Home › Articles › PC Monitoring Tools Guide
Essential Tools Guide

Free PC Monitoring Tools:
HWiNFO, Afterburner & GPU-Z

Published June 2026  ·  By TempCore Editorial Team  ·  9 min read

Why this matters: Online calculators and estimators tell you what your hardware might do based on approximations. These free tools tell you what your hardware is actually doing right now — exact temperatures, voltages, clock speeds, and power draw from real hardware sensors. This is what r/buildapc and r/hardware recommend every time someone asks about performance or temperature issues.

The Four Tools You Need

There are four free tools that cover everything you need for PC hardware monitoring. Each does something the others don't:

  • HWiNFO64 — the most comprehensive sensor reader available. Every temperature sensor, voltage rail, current, power reading, and fan RPM on your system, in real time.
  • MSI Afterburner — in-game overlay (OSD) for live monitoring while gaming, plus fan curve control and GPU overclocking/undervolting.
  • GPU-Z — detailed GPU spec lookup plus live GPU sensor tab. Best for understanding your exact GPU silicon, memory type, and power behavior.
  • CPU-Z — CPU, motherboard, RAM specs and live clock/voltage monitoring. Essential for confirming XMP/EXPO memory profile is actually active.

HWiNFO64 — The Gold Standard

HWiNFO64 is what experienced builders and system diagnostics professionals use. Every benchmark YouTube channel (GamersNexus, Hardware Unboxed) uses it for their testing. It reads every sensor on your system — not just the basic temperature your BIOS shows, but every sub-sensor: VRM temperatures, VRAM hotspot temperature, individual CPU core junction temperatures, SSD operating temperature, fan RPMs, voltage rails, and power consumption.

Setup (5 minutes)

  1. Download from hwinfo.com (free, portable version available — no install needed)
  2. Launch → click Sensors-only (the sensors window is what you need, not the summary)
  3. The sensors window opens showing every measurable value on your system
  4. To find a specific sensor: use Ctrl+F to search (e.g., search "GPU Temperature" or "CPU Package Power")
  5. Right-click any value → "Add to Tray" to add it as a taskbar notification icon for quick reference

Key Sensors to Watch

Sensor Name in HWiNFO What It Tells You Concern Threshold
CPU Package Power Total CPU power draw in Watts Check vs MTP spec
CPU (Tctl/Tdie) AMD CPU junction temperature >90°C (AMD)
CPU Package (Intel) Intel CPU package temperature >90°C sustained
GPU Temperature Core die temperature >90°C
GPU Memory Temperature GDDR6X/GDDR7 hotspot (RTX 30/40/50) >104°C (GDDR6X)
GPU Power Actual GPU board power draw (W) Check vs TDP
Drive Temperature (NVMe) SSD operating temperature >70°C sustained

The "Max" Column Is Critical

HWiNFO shows Current / Minimum / Maximum / Average columns. The Maximum column is what you should check after a gaming session — it captures the peak temperature hit during the session, which the current reading misses. After a stress test or gaming session, screenshot the Max column and check it against your component's safe limits.

Logging for Diagnostics

HWiNFO can log all sensor data to a CSV file. This is invaluable when troubleshooting a crash or thermal throttle event: File → Log All Sensors to CSV. Then correlate the timestamps when your PC crashed or started dropping performance against the temperature and power columns. You'll almost always see a thermal limit hit or a voltage drop immediately before the event.

MSI Afterburner — In-Game Overlay (OSD)

MSI Afterburner's on-screen display (OSD) shows you hardware stats while you're actually gaming — without needing to alt-tab. It uses the RivaTuner Statistics Server (RTSS) backend, which hooks into the game's rendering pipeline to display an overlay.

Setup

  1. Download MSI Afterburner from msi.com/Landing/afterburner — it installs both Afterburner and RivaTuner Statistics Server (RTSS). Install both.
  2. Open Afterburner → Settings (gear icon) → Monitoring tab
  3. In the sensor list, check "Show in On-Screen Display" for each metric you want
  4. Recommended metrics to enable: GPU Temperature, GPU Usage, GPU Memory Used, Framerate, CPU Temperature, CPU Usage, RAM Used
  5. Press OK — the overlay appears in games automatically
  6. Default OSD toggle key: Scroll Lock (configurable)

What to Watch While Gaming

  • GPU Usage %: Should be near 100% in GPU-limited scenarios. If it's consistently below 80% at your target resolution, the CPU may be the limiter — or the game is CPU-bound by design.
  • GPU Memory Used: Watch this climb as you load into areas. If it approaches or exceeds your VRAM capacity, expect stuttering.
  • Framerate + Frametime: Enable both. A stable 60 FPS with occasional 50ms frametime spikes will feel much worse than a stable 55 FPS with consistent frametimes. Frametimes reveal stutter that averages don't.
  • GPU Temperature: Should plateau within the first 10 minutes. If it keeps climbing across the whole session, your case airflow is recycling hot air.

Fan Curve Setup

Afterburner's fan curve is one of its most useful features. The default GPU fan behavior is manufacturer-set and often either too quiet (high temps) or too aggressive (loud for no reason). A custom curve: 0% at 40°C, 30% at 55°C, 55% at 70°C, 80% at 83°C, 100% at 90°C — gives meaningful cooling while staying quiet during light loads.

GPU-Z — Your GPU's Full Spec Sheet

GPU-Z shows everything about your GPU in one screen: chip name, architecture, shader count, memory type and bus width, BIOS version, and the exact clock frequencies both boosted and base. The "Sensors" tab gives live monitoring of all GPU parameters including GPU chip temperature, VRAM temperature, GPU clock, memory clock, voltage, power, and fan speed.

What GPU-Z Is Actually Useful For

  • Verifying your GPU is genuine: Checking the exact shader count, memory type, and memory bus width against spec confirms you have the real product (relevant for used GPU purchases).
  • Reading GPU BIOS version: Helpful when checking for manufacturer firmware updates.
  • Live voltage monitoring: The Sensors tab shows GPU core voltage in real time as it boosts. Compare this before and after undervolting.
  • GPU load indicator: The "GPU Load" bar shows the GPU's actual utilisation percentage from the hardware side — complements Afterburner's display.

CPU-Z — Confirming Memory Profile Is Active

The single most important thing CPU-Z reveals for most builders: is your XMP/EXPO memory profile actually enabled? A common situation: you buy DDR5-6000 RAM, install it, and it runs at DDR5-4800 (the JEDEC default) because XMP wasn't enabled in BIOS.

How to Check

  1. Download and run CPU-Z from cpuid.com
  2. Click the Memory tab
  3. Check "DRAM Frequency" — this is the actual operating frequency
  4. For DDR5-6000 RAM, you should see 3000 MHz (CPU-Z shows half the DDR rate)
  5. If you see 2400 MHz (DDR5-4800 default), go into BIOS and enable XMP or EXPO

This is one of the most commonly missed optimizations — many systems run with XMP disabled for their entire life because nobody checked. DDR5-4800 to DDR5-6000 can mean 10–15% better performance in CPU-limited scenarios.

Why These Beat Online Calculators

Online FPS estimators and bottleneck checkers are built on averaged benchmark data and mathematical approximations. They tell you what a theoretical system might do. These tools tell you what your specific hardware is doing right now: your silicon variant, your ambient temperature, your case airflow, your specific driver version, your specific game's CPU utilisation pattern.

When r/buildapc says "download HWiNFO and check your temps," this is why. A forum post can't tell you your VRM is running at 108°C because your case has no airflow across the motherboard. HWiNFO will.