Mouse Input Lag

Psyoletic · 18 Feb 2015 at 19:55

Evening,

Not sure if this is the right part of the forum.

Past few months or so, any game I play has noticeable input lag which is makes it unplayable especially Battlefield 4 which at the moment is the only FPS I play online.

It's bizarre as nothing has changed and all of sudden I have input lag that's too noticeable to play. Makes the mouse feel like it's in slow motion and I don't have complete 1:1 control.

About 6 months ago I realised that Windows 8.1 has "Enhance Pointer Precision" automatically enabled and turned that off and regained what felt to be 1:1 again prior to installing W8.1 from W7 but as above, last few months something has changed to cause the lag throughout a range of games offline and online.

Battlefield 4
Borderlands 2
Call of Duty - Advanced Warfare
Call of Duty - Black Ops 2
Far Cry 4
Planetside 2

The mouse is a Zowie EC2, all software (drivers, W8.1, firmware, BF4) is up to date.

Before I continue I'll list the spec of my computer.

i7 4770K @ 4.3Ghz w/ Speedstep
Z87X-UD3H-CF
C. Vengeance Pro 16GB 1600MHZ
EVGA ACX GTX770 OC @ Stock
Asus Xonar D2X
Crucial M4 256GB
2x WD "Black" 2TB
XFX "XXX" 750W
Zowie E2C eVo @ 1000hz polling rate / 1150 dpi
Steelseries QLK Mousemat
Dell 27" Ultrasharp U2713HM via DisplayPort
Windows 8.1 Pro 64-Bit (Genuine Licence)

Whenever I can I always run Vertical Sync as I can't deal with the screen tearing and particularly Battlefield 4 I'm running on low with no AA or HBAO, 100% Resolution at 2560x1440 59.5hz although Nvidia control panel says it's running at 60hz W8.1 won't allow me to save it as 60hz and returns to 59hz. Bug?

I understand that VS can cause slight input lag, but not this bad. To make sure it's not my mouse that's buggered I turned off VS in BF4 and hey presto no more lag and its fluid and responsive, not longer feels I'm using a brick for a mouse. I seriously considered if I've grown weary of FPS and its me that's the problem, but turning off VS confirmed its not me thankfully

To save you time I'll again list what I've already tried to resolve my problem.

Windows Refresh (OS only)
Battlefield repair, deafult settings and reinstall
BF4 console commands (GameTime.MaxVariableFps 60, 61, 59.95, 59, 62)
Nvidia driver clean install (347.52)
Tested current mouse (Zowie EC2) on different PC and laptop
New mouse (Zowie EC2-A) and spare gaming gigabyte mouse
Nvidia Panel, enabled Triple Buffering, Maximum pre-rendered frame "3", Virtual Reality pre-rendered frames "Use the 3D application setting"
MarkC Windows 7/8/8.1 Mouse Fix

I'm now wondering if it's my GTX770, considering I'm playing with lowest settings I'm curious to know it's a little out of its depth at 2560x1440? Or perhaps some bottleneck or something under performing to cause the input lag with VS on?

I don't render in the background or have a hundred applications running so I can't see myself that it's W8.1 problem.

Help and advice is greatly appreciated as I've come to a blank with this trying to figure out what's causing the extra input lag.

Psyoletic · 18 Feb 2015 at 23:08

Anybody got any ideas?

gerbil47 · 19 Feb 2015 at 18:05

Try Nvidia Triple Buffering instead.

Frenzy · 19 Feb 2015 at 18:13

Why don't you just turn vsync off and set the GameTime.MaxVariableFps to the refresh rate detected by BF4?
Shouldn't pre rendered frames be disabled?
I heard nvidia panel scaling on the gpu can cause input lag too

David Bisset · 19 Feb 2015 at 18:25

triple buffering won't be helping any!

PaulyD · 19 Feb 2015 at 19:23

Or rather than use vSync use something to frame rate limit such as Afterburner?

Frenzy · 20 Feb 2015 at 11:23

Thats what gametime does, limits frame rate.

nutsnut · 20 Feb 2015 at 11:31

Don't use V-sync :-)

Make sure you are not using both the in game BF frame rate limiter as well as V-Sync, this may be causing a conflict. Also, check in the NV control panel to make sure V-Sync is not forced.

Also, how much Vram is being used as the 770 only has 2GB?

Cheers

Rroff · 20 Feb 2015 at 11:33

Limiting framerate to the refresh rate with vsync off will usually result in horrid tearing/rippling, you want it a little bit higher so that you perceive less tearing if your doing it that way.

I've always found vsync to have nasty rubber bandy input lag - it might be that you've been playing games long enough your reactions, etc. are honed to a degree where your seeing it for what it is other than that the most likely things are some background task or triple buffer settings.

There are settings in nvidia inspector for capping framerate at certain levels when using vsync that supposedly reduces input lag with vsync - any chance you used to use that and it got reset in a driver update?

