Adjust Image Settings With Preview
Here you can set the overall manner in which your GPU determines which settings to use:
Let the 3D Application Decide: Selecting this essentially disables the impact of any Nvidia Control Panel settings on games. Only settings you actually select in a game will be in effect. This is not recommended, as it reduces your ability to enhance and further control game graphics quality and performance via the NVCP.
Use the Advanced 3D Image Settings: This is the recommended setting, as it allows the NVCP settings to override/enhance games, and gives you a great many options to do so via the Manage 3D Settings section of the NVCP, as covered further below.
Use my preference emphasizing: This setting is not recommended. Selecting this option allows you to use a slider to adjust the NVCP settings that are automatically applied to all games, as shown in the following table:
So for example, if you select the Quality option on the slider and click Apply, it will automatically change your NVCP settings such that it will globally force 4x Anti-aliasing and 8x Anisotropic Filtering, as well as general texture filtering changes, on every game you play. This is clearly not optimal under all circumstances, often resulting in lower image quality and/or lower performance than desired in various games.
It is strongly recommended that you select the 'Use the Advanced 3D Image Settings' option here and then proceed to the Manage 3D Settings section of the NVCP to customize each setting as necessary.