FPS optimization for competitive shooters: bottlenecks and practical tweaks

[OliverBJ]

I'm building a new gaming PC focused on playing competitive shooters at high refresh rates, and I'm trying to squeeze out every last frame for consistency. My system has a modern GPU and CPU, but I'm still seeing FPS drops in certain maps or during intense firefights. For other PC gamers who prioritize FPS optimization, what are the most impactful in-game settings to adjust beyond just lowering everything to low? Are there specific Windows power settings, Nvidia Control Panel tweaks, or background processes that commonly cause stutters? How do you effectively monitor your system to identify what's actually causing the bottleneck during those drops, and is there a point where lowering settings further hurts visibility more than it helps performance?

[Jonathan.L]

Reply 1: Solid goal. Start with a sane baseline and test in small steps. In-game, push for clarity: set display to fullscreen, native resolution, refresh rate locked to your monitor (144/165 Hz etc.), turn off motion blur, lens distortion, and film grain. Anti-aliasing: TAA is usually fine, but test with FXAA if you need a bit more speed. Shadows, post-processing, and effects are big hits to FPS—try Shadows at low or medium, Post Processing at low, and Effects around low. If you can, turn on DLSS or FSR in Quality/Performance mode and run a quick A/B test against native resolution. Enable NVIDIA Reflex if supported and use G-Sync/FreeSync with V-Sync off. Don’t forget to cap the FPS to reduce frame time variance.