V-Sync

[Blackthorn]

Simply out of interest, I was wondering what opinion is here on v-sync? Personally, screen tearing ruins games for me, it's just too ugly. V-sync always on, no matter what I play.

 

[Raziaar]

I haven't experienced much screen tearing in a long time. So I just keep it to application preference, and usually off within games. Sometimes a game will need it on to avoid problems, but most of the time I keep it off to keep frame rate up.

 

[Zephos]

Does depend on the game.

I sometimes can't live without V-Sync.

 

[WhiteZero]

I get tons of tearing on most games, since my LCD monitor is limited to 60Hz and most games I'm running on this newer rig push 100FPS.
V-Sync is mandatory for my situation.

 

[StardogChampion]

Off always. Never really notice tearing.

 

[Stigmata]

Always off, unless it's a game where I get above 60fps (which is currently none, as I stopped playing CSS months ago).

 

[Fliko]

I get tons of tearing on most games, since my LCD monitor is limited to 60Hz and most games I'm running on this newer rig push 100FPS.
V-Sync is mandatory for my situation.

LCD Monitors don't have a refresh rate, instead they have their millisecond latency/response time.

 

[Letters]

Always off no matter what... I couldn't even tell you what screen tearing looks like, but I could sure tell you how much that mother****ing v-sync thing can ruin your performance.

 

[Saturos]

Always on. For the most part, screen tearing is more noticable to me than slight lag. I hate screen tearing.
Turing off V-sync off doesn't improve performance that much anyways. At least not on my system.

Futhermore, in some of the more intensive games, turning off V-sync could mean slight lag and screen tearing, so turning it off could actually be detrimental to performance.
Again though, on my system anyways.

 

[Naph]

Most newer games I get boosts of FPS with it on.
Unlike the older games.

 

[Lucid]

What exactly is this screen tearing you all speak of?

 

[Dalamari]

 

[VirusType2]

^
the screen is ready to be updated by your graphics card, but your monitor isn't. with v sync on, it will wait to update until it is in sync with the monitor's refresh. With V sync off, it will allow a higher frame rate than your monitor's refresh rate. If you keep your monitor at 60hz refresh - for example, and your game is running at 100fps, with v sync on, you will only get 60 fps.

I can't speak on LCD monitors because I'm not familiar with them.


For me, it's always off. Screen tearing doesn't bother me, and it happens rarely, and i never even notice if it happens in most games. V sync absolutely destroys games performance. Also, 60fps is too low for my eyes especially on a monitor. I use at least 72 hz, sometimes as much as 80 or even 85hz refresh or else I can see it flicker.

However, for some reason, in Condemned: Criminal Origins, it seemed to make my frame rate go up when I enabled V sync. But it was really bad tearing without it and that was making it jerky and hurting my eyes.

 

[Asus]

Depends on the game. But I'd prefer it when games have a frame limiter so it keeps the frame rate steady but doesn't kill my frame rate when it just misses the target frame rate. I don't notice tearing as much as I notice frame rate going up and down.

With v-sync if your card can't hit say 60FPS (assuming 60 Hz refresh rate) then it drops frame rate to 30FPS to maintain sync (half of 60). If you can't hit 30 then it goes to 15 fps (60/4). With a frame limiter, frame rate would stay at 60fps if the performance is there but if it drops then you may get 55fps or 50 (whatever the card can deliver in that scene) but the frame rate won't get modified down.

If you have an ATI card and run temporal AA, it has a built in frame limiter. It was awesome when I had an ATI card. Set it for any game via the control panel. Get AA plus the frame rate would be steady. And if performance dropped the AA would disable and your frame rate would be free of any limitation until the scene got easier to render and back at the target frame rate and with AA again.

 

[Bad^Hat]

Off. Frame rate > all.

 

[Asuka]

Depends on the Game

 

[Asus]

Frame rate > all.

You can't see it if your monitor doesn't display it. /shock

 

[Ravioli]

takes too much computer power and lowers the fps by a huge margin. I just put everything on max and turn off V-sync

 

[giant384]

LCD Monitors don't have a refresh rate, instead they have their millisecond latency/response time.

.................okkkkkkkk

wrong much? all monitors have a refresh rate. also you cant really tell where its tearing in the above pic. you need to take a picture of a solid wall.

 

[Lucid]

Oh, I have never in my life ever seen that happen before.

