Is gsync that good ?

[Modinstaller]

Hey. I'm trying to get a grasp on what gsync has to offer, for a possible future purchase (looking at 144hz). I've read gsync 101 and it just doesn't seem that good to me now.

I thought it had two big upsides : less input lag, and smoother visual quality. But now that I've read a bit more about it, those don't seem to be that important.

As I understand it now, it's not a lot less input lag. It's a couple of milliseconds at 144hz, really, which doesn't make any difference to me. Is that right or did I misinterpret something ?

As for the smoother visual quality, it seems to be absolutely huge for framerates lower than the screen's refresh rate. So, if I run some games at less than 144 fps, it'd be worth it for example. Even if it's just for those few crowded moments where your framerate tanks a bit, I'd consider it necessary. But what about for 144+ constant framerate, will it make any difference ?

The reason I'm considering at all is because gsync costs that much more. I've spent some money unnecessarily a few months ago on my new rig, so I want to avoid repeating the mistake. On that topic by the way, is freesync essentially the same as gsync ? (other than the fact that it's for amd gpus and that it's free) If so can all the knowledge in gsync 101 be applied to freesync, bar the specific gsync test results ?

Thanks for taking the time to help

[RealNC]

If you play with vsync OFF and it looks fine to you, you don't need g-sync. But if you play with vsync OFF but you really, really wish you could play with vsync ON instead to get rid of the tearing and the slight stutter, but can't stand the input lag of vsync ("my mouse feels like a boat"), then g-sync is for you, as it was made to solve exactly that problem, and nothing else.

As for the smoother visual quality, it seems to be absolutely huge for framerates lower than the screen's refresh rate. So, if I run some games at less than 144 fps, it'd be worth it for example. Even if it's just for those few crowded moments where your framerate tanks a bit, I'd consider it necessary. But what about for 144+ constant framerate, will it make any difference ?

"144+" means you're not using vsync and thus you get tearing and some stutter because the frame rate and refresh rate are out of sync. As I said above, if that looks good to you, you don't need g-sync. If you wish the tearing and stutter wasn't there but don't like the input lag of vsync, then you would enjoy g-sync.

As I understand it now, it's not a lot less input lag. It's a couple of milliseconds at 144hz, really, which doesn't make any difference to me. Is that right or did I misinterpret something ?

I'm not sure what you're referring to. G-Sync has noticeably lower input lag compared to vsync, even at 144Hz. If I run a game at 144Hz with just vsync, the mouse still has a bit of a "floaty" feel to it. With g-sync, that goes away. True, the difference is massive at lower frame rates (60FPS g-sync vs 60FPS plain vsync difference is so huge, it's not even funny), but it's still noticeable even at 144Hz.

[Modinstaller]

but can't stand the input lag of vsync ("my mouse feels like a boat"), then g-sync is for you

I am very much in that situation. I upgraded my computer lately and my gaming problems switched from "I wish I had constant 60+ fps" to "I wish I had a good compromise between tearing, stuttering and input lag". Gsync seemed to be the answer to all those new problems, but some of my interrogations remain without an answer.

it was made to solve exactly that problem, and nothing else

What about the whole vrr "you can have games running at sub refresh rate framerates without any stutter" thing ? It's got nothing to do with input lag but seems to be the main selling point of vrr displays. Improved visual smoothness.

"144+" means you're not using vsync

When I say 144+ I just mean vsync with a stable framerate. So more explicitly : would gsync make any visual difference if I never drop below 144 fps with vsync ? Will it improve anything visually ?

I'm not sure what you're referring to.

As for the input lag, I'm basing my understanding on the website's gsync 101 article. https://www.blurbusters.com/gsync/gsync ... ettings/7/
According to its tests, at 60hz you'd get 48 ms delay without gsync and 39 ms with gsync. A pretty substantial reduction in input lag but which is unfortunately not worth 100€ to me. And that was for 60hz, at 144hz it's 25 ms without, 23 ms with. It just seems unnecessary, or did I miss something ?

Of course the guide says something about experiencing stuttering with a cap and that gsync fixes this. Which I don't quite understand since the guide also seems to state that the stutter issue only arises with limits of 58 or 59 for a 60 hz display, for example, and not with limits of 0.007-0.015 below the screen's refresh rate. That seems to make the point irrelevant. I've been using a cap of 59.987 fps myself, I've only been bothered by some input lag (which I surmise a 144hz screen will already fix anyway) and never had any problem with stuttering. Maybe I just can't notice it though ...

