Counter Strike 2 hasn’t even launched yet, but any player who has or has had anything indirectly to do with this series of games from Valve will inevitably stop by and play it. Especially for you we have prepared the most useful guides for quick and correct game setup, tips and tricks and general tips for effective competitive process.
Best CS 2 Settings for Max FPS
The most interesting and most needed topic for any player. Default settings are very unbalanced. Even if you use any aspect ratio except 16:9, these graphics settings will absolutely fit. The best video settings look like this:
| Boost Player Contrast | Enabled (except you have really bad monitor so your eyes will be in stress) |
| Wait for Vertical Sync | Vertical synchronization must be turned off on any PC. It “tears” frames and limits FPS to your monitor Hz (60/144/240, etc.) |
| Current Video Values Preset | Custom |
| Multisampling Anti-Aliasing Mode | 2x MSAA. Yes, it’s not the minimum setting, so you’ll be missing a couple FPS. However, the silhouettes of the players will become much more distinguishable, and the game will become much more enjoyable. |
| Global Shadow Quality | Low |
| Model/Texture Detail | Medium. Situation is the same as with Multisampling Anti-Aliasing Mode, your eyes will be thankful. |
| Shader Detail | Low |
| Particle Detail | Low |
| Ambient Occlusion | Disabled |
| High Dynamic Range | Performance |
| FidelityFX Super Resolution | Disabled (Highest quality) |
| NVIDIA Reflex Low Latency | Disabled. But! You can enable it if your internet connection is poor, then check if something changed and if it didn’t affect your ping, disable it. |
Important note: Remember that if your monitor has 144 or more Hertz, be sure to set the settings so that the FPS is consistently greater than or equal to the number of Hertz of your monitor, otherwise, the picture will be jagged and not smooth.
Best Launch Options For CS 2
The launch options will be the same as CS:GO. We recommend to prescribe this:
-high +fps_max 0 -disable_d3d9ex -novid -console -refresh 144 -nojoy
| CS 2 Launch Options | Description |
| -console | Console will be already opened after launch. |
| -novid | This launch option skips the Valve intro video. |
| -refresh | This launch option will force the users monitor to run at a specific refresh rate. For example, if you have a 144 Hz monitor, you need to write -refresh 144. |
| -high | This launch option will force the users system into running the game on ‘high priority’. Users need to be cautious before implementing this setting and in case they do not observe an increase in performance, it is advised to remove this launch option. |
| +fps_max | This launch option sets the maximum FPS that users want for CS 2. It is recommended to set this at 0, as this will remove all limits and run the game at the highest FPS possible. |
| -nojoy | This launch option will simply disable the joystick support and free up some resources like less load on the RAM. |
| -disable_d3d9ex | This launch option disables the d3d9ex mode for CS 2. It definitely helps resolve some graphic errors, but the time taken to minimize and reopen the game increases considerably, increasing the CPU consumption. |
Best CS 2 Pro Player Settings
Not a single pro player from CS:GO has made the full transition to CS2 yet. However, many of those who have played and tried Valve’s new product have already formed impressions and, more importantly, customizations. We took the settings s1mple and m0NESY, because they will be similar:
- Screen resolution – 1280×960 (4:3 aspect ratio);
- Boost Player Contrast – Disabled. In fact, s1mple simply doesn’t like how it feels on the long distances;
- Wait for Vertical Sync – Disabled;
- Current Video Values Preset – Custom;
- Multisampling Anti-Aliasing Mode – 8x MSAA;
- Global Shadow Quality – Low;
- Model/Texture Detail – Low;
- Shader Detail – Low;
- Particle Detail – Low;
- Ambient Occlusion – Disabled;
- High Dynamic Range – Performance;
- FidelityFX Super Resolution – Disabled (Highest quality);
- NVIDIA Reflex Low Latency – Disabled.
