G-Sync first impressions

[ZTylerDurden]

Say it ain't so nimbulan! I was imagining gsync as a workaround for fundamental game engine issues with stuttering!

I know of three well-known games that fall under this issue and you mentioned one of them (FC3).

As you may know, Darksiders 2 and Fallout: New Vegas are notorious for their frame stuttering issues. There's a workaround for DS2 and a mod patch on moddb for FO: NV. Could you tell me if stuttering is still present for either of those games with gsync on?

Darksiders 2: Runs perfectly smooth with some brief stutters when entering a new area (data loading probably.) Some camera movement also causes brief stutters, possibly due to a lack of animation interpolation. I was rather surprised since I had a lot of stuttering problems on my old PC, both microstuttering and intermittent frame drops.

Fallout New Vegas: Worst stuttering I've ever seen, even worse than Divinity 2 which is also based on the Gamebryo engine. Forcefully disabling vsync in the config shows no change. Adding a 64 fps cap in the drivers in addition lets it run smoothly with an intermittent large stutter every couple seconds. Using the stutter remover mod like I've always done lets it run silky smooth. It's a very good example how low resolution engine timing severely impacts how smooth the game will run. I honestly don't know how this game can run smoothly for anybody without the stutter remover mod with the way the engine is designed. Strangely I could hardly manage more than about 65 fps looking over Goodsprings even with a GTX 760. I guess it's par for the course for that engine.

I'll be adding these to my G-sync game testing thread.

Incredible. Do you get stuttering in Saints Row IV? I definitely do but I might be in the minority based on how some gamers claim it's my specs (Titan SLI + 3770k). If you do too, I'd love to know how it performs with Gsync because I'm not touching the game otherwise.

[ZTylerDurden]

Oh and you need to at least reach the free roam city area to experience the issue for me.

[nimbulan]

Incredible. Do you get stuttering in Saints Row IV? I definitely do but I might be in the minority based on how some gamers claim it's my specs (Titan SLI + 3770k). If you do too, I'd love to know how it performs with Gsync because I'm not touching the game otherwise.

No stuttering whatsoever. Definitely one of the smoothest running games I've tested, along with Tomb Raider.

[ZTylerDurden]

Excellent. And to clarify, did you get any stuttering for SRIV without the gysnc feature?

[nimbulan]

Excellent. And to clarify, did you get any stuttering for SRIV without the gysnc feature?

I found SR4 to have about average stuttering with vsync off, a little bit less with vsync on. Though I probably wouldn't notice it at all after testing Fallout New Vegas. I'd forgotten how bad it was without the stutter remover mod.

[ZTylerDurden]

Looks like this tech is exactly what I need. Last question--CAN IT PLAY CRYSIS?!?

No but seriously are the frame drops smooth encounters now in Warhead?? Zooming with binoculars overlooking the final beach area WILL drop frames sub 60 no matter if you own 1 titan or 4. If it's smooth, well, then, gsync has truly conquered Crysis.

[nimbulan]

Looks like this tech is exactly what I need. Last question--CAN IT PLAY CRYSIS?!?

No but seriously are the frame drops smooth encounters now in Warhead?? Zooming with binoculars overlooking the final beach area WILL drop frames sub 60 no matter if you own 1 titan or 4. If it's smooth, well, then, gsync has truly conquered Crysis.

I tried Warhead briefly. The game seems to force 60 Hz so you have to override it with the nVidia control panel (use the Crysis profile, not the Crysis Warhead profile,) and it runs smoothly. There are frame drops here and there and using the binoculars seems to drop the framerate by 10-15% for less than a second before returning to normal.

[Oubadah]

I tried Warhead briefly. The game seems to force 60 Hz so you have to override it with the nVidia control panel (use the Crysis profile, not the Crysis Warhead profile,) and it runs smoothly. There are frame drops here and there and using the binoculars seems to drop the framerate by 10-15% for less than a second before returning to normal.

I just purchased the XB280HK, after waiting months for a G-Sync monitor (that wasn't the Swift) to appear in NZ. Crysis was my number 1 interest the moment I first read about G-Sync. After checking standard 60Hz operation in UT2004, I went straight to Crysis, but the game is a trainwreck under G-Sync. It has the most appalling stutter, worse than V-Sync with triplebuffering. So that was pretty disappointing. I think the monitor and G-Sync in general is working properly (haven't tried much, but it's certainly effective in BF3 and Crysis 3).

Any ideas on getting G-Sync to work with Crysis? It's going to be a proper kick in the face if Crysis is one of the games incompatible with the tech.

Tried 337.88 and 344.80.

I also noticed, with some concern, that 'no scaling'/1:1 is not working with G-Sync. From posts on the Nvidia forum, it appears that it once did, but they broke it. I was hoping it would be fixed by 344.80. This is a major issue with the 4k monitor, as clearly that res will be a problem for current GPUs, and I'm damned if I'm subjecting myself to a blurry upscaled mess. I purchased the XB280HK because 28" keeps it's pixel pitch relatively tight, but not excessively fine to the point where 1:1 mapping something like 2560x1440 would be unusable. That's worth nothing if Nvidia isn't going to fix their GPU 1:1 mapping though, because obviously the monitor can't do it.

[nimbulan]

I just purchased the XB280HK, after waiting months for a G-Sync monitor (that wasn't the Swift) to appear in NZ. Crysis was my number 1 interest the moment I first read about G-Sync. After checking standard 60Hz operation in UT2004, I went straight to Crysis, but the game is a trainwreck under G-Sync. It has the most appalling stutter, worse than V-Sync with triplebuffering. So that was pretty disappointing. I think the monitor and G-Sync in general is working properly (haven't tried much, but it's certainly effective in BF3 and Crysis 3).

Any ideas on getting G-Sync to work with Crysis? It's going to be a proper kick in the face if Crysis is one of the games incompatible with the tech.

Tried 337.88 and 344.80.

I'm not sure what to tell you, it's working perfectly for me with 344.75 on a GTX 970 and max settings. I loaded up the final boss fight which in my experience is the most performance-intensive part of the game and was getting 60-80 fps with zero stuttering. Would you perhaps be running SLI?

[Oubadah]

No, I have a single 780 Ti.

Well that's encouraging I guess, seems like there's a chance I'll get it working. Could you possibly post screens of your Crysis profile in NVCP?

I must say I have a slight problem with the idea of 60-80 fps as a worst case scenario. To be honest, I haven't played up to the final boss fight in a long time, but Crysis is terribly CPU bound, and it's often well below 60fps (hence the need for G-Sync). One of my favorite test areas is the shipyard, and the framerate will easily drop as low as the 30s on a stock (4GHz) 4790K.

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