...either that or I've never noticed it. :hmph:

 

[Saturos]

You can't see it if your monitor doesn't display it. /shock

That's right. All monitors have a framerate cap.

Just because an in-game benchmark states FPS > 60 doesn't mean that's what your actually seeing. In fact, it's because of this framerate cap that screen tearing occurs, which is why there is V-sync.

 

[PvtRyan]

I voted always off, but I meant always on. I got no need for a framerate > 60 and tearing is annoying.

 

[Saturos]

I voted always off, but I meant always on. I got no need for a framerate > 60 and tearing is annoying.

For the sake of confusing PvtRyan even further, I was wrong about the above statement, the framerate cap for screen tearing to occur is actually much lower than 60 FPS.

 

[Operational]

I voted always off, but I meant always on. I got no need for a framerate > 60 and tearing is annoying.

This. Except I voted correctly.

 

[WhiteZero]

.................okkkkkkkk

wrong much? all monitors have a refresh rate. also you cant really tell where its tearing in the above pic. you need to take a picture of a solid wall.

Exactly. The majority of LCDs have a 60Hz verticle refresh frequency. There are more and more TVs at least that can do 120Hz.
The 60Hz refresh rate is quite apparent on any monitor when you notice tearing over 60FPS, and when you turn on V-Sync, it limits the FPS to 60 and BOOM, no more tearing.
Now, I'm sure that LCDs "refresh rate" is not the same as a CRTs. because LCDs dont has a raster, but there is something about an LCD which limits the ammount of images it can cycle per second, but it's not the Pixel Responce Time, which we all know is rate in "ms" for LCD specs.
LCD "refresh" may not be something limited by hardware either. I'm no super LCD expert, but I know what my eyes see.

 

[Sanada]

Actually, it is the response time and what Flicko said was correct about LCDs not having a refresh rate. A refresh of the screen would be a complete update of the image being display, so 60Hz would be a refreshing of the screen 60 times every second. An LCD doesn't refresh because the pixles always stay on, they just change state.

An easier way to put it into perspective would be with candles that can emit light in colour.

In a CRT the candles are lit but fade and go out over time so they need to be relit constantly. To relight them a beam travels across the screen from top to bottom in a vertical motion, relighting the candles as it goes along and relighting them as a different colour if the colour they need to display has changed.

In a LCD the candles don't fade and go out but have colour filters over them. When they need to be changed to a different colour the filter transists to another colour. If the whole image needed to be updated at the same time then all the candle filters would change. Changing from black to white takes the longest which is the "ms" response time. So 4ms would be the time it takes any of the pixels on the screen to change from black to white. The optimal FPS for an image that flickers from black to white on a 4ms LCD would be 25. If it just changes from a red (decimal 255) to a slighty darker red it'll do it much quicker. This means there's no constant or definable frame rate on an LCD if the image contains many different colours as it is variable to each pixel and is why "ghosting" occurs on strong contrasts.

LCD monitors and refresh rate

Refresh rate does not apply to LCD (liquid crystal display, now commonly referred to as flat panel) monitors, because they do not render images the same way CRT monitors do. Pixels in LCD monitors remain open or closed as needed until the image changes, and the light that passes through from behind stays constant. Therefore, the pixels don't fade. The rate that affects LCD displays is "response time", the time it takes for a pixel to go from fully open (the brightest intensity) to fully closed (black). Response time is a fixed property, not a configurable setting.

http://kb.iu.edu/data/atui.html

 

[Blackthorn]

What a fantastic description. Finally I understand the difference.

 

[Eejit]

Usually on, tearing annoys me greatly even if it's infrequent.

As I understand it the reason LCD monitors are usually 60hz is something to do with the bandwidth of the connection, and is a holdover from the CRT technology. You can usually get 75hz at lower resolutions even if 60 is normally your max.

 

[Asus]

I believe the refresh rate on LCDs is a timing thing so the screen and PC communicate properly and not directly related to how the image gets updated. The response time of the pixels on the screen dictate how fast an image can change to another. And that varies depending on the color it was and the color it wants to change to.

The image going through the screen on CRTs is directly related to how often the electric ray gun passes over that specific spot on the screen. A refresh rate...

refresh rate: lcd

 

[Paulaner]

Definitely on. I can't stand screen tearing, it gives me a headache. I prefer losing some frames per second.

 

[Qonfused]

Always off.