EDIT: The origin overlay can cause laggy mouse input in BF4 (known issue) but that wouldn't affect non-origin games also Samsung Magician has been known to cause it and other rendering issues at times due to its non-standard way of interfacing with DX.

setter · 20 Feb 2015 at 12:06

I limit fps to 60 in bf4 using the user.cfg using the max frame command, (60Hz monitor). It does indeed result in a bit of noticeable tearing. Tried adaptive vsync which was a bit better. I'm mainly limiting fps to keep temps down a bit though as sli 780's dump a lot of heat into the case causing cpu temps to rise a fair bit.

nutsnut · 20 Feb 2015 at 12:09

I had tearable input lag when limitting BF4 to 59/60 FPS.

When limited to 100fps (60 hz monitor) i had no input lag, no tearing and lower temps.

Wizzfizz · 20 Feb 2015 at 12:12

defo turn vsync off it's aload of crud

setter · 20 Feb 2015 at 12:18

nutsnut said:
I had tearable input lag when limitting BF4 to 59/60 FPS.

When limited to 100fps (60 hz monitor) i had no input lag, no tearing and lower temps.

I did try at 90 via the user.cfg, less tearing indeed, but temps were still pretty high on my top card.

Frenzy · 20 Feb 2015 at 12:27

Rroff said:
Limiting framerate to the refresh rate with vsync off will usually result in horrid tearing/rippling, you want it a little bit higher so that you perceive less tearing if your doing it that way.

What's the difference between vsync and frame limit to the refresh rate? Wouldn't frame limit be better because the frames are rendered to a point rather than being queued like vsync?

I don't see any rippling or tearing or maybe I'm just not noticing it. I limit gametime to 119 my refresh rate in game is 119, my fps hits 100-119 on average.

Wizzfizz · 20 Feb 2015 at 12:33

Yup, you should be setting your config refresh to match your monitor refresh

Psyoletic · 20 Feb 2015 at 19:03

Frenzy said:
Why don't you just turn vsync off and set the GameTime.MaxVariableFps to the refresh rate detected by BF4?
Shouldn't pre rendered frames be disabled?
I heard nvidia panel scaling on the gpu can cause input lag too

Nvidia scaling is turned off.

PaulyD said:
Or rather than use vSync use something to frame rate limit such as Afterburner?

nutsnut said:
Don't use V-sync

Make sure you are not using both the in game BF frame rate limiter as well as V-Sync, this may be causing a conflict. Also, check in the NV control panel to make sure V-Sync is not forced.

Also, how much Vram is being used as the 770 only has 2GB?

Cheers

Rroff said:
Limiting framerate to the refresh rate with vsync off will usually result in horrid tearing/rippling, you want it a little bit higher so that you perceive less tearing if your doing it that way.

I've always found vsync to have nasty rubber bandy input lag - it might be that you've been playing games long enough your reactions, etc. are honed to a degree where your seeing it for what it is other than that the most likely things are some background task or triple buffer settings.

There are settings in nvidia inspector for capping framerate at certain levels when using vsync that supposedly reduces input lag with vsync - any chance you used to use that and it got reset in a driver update?

EDIT: The origin overlay can cause laggy mouse input in BF4 (known issue) but that wouldn't affect non-origin games also Samsung Magician has been known to cause it and other rendering issues at times due to its non-standard way of interfacing with DX.

I tried various methods of frame limiting in BF4, EVGA Precision and Afterburner with different out comes. Mainly screen tearing and stuttering. Best frame limiter was BF4 but the tearing was too noticeable however the mouse was pretty much 1:1. I'd stick with it but when there's allot going on the screen tearing goes crazy and it's difficult to make anything out.

nutsnut said:
I had tearable input lag when limitting BF4 to 59/60 FPS.

When limited to 100fps (60 hz monitor) i had no input lag, no tearing and lower temps.

That sounds promising I'll have to try it!

I've tried overclocking my monitor to 75Hz and 80Hz and limited the FPS respectfully and to 100FPS. 75Hz wasn't too bad but again as soon as you join in a gun fight it micro stutters and the input lag is intermittent.

Adaptive V-Sync didn't help as it caused stuttering and random waves of input lag, nothing consistent.

Appreciate the helps folks! Hopefully something will work!

Rroff · 21 Feb 2015 at 02:09

Frenzy said:
What's the difference between vsync and frame limit to the refresh rate? Wouldn't frame limit be better because the frames are rendered to a point rather than being queued like vsync?

I don't see any rippling or tearing or maybe I'm just not noticing it. I limit gametime to 119 my refresh rate in game is 119, my fps hits 100-119 on average.

When you use vsync the next frame only starts drawing when the display is ready to start drawing the whole image again from the top down, when you cap the frame rate without vsync the next frame will start rendering whenever its available which could be half way through drawing the previous frame so you end up with more than 1 different image on the screen at once.

Frenzy · 21 Feb 2015 at 22:26

But surely if you can limit the frame rate to the refresh rate and maintain that frame rate then you won't come across this problem? Every frame should be in sync with the monitor shouldn't it?