Did you know that overclocking your display is really simple? Here is a brief explanation of How To Overclock Monitor and the benefits of doing so.
The ability to establish a custom resolution can be found in the driver settings of your NVIDIA or AMD graphics card. Increase the refresh rate gradually until you begin to experience negative effects like frame skipping.
Once you have the sweet spot, reduce the refresh rate by 1Hz.
Many pieces of hardware may be easily overclocked for better performance, as you may already be aware. That holds true for computer gear as well, since your graphics card, RAM, and CPU can all be overclocked.
Fewer people are aware that you can overclock your display to acquire a higher refresh rate, even though many already know this.
So’s relatively easy to overclock your hardware, and lots of people do it.
For a more fluid gaming experience, you can increase your monitor’s refresh rate over the recommended level if you have a high-quality panel.
The driver settings for both AMD and NVIDIA users can be adjusted to simply overclock your monitor with very little effort.
We’ll go over exactly how to overclock a monitor in this article.
Why Should You Overclock Your Monitor?
Gaming with a high refresh rate is fantastic. Compared to what you’ll see on a normal refresh screen, it is smoother, more responsive, and generally better in almost every regard. However, high refresh rate monitors are more expensive(opens in new tab)! I hear you sobbing. While it is possible, the good news is that, with a little overclocking wizardry, you may be able to get greater refresh rates on your present monitor.
You can overclock your monitor, that’s true.
Many 1080p monitors that are manufactured at 60Hz can easily be pushed to 75Hz. Even a 25% improvement will actually change how your games feel, making them smoother and more responsive. Generally speaking, you won’t be able to go much higher than that, not much anyhow.
Almost all games would profit from displaying you more frames per second, but competitive shooter games would gain the most. Getting a headshot against a real-life opponent in Valorant before they can do the same to you is far more satisfying than pulling a last-second shotgun blast on an advancing zombie in Resident Evil Village.
The kind of panel that is used does affect this. Although, as always, it depends on your particular screen, TN panels typically overclock more than their IPS and VA equivalents. The native resolution of your screen also matters; 1080p displays are most likely to let a little overclocking, while 4K panels are least likely to cooperate.
Even if your panel has a higher resolution, you should find that increasing the refresh rate by just a few frames—say, from 1440p to 1080p—unlocks compatibility for it. For professional or more intricate games, we wouldn’t advise running a 4K screen at 1080p all the time, but for titles like Valorant, CS: GO, and Apex Legends, refresh rate is king, and that’s where you want to be. In the interest of smoothness, experiment.
When Should You Overclock Your Monitor?
You will only be able to see up to 60 complete frames if you have a 60Hz monitor and your video games are running at a frame rate higher than 60FPS (Frames Per Second). This is because your monitor can only display 60 whole frames at a time.
Depending on the quality of the panel, you can overclock your monitor a few Hz in order to experience a greater framerate.
How To Overclock Monitor For AMD and Intel GPUs Users
If you have an AMD graphics card, enter your Radeon settings and select “Create” next to “Custom Resolutions” in the “Display” section. Enter your preferred refresh rate in the “Refresh Rate (Hz)” section.
We advise overclocking by 5Hz up until you experience negative effects or the screen stays dark for a few seconds before returning to default settings. Once you’ve reached that threshold, you can gradually lower it by 1Hz until you discover the ideal refresh rate.
As an alternative, you may install CRU (Custom Resolution Utility), which is very well-liked for boosting the dynamic range of FreeSync. With the automatic modes in this software, you can also increase the frequency (Hz) with simplicity.
If you have more experience, you can take advantage of the program’s extra features, like the ability to design your own display modes.
Run the first tool, called CRU, after downloading and extracting CRU wherever convenient. The list of your screen’s officially supported resolutions and refresh rates is located on the left side.
Simply select the “Add…” option under the top section and type your preferred Refresh rate under Frequency to add your own item. Again, switching to 1920×1080 at 75Hz is a smart option if you have a high-resolution screen. Your edits are accepted.
To actually test the modifications, return to the location where you extracted the CRU files and execute the Restart64.exe tool. You must run this as Administrator, so right-click and choose “Run as Administrator” to do so. If everything goes according to plan, you should experience a few screen blanks before everything return to normal.
You may have gone too far if it becomes black and stays that way. After around 15 seconds, Windows will resume its regular operation. Consider reducing the refresh rate and see the results.
