6 PC Upgrades and Settings to Improve Performance and Reduce Noise

The short version: start with the reversible checks​

If you do nothing else, do these. They are low risk, and you can undo each one.

• Confirm your RAM is running its advertised XMP or EXPO profile.
• Confirm Windows is driving your monitor at its native refresh rate.
• Check whether your case fans can be speed-controlled.
• Check that Resizable BAR is on, if your hardware supports it.
• Check that your fastest SSD is in the right M.2 slot.

Treat everything past that, such as CPU and GPU voltage tuning, RAM timing tweaks and monitor overclocking, as optional. These need stability testing and a look at your warranty.

1. RAM: turn on the profile you paid for​

XMP is Intel's memory profile standard. EXPO is AMD's. Both are factory presets for speed, timings and voltage. Intel describes XMP profiles as preset combinations of speed, timing and voltage, tested by the manufacturer. This is from Intel's own XMP page, which I'm paraphrasing rather than quoting at length. The article's advice is to enter the BIOS, find the XMP or EXPO option and enable it. On the author's MSI B550 Tomahawk, the option sits on the BIOS home screen. It's also in the OC menu under DRAM settings. Menu names and layouts differ by board, so check your manual.

The author claims "well over 10%" higher game performance from this. He gives no named tests behind that figure. Real results depend on your CPU, kit, motherboard, GPU and game. Intel's guide describes one test system whose measured memory bandwidth rose substantially after XMP. That is a bandwidth measurement, not a promise of game FPS.

Warranty caveat: Intel says XMP is a form of memory overclocking. It says using it beyond specifications may void the processor warranty. Intel's guide also says to baseline your performance first, change one thing at a time and test for stability after each change.

Manual timing tweaks are a step beyond XMP and EXPO. The author's colleague got a "small but measurable" gain in the games he tested. Intel's guide agrees on the effort involved, noting that even experienced overclockers can spend hours on a small gain.

2. The case: airflow, fans and fan curves​

Some cases already do this well. Fractal Design says its Torrent ships with five PWM fans, two 180 mm and three 140 mm, and was built for airflow out of the box. More fans aren't automatically better.

The author's own fix was different. His NZXT H510i had stock fans that, he says, lacked PWM control and ran flat out. He swapped in two budget Arctic P12 fans. He reports the PC got quieter and his RTX 3070 dropped from over 80°C to about 77°C under load. He says the fans cost about $15. That's one person's result, not a controlled test.

The PWM point is real. Arctic's P12 PWM PST is a 120 mm fan with a four-pin connector. Arctic lists a speed range of 200 to 1800 rpm. Arctic's page lists the US MSRP at $11.99. That is a list price, not necessarily what you'd pay today. Arctic's manual also warns about header current limits, so check your motherboard's fan header ratings before chaining many fans together.

A practical routine:

1. Look up the best fan layout for your specific case.
2. Check which fan positions and sizes the case supports.
3. Install a fan control app. The author uses Fan Control.
4. Set a curve that keeps fans slow at idle and ramps up under load. The author ramps up above 60°C GPU temperature. That is his preference, not a rule.
5. Re-check temperatures under the workloads you actually run.

3. The motherboard: slots, ports, Resizable BAR and M.2 placement​

Add-in cards. If you need more USB ports, Wi-Fi, SATA ports or M.2 slots, the author says a card of a few dozen dollars beats a new board. Check your manual first for free slots, physical clearance and lane sharing. The article shows a Gigabyte WiFi 6E card at $60 on Amazon. That is a listing from the source, not something I've verified today.

USB-C hub. The author turned an unused 10Gbps USB-C port into four USB-A ports, one USB-C port and SD and microSD slots. The hub can't make the port faster than its rating.

Resizable BAR (AMD calls it SAM). The author says to enable it in the BIOS. On his MSI board that is Settings > Advanced > PCIe/PCI Subsystem Settings > Re-Size BAR Support. That path is specific to his board. NVIDIA's guidance, written for RTX 30-series cards in 2021, spells out the requirements:

• A compatible GPU with a supported VBIOS.
• A compatible CPU and motherboard.
• A motherboard BIOS update where needed.
• A recent GeForce driver.

NVIDIA's own testing found gains of "a few percent, up to 12%" in some titles. It also found some titles got slower, so gains vary by game. To confirm it's on, NVIDIA says to open the NVIDIA Control Panel, click System Information and look for Resizable BAR. If it says No, check the BIOS setting and reboot. That check applies to NVIDIA cards. Other vendors have their own tools.

