Support

Product: App Priority Keys for Windows (Stream Deck plugin for Windows) · Provider: GRAMSHIFT (Tokyo, Japan)

Contact

Email contact@gramshift.com in English or Japanese. We reply within 7 business days, usually sooner. Please include your Windows version (Settings > System > About), your Stream Deck app version, the name of the game or app, whether it runs as administrator, and a photo or screenshot of the key.

Read this first: what a priority does, and what it does not

A priority does not make a program faster by itself. It only tells Windows which program goes first when the processor is busy with more work than it can do at once. If the processor is not busy, or if your game is limited by the graphics card, you will see no difference. We promise no gain in frames per second or anything else.

High can make other things worse. A program on High is served before everything on Normal: streaming software, voice chat, sound or the browser can stutter while it is busy. If that happens, press the key again to put it back, or use Above normal. Low and Below normal are the gentle direction: a heavy background job gets out of the way of what you are doing.

Realtime can not be chosen. A program on Realtime is served before parts of Windows itself, and a busy one can freeze the mouse, the keyboard and the whole PC. The settings offer five priorities only, a saved value that names anything else counts as High, and the part of the plugin that talks to Windows refuses any other value.

Get started

Install the plugin from the Elgato Marketplace. In the Stream Deck app, find App Priority Keys for Windows in the action list and drag an action onto a key.
Front App Priority shows the program of the window in front and its priority, for example NORMAL. Choose the priority the key should set in its settings (High unless you change it).
Press the key. It reads the priority again and shows it with a blue frame: HIGH, and below it undo: NORMAL. Press again to put it back.

The actions

Front App Priority: shows the program of the window in front and its priority. A press sets the chosen priority on that one process (not on other processes of the same program). A press on a process this key has set puts it back. While the Stream Deck app, the desktop or the taskbar is in front, the key shows -- and does nothing.
App Priority: for one program you choose in the settings. The list holds the programs that show a window now, so start the program first. A press sets the chosen priority on every process with that file name, in any folder; another press puts them back. Automatic: when it is on, a process of that program is set by the plugin itself, once, after it has been seen running for the wait you chose (2, 5, 10 or 30 seconds). This is for the fact that Windows does not remember a priority: every start of a program begins at Normal.
Restore Priorities: shows how many processes this plugin has changed and not put back. A press puts every one of them back.

How things are put back

Before the plugin changes a process for the first time, it reads the priority the process has and remembers it together with the process number, the time the process started and its program file. If the same process is changed again (by another key, with another priority), the first value stays the one to go back to.
A process is only touched while it still is that process: same number and same start time. Windows gives the number of a closed program to a new one later; the plugin does not touch that one.
If the plugin can not read a changed process three times in a row (about a second and a half), it takes it as closed and forgets it.
When the Stream Deck app closes its connection to the plugin, the plugin puts back every process that still has the priority it set, and then stops. A process whose priority someone else changed in the meantime is left as it is.
If the plugin is stopped at once (it crashes, it is ended in Task Manager, the PC loses power), none of its code runs and what it changed stays changed. This is not lasting: close that program and start it again, and it is at Normal. We measured both cases, see below.
A program set to Low or Below normal passes that priority on to the programs it starts (Windows does that). While the plugin is watching, it counts those and puts them back together with it.

Automatic setting: what to expect

It works only while the App Priority key is on a page that is showing on a connected Stream Deck. A program that starts while the key is on another page or profile is set when the key is shown again, after the wait.
Each process is set once. If you put it back with a key, or change it in Task Manager, the plugin leaves that run of the program alone. Restarting the Stream Deck app starts this over.
For a game that is started by a launcher, choose the game's own program, not the launcher: a program on High or Above normal does not pass its priority on to the programs it starts (measured).
Some programs set their own priorities. Browsers lower and raise their own processes all the time: the key will often say CHANGED for them, and that is the browser, not a fault.

