G-Sync or Freesync ?

foster grant said:
Well I was thinking of this one for a 27" Freesync

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/aoc-...descreen-led-monitor-black-red-mo-033-ao.html
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27" @ 1080p is too blocky if you like to be close to your monitor (I know I do).

You want 2560x1440 minimum for 27" (imo). Which is in price range, but only at 60Hz.


Your sweet spot with bang for buck is Freesync 1080p with 144hz, on the 290x and selling the 980.


The only other option of spending around £250 total to go gsync (as opposed to being about £50 up from going Freesync) seems bonkers because you could just go all in, sell the 980 use the 290x and buy the Freesync Rog swift 27" 2560x1440! :p :D
 
No. ;) They are both equally as effective at eliminating tearing, juddering and stuttering from the traditional refresh rate and frame rate mismatches. I've seen some fairly good pixel overdrive implementations for both FreeSync and G-SYNC models and also some not so good ones. And if there are any latency differences they're certainly beyond my sensitivity for that sort of thing.
 
PCM2 said:
No. ;) They are both equally as effective at eliminating tearing, juddering and stuttering from the traditional refresh rate and frame rate mismatches. I've seen some fairly good pixel overdrive implementations for both FreeSync and G-SYNC models and also some not so good ones. And if there are any latency differences they're certainly beyond my sensitivity for that sort of thing.
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Cheers for confirming my suspicions man, it's good to know :)
 
PCM2 said:
No. ;) They are both equally as effective at eliminating tearing, juddering and stuttering from the traditional refresh rate and frame rate mismatches. I've seen some fairly good pixel overdrive implementations for both FreeSync and G-SYNC models and also some not so good ones. And if there are any latency differences they're certainly beyond my sensitivity for that sort of thing.
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Even with this post of yours and badass's + anandtech's thoughts being the exact same with "hard evidence" to back up their claims, you will still get the same old coming in with the "gsync is better" line... :o
 
Nexus18 said:
Even with this post of yours and badass's + anandtech's thoughts being the exact same with "hard evidence" to back up their claims, you will still get the same old coming in with the "gsync is better" line... :o
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Sorry but they and you are WRONG (well PCM2's comment is correct as far as it goes but it stops short of commenting on anything outside of the core functionality) - to the average consumer there might be a relatively similar experience but for anyone who really pushes the boundaries of the 2 techs you will find that G-SYNC has several advantages that AMD are still playing catch up on.

There is no hard evidence in that anandtech review. The only thing they go indepth into is pricing and framerate performance both of which are a long long way down the list of things particularly relevant to the fundamental mechanics of adaptive sync systems such as testing frame presentation, testing latency, application compatibility, etc.

Watch a few videos on youtube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VkrJU5d2RfA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhLYYYvFp9A

etc. even with the recent framerate compensation implementation AMD are still behind nVidia when it comes to handling situations where the framerate is spiking/dropping or low which can result in noticeably increased input latency in some cases - while AMD's solution does actually result in a smoother, less juddery transition which can be nice for things like movies it is the less ideal implementation of the 2 for serious gaming as you have less precise response during that time period where it is displaying duplicate frames for longer or reverting to other behaviour before catching up - in some cases with uneven framerates with significant frametime swing with FreeSync you will be waiting an extra ~40ms before it is displaying the latest available frame compared to G-SYNC which is noticeable.

FreeSync still doesn't have as good compatibility as G-SYNC as FreeSync does not handle windowed mode or non-exclusive fullscreen modes - which means about 20% of recent mainstream titles (and an unquantifiable number of non-mainstream/older games) can't utilise FreeSync ingame - but can be made to work with G-SYNC (this can be a significant aspect for some MMO players, etc. who like to play the game in borderless window mode and have companion applications, etc. running alongside the game).
 
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You're correct that there are certain features that G-SYNC has and FreeSync lacks at present and it is playing catch-up in that respect. But the overall experience is going to be extremely similar for most users.

For me both technologies worked best at relatively high frame rates and got rid of the traditional issues with even slight drops very nicely. I have tested both technologies extensively and can say that fretting about which technology handles low frame rates is of little consequence when such frame rates feel horribly sluggish and unresponsive on both technologies. I cover this extensively at a subjective level in my reviews, and my thoughts are backed up by others who help with the reviews (they aren't just personal opinion). I can't say I found sudden drops in frame rate more jarring with FreeSync than G-SYNC either. It is possible that G-SYNC does technically handle low frame rates (<30fps or whatever is lower than the refresh rate floor) better, but such low frame rates remain low frame rates. It's not where you want to be on a high refresh rate monitor and no amount of technical wizardry will change that.
 
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PCM2 said:
You're correct that there are certain features that G-SYNC has and FreeSync lacks at present and it is playing catch-up in that respect. But the overall experience is going to be extremely similar for most users.
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I have a hard time letting certain claims that G-SYNC isn't better stand when what you say above is perfectly true - there are some areas where FreeSync is playing catchup and G-SYNC has already caught up on some of the earlier advantages FreeSync had like the ability to toggle V-SYNC behaviour when able to render above the max framerate.

