Ground loop related input lag?

[Cyanide_]

TL;DR: played with ferrite clamps on signal cables & moved everything to one power strip including router, saw an immediate improvement, which lasted for 5 days, now it's slightly worse for 2 days, but playable, am I on the right track & is it ground loop causing lag or not?

Hello, I decided to start a new thread instead of old one after I have discovering something.

I've realized I might have a ground loop after reading this thread and finding out my router was connected to a different outlet. After remanaging the cables and connecting router to the same power strip as PC & monitor, lag was nearly gone but for few days, now it's slightly worse. Even phone felt smoother and typing on touch screen too, same as keyboard on PC. Even saw improvement on laptop in other room.
I also played with ferrite clamps (NiZn if that matters) on signal cables (ethernet, mouse, keyboard, HDMI) and I swapped DP cable with HDMI one with clamps on it at the same time as I moved router closer.

I'm not sure what exactly helped, new HDMI cable with ferrites or router re-connection, but improvement was there, could finally track people, headshots were near-instant, mouse felt lighter, could flick, feel my character in game, no flicking textures etc. No fps drops in other games too.

One more thing I've realized is that I'm still hearing some high pitched noise on headphones, which varies as FPS in game changes, now i've locked 233 fps in NV panel and it's "constant" but still alters slightly if FPS drops down e.g. in BG3. Speakers in other room also have that annoying noise, but it's like low pitch hum and these speakers are some cheap Edifiers anyway.

I'm sure now it's not "dirty electicity" lag since it was always the same during night & day, "iron test" or anything in the same outlet with huge draw didn't make a difference, mouse is not floaty (at least anymore, it's been an year since it's good). The lag was growing over time, like first 5 minutes of online match were fine, then it started to feel worse & worse until it's unplayable.
Also haven't had real issues with old or single player games, but with online games only (R6 Siege, Warzone, Battlefield series, DotA 2 etc.). Also bought a new PC 6 months ago (5800x3d, b550, 32gb3600 ram, msi 750w psu etc) with no luck, changed ISP, peripherals, bought cat6a cables and so on.

What should be my next steps? Is it ground loop issue for real, and is it beatable? Can it cause any lag?

Thank you for any help in advance.

[spkii]

What do you mean saying ground loop? I have same problem than you, but at nights hours works a little better.

[Cyanide_]

What do you mean saying ground loop? I have same problem than you, but at nights hours works a little better.

Literally this lol

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground_loop_(electricity)

Are you sure you have the same symptomps - lag grows over time (5-10 min), some desync between firing weapons and hitting enemies, it's only online games not SP games, fps drops, game is choppier & blurrier as the time goes on, no difference between night and day? At the same time no "floaty" or "icey" mouse feeling, it's smooth and precise.
(it's kinda fixed now, or feels much much better but still looking for a complete fix or advice)

[loccomacco]

TL;DR: played with ferrite clamps on signal cables & moved everything to one power strip including router, saw an immediate improvement, which lasted for 5 days, now it's slightly worse for 2 days, but playable, am I on the right track & is it ground loop causing lag or not?

Hello, I decided to start a new thread instead of old one after I have discovering something.

I've realized I might have a ground loop after reading this thread and finding out my router was connected to a different outlet. After remanaging the cables and connecting router to the same power strip as PC & monitor, lag was nearly gone but for few days, now it's slightly worse. Even phone felt smoother and typing on touch screen too, same as keyboard on PC. Even saw improvement on laptop in other room.
I also played with ferrite clamps (NiZn if that matters) on signal cables (ethernet, mouse, keyboard, HDMI) and I swapped DP cable with HDMI one with clamps on it at the same time as I moved router closer.

I'm not sure what exactly helped, new HDMI cable with ferrites or router re-connection, but improvement was there, could finally track people, headshots were near-instant, mouse felt lighter, could flick, feel my character in game, no flicking textures etc. No fps drops in other games too.

One more thing I've realized is that I'm still hearing some high pitched noise on headphones, which varies as FPS in game changes, now i've locked 233 fps in NV panel and it's "constant" but still alters slightly if FPS drops down e.g. in BG3. Speakers in other room also have that annoying noise, but it's like low pitch hum and these speakers are some cheap Edifiers anyway.

I'm sure now it's not "dirty electicity" lag since it was always the same during night & day, "iron test" or anything in the same outlet with huge draw didn't make a difference, mouse is not floaty (at least anymore, it's been an year since it's good). The lag was growing over time, like first 5 minutes of online match were fine, then it started to feel worse & worse until it's unplayable.
Also haven't had real issues with old or single player games, but with online games only (R6 Siege, Warzone, Battlefield series, DotA 2 etc.). Also bought a new PC 6 months ago (5800x3d, b550, 32gb3600 ram, msi 750w psu etc) with no luck, changed ISP, peripherals, bought cat6a cables and so on.