What the plugin never changes

Windows' own processes, by name: among them explorer (the desktop and the taskbar), dwm, csrss, winlogon, lsass, services, svchost, audiodg, the Start menu, search and text input hosts, ApplicationFrameHost and Taskmgr. Windows would let you change some of these (we measured that explorer can be opened for it); the plugin's own list stops it. Because of ApplicationFrameHost, an app from the Microsoft Store that is drawn inside that host window shows as protected on the Front App Priority key.
The Stream Deck app, its helper programs and every plugin inside its folders, and this plugin itself.
Programs of another Windows session (services, another signed-in user), and any process the plugin can not open to read its program name and start time.
A process that is on Realtime already (set by something else): the plugin does not lower it either.

None of this can be switched off in the settings.

What we tested, and what we did not

Measured on Windows 11 (build 26300) without administrator rights, on test programs we started ourselves (copies of a small program under names of their own, and a small test window):

Each of the five priorities was set and read back the same, also by a second program. High needs no administrator rights.
Asking Windows for Realtime without the right to it: Windows reported success and set High. The plugin never asks for it; this is why every key shows the priority that was read back, not the answer of the request.
A program started by a parent on Low or Below normal started with that priority; started by a parent on Normal, Above normal or High it started at Normal.
Turning on Windows' efficiency mode setting (power throttling) for a process did not change the priority that is read. Bringing a window to the front did not change it either.
With the plugin as shipped: a press set a test process to High and a second press put it back; the automatic setting set a newly started test process about 2 seconds after its start with a wait of 2 seconds; when the connection was closed, both changed test processes were back at Normal and the plugin had exited within a fraction of a second; when the plugin was ended at once, the test process stayed changed, and the same program started again was at Normal.

Not tested: any specific game or commercial app; a program that runs as administrator (we expect FAILED / no permission); programs guarded by anti-cheat or security software (they may refuse, or may not even let the plugin read their name: the key then says protected); how such software judges a tool that changes a game's priority; what the real Stream Deck app does to its plugins when it quits or updates (the closing of the connection was tested with a stand-in for the app); Windows on ARM; Windows 10.

What the keys show

On the key	Meaning
`LOW` `BELOW` `NORMAL` `ABOVE` `HIGH`	The priority Windows reports now (Task Manager: Low, Below normal, Normal, Above normal, High). On an App Priority key with several processes: the priority of the oldest one, or the one the plugin set.
blue frame, `undo: NORMAL` / `was NORMAL`	This plugin set the priority and it still is as set. The small line names what it was before.
`2 of 3`	The plugin set two of the three processes of that program; one started later. A press puts the two back; another press sets all three.
`CHANGED`, `now ABOVE`	After the plugin set a priority, another program, or you in Task Manager, changed it. The plugin does not change it back by itself. A press puts it back to what it was before the plugin touched it.
`FAILED`, `still NORMAL`	Windows did not apply the priority: what the plugin read afterwards was not what it asked for.
`FAILED`, `no permission`	Windows refused: the program runs as administrator or is protected.
`already set`	The process already had the priority of this key. Nothing was changed.
`--`, `protected` / `PROTECTED`	A part of Windows, the Stream Deck app, or a process the plugin can not read. Never changed.
`--`, `not running` / `auto: HIGH`	The chosen program is not running. With Automatic on, the key names the priority it will set.
`auto soon`	A new process of the chosen program was seen; it is set when the wait is over.
`Windows only` / `reinstall plugin`	The PC is not Windows / the plugin could not load its Windows part: remove it and install it again.

Questions

I set my game to High and nothing got better. That is common. See "Read this first". Put it back with the key.

The key says CHANGED all the time. The program, or another tool, sets its own priority. Browsers do. The key only reports it.

Does the priority stay after I close the game? No. Windows does not keep it. Turn on Automatic on an App Priority key and keep that key on a page that is showing.

Can I choose which processor cores a program uses? Not in this version.

Is this safe with anti-cheat? We do not know and promise nothing: we have not tested any game or anti-cheat. The plugin does the same thing as "Set priority" in Task Manager, from another program. If a game forbids tools that touch its process, do not use the plugin on it.

Privacy

To show program names and priorities and to set a priority, the plugin reads program file names, process numbers and priorities on your PC and opens processes. Nothing is logged or sent to us or to any online service. See the Privacy Policy for exactly what is read and what is done.