Occasionally the entire on-screen motion feels slower and more stable after a cold boot — how do I force this state?
Posted: 11 Sep 2026, 21:31
Hi everyone,
I've been chasing this for about a year and I can't find a way to reproduce it reliably. I'd really appreciate any insight.
MY SETUP
- CPU: Ryzen 7 7800X3D
- GPU: RTX 5070 Ti
- Monitor: BenQ ZOWIE XL2566K (360Hz, DisplayPort)
- Windows 11
- Games: Valorant (mainly), Rocket League
THE ISSUE
To be clear upfront: this is NOT about mouse sensitivity or aim feel. It's the on-screen motion itself — the visual movement of everything in the game world.
Most of the time, everything on screen moves and feels "fast".
However, maybe once every 2-3 weeks (completely unpredictable), I boot the PC and everything looks and feels totally different: the entire image moves slower, and motion is extremely stable and smooth. This is the state I want.
The moment I shut down and boot again, that state is gone and everything is back to moving fast.
IMPORTANT DETAILS
- This is NOT about FPS. Frame rate is locked at 357 FPS with a completely flat 2.8ms frame time in both states (verified with HWiNFO logging). There is zero measurable difference between the good state and the bad state.
- It's noticeable on the desktop too, not just in games.
- In the "slow/stable" state I can play 20 hours without hand fatigue. In the current state my hand is tired after 15 minutes because I'm constantly over-correcting to keep up with the faster motion.
- I'm the only one experiencing it — friends playing the same games don't notice anything on their end.
WHAT I'VE ALREADY TRIED
- BIOS: PBO, PBO Scalar, Curve Optimizer — all on Auto (verified)
- Power plans: Balanced vs High Performance (High Performance makes motion feel even faster), core parking min cores = 100%, min/max processor state = 100%, throttle states off
- bcdedit: no useplatformclock / disabledynamictick / tscsyncpolicy present
- CPU affinity experiments via Process Lasso (disabling cores)
- G-Sync/Adaptive-Sync ON and OFF, DyAc off, AMA off
- New DisplayPort cable
- RTSS / in-game frame caps at various values
- HAGS on/off, Game Bar off, NVIDIA overlay off
- Latest chipset + GPU drivers, clean Windows install
- Color format verified: RGB, 8bpc, Full range, 360Hz
MY QUESTION
Since this state does occasionally happen on a fresh cold boot, something in the system must be initializing differently. Is there any known mechanism (driver init order, DisplayPort link training, timer resolution, USB/HID enumeration, power state, etc.) that could explain why a cold boot occasionally lands in a completely different motion state?
More importantly — is there any way to force or lock that state so I can get it consistently?
Thank you.
I've been chasing this for about a year and I can't find a way to reproduce it reliably. I'd really appreciate any insight.
MY SETUP
- CPU: Ryzen 7 7800X3D
- GPU: RTX 5070 Ti
- Monitor: BenQ ZOWIE XL2566K (360Hz, DisplayPort)
- Windows 11
- Games: Valorant (mainly), Rocket League
THE ISSUE
To be clear upfront: this is NOT about mouse sensitivity or aim feel. It's the on-screen motion itself — the visual movement of everything in the game world.
Most of the time, everything on screen moves and feels "fast".
However, maybe once every 2-3 weeks (completely unpredictable), I boot the PC and everything looks and feels totally different: the entire image moves slower, and motion is extremely stable and smooth. This is the state I want.
The moment I shut down and boot again, that state is gone and everything is back to moving fast.
IMPORTANT DETAILS
- This is NOT about FPS. Frame rate is locked at 357 FPS with a completely flat 2.8ms frame time in both states (verified with HWiNFO logging). There is zero measurable difference between the good state and the bad state.
- It's noticeable on the desktop too, not just in games.
- In the "slow/stable" state I can play 20 hours without hand fatigue. In the current state my hand is tired after 15 minutes because I'm constantly over-correcting to keep up with the faster motion.
- I'm the only one experiencing it — friends playing the same games don't notice anything on their end.
WHAT I'VE ALREADY TRIED
- BIOS: PBO, PBO Scalar, Curve Optimizer — all on Auto (verified)
- Power plans: Balanced vs High Performance (High Performance makes motion feel even faster), core parking min cores = 100%, min/max processor state = 100%, throttle states off
- bcdedit: no useplatformclock / disabledynamictick / tscsyncpolicy present
- CPU affinity experiments via Process Lasso (disabling cores)
- G-Sync/Adaptive-Sync ON and OFF, DyAc off, AMA off
- New DisplayPort cable
- RTSS / in-game frame caps at various values
- HAGS on/off, Game Bar off, NVIDIA overlay off
- Latest chipset + GPU drivers, clean Windows install
- Color format verified: RGB, 8bpc, Full range, 360Hz
MY QUESTION
Since this state does occasionally happen on a fresh cold boot, something in the system must be initializing differently. Is there any known mechanism (driver init order, DisplayPort link training, timer resolution, USB/HID enumeration, power state, etc.) that could explain why a cold boot occasionally lands in a completely different motion state?
More importantly — is there any way to force or lock that state so I can get it consistently?
Thank you.