[RealNC]

What about the whole vrr "you can have games running at sub refresh rate framerates without any stutter" thing ? It's got nothing to do with input lag but seems to be the main selling point of vrr displays. Improved visual smoothness.

That's the obvious benefit. Not much to tell here. If the game runs at 110FPS, it will look like it's running at 110Hz vsync. If it them runs at 125FPS, it will look like it's running at 125Hz vsync.

So more explicitly : would gsync make any visual difference if I never drop below 144 fps with vsync ? Will it improve anything visually ?

No. It will look 100% exactly the same. The only difference will be that input lag feels like you're playing with vsync OFF.

As for the input lag, I'm basing my understanding on the website's gsync 101 article. https://www.blurbusters.com/gsync/gsync ... ettings/7/
According to its tests, at 60hz you'd get 48 ms delay without gsync and 39 ms with gsync. A pretty substantial reduction in input lag but which is unfortunately not worth 100€ to me. And that was for 60hz, at 144hz it's 25 ms without, 23 ms with. It just seems unnecessary, or did I miss something ?

Yes. You missed the fact that these compare frame-limited vsync to g-sync. But 58FPS @ 60Hz and 142FPS @ 144Hz has stutter, which is the price you need to pay to reduce vsync input lag as much as possible. G-Sync resolves that issue.

Of course the guide says something about experiencing stuttering with a cap and that gsync fixes this. Which I don't quite understand since the guide also seems to state that the stutter issue only arises with limits of 58 or 59 for a 60 hz display, for example, and not with limits of 0.007-0.015 below the screen's refresh rate. That seems to make the point irrelevant. I've been using a cap of 59.987 fps myself, I've only been bothered by some input lag (which I surmise a 144hz screen will already fix anyway) and never had any problem with stuttering. Maybe I just can't notice it though ...

The -0.01Hz frame cap is a trade-off. It does have decreased input lag and no stutter, but the input lag is not as low as a full -2FPS cap. G-Sync on the other hand has input lag that is as close to vsync OFF as you can get while still being in sync with the monitor. And it certainly feels that way. Disable vsync in your current setup, set RTSS to your wanted frame rate, and play. That's basically the input lag you'll get with g-sync.

If your games never drop below 144FPS, then yes, g-sync will not be of much use to you, since 144Hz has quite low vsync lag when using the -0.01Hz cap. Even 120Hz has quite low vsync lag that way. Only if you run games that can't maintain 120FPS or 144FPS will g-sync become useful.

[Modinstaller]

Makes sense, thanks for the clarifications.

I'm thinking the extra money for a gsync monitor could probably be spent into a better gpu so as to not have games run below the monitor's refresh rate. The differences in input lag aren't that huge.

But for freesync, or if you find a good deal, it seems to be definitely worth it, and is a bit of a "future proof" since you don't have to be worried so much about your computer not being enough for future games. Now I don't exactly know how much of a difference there is between 100 and 144 fps on a gsync monitor for example, if it still looks good or not, but one thing is sure, it must be way better than without gsync.

[RealNC]

Well, I upgraded to a g-sync monitor instead of upgrading my GPU. Even if I upgraded my GPU, there's no way I can guarantee 120FPS on every game. And some games are locked to 60FPS to begin with. On others, I just don't want to lower some of the graphics settings. G-Sync seemed more future-proof to me than a GPU upgrade. But I'm on a 980 Ti. If you're on a slower card, it might be better to upgrade the GPU.

As for the difference between 100 and 144FPS, it's the same difference as on your monitor if you switch to 100Hz. Except that on a g-sync monitor you don't have to switch

[Chief Blur Buster]

There are other considerations:

A GSYNC monitor also usually includes ULMB -- which is extremely good motion blur reduction (CRT clarity) -- Motion Blur Reduction.

There is an animation demo of variable refresh rate at www.testufo.com/vrr if you want to see a rough simulation of how VRR elimnates stutters of varying frame rates. Try Slow/Fast Ramp & Random, as well as Struggle At Max.

[lossofmercy]

If you want only want low latency, stable 144hz update rate, GSYNC is not a huge benefit. Sure, it's nice if it dips, but not a huge deal as you are mostly going to be playing Counter Strike, LoL, Overwatch or other relatively simple game.

Edit: Although there are still some benefits: https://www.blurbusters.com/gsync/gsync ... ttings/13/

But if you are buying a higher resolution (1440p+) monitor and still want to turn up the graphics/effects on high production value games so it doesn't look like 2007, then GSYNC is a huge deal.

