files. Also makers of CCEnhancer.
http://singularlabs.com/software/

NOTE:
A very common issue I find on home-made PC's that I have to fix, is a lack of "Chipset divers".
Your motherboards chipset drivers are extremely important for stability and full speed. These drivers should always be installed before your GFX and sound card drivers (The compatibility drivers installed during Windows installation will not do).
If you do not know what chipset your PC uses, then you can use PC Wizard to look inside your machine.
PC Wizard - See what is inside your PC, even if the drivers are not installed (it's like a small free SiSoft Sandra).
http://www.cpuid.com

Overclocking and tweaking downloads and info at Guru3D
http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?id=13

I keep this list maintained on http://yourunreal.wordpress.com/2013/05 ... k-windows/ where you will find further information on effective drive usage.

[Hermskii]

Great post Dr.Flay

What motivated you to post this info? It is good to have. Thanks!

[Dr.Flay]

The realisation that we are all of mixed ages and abilities, with various backgrounds in computing
...That and I get paid to do this normaly
I'm going to add a few useful tweak/speedup/overclocking tools here as well
Hold on to you seats!

[Dr.Flay]

Ok now EVERYONE can have a faster PC, even if they don't have an modern nVidia or ATI card
All the tools have active forums, but I have (and do) use them all, so I can provide some support.

Feedback, as ever would be handy, as all geeks need to tweak.
Any other useful tools (especially better, or more up to date) that belong in this list, would be much appreciated

[Creavion]

I have not read the post ... but it looks legit^^.

[Dr.Flay]

Legit ! Nothing but legit.

I will NOT post any keys or keygens, or cracks.
All links will ALWAYS be to the original authors sites.
I will always try the software before recommendation, or I will state that I have not used it.
Most of these in this thread, I have used for many years.

The Doctor's seal of approval, is a guarantee of quality, or your money back

I hope you all have faster PC's now. I will try and put together a "I Just installed windows, how can I make it fast ?" thread at some point.

[rsbloom44]

Hey Dr.Flay, I was just wondering if you used an ATI card?

[Dr.Flay]

Unfortunately yes, I have an ATI Radion HD3600 512MB, as nVidia stopped making AGP cards.

*NOTE*
I have found that the new OpenGL renderer does not use the RAM on my card, whereas the new D3D9 renderer does.
ATI Tool can overlay lots of useful info, like GFX RAM usage.

[rsbloom44]

Are you familiar with flip queue size? It's under 3D in ATI Tray Tools. By default it's 3, I have it set to 0, it's suppose to reduce input lag. It feels snappier and more responsive, although it could be a placebo. I was wondering if you have tried setting it to 0 before and if you noticed a change.

another nice program to add: radeon pro, it's sort of like ATT.

[Dr.Flay]

I never changed it, thanks for the tip. I'll certainly look into it, and "RadionPro"
http://www.radeonpro.info

*EDIT* (Please avoid doub.... oh...)

Updated with a few more tools

[Carbon]

Please avoid double posting.



Great thread mate. Very useful stuff.

[maximdymok]

That SpeederXP website really looks pretty fishy..
But really good list otherwise, some very useful utilities in there. I can recommend PowerStrip especially, it's great for setting up custom resolutions and refresh rates if you have a CRT monitor.

[Dr.Flay]

I agree, SpeederXP has always looked fishy, but you don't need to buy it to see it actually works.
As I haven't tested it for a while, I just downloaded and installed the current version, then updated my review on WOT.

Hmm, My double-post was intended as a bump, but I could have gone the whole-hog and deleted my previous post.
I was well beyond the time limit though anyway, so

...Damn you Carbon ! I am going to have to combine them now. It is annoying me

[rsbloom44]

Speeder Xp, hmmm I wonder if it's the same as Game Xp? Anyways I would like to add Uni Drivers to the list.
http://maxedtech.com/asus-xonar-unified-drivers/

If you have a xonar card you should definitely check out these drivers. There is an addon for 7.1 virtual speaker for the driver and paired with OpenAL the sound positioning is pretty dead on.

[Barbie]

The link "http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id=35" in the first post seems to be outdated - I am redirected to a "Download Windows 10" page. I guess that is not intended by the author.