What should be my next steps? Is it ground loop issue for real, and is it beatable? Can it cause any lag?

Thank you for any help in advance.

Hey I know you from these couple of posts:

Another proof of dirty electricity existence

It's complete off topic, but yeah I've stumbled upon this issue twice it looks like.
My friend who lived 0.5km away from me had this issue as well. I took my whole rig to him & tested everything for hours. Exact same crap.
But in my parents' house it's perfectly fine and always have been. As I've discovered later, their house is connected to some hospital/police station so they have "cleanest" electricity possible. And recent outages haven't affected them in any way. Guess some objects and houses are connected to these "good" "dedicated" power grids and are perfect for gaming.

BTW can mods close this topic or move it to electricity forum? I'm grateful for your help guys, now issue is gone it looks like, it's been a month.

Oh my Lord, you should've mentioned it before, I mean about hospital/police station and about not affected by power outage. Your case should move to EMI topic, to prove EMI and dirty electricity by PoCo.
Btw your case thanks to you, proved something in my mind too

Your welcome. Learnt it hard way haha. Hope it helps somebody. But yeah some places are "naturally" good if not perfect for gaming because electricity there is "pure".
Did some excessive testing in many games monitoring everything and realized I had some 1% 0.1% drops especially in heavy games, e.g. in Skyrim with fps unlocked or in Dead Island 1, old games, it's perfectly fine, smooth as butter, when in BFV it's stuttery laggy mess. Indeed it feels kinda like "dirty electricity" lag but that's not it.
Edit: double checked, things were normal, like in BFV having low 1% 0.1% in MP is kinda expected, in Skyrim lets say or in R6 Siege it never drops below 150-180. In other words 1% 0.1% lows are okay, in heavy games they are as low as expected, my bad.
U guys were right, it must be something with RAM or MoBo or whatever, I was planning an upgrade anyway. Thank you guys for all the help and insights you provided.

Seems another one of my predictions came true. Wanna know why? This time I told you why:

What you mean by saying your main suggestion? Did something new change youd mentioned recently around your house? Like changing cables or transformers or something like that by PoCo? Or new building near you?
Btw the way you talk, from my experience, I can bet your problems will come back soon or later, I've had the same experience for just a month or two, but I hope yours remain.

Every single line of your story reminds me of mine. About the sound, fps, choppiness, mouse, everything, I've had them even more and even worse.

My next prediction for you is you'll go for grounding issues but you won't be able to fix your problems, maybe in short term but not in long term. Wanna know why? Let me explain:
While grounding issues can screw up pretty much a lot of things on electronics and you can find a lot of those reports, BUT, I'm sorry for telling this, no one ever could fix their problems when they went into that way, at least I couldn't find. An example here is thatweirdinputlag user
Let's see if you can beat this prediction or not.
Anyways, I don't mean you should not go into that way, instead I encourage you to do so, because like I said, there are lots of reports for grounding being the reason for screwing things up.
Good luck.

[Cyanide_]

TL;DR: played with ferrite clamps on signal cables & moved everything to one power strip including router, saw an immediate improvement, which lasted for 5 days, now it's slightly worse for 2 days, but playable, am I on the right track & is it ground loop causing lag or not?

Hello, I decided to start a new thread instead of old one after I have discovering something.

I've realized I might have a ground loop after reading this thread and finding out my router was connected to a different outlet. After remanaging the cables and connecting router to the same power strip as PC & monitor, lag was nearly gone but for few days, now it's slightly worse. Even phone felt smoother and typing on touch screen too, same as keyboard on PC. Even saw improvement on laptop in other room.
I also played with ferrite clamps (NiZn if that matters) on signal cables (ethernet, mouse, keyboard, HDMI) and I swapped DP cable with HDMI one with clamps on it at the same time as I moved router closer.

I'm not sure what exactly helped, new HDMI cable with ferrites or router re-connection, but improvement was there, could finally track people, headshots were near-instant, mouse felt lighter, could flick, feel my character in game, no flicking textures etc. No fps drops in other games too.

One more thing I've realized is that I'm still hearing some high pitched noise on headphones, which varies as FPS in game changes, now i've locked 233 fps in NV panel and it's "constant" but still alters slightly if FPS drops down e.g. in BG3. Speakers in other room also have that annoying noise, but it's like low pitch hum and these speakers are some cheap Edifiers anyway.

