GeForce GTS 250 Roundup (ASUS, Gigabyte, Sparkle, EVGA)

Included Software

Yes, we know that there are plenty of free programs out there which will help you overclock and monitor your graphics card. From Rivatuner to GPU-Z, they can be downloaded in a few clicks of the mouse and are regularly updated to support the latest and greatest hardware. In order to try and break into the GPU tuning scene, graphics card manufacturers are turning to their own proprietary software. We haven’t really focused much on what manufacturers offer but in this roundup we decided to take a look at the programs each of these companies distributes with their cards.

Gigabyte GamerHUD Lite
System Resource Usage: ~4.8MB


Gigabyte’s GamerHUD is a straightforward program that offers basic overclocking functions as well as a temperature and usage logger. There are also areas in which you can see the specifications of the GPU and control whether the card downclocks itself in a 2D environment. This is all presented in a highly stylized pop-up box that is actually more confusing than it is functional.

Unfortunately, the issues with this interface are everywhere. There is no way to drag the sliders so you have to endlessly click away on the tiny arrows in order to increase your clock speeds. Want a 50Mhz bump in core speeds? That’ll be 50 clicks, sir. In other overclocking programs it is possible to link and unlink the Core and Shader clocks; not here. Temperature “monitoring” isn’t monitoring at all considering the program doesn’t keep a record of past temperatures or GPU load. In addition, the GTS 250 1GB OC came with the Lite version of GamerHUD so it was missing the voltage tweaking section (which never worked to begin with) that comes with the full version.

Stick with Rivatuner, you’ll be happier for it.


Sparkle SpaTune
System Resource Usage: ~2.4MB


Sparkle’s approach to the whole monitoring and overclocking craze is streamlined and simple program called SpaTune. It is perfectly sized to fit right into the Vista Sidebar and carries with it a straightforward design with all of its limited functions at your fingertips. There are five buttons clustered in the middle of the display that control what the top information bar displays –everything from clock speeds to temperatures- in real time.

Meawhile, at the bottom there are three additional buttons used to control the clock speed of your graphics card. The OC button brought the Calibre GTS 250 to its pre-overclocked speeds and Standard Mode brings the speeds down to reference GTS 250 values. Finally, Green Mode will further decrease the clocks to reference 2D speeds. I personally don’t think these adjustments were really necessary since the card should downclock itself when used in 2D mode.

All in all, SpaTune is user friendly, light on system resources and well designed but it doesn’t really offer much in terms of functionality. My only real beef with it is that there is no way to control whether it loads or not when Windows starts.


ASUS GamerOSD / SmartDoctor
System Resource Usage (GamerOSD): ~4.8MB
System Resource Usage (SmartDoc.): ~8.1MB


GamerOSD mainly consists of the functions you would normally find within a game monitoring program like FRAPS. It is exactly what the name suggests: an on-screen display for frames per second, GPU temperature and other information while you are gaming. You even have the option to record movies and take screenshots. All in all, this is a pretty interesting little program.


When you first start SmartDoctor, you are greeted with cluttered interface with all of the important settings compacted down at the bottom of the screen. The left side shows a pointless animation of a magnifying glass passing over your graphics card while the upper right hand portion of the screen gives you the fan speed setting (without the option to change it) and temperatures. The clock speed sliders are straightforward and you can easily set the core and memory speeds but we wish this section was given prominence.


The real meat to this program lies in the Advanced Settings pop-up. Here you can easily control a massive amount of options from fan speeds to temperature alarms to monitor settings. We wish the whole program would have been set up in this format instead of having the overclocking relegated to the bottom quarter of a convoluted interface.

Regardless of how much we hate the interface on this program, it does offer a good amount of options for overclocking and monitoring the health status of your graphics card.


EVGA Precision
System Resource Usage: ~6MB


Even though EVGA’s Precision isn’t bundled with their GTS 250 1GB, it is readily available on their website. We decided to include it here because it is simply one of the best manufacturer-released overclocking and GPU monitoring tools in existence.

Above we have the main window which has every single feature you could possibly want right at your fingertips. Directly below the Precision logo are sliders to control the speed of the core and memory as well as simple buttons to link or unlink the core / shader speeds as well as fan speed control. Next to the fan speed control is a button to toggle on and off the automatic fan speed profiles. To the left of the sliders is an area to select individual GPUs if you are running more than one card in SLI as well as a button to sync or unsync the clock speeds of all GPUs.

To the left of the settings section is where all of the GPU health and clock speed monitors are located in a setup reminiscent of Rivatuner. Directly below this is a button to set the program to apply all your new settings when Windows boots as well as a box where you can save and select custom profiles.


In the Properties dialog box, there are a stunning number of options for you to play around with. This includes compatibility with certain Logitech keyboards’ LCDs, setting on screen displays for your GPU temperature and other properties, screen shot capture options and countless other things. It is brilliant, well done and only available if you are running and EVGA card.