However, if all goes properly, you can now control your refresh rate. Select Advanced Display Settings by scrolling down after choosing Display Settings from the context menu of the desktop. Your custom refresh rate should be listed under the Screen refresh rate drop-down option when you select the Monitor tab. After choosing your 75 Hertz entry and pressing OK, you’re done. It’s time to play some slick video games.
Testufo.com is a great fantastic website to use to check if it’s working. Online are many tests there that will examine your refresh rate and the capabilities of your display in general to see what is actually declining. The video game panning test is a very effective approach to ensure everything is in order.
How To Overclock Monitor For Nvidia GPUs
Customers of NVIDIA can overclock their display by simply accessing the NVIDIA Control Panel, selecting “Change Resolution” under “Display Tasks,” and then selecting “Customize.” This feature is included into the GeForce driver for NVIDIA users.
This will display a list of all the screen modes that are currently accessible. From this point, you select “Create Custom Resolutions” and raise the Hz value until synchronization errors appear.
Both the Nvidia Control Panel and the little tool known as Custom Resolution Utility (CRU), which was created particularly for the task at hand, can be used to adjust the refresh rate of your display. Of course, the first method is only available to those with Nvidia graphics cards, but everyone may use the CRU tool to get a similar result.
Simply right-click the Windows desktop and choose Nvidia Control Panel from the drop-down menu if you do have a GeForce graphics card. To begin, select the “Change resolution” option under “Display,” then click the “Customize” and “Create Custom Resolution” buttons.
The remainder of this screen can be ignored; pay attention to the Refresh rate (Hz) entry in the top part. It’s presumably set to 60 by default. Change it to 75 and then test it by using the “Test” button at the bottom of the screen. Don’t worry if your screen goes completely black; within 15 seconds, the normal picture will return.
Keep your hands off everything and wait it out. It’ll be alright.
Try lowering the refresh rate a little if that doesn’t work, or, if you’re using a 1440p or 4K screen, try lowering the resolution to 1920×1080 and setting the refresh rate to 75.
If everything went well, you’ll be able to “OK” the modifications, and on the main screen’s custom section, a new resolution and refresh rate option will show up. To use it, just select it and click “Apply.”
How to Safely Overclock your 60Hz Monitor with CRU (Custom Resolution Utility)
- The Custom Resolution Utility tool (CRU), which is available here on the MonitorTests forum, must be downloaded. Somewhere, unzip it.
- Run the main CRU app as administrator by selecting it from the context menu.
- Under detailed resolutions, click “Add.”
- Enter your target refresh rate and display resolution. We advise beginning at 75 Hz. then press okay.
- To exit the main interface, click okay.
- Return to the CRU folder that was unzipped. “Restart64.exe” should be clicked and launched as administrator.
- Your screen should briefly flicker and then become black. Your screen should operate normally if everything went as planned. For 10 to 15 seconds, your display will go dark if the overclock is too high. Repeat steps 2 through 6 while lowering the refresh rate if this occurs.
- Applying the overclocked refresh rate is now necessary. Go to Start and type “Display Settings” into the search box.
- Select Advanced Display Settings by clicking.
- Select Display Adapter Properties by clicking. This will bring up a new tab.
- Select “Monitor” from the tabs.
- The Screen refresh rate drop-down allows you to enter a custom refresh rate. Finally, click apply.
All there is to it is that. You’ll be fragging like a boss like it’s 1997 in no time if you’ve followed these instructions!
Testing & Other Tools
Keep a look out for flickering horizontal lines, skipped frames, and other odd behavior while playing some games, moving windows, and watching films.
Simply reduce the refresh rate by a few ticks and try again if you experience any of those. Trial and error is involved because even the same monitor type might be overclocked to have a different refresh rate.
Finding the sweet spot for your specific machine is key.
Additionally, we strongly advise using online testing tools.
If you use NVIDIA, you can change the refresh rate of your display using the slider by using the Precision X16 tool, which is a simple program.
The importance of cables should not be overlooked. Verify that the cable and connection versions have sufficient bandwidth for the desired resolution/refresh rate.
Additionally, make an effort to keep the wire short to avoid signal deterioration. When possible, stay away from adapters.
Warning
Finally, exercise caution when overclocking any hardware. It’ll probably void your warranty, so be ready to take the hit if something goes wrong.
Overclocking is done at the user’s own risk because there is a very slim probability of irreparably damaging your display.