I'm sure now it's not "dirty electicity" lag since it was always the same during night & day, "iron test" or anything in the same outlet with huge draw didn't make a difference, mouse is not floaty (at least anymore, it's been an year since it's good). The lag was growing over time, like first 5 minutes of online match were fine, then it started to feel worse & worse until it's unplayable.
Also haven't had real issues with old or single player games, but with online games only (R6 Siege, Warzone, Battlefield series, DotA 2 etc.). Also bought a new PC 6 months ago (5800x3d, b550, 32gb3600 ram, msi 750w psu etc) with no luck, changed ISP, peripherals, bought cat6a cables and so on.

What should be my next steps? Is it ground loop issue for real, and is it beatable? Can it cause any lag?

Thank you for any help in advance.

Hey I know you from these couple of posts:

It's complete off topic, but yeah I've stumbled upon this issue twice it looks like.
My friend who lived 0.5km away from me had this issue as well. I took my whole rig to him & tested everything for hours. Exact same crap.
But in my parents' house it's perfectly fine and always have been. As I've discovered later, their house is connected to some hospital/police station so they have "cleanest" electricity possible. And recent outages haven't affected them in any way. Guess some objects and houses are connected to these "good" "dedicated" power grids and are perfect for gaming.

BTW can mods close this topic or move it to electricity forum? I'm grateful for your help guys, now issue is gone it looks like, it's been a month.

Oh my Lord, you should've mentioned it before, I mean about hospital/police station and about not affected by power outage. Your case should move to EMI topic, to prove EMI and dirty electricity by PoCo.
Btw your case thanks to you, proved something in my mind too

Your welcome. Learnt it hard way haha. Hope it helps somebody. But yeah some places are "naturally" good if not perfect for gaming because electricity there is "pure".
Did some excessive testing in many games monitoring everything and realized I had some 1% 0.1% drops especially in heavy games, e.g. in Skyrim with fps unlocked or in Dead Island 1, old games, it's perfectly fine, smooth as butter, when in BFV it's stuttery laggy mess. Indeed it feels kinda like "dirty electricity" lag but that's not it.
Edit: double checked, things were normal, like in BFV having low 1% 0.1% in MP is kinda expected, in Skyrim lets say or in R6 Siege it never drops below 150-180. In other words 1% 0.1% lows are okay, in heavy games they are as low as expected, my bad.
U guys were right, it must be something with RAM or MoBo or whatever, I was planning an upgrade anyway. Thank you guys for all the help and insights you provided.

Seems another one of my predictions came true. Wanna know why? This time I told you why:

What you mean by saying your main suggestion? Did something new change youd mentioned recently around your house? Like changing cables or transformers or something like that by PoCo? Or new building near you?
Btw the way you talk, from my experience, I can bet your problems will come back soon or later, I've had the same experience for just a month or two, but I hope yours remain.

Every single line of your story reminds me of mine. About the sound, fps, choppiness, mouse, everything, I've had them even more and even worse.

My next prediction for you is you'll go for grounding issues but you won't be able to fix your problems, maybe in short term but not in long term. Wanna know why? Let me explain:
While grounding issues can screw up pretty much a lot of things on electronics and you can find a lot of those reports, BUT, I'm sorry for telling this, no one ever could fix their problems when they went into that way, at least I couldn't find. An example here is thatweirdinputlag user
Let's see if you can beat this prediction or not.
Anyways, I don't mean you should not go into that way, instead I encourage you to do so, because like I said, there are lots of reports for grounding being the reason for screwing things up.
Good luck.

Hey, thanks, yea you are right, I'm living in crowded area & they are doing some construction around, maybe it feels better now since they have finished some house around idk. It's like new district they're building, if that makes sense.
Grounding by itself, is not a panacea I know, at least in old apartment guy tried to implement grounding in an old house, added some rods and wired it up to flat, but issue became even worse since that so I moved out lol.
Played right now with pc+monitor+router plugged in one strip, and strip into power station (it's 500w, so it's enough for 1,5 hours of testing, or even 3 hours when on gaming laptop), honestly haven't seen any difference, it was good (like it is now, playable at least) but not insanely good or perfect. BTW I'm not mistaken there's no grounding in power station so basically I tested w/o grounding too.
From my understanding "dirty electricity" is also a grounding issue, in a way, since it's lack of grounding or bad grounding from PoCo's side, they are not following some norms or smth.

[MegaMelmek]

You can freely disconnect ground from your outlet. If you have in your outlet ground as you like to call it this ground cable is at some point connected to N wire. The yelow/green wire is there just for safety its not real ground cable. If your outlet have L N PE you dont need realy that PE cable.
I am kinda sure is not ground loop….
Be carefull when changing DP and HDMI wery often acting wery well even for me. Because you change many things at once will be had to find what cause the improvement… Outlets/HDMI/Ferites

[MontyTheAverage]

What do you mean saying ground loop? I have same problem than you, but at nights hours works a little better.