PCM2 said:
For me both technologies worked best at relatively high frame rates and got rid of the traditional issues with even slight drops very nicely. I have tested both technologies extensively and can say that fretting about which technology handles low frame rates is of little consequence when such frame rates feel horribly sluggish and unresponsive on both technologies. I cover this extensively at a subjective level in my reviews, and my thoughts are backed up by others who help with the reviews (they aren't just personal opinion). I can't say I found sudden drops in frame rate more jarring with FreeSync than G-SYNC either. It is possible that G-SYNC does technically handle low frame rates (<30fps or whatever is lower than the refresh rate floor) better, but such low frame rates remain low frame rates. It's not where you want to be on a high refresh rate monitor and no amount of technical wizardry will change that.
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One area where I've really noticed the difference is with heavily modded Skyrim - where the framerate with what I'm running can even on the best of GPUs be bouncing from ~19fps to my framerate cap at 58fps (to prevent game bugs) i.e. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_REaPDK67kM
 
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It is slightly more polished and significantly more expensive. The core functionality remains the same, but it's a question of how much the user is willing to pay for that. And of course dictated by the GPU they have. I say this as the owner of a G-SYNC monitor and GTX 980 Ti for my main gaming rig as well, so I'm completely impartial. But I still think AMD are going about this the right way and Nvidia are... Well... Best leave that kind of discussion in the GPU section.
 
PCM2 said:
But I still think AMD are going about this the right way and Nvidia are... Well... Best leave that kind of discussion in the GPU section.
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I'm no fan of the direction nVidia have gone with it - I'd be quite happy to see the day they are forced to support adaptive sync - but at the end of the day they have poured resources into making it work and getting it out there and that is something I can get behind.

(Though whether they'd have been as enthusiastic if they couldn't have bundled their FPGA lockin in the equation is another matter :S).
 
At the end of the day, as PCM2 has said, in real world usage, there is no difference, just like badass and anandtech have found (I will take their "opinions" over any other sites/people's every day of the week).

You can look into it with this fancy equipment all you want but that doesn't change the fact that hardly any one, if anyone is going to notice the difference in "real world usage"

As for latency, response time etc. It largely comes down to the panels/monitors as shown by badass's thorough testing, there is little to no difference between similar g and free sync panels/monitors in these areas. Also, as has been pointed out by reviewers and a select few on forums (who are sensitive to frame rates etc.), anything below the 45/40FPS range will still not feel as good as 60+FPS regardless of g or free sync so if people are hitting sub 40FPS, time for a new GPU or to dial the settings back a bit.

And true on that last point but as you said earlier on, AMD are working on it and no doubt we will see an update at some point this year to address that and many other things. Personally of all the games I have played, they all have full screen mode and perform better in full screen mode too, the only games lately that have this problem are the ones on the windows 10 store, which I believe microsoft are working on too.

Don't forget, gsync has been out for over a year longer than freesync so it isn't as surprising that gsync "might" have a few "technical" advancements over freesync and I would imagine that AMD are more limited with what they can and can't do with the current scalers, it will only improve with time and when nvidia have no choice but to jump on the adaptive sync bandwagon, they will/might contribute support to improving this universal adaptive sync tech.

If you want to say "gsync is better" just because of it possibly handling then what about users who want more than 1 connection port for their display, what about users who want a much larger choice for panel type as well as brand choice, what about users who want universally cheaper equivalent versions of a gsync monitor.....

So yeah gsync isn't better and freesync isn't better either in terms of what they were both designed for.

As for the pcper in depth testing video, it is a bit pointless now since freesync has had many updates such as the LFRC since March 2015.... Unless of course you have a video/review to show a new updated version?
 
The latest G-SYNC panels like the Dell have HDMI as well as DP input (TBH an aspect I might be guilty of glossing over as I only have my gaming PC hooked upto my main gaming panel and have a range of monitors either on my desk or that I can swap out as needed alongside it for anything else I need).

The point of linking to those videos is that there are many aspects that people are glossing over when claiming that G-SYNC isn't any better and as you even admit yourself AMD are playing catch up on some of those aspects.
 
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Rroff said:
The latest G-SYNC panels like the Dell have HDMI as well as DP input.

The point of linking to those videos is that there are many aspects that people are glossing over when claiming that G-SYNC isn't any better and as you even admit yourself AMD are playing catch up on some of those aspects.
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Even then, it still doesn't have as many connections as the equivalent freesync monitors (this isn't something that I really care about tbh but I have seen quite a few on various forums avoid gsync purely because of this) and afaik, there are only 3 (?) monitors using the latest gsync so a large gap still for people who don't want the latest fancy & expensive monitors.

Yes some of the points of that video "might" still apply but like I said, there has been a lot of updates improving freesync since then and probably likewise for gsync improvements so the test is a bit irrelevant now especially for the area where they test the very low frame rates.
 
Nexus18 said:
Yes some of the points of that video "might" still apply but like I said, there has been a lot of updates improving freesync since then and probably likewise for gsync improvements so the test is a bit irrelevant now especially for the area where they test the very low frame rates.
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My aim isn't to diminish FreeSync - there are just a lot of aspects to adaptive sync technologies that don't tend to get discussed - even by many of the big review sites and it bugs me a bit when not unimportant aspects like the implications of support for non-exclusive fullscreen modes go largely un-remarked when people compare the 2.
 
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