How to reduce input lag on ALL monitors

well, tested this in Max Payne 3 multiplayer, here are my findings:

- i am currently having vsync ON
- i have limited the fps through MSI afterburner to 59

result: much smoother aim, no tearing. i was so used to playing with the input lag that i couldn't hit a door of a barn when i turned the FPS limiter on. i also had to lower the mouse sensitivity from 3 to 2 and get used to it for a couple of days.

so yes, for me it does work. i will turn off vsync completely tonight and test how the controls feel. vsync seems redundant with the FPS limiter. also, i will check and test out the adaptive vsync and what it does with the controls vs smoothness.

in running on Gigabyte GTX580 SOC with DELL U2412M
 
Dash RipRock said:
To be honest with 120hz you can get away with vsync and triplebuffer,most games dont suffer from the "floaty" feel that badly.Certainly on the title screens when your moving your cursor you sort of think you can feel it but once in game when your jumpin around and stafing whatever lag is there, is most certainly not game destroying.

Some people say dont be silly you can turn off vsync cos you wont see tearing with 120hz but unfortunatly while its true that its much reduced its certainly there and can be seen quite easily in some games.A lot of times you just seem vaguely aware that the screen seems to "wobble" slightly around 2/3 the way up and an occasional tear shows.It just doesnt quite seems silky smooth and like watery smooth in its movement.In fact when you turn vsync back on you just know it`s moving smoother and feels like it should.
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+1
I get it slightly still on bf3 on my Samsung 120hz it's no wher near as bad as on a 60hz though.
 
jaybee said:
Silly question, presumably this would still work for games where your machine cannot provide a constant fps of 59? i.e. Say it drops to 35fps during a battle, this method would still a) reduce tearing and b) prevent input lag?
Why have I never heard of this before if it is so simple as capping the fps at 59? It's taken nearly decade for someone to work this out and make it public knowledge?
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It would still work, yes. Ignore the "no" answer.

The reason it would work is because vsync would work in its normal fashion and sync at half rate, eliminating the tearing as it normally would.

In this situation, you would still get vsync lag particularly when your fps would jump and go above 60.

Cappin at 59 fps, even if you are runnin at 30fps ensures that the vsync buffer still never has to flush excess frames, and thus results in moments that would have had input lag, not having them.

skuko said:
well, tested this in Max Payne 3 multiplayer, here are my findings:

- i am currently having vsync ON
- i have limited the fps through MSI afterburner to 59

result: much smoother aim, no tearing. i was so used to playing with the input lag that i couldn't hit a door of a barn when i turned the FPS limiter on. i also had to lower the mouse sensitivity from 3 to 2 and get used to it for a couple of days.

so yes, for me it does work. i will turn off vsync completely tonight and test how the controls feel. vsync seems redundant with the FPS limiter. also, i will check and test out the adaptive vsync and what it does with the controls vs smoothness.

in running on Gigabyte GTX580 SOC with DELL U2412M
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Exactly.

All these naysayers who say this method would be "pointless" i know for fact have not tried this method.

All the reasons why they think it wont work are irrelevant.

It works. And it works for exactly the reason explained on the web page i linked on my original post.


I have no idea why Nvidia or ATI driver settings do not allow this cap, since it clearly results in smoother gameplay.

But i can tell you that Steam-Valve actually has a code implemented to handle this situation, and if activated, limits frames per second to 1 below the hz of the monitor refresh rate.
 
MADMAN said:
surely input lag is a hardware thing ?
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Yes (see my original post to this thread). It is possible to reduce the input lag penalty (additional input lag) caused by Vsync but you can't reduce the base latency of a monitor using this method.
 
PCM2 said:
Yes (see my original post to this thread). It is possible to reduce the input lag penalty (additional input lag) caused by Vsync but you can't reduce the base latency of a monitor using this method.
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I love how you understand the whole situation and had the correct reply as the very second post before any debate ever started about it LOL :D
 
Trying to short the frame buffer like this doesn't work if the the game can't hit the sync rate. You will get the same reduction (half rate) in fps regardless.

I've tried all these tricks over the past 20 years. They all have downsides that become annoying. People will just need to try it for themselves. In some games this fudge may result in improved mouse performance but you will also have hitching and possibly a regular sync line on screen.
 
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dsswoosh said:
It would still work, yes. Ignore the "no" answer.

The reason it would work is because vsync would work in its normal fashion and sync at half rate, eliminating the tearing as it normally would.

In this situation, you would still get vsync lag particularly when your fps would jump and go above 60.

Cappin at 59 fps, even if you are runnin at 30fps ensures that the vsync buffer still never has to flush excess frames, and thus results in moments that would have had input lag, not having them.



Exactly.

All these naysayers who say this method would be "pointless" i know for fact have not tried this method.

All the reasons why they think it wont work are irrelevant.

It works. And it works for exactly the reason explained on the web page i linked on my original post.


I have no idea why Nvidia or ATI driver settings do not allow this cap, since it clearly results in smoother gameplay.