Literally this lol

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground_loop_(electricity)

Are you sure you have the same symptomps - lag grows over time (5-10 min), some desync between firing weapons and hitting enemies, it's only online games not SP games, fps drops, game is choppier & blurrier as the time goes on, no difference between night and day? At the same time no "floaty" or "icey" mouse feeling, it's smooth and precise.
(it's kinda fixed now, or feels much much better but still looking for a complete fix or advice)

I got exact same issues you describe bro. My desync can get pretty bad but also input lag though. Ground loop could be possibe. I tried a usb ground loop isolator. It fixed the issues for a bit when i bought it and never worked again since then.

[MegaMelmek]

What do you mean saying ground loop? I have same problem than you, but at nights hours works a little better.

Literally this lol

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground_loop_(electricity)

Are you sure you have the same symptomps - lag grows over time (5-10 min), some desync between firing weapons and hitting enemies, it's only online games not SP games, fps drops, game is choppier & blurrier as the time goes on, no difference between night and day? At the same time no "floaty" or "icey" mouse feeling, it's smooth and precise.
(it's kinda fixed now, or feels much much better but still looking for a complete fix or advice)

I got exact same issues you describe bro. My desync can get pretty bad but also input lag though. Ground loop could be possibe. I tried a usb ground loop isolator. It fixed the issues for a bit when i bought it and never worked again since then.

You are on the forum long time why you think is ground loop?
Between what? You say you buy USB ground loop isolator for what (mouse/keybord/sound??)

When new ppl come to the forum lets give them knowlege to not spend money and waste time.

Ground loop can exist between two or more points that are connected to the groud.
Most likely only monitor and PSU are connected to the ground. Routers/switch and so one use only two prongs adapter so how they can loop?.

He claim that he connect all things to one outlet so how they can loop?
He can buy ground loop isolator for 50USD. Was they tested yes/was they working no…

[Cyanide_]

What do you mean saying ground loop? I have same problem than you, but at nights hours works a little better.

Literally this lol

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground_loop_(electricity)

Are you sure you have the same symptomps - lag grows over time (5-10 min), some desync between firing weapons and hitting enemies, it's only online games not SP games, fps drops, game is choppier & blurrier as the time goes on, no difference between night and day? At the same time no "floaty" or "icey" mouse feeling, it's smooth and precise.
(it's kinda fixed now, or feels much much better but still looking for a complete fix or advice)

I got exact same issues you describe bro. My desync can get pretty bad but also input lag though. Ground loop could be possibe. I tried a usb ground loop isolator. It fixed the issues for a bit when i bought it and never worked again since then.

You are on the forum long time why you think is ground loop?
Between what? You say you buy USB ground loop isolator for what (mouse/keybord/sound??)

When new ppl come to the forum lets give them knowlege to not spend money and waste time.

Ground loop can exist between two or more points that are connected to the groud.
Most likely only monitor and PSU are connected to the ground. Routers/switch and so one use only two prongs adapter so how they can loop?.

He claim that he connect all things to one outlet so how they can loop?
He can buy ground loop isolator for 50USD. Was they tested yes/was they working no…

Can't there be a ground loop caused by signal cables (hdmi, dp, ethernet etc) especially if you have stuff connected to different outlets?
Testing for 10 days now, it's slighly worse but still playable. I'm still consufed how can I have some symptoms (online game "lag", slight chopiness on screen, slight desync aka slow death animations) but not other symptomps (no floaty mouse feeling, no bad hitreg, single player games are smooth even the newest titles)?
What if it's on ISP's side, maybe their equipment is poorly grounded or so? Also I'm living almost on the last floor, there's allegedly some "technical level" above me, can it cause some issues e.g. interference? Also elevator is like 6m away from PC lol. I'm just looking everywhere at this point, maybe even PC is poorly grounded (installed it incorrectly, some screws or I/O shield etc), I vaguely remember that being the case like 7 years ago, same chopiness until I fixed it, somehow.
Also no I'm not buying these audiophilic "ground loop isolators", we don't even have them here in Eastern Europe

[loccomacco]

Testing for 10 days now, it's slighly worse but still playable. I'm still consufed how can I have some symptoms (online game "lag", slight chopiness on screen, slight desync aka slow death animations) but not other symptomps (no floaty mouse feeling, no bad hitreg, single player games are smooth even the newest titles)?

Don't worry, in my experience, your remained symptoms will go away slowly, but then again all symptoms will come back with it's full party, LoL, at least it happened for me like that, hope yours doesn't btw.
But now that don't have too much of it, don't speak too loud, because it may hear you and come back to hit you in a worst way shush... shush shush... na um uh