Feral GameMode vs Gaming Optimizer

Feral GameMode is a free Linux daemon and library that lets games request temporary optimisations to the host operating system or game process. It can adjust the CPU governor, I/O priority, process niceness and scheduler policy, inhibit the screensaver, change GPU performance mode, pin or park CPU cores, and run custom scripts. Games and launchers with built-in support can activate GameMode automatically; other games can be launched with the gamemoderun command or a Steam launch option. GPU performance mode is supported for NVIDIA and AMD, while GPU overclocking is listed for NVIDIA. The project lists packages for Ubuntu, Debian, Solus, Arch, Gentoo, Fedora, OpenSUSE and Mageia, with possible availability elsewhere. Configuration uses a gamemode.ini file with options for GPU and CPU settings, filters, supervisor access and scripts. GameMode is maintained by Feral Interactive and is available under the BSD 3-Clause License (Revised). Its build depends on Meson, internal communication uses systemd, and development requires a C environment. For hybrid GPU commands such as optirun, automatic integration after game startup is unavailable; a wrapper with gamemoderun is described instead.

Gaming Optimizer is a free, MIT-licensed Windows app for managing CPU affinity in games and background processes. It can assign games to fast cores and demote background processes, but CPU pinning is off by default and changes do not occur until it is enabled. The app says it restores altered processes and system settings when a game closes. Its dashboard shows CPU and GPU metrics, network activity, ping and jitter, bottleneck classifications and process zones. It detects game launches through WMI and scans Steam, Epic Games, GOG, Ubisoft Connect and EA App libraries. Per-game reports include average and peak CPU and GPU metrics and bottleneck breakdowns, with a cumulative sessions.csv file. An optional setting locks NVIDIA graphics clocks while a game runs and resets them afterward. The maker says there is no telemetry, analytics or update checking; the only outbound connection is a configurable latency ping. It requires Windows 10 version 1809 or Windows 11, an x64 processor and administrator rights. The README describes ZIP distribution without an installer, while the Releases page lists no releases.