Best Nvidia & AMD Settings for CS 2
Let’s start with NVIDIA. Open Nvidia Control Panel and choose these graphics settings:
- Image Scaling – Off
- Ambient Occlusion – Off
- Anisotropic filtering – Off
- Antialiasing – FXAA – Off
- Antialiasing – Gamma correction – Off
- Antialiasing – Mode – Off
- Background application Max Frame Rate – Off
- CUDA – GPUs – All
- DSR – Factors – Off
- Power management mode – Prefer maximum performance
- Preferred refresh rate – Application-controlled
- Shader Cache Size – Driver Default
- Texture Filtering – Anisotropic sample option – On
- Texture Filtering – Negative COD bias – Allow
- Texture Filtering – Quality – High performance
- Texture Filtering – Trilinear optimization – On
- Threaded optimization – Auto
- Triple buffering – Off
- Vertical sync – Off
- Virtual Reality pre-rendered frames – 1
- Virtual Reality – Variable Rate Super Sample – Off
Now a few words about AMD settings:
- Radeon Super Resolution – Off
- Radeon Anti-Lag – Off
- Radeon Chill – Off
- Radeon Boost – Off
- Radeon Image Sharpening – Off
- Radeon Enhanced Sync – Off
- Wait for Vertical Refresh – Off
- Frame rate target control – Off
- Anti-Aliasing – Use application settings
- Anti-Aliasing method – Multisampling
- Morphological Anti-Aliasing – Off
- Anisotropic Filtering – Off
- Texture streaming quality – Standart
- Surface Format Optimization – On
- Tesselation Mode – AMD optimized
- OpenGL Triple Buffering – Off
- 10-Bit Pixel Format – Off
To summarize. Both settings are made to maximize performance without harming your eyes. You will still be able to see your opponents perfectly, but the FPS will increase many times over.
Best Mouse Settings for CS 2
There are no universal settings, so we will give you some tips and tricks on how to make a proper mouse preset in CS2:
- The most common DPI players use is 400, but you don’t have to fit in it. The best way to find out what mouse sensitivity to DPI ratio suits you best is to go to a custom map or even an official server (just not a competitive one) and try playing with your favorite weapons, try flicks and so on;
- You should be satisfied with your mouse pad. Be sure to set the sensitivity so that you don’t have to swipe the mat for 2 minutes to turn 180 degrees;
- Remember about the mouse Hertzation. It determines how fast the mouse updates the communication with the sensor. Set the highest hertz setting, and then play with DPI later.
Best CS 2 Resolution
When it comes to screen resolution, it’s hard to argue which is the best (more specifically, which aspect ratio is better), but we’ll outline the pros and cons of using 16:9 over 4:3 and vice versa:
- Many pros play a 4:3 aspect ratio (1280×960 resolution) because it visually augments players’ models (but not head hitboxes or body hitboxes) and changes vertical and horizontal sensitivity multipliers. Our advice is to use this aspect ratio only if you used to play with it a lot of time;
- 16:9 (1920×1080 resolution) is better because it increases fov, causing you to see much more of the area than those using 4:3.
So the best CS2 resolution according to many professional players is 1280×960 or 1280×1024.
Best Refresh Rate for CS 2
Of course, the best refresh rate for your monitor in CS2 is the maximum refresh rate on the market. At the moment, that’s 360 Hertz. However, you will hardly notice the difference between 144, 240 and 360 Hz, unlike the difference between 60 and 144. Hence we conclude that the best and optimal solution for CS2 at the moment is a 144 Hz monitor.
Best CS 2 Audio Settings
Music settings (and audio settings at all) are very individual. First, the volume in the game will depend on the volume level of your operating system. And if it is not universal, but constantly changing, we strongly recommend you to fix the volume in Windows on one value and adjust all programs and games to it. Secondly, the volume of music in a game is purely your perception, and you can’t make it better or worse. The best advice about the sound in CS2 is to turn on at least 10% of the sound of the ten-second bomb timer. Believe us, this setting will save more than one of your rounds!
Best CS 2 Radar Settings
You don’t need radar except to spot those enemies your teammates have spotted, and to see where the bomb has dropped and is lying. The following radar settings are ideal for this:
- Radar Centers The Player – Yes. This setup greatly helps your brain to quickly navigate through rads in space;
- Radar Is Rotating – Yes. Just like the previous setting helps you to orient yourself in space;
- Radar Hud Size – 1.00-1.30. The best size radar that will not cover half of the screen, and still you will easily distinguish where the enemy was spotted;
- Radar Map Zoom – 0.40. The minimum value, as even this is more than enough to see the entire map and distinguish where the red dot or question mark appears;
- Toggle Shape With Scoreboard – Yes.
Counter Strike 2 is a very complex and comprehensive game. In addition to the new smoke grenades, you will also have to re-learn the game. We hope our guide has helped you with this!
