Steam's New Performance Overlay: Is it Wizardry or Just Plain Clever?
AI Gaming News Author · Rock Paper Shotgun ·
Steam's new performance overlay is more than just a pretty face; it gives you granular insights into your PC's performance, letting you see exactly how much those shiny new frame generation technologies are *actually* helping. Plus, it might just save you from smashing your keyboard when your favourite game starts stuttering.
Right then, listen up, because Steam's been tinkering again – and this time, it's not just another sale to empty your wallets. They've quietly dropped a revamped PC performance monitor, and fair dinkum, it's more insightful than you might think. We're talking about an upgrade to the classic FPS overlay, stacking juicy readouts for framerate, CPU, GPU, and memory usage. But here's the kicker: Valve themselves are calling it "a first step" towards helping us understand our game and system performance. A *first* step, eh? Sounds like they've got bigger plans up their sleeves.
Now, what makes this overlay genuinely interesting? Well, it's digging into frame generation tech like DLSS 4 and FSR 3. Existing monitors usually show either raw, un-generated frames *or* the combined total. Steam's clever trick? It tracks *both* separately. So, you can finally see how much of that buttery-smooth gameplay is down to 'real' frames versus the AI-generated magic. Handy for bragging rights, or for figuring out if that shiny new graphics card is actually pulling its weight, yeah?
But it doesn't stop there, mate. This new overlay (which, by the way, you can customize to show as much or as little detail as you like – just like on the Steam Deck) also breaks some traditional monitoring conventions. Take the CPU usage monitor, for example. Instead of just showing the average CPU core usage percentage, it *also* displays the current busiest core, specifically how much it's working relative to its base clock speed. Sometimes it even reads *above* 100%, which means that little silicon beast is running at its 'boost' clock speed to get more done when it can keep its cool.
"But Jeff," you might be asking, "why do I care? I just want to play games, not do bloody arithmetic!" And that's fair enough. But consider this: average core usage doesn't always paint the full picture, especially when a game isn't properly utilizing all your CPU cores. Seeing that one poor core working its digital arse off can help you diagnose performance problems that might otherwise slip under the radar.
There's a similar troubleshooting benefit to how the Steam monitor counts VRAM availability. Some monitors only look at the GPU's own memory, while the Steam overlay also considers the system RAM temporarily holding graphics data. So, if the Steam overlay tells you you're maxing out your VRAM, you can be pretty damn sure you've squeezed out every last gigabyte. It's like when your wizard's familiar finally finds that extra mana potion you didn't know you had.
Of course, no magical trick is perfect. Apparently, there's a bug where the generated frames counter sometimes doesn't display correctly (showing 30 instead of 300-odd). A quick fiddle with DLSS settings can sometimes fix it, but hopefully Valve will squash that bug soon enough.
All in all, it's another impressively useful feature that Steam has nonchalantly slipped into its ecosystem. It's like the Game Recording launch, but instead of showing off your skills, it helps you figure out why things are going pear-shaped. And who doesn't need a little help with that from time to time?
Tags: Steam, PC Gaming, Performance Monitor, DLSS, FSR
Original article: Rock Paper Shotgun