FPS vs. refresh rates

[wogfor]

I am trying to understand this: If you game in the budget side as I do and have just a standard monitor with a typical 60hz refresh rate, does higher FPS over this amount really mean anything to me? Honestly, I usually can't see the difference until the rates drop down very low.

 

[R_1]

Frames per second _ How many unique images the GPU can draw per second
Refresh Rate _ How many times the image changes per second on screen. the refresh is the most images the screen can draw per second

Ideally you would want these to be as close to in sync as possible. if you have 250 images per second to choose from and can only choose 60 which do you choose? this is the monitor problem. it is being flooded with more data than it can use. you could try to cap the FPS to the refresh, tell games to only draw 60FPS instead of the 250 CS:go (example) gives you. every image will have its place.
not every game will let you cap the FPS.
G-sync and Freesync are the card makers way of implementing this but your monitor will need to be compatible for this to be smooth.

if your monitor is keeping you at 60hz, as long as you can get at least 60FPS you should be fine. I play with my games and find the sweet spot for my hardware. some games need to render more frames, some less.

 

[Eximo]

To the above, the monitor is dumb and just pulls whatever is in the frame buffer. So it is not flooded with information, it just takes what is there. If you have 250FPS on a 60hz screen you would see 4 distinct partial frames drawn on the screen, or tearing between the frames.

Tearing: When the refresh rate and FPS don't match and the monitor displays a distinct break between two frames rendered at different times.

You can cap the FPS in any game by turning V-sync on at the GPU level. This forces the GPU to have a frame ready at the beginning of each monitor refresh cycle. Adaptive V-sync will display the same frame more than once to avoid tearing when the refresh rate is below the target.

With V-sync off the monitor pulls whatever is the frame buffer as it draws the screen. So you will see tearing, a distinct line where one frame stops and another begins. Really noticeable when you turn around rapidly in an game.

G-Sync and Freesync turn control of the monitors refresh rate to the GPU. The GPU will predict its potential output, set the monitor's refresh rate accordingly. Since it does this faster than any monitor can refresh it is not seen by the user so there will be no tearing and the gameplay will be smooth.

 

[Eximo]

The typical argument for V-sync off and rendering above your refresh rate is the least amount of input lag. Meaning the game engine/GPU has rendered a frame and displays what it has immediately + the time it takes for pixels to actually change. Any type of Sync will increase this input lag, since it has to match up before displaying anything, and give you a slight disadvantage to other players.

60Hz = ~16.67ms per frame
144hz = ~7ms per frame

So a player with a 144hz monitor running at or above 144 FPS is going to see something almost 10ms earlier. Given that network lag and human reaction time are both more important, it really only applies at the top level of competition.

But even just having 100 FPS running on a 60hz monitor might let you see something before your opponent.