Also, I would also argue that the current GPU market makes the monitor upgrade a bit more palatable.

[Chief Blur Buster]

Of course the guide says something about experiencing stuttering with a cap and that gsync fixes this. Which I don't quite understand since the guide also seems to state that the stutter issue only arises with limits of 58 or 59 for a 60 hz display, for example, and not with limits of 0.007-0.015 below the screen's refresh rate. That seems to make the point irrelevant. I've been using a cap of 59.987 fps myself, I've only been bothered by some input lag (which I surmise a 144hz screen will already fix anyway) and never had any problem with stuttering. Maybe I just can't notice it though ...

You might be confusing the GSYNC cap differential (~3fps) with the low-lag VSYNC ON cap differential (~0.007-0.015).

There are extremely good reasons why the differentials are different recommendations.

1. For GSYNC, you need a little breathing room for varying frametimes. At 144fps, some frames will be 1/143sec and some will be 1/145sec. One frame will be lagged and the other will not be. Ideally, the lag is supposed to be microscopic, but is not always -- measurable input lag occured until the cap differential was at least ~2 to ~3fps below. That's what high speed video showed. So if you're doing 0.007 on GSYNC, you're getting a few milliseconds more lag even if your motion makes no difference between 3fps cap versus 0.007fps cap differential. That's what the 1000fps high speed camera lag results showed. Very tiny, a few milliseconds, but it showed statistically. (However, in theory, with better firmware and better drivers, the capping differential might now be smaller -- a retest may be needed with latest GSYNC to see how tight the differential can be)

2. For Low-Lag VSYNC ON, there's no such concern since varying frametimes behaves differently with this situation. You've got VSYNC rounding issue (aka stutter -- randomly missed VSYNCs result in a frame being displayed for one more refresh cycle). If you make the differential too big, you've got the harmonic / beat-frequency microstuttering. E.g. 59fps at 60Hz will be 1 stutter per second. 59.5fps at 60Hz will be 1 stutter every 2 second. And so on. If you make the differential too small, you run into framepacing accuracy limitations of the framerate capping software -- running 59.99fps at 60Hz may cause a 100-second cycle where 80 seconds is perfectly smooth and 20 seconds is massively stuttering. So you attempt to find a goldilocks point.

Alternative (zero differential capping): Also, some newer news is there's a brand new low-lag VSYNC ON that eliminates the need for a cap differential, if you use the low-lag VSYNC ON trick, please read this brand new thread. It is achieved by a form of tearingless (Raster-synchronized) VSYNC OFF. It is extremely highly experimental but this can produce 1 to 2 less frame of input lag for VSYNC ON, while having a perfect cap match (no differential). Works best in older games where there's enough horsepower room to allow the raster synchronization to work well.

[haanuman]

If you play with vsync OFF and it looks fine to you, you don't need g-sync. But if you play with vsync OFF but you really, really wish you could play with vsync ON instead to get rid of the tearing and the slight stutter, but can't stand the input lag of vsync ("my mouse feels like a boat"), then g-sync is for you, as it was made to solve exactly that problem, and nothing else.

As for the smoother visual quality, it seems to be absolutely huge for framerates lower than the screen's refresh rate. So, if I run some games at less than 144 fps, it'd be worth it for example. Even if it's just for those few crowded moments where your framerate tanks a bit, I'd consider it necessary. But what about for 144+ constant framerate, will it make any difference ?

"144+" means you're not using vsync and thus you get tearing and some stutter because the frame rate and refresh rate are out of sync. As I said above, if that looks good to you, you don't need g-sync. If you wish the tearing and stutter wasn't there but don't like the input lag of vsync, then you would enjoy g-sync.

As I understand it now, it's not a lot less input lag. It's a couple of milliseconds at 144hz, really, which doesn't make any difference to me. Is that right or did I misinterpret something ?

I'm not sure what you're referring to. G-Sync has noticeably lower input lag compared to vsync, even at 144Hz. If I run a game at 144Hz with just vsync, the mouse still has a bit of a "floaty" feel to it. With g-sync, that goes away. True, the difference is massive at lower frame rates (60FPS g-sync vs 60FPS plain vsync difference is so huge, it's not even funny), but it's still noticeable even at 144Hz.

Thanks @RealNC I have read multiple answers and they always either confuse me in the beginning or in the end.Hence I am left with confusion instead of the solution.