[Power/EMI] I discover why sometime PC become fast and low input lag and otherwise feel high input lag

[dendu]

I guess the biggest problem at my pc is also that the mouse feels floaty. I got 3 new pcs and they all worked fine for about 20-30-50Mins and after that always this weird mous feeling. Fees like the mouse is on ice or something like that. Was it nearly the same for you? I think i noticed it everywhere also in bios very laggy or on desktop also weird. And glad to see that people like you could fix it my problem started since i installed a metall house next to mine and we also put electricity in it. but i dont really know what we damaged there. Under this house there are also internet cables and also electric. I hope i can fix it too

Yes I do have similar experience with that 20-30min time frame, when playing with something like a power conditioner, at first the mouse felt good for about 30min, but I knew if I waited a bit it would become floaty again.

With the extra details you shared, it sounds very likely that you do have a grounding problem. Please consult with an electrician to help make sure things are wired correctly. Over here we use small electric water heaters in the shower, which I believe is the biggest hazard/danger with respect to wiring. These types of devices should be on their own ground rod if possible to eliminate the chance of bad wiring elsewhere causing a fatal shock.

If you have a multimeter, you can test some things. With AC volts, probing the hot(line) and neutral should read 120V or 220-240V depending on where you live. Hot to ground should still read the same 120-240V, if 0V that means ground not connected. Neutral to ground should ideally read 0-1V. If there is high voltage, like over 30-70V, go through the house and unplug things and recheck the voltage. Bad surge/extension cords can cause this and should be replaced.

Now if you did find high voltages in neutral to ground, that means that the neutral to ground isn't bonded at your main panel, where the power comes in from outside and connects to the circuit breakers and needs to be fixed by connecting the two. Again, please study a bit more and consult a electrician. Check these voltages in the new metal house too, this thing sounds like it should have some special consideration for its grounding as well. Try to follow the rule of thumbs mentioned earlier for installing the rods. Good luck and be cafeful!

[nick4567]

dendu when you fixed your problem was there any changes in how your peeks felt in fps games or if you noticed you were hitting alot more of your shots/ better hitreg and also what device/devices would you reccomend for testing

[dendu]

dendu when you fixed your problem was there any changes in how your peeks felt in fps games or if you noticed you were hitting alot more of your shots/ better hitreg and also what device/devices would you reccomend for testing

After a few online 1v1 aim maps, there is improvement in hitreg and overall feel is better. i thought with fiber internet not much effect, but the new ground does make all aspects smoother including hitreg and peeking. Still getting insta-peeked by a few opponents but probably feels the same for others when i peek.

A cheap multimeter is a good investment along with some basic youtube lessons on how to use like measuring voltage and continuity/resistance testing, get one that beeps during continuity, very useful for testing what is connected to what.

[ikeP]

I came across this reading about emf/emi stuff:

Using an AM Radio to Detect EMI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXPJvSU8MwI

My benq monitor has noisy power circuitry right above my mousepad and makes the most disturbing noises compared to rest of the system. Using the metal side panel of my case seems to quiet it down some when I try to shield the mouse area, but need to test more to see if it affects mouse movement.

I tried checking things using this, but at 1035khz (seems to pick stuff better at this freq). I noticed that my fancy-ish APC PM6U-GR power strip (with "EMI and RFI noise filtering") gives crazy amounts of EMI to 20cm+ from the device. I wonder if this could be a source for input problems?
For comparison, one of those normal power strips gives basically zero noise.

[dendu]

I came across this reading about emf/emi stuff:

Using an AM Radio to Detect EMI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXPJvSU8MwI

My benq monitor has noisy power circuitry right above my mousepad and makes the most disturbing noises compared to rest of the system. Using the metal side panel of my case seems to quiet it down some when I try to shield the mouse area, but need to test more to see if it affects mouse movement.

I tried checking things using this, but at 1035khz (seems to pick stuff better at this freq). I noticed that my fancy-ish APC PM6U-GR power strip (with "EMI and RFI noise filtering") gives crazy amounts of EMI to 20cm+ from the device. I wonder if this could be a source for input problems?
For comparison, one of those normal power strips gives basically zero noise.

If your power strip is near the mouse it might have an effect, if you have a roll of screen/wire mesh you can check some more things out.

I followed Timecard's example in a post on OCN where he use 1/4" wire mesh on a monitor.

I already had a roll of aluminum wire mesh/screen for windows to keep small insects out.

You can do some simple tests with your wire mesh by placing the radio inside of it and going near your power strip/router/monitor to test its effectiveness.


Used a pair a scissors/utility knife to cut out pieces to use with the monitor (i know its ugly):


Timecard found that connecting the mesh to ground made things worse. For me, grounding a stray wire strand of the mesh to the dvi screw connector threads worked better. Grounding an additional 26awg wire from the mesh to a screw on the psu made things worse for me.


Trying to lessen monitor noise by adding additional wire mesh over mouse area:


I could feel mouse difference when adding more layers, but the effects were finicky and my hand would bump into it. I turned monitor upside down and it felt good enough that it is staying this way:

A little disappointed when I found out TN panel's crappy viewing angles also apply when upside down(lower portion of screen is dark) but am used to it now.

