• News

Windows 10 Fall Creator's Update Brings Improvements For PC Gamers

Some attention paid is better than nothing.

Chris Jarrard

October 18, 2017 9:20 AM

14

Starting this week, Microsoft’s Fall Creator’s Update for Windows 10 will be deployed to the public. As is tradition, expect your PC to download this update in the background and then randomly initiate itself right when you try to do something important, despite the fact that you clearly set the operating system to defer updates. Despite Microsoft’s Cosby-esque approach to pushing updates without your consent, the Fall Creator’s Update is packing some needed changes that make things easier for those using their PCs to do important things, like playing PUBG, Divinity 2, or Shadow of War.

As was first reported on back in September, the new update adds GPU usage monitoring to the Windows 10 Task Manager. User can observe overall GPU usage or choose to monitor several different usage parameters, such as VRAM, render percentage, and encoding percentage. Another change for the better includes Windows Volume Mixer support for UWP applications and games. Previously, titles like Gears of War 4 and Forza Motorport 7 offered no options for individual volume control at the operating system level, forcing users to modify the system volume, possibly interfering with VoIP applications and music playback.

Added earlier this spring in the last Windows 10 Creator’s Update, Game Mode was a feature designed to ensure the operating system was focused on delivering the best possible performance for your games and disabling non-critical processes to free up resources. Previously, users had to manually enable or disable the feature via the windows gaming settings menu. With the Fall Creator’s Update, a Game Mode toggle has been added to the Game Bar overlay menu, allowing the mode to be toggled in-game, on the fly. Finally, a new option called Xbox Networking has been added to the system gaming settings. This will allow users to ensure optimal network quality for multiplayer games and voice chat applications.

The Fall Creator’s Update can be acquired now by opening the Windows Update application on your Windows 10 PC. As a major change to the core operating system, expect the installation to take up to 20 minutes or more, depending on your hardware and software configuration.

Chris Jarrard

Contributing Tech Editor

Chris Jarrard likes playing games, crankin' tunes, and looking for fights on obscure online message boards. He understands that breakfast food is the only true food. Don't @ him.