M.2 placement. The author advises putting a PCIe 5.0 SSD in a PCIe 5.0 slot and slower drives in slower slots. This is only true if your board has such a slot. Slot generations and shared lanes vary, so check the manual. None of the supplied sources shows how much a mismatch costs in everyday use.

4. The CPU: undervolt first, overclock later​

The author says modern CPUs already boost close to their limits. He argues the days of double-digit overclocking gains are mostly gone. He recommends undervolting instead. On his old Ryzen 5 5600X he says it boosted slightly higher, ran noticeably cooler and spun the cooler slower. He gives no measurements. AMD's Ryzen Master documentation describes Curve Optimizer, which shifts the voltage-frequency curve toward lower voltages. Controls vary by CPU generation and board. An unstable undervolt can cause errors or crashes, so test it. If you're happy with your PC as it is, the author says to leave it alone.

Using the integrated GPU. If your CPU has integrated graphics and you have a discrete card, the iGPU needn't sit idle. The author suggests three uses:

• Plugging a second monitor into the motherboard's video output. This may need a BIOS option with a name like iGPU Multi-Monitor.
• Hardware video encoding, for example for streaming or a media server.
• Running Lossless Scaling frame generation on the iGPU. The author says this can reduce frame-generation latency. I couldn't independently verify that claim, so treat it as a possible experiment.

All of this depends on your CPU having an iGPU, your board having video outputs, and driver and application support.

5. The GPU: tune carefully, compare against stock​

The author says overclocking can still give a double-digit gain. He names the RTX 5070 Ti and RTX 5080 at around 10%. He gives no benchmarks for that, and silicon quality varies from card to card. His own RX 9070 XT gained about 3% from an undervolt plus overclock, so he reverted to stock. Undervolting a budget RTX 3070 made it much quieter, he says, because its fans were loud.

To do this sensibly:

1. Benchmark at stock settings using a repeatable workload.
2. Change one setting at a time.
3. Monitor temperatures and watch for crashes or artifacts.
4. Revert if the gain is negligible or the card becomes unstable.

Check your card maker's warranty terms before you start.

6. The monitor: not a component, but it matters​

The author admits a monitor isn't a PC component. His point is that many people run a high-refresh display at 60Hz without noticing.

The check takes a few seconds. Microsoft's support page documents it:

1. Open Settings > System > Display > Advanced display.
2. If you have several monitors, select the right one.
3. Look at the refresh rate under Display information and use Choose a refresh rate to pick your monitor's top supported rate.

The rates that appear depend on your display and what it supports. If you don't see a higher rate, the author suggests an old HDMI or DisplayPort cable as a cause. Newegg's guide, published about six days before this article, adds that the usual culprits are the cable, the port or an outdated graphics driver. Microsoft also notes that a rate with an asterisk doesn't support your current resolution. Choosing it will change the resolution.

The author says his refresh rate reverted to 60Hz after a driver reinstall with Display Driver Uninstaller. He says it also happened when he switched between monitors. Those are his anecdotes. Wikipedia notes that NT-based Windows versions set a conservative default, usually 60Hz, so it's worth re-checking after driver changes. I'd call that a good habit rather than proof that Windows routinely resets it.

Dynamic Refresh Rate in Windows 11. Microsoft says DRR needs a display that supports VRR and at least 120Hz. It can limit the maximum refresh rate in some games that aren't designed for VRR. The toggle only appears if your hardware supports it. If a favorite game seems stuck below your maximum, Microsoft says the best fix is to turn DRR off. Windows 10 doesn't support DRR, and Microsoft says it stopped providing free updates after October 14, 2025.

Monitor overclocking with Custom Resolution Utility (CRU). The author overclocked the screen on an MSI Claw 8 EX review unit from 120Hz to 144Hz. He says OLED monitors generally don't support overclocking. He says Windows normally reverts after a black screen and that F8 opens CRU's recovery mode. He also says a stuck black screen may need Safe Mode and CRU's reset-all tool. I couldn't confirm those recovery steps against a primary CRU source. Treat this as optional and at your own risk.

What to take away​

• Safe and reversible: XMP or EXPO, the refresh rate check, fan control software, a Resizable BAR check and correct M.2 placement.
• Hardware spend, modest cost: case fans with PWM control, a PCIe add-in card or a USB-C hub.
• Advanced, test first: CPU and GPU undervolting or overclocking, manual RAM timings and monitor overclocking.

The article's broad percentage claims are the author's estimates, with no named tests behind them. Vendor figures like NVIDIA's apply only to its tested cases. The sensible approach is to measure before and after, and to keep the changes that help.