Looking to get more performance from your AMD GPU without upgrading? AMD claims you can achieve up to 40% more performance from your existing hardware without spending a dime. This guide explains the simple settings changes that can dramatically improve your gaming experience. 🚀
Today's high-end graphics cards are approaching physical and practical limits. Current top-tier GPUs draw nearly 500 watts - equivalent to a small space heater. This creates several challenges: heat management becomes difficult in smaller spaces; power requirements strain standard home electrical circuits; energy costs become a significant concern, especially in Europe; and physical limitations of transistor size affecting future development.
Smart Access Memory (SAM) is one of the easiest ways to boost performance on AMD systems. It allows your CPU to access all GPU VRAM at once instead of being limited to 256MB chunks, offering a 5-10% improvement in many games. You will need a compatible AMD CPU and GPU to use it.
To enable SAM: Enter your BIOS (usually by pressing Delete or F2 during startup). Enable D.O.C.P. for optimal memory performance. Look for the "Resize BAR" button or navigate to Advanced > PCI Subsystem Settings. Enable "Above 4G Decoding". Set "Resize BAR Support" to auto. Save and exit BIOS.
FidelityFX Super Resolution (FSR) and Radeon Super Resolution (RSR) are technologies that render games at lower resolutions then intelligently upscale them. FSR is optimized for specific games and preserves HUD elements at native resolution, while RSR is implemented at the driver level and works with virtually any game. Both offer a performance benefit of 10-50% more frames depending on settings.
At 1080p, FSR/RSR should be used sparingly as image quality degradation is more noticeable. It's often better to reduce in-game settings than enable FSR at this resolution.
At 1440p, results vary by game. Some titles like Assassin's Creed Valhalla look great with minimal quality loss, while games with fine details or hard black lines (like Tiny Tina's Wonderland) may show artifacts.
At 4K, FSR truly excels. The higher pixel count provides enough data for excellent upscaling, making image quality differences minimal and ideal for maintaining high framerates with demanding visual settings.
AMD has addressed earlier limitations with FSR 2.0, which adds temporal information to reduce issues like shimmering. While FSR 2.0 support is still growing, it represents the future direction of performance optimization through smart software rather than raw power alone.
For immediate performance gains, enable Smart Access Memory on your AMD system. If gaming at 1440p or 4K, experiment with FSR/RSR to significantly boost framerates with minimal visual impact. These optimizations work across various GPU brands, not just AMD hardware.
For users needing even more GPU power for demanding tasks, BlackSkye provides a decentralized marketplace connecting those with GPU computing needs to available resources. BlackSkye offers a cost-effective alternative to traditional cloud services while allowing GPU owners to monetize their idle hardware.