But i can tell you that Steam-Valve actually has a code implemented to handle this situation, and if activated, limits frames per second to 1 below the hz of the monitor refresh rate.
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the question is, why use vsync at all, when you have the fps limiter turned on? isn't vsync redundant? i mean, i can't see the benefit of vsync if the fps won't go above 59.
 
skuko said:
the question is, why use vsync at all, when you have the fps limiter turned on? isn't vsync redundant? i mean, i can't see the benefit of vsync if the fps won't go above 59.
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Because pushing 59 frames per second through vsync forces 1 of those frames to get repeated, resulting in 60 frames per second hitting the monitor and v-syncing properly so you dont get any screen tearing.

With a 59 fps frame limit and no vsync you will still get screen tearing because you arent sending 60 frames per second to the monitor.

As mentioned, sending 59 frames per second + 1 repeat frame will result in a SLIGHT hitch every second. (almsot impossible to see).


Its by far the best way to play games on a 60hz monitor because you have 0 screen tear, 0 extra mouse lag AND a cooler running PC because no excess frames are flushed out of the vsync buffer (which is what causes vsync mouse lag and requires extra computational power).
 
dsswoosh said:
Because pushing 59 frames per second through vsync forces 1 of those frames to get repeated, resulting in 60 frames per second hitting the monitor and v-syncing properly so you dont get any screen tearing.

With a 59 fps frame limit and no vsync you will still get screen tearing because you arent sending 60 frames per second to the monitor.

As mentioned, sending 59 frames per second + 1 repeat frame will result in a SLIGHT hitch every second. (almsot impossible to see).


Its by far the best way to play games on a 60hz monitor because you have 0 screen tear, 0 extra mouse lag AND a cooler running PC because no excess frames are flushed out of the vsync buffer (which is what causes vsync mouse lag and requires extra computational power).
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this is all assuming you have a constant 59 fps though. what if your FPS has dips into low 50s and high 40s? doesn't it get rounded to 30 fps due to vsync?

i wonder how nvidia adaptive vsync would affect this.
 
*EDIT Holy crap it works I just downloaded RadeonPro and forced vsync and triple buffering in directx games and fired up Risen as I was getting bad tearing on it. I walked around and I couldn't believe the difference no tearing and it felt really realistic I smiled and turned the game off to come post this. I didn't even need to spend any time judging it. No jitter or input lag either. Thanks for this thread and I love the fact I found RadeonPro, an awesome tool you should download it if you use ATI cards as you can force triple buffering and no need for fraps now.

I will still have vsync off for competitive online shooters though as I don't want a single bit of input lag.


Well I tried it and it worked really good on sniper elite, even took out the tearing on the super fast bullet camera sideviews. Then I tried it in FO3 and I noticed the stuttering it seems you need to be constantly over 60FPS. I don't know which I like more with it on or off but I haven't tried Counter Strike yet that will be the real test.

Stupid ccc won't force vsync either on any games.


found this..
4j9ibt.png


Edit* Gonna try this for triple buffering, D3DOverrider I don't think it was working through CCC.
 
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Nate Silvers said:
Well I tried it and it worked really good on sniper elite, even took out the tearing on the super fast bullet camera sideviews. Then I tried it in FO3 and I noticed the stuttering it seems you need to be constantly over 60FPS. I don't know which I like more with it on or off but I haven't tried Counter Strike yet that will be the real test.

Stupid ccc won't force vsync either on any games.


found this..
4j9ibt.png


Edit* Gonna try this for triple buffering, D3DOverrider I don't think it was working through CCC.
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Ha, well i guess this puts all the doubters to shame.

Where the heck did you find this ????!
 
I found it in a discussion about fps limiter vs vsync. Read my edit above I ******* love this triple buffering and fps limit 59 vsync magic. This threads title is misleading and needs changing to "How to reduce input lag on all games and prevent tearing" as it not really anything to do with the monitor but the graphics card.
 
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Nate Silvers said:
I found it in a discussion about fps limiter vs vsync. Read my edit above I ******* love this triple buffering and fps limit 59 vsync magic. This threads title is misleading and needs changing to "How to reduce input lag on all games and prevent tearing" as it not really anything to do with the monitor but the graphics card.
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What i meant was, where do you find those options?

Are they an nvidia/ati hidden setting somewhere or is it a 3rd party program?
 
Nate Silvers said:
I found it in a discussion about fps limiter vs vsync. Read my edit above I ******* love this triple buffering and fps limit 59 vsync magic. This threads title is misleading and needs changing to "How to reduce input lag on all games and prevent tearing" as it not really anything to do with the monitor but the graphics card.
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this ;)
 
nvidia driver functions and apparently it used to have an fps limiter too. I have an ATI card so I'm using RadeonPro to force triple buffering. I tried D3DOverrider but it wouldn't launch so I found RadeonPro and you have to enable triple buffering in directx games as enabling it in the drivers page is opengl only, this made the big difference to me.

Gonna play some more Risen now with this trick :D
 
Nate Silvers said:
nvidia driver functions and apparently it used to have an fps limiter too. I have an ATI card so I'm using RadeonPro to force triple buffering. I tried D3DOverrider but it wouldn't launch so I found RadeonPro and you have to enable triple buffering in directx games as enabling it in the drivers page is opengl only, this made the big difference to me.

Gonna play some more Risen now with this trick :D
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Wonder why they removed these options then?

It is a clear improvement by a mile on most monitors.
 
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