[pwn]

I got a dispayport cable from a professional monitor, I noticed immediately how hard it was and immediately felt the braid of the cable. I have thoughts that almost all complete cables are crap.

model:
bizlink displayport cable e164571-ks

[KingJosh2475]

Alright, so here's my take on everything, I have been experiencing latency/input lag problems on my PC for around 8 months now since February of 2020. This all occurred the day after one night around 1-2 o'clock where all the lights and electronics in my neighborhood including my electronics turned off for around 3-5 minutes. I thought nothing of this and decided to go to sleep for the next morning, when waking up I felt latency delay, sometimes there feeling none, and sometimes there being a lot, of course I'm thinking that this is a PC software problem and decided to FULL RESET my PC, you can only imagine how mad I was when this FULL RESET did not fix my problem. Since I realized that this is either a Hardware problem or an electricity problem, I tried to play games on my PS4, where I can legitimately feel more than normal latency on my PS4 controller.

I also have had other experiences that may tie in with these electricity problems that I am assuming is EMI, such as my PC getting either more or less latency when unplugging and re-plugging things into the house and my room such as fans, lights, chargers, and especially my ethernet cord that goes through the wall using a Netgear powerline adapter into my PC ethernet slot. I also have tested this with my PS4 and there is more latency when plugging in the ethernet then when not plugging it into my console.

Another weird experience I have had is that my sleep mode for both my PC and monitor/tv screen on some weeks do not kick into affect, a good example is that two weeks ago my monitor kicks into sleep mode 15 minutes after no use which it did and my PC kicks into sleep mode 30 minutes after no use which it did. Just this week though, my monitor still kicks into sleep mode as it always does but my PC no matter how long I don't use it decides not to kick into sleep mode which is weird because I legitimately have not changed anything from 2 weeks ago to this week other than maybe making my GeForce driver up to date, which shouldn't change my PC sleep schedule thing.

Lastly, in my basement where there is the breaker box, I go downstairs and even if there is almost everything turned off, I can hear decibels of noise emitting off of certain devices which I'm thinking causes a whole bunch of EMI.

This problem really sucks because I was just starting to play games competitively for money, and now I can barely hit shots due to latency/lag, and end up dying to players that I know are worse then me at the video game I am playing.

Things that are within my abilities to try and fix this problem (I haven't tried yet but I can buy them):
+ Buying an EMI meter to test the things that create a lot of EMI in my house and turn them off when gaming.
+ Earlier in this thread I saw someone cut this problem completely by buying a corsair PSU with better electric filtration, I could also buy one to test this problem
+ Buying an EMI filtration from the same place (greenwave) that I was gonna buy the meter from, I saw that plugging these EMI filtrations into the wall makes the EMI better apparently
+ Buying a double conversion UPS (this would probably be the last thing I would do because of the amount of money double conversion UPS's cost)

Things I cannot do is move into a new house just because of the simple fact that I am going to college in under a year anyways so it doesn't really matter to me. I did once bring my PS4 to a different building 15-30 min away from me though and when trying it there, it also had bad latency, but I think that was her house wiring in general because the lights would at some points flicker out of nowhere.

Ps. In this thread I saw someone speak about water lines, well I don't know if this relates much but at times the water in my house, especially in the bathroom sink next to my room smells like rotten eggs (only if your right next to it), I looked it up and its because of something called sulfide that won't harm you but will produce a smell in the water pipelines of your neighborhood. So I was wondering if this could also relate towards anything, or if it has nothing to do with my problem

If anyone has any suggestions of what I should try first please respond to this and let me know, so I can take my first steps to fixing this problem and gaming competitively once more, it would be greatly appreciated. (I will most likely try the Green wave meter first no matter what to confirm if I actually have elevated EMI)

[alexander1986]

one thing that im curious of, is how this problem potentially affects consoles like playstation and xbox ?

anyone with this issue, do you also maybe have a xbox/playstation and if so does the phenomenon with intermittent input lag also occur there? (for example in offline game modes so you know for sure its not network latency related)

would also be interesting to hear thoughts on this question by @Chief Blur Buster !

...

(quoted you chief to make sure you get notified, hope that is okay)

cheers!

[KingJosh2475]

one thing that im curious of, is how this problem potentially affects consoles like playstation and xbox ?

anyone with this issue, do you also maybe have a xbox/playstation and if so does the phenomenon with intermittent input lag also occur there? (for example in offline game modes so you know for sure its not network latency related)

would also be interesting to hear thoughts on this question by @Chief Blur Buster !

...

(quoted you chief to make sure you get notified, hope that is okay)

cheers!

I as well have this problem of EMI causing latency and lag problems, and first I felt it on my computer through my controller playing Fortnite. Then I went to my PS4 and tried the controller on there playing Fortnite, and it felt good for around 5-7 days until the latency problems eventually crept up to my console and infected it with this problem as well.

[nuggify]

one thing that im curious of, is how this problem potentially affects consoles like playstation and xbox ?

anyone with this issue, do you also maybe have a xbox/playstation and if so does the phenomenon with intermittent input lag also occur there? (for example in offline game modes so you know for sure its not network latency related)

would also be interesting to hear thoughts on this question by @Chief Blur Buster !

...

(quoted you chief to make sure you get notified, hope that is okay)

cheers!

Consoles, laptops on battery, TVs, cable boxes all display this issue- input lag and degraded display quality.