Simulating a lower-spec pc on your pc

[questioner1]

Hey guys,

I'm not sure in what forum I should be posting this, and I'm guessing this question is not often asked, I searched on google but couldn't find a thing: I'm looking for a way to simulate a downgrade of my pc specs.

I have a relatively good pc for my business (i7 quad 3.6Ghz, 16 gb Ram, geforce GTX 960, 265 GB SSD).
I don't actually know for sure whether I really need this, but I wanted to be on the safe side, so I chose a high end pc. I preferred the risk of paying too much over the risk of running my programs too slowly.
Now we're expanding so we're buying more pc's, and I want to be more conscious about how much I spend.

I know there are benchmarks and required specs for most software, but I'd prefer to test out myself what kind of specs I need for the performance that I will be satisfied with.

So for that reason, I'm wondering: is there a way to SIMULATE a downgrade the specs of my pc in order to test at what specs programs run at a performance I'm satisfied with?
I explictly say simulate, because I don't want to underclock, or take out RAM or something like that. I'm wondering if there is some kind of software program that can make your i7 behave more like an i5, or lets your graphics card only work at 50%.

is this something people have experience with? is it even possible?

Thanks guys!

Edit: if this is not possible, is there maybe something like a program that documents during a day how heavily your pc is loaded? e.g. that it would give you a graph at the end of the day with CPU % usage and Ram usage, FPS, so that you can decide whether a downgrade would have an effect on performance given your particular usage pattern?

 

[drtweak]

No you would need to underclock your CPU/RAM speed or toss in a slower CPU/RAM.

Another thing you can try is download orcal Virtual Box, install windows (You can just download any ISO of windows and just run it under the 30 days activation period (For windows 8 and up there are keys you need to find to get pass the intial install but it does NOT activate it)

You can then set how many CPU cores and Ram size. The things it wont be able to test is video because it runs off a virtual adapter and no your Nvidia. The CPU and RAM though will still run at their same clock speeds. So if you gave it like 2 cores it would still run at your 3.6 ghz speed but less cores which means less power.

Just an option. I have never tested a PC that way though.