Windows provides various methods for seeing what hardware is installed and recognized by the operating system, but it is rather clunky and not straight forward. If you built your own gaming PC or at least selected the hardware installed then you probably know exactly what your PC is running, but if you are like many and bought an off the shelf gaming PC you may not know the exact hardware configuration. That's not to say that PCs that have hardware below the minimum requirements can't run the game, many times they can but the fact is you're most likely not going to get the most out of your gaming experience if the graphics are stuttering every few seconds.

Most developers or publishers make both the minimum and recommended system requirements available to help gamers out in determining if their rig can handle the game. The starting point for optimizing your PC for gaming is to make sure that your PC meets or exceeds the minimum system requirements published. It is useful for both those that have an aging PC that just meets the minimum requirements as well as those that have the latest and greatest graphics card, CPU, SSD and more. The steps that follow will take you through some basic tips and recommendations for optimizing your PC for gaming so that you can get the most out of the hardware and get your games running smoothly again. So why aren't your games running smoothly when your gaming rig meets or even exceeds the minimum and recommended system requirements? You can't make a 10-year-old PC run the latest new release or big-budget blockbuster with the high-end graphics and latest shader model no matter how much tuning and optimization you do. There is really no getting around these requirements and optimizing your PC for gaming guide will not show you how to make an older PC run a new game that doesn't meet the minimum system requirements. Most game developers publish a set of minimum and recommended system requirements that outline what type of hardware is required for the game to run at an acceptable level.

Optimizing your PC for gaming can be a daunting task especially if you are not familiar with the internal hardware, operating system and overall configuration of your PC.

How to optimize pc for gaming