2nd look, game lag at high refresh and fps

Unoid

I posted in a thread of someone who played at 120hz, who also noticed that evenw ith 100+ fps at a 100Hz + monitor the game seemed to lag internally.
At first then I said I didn't notice, but now I do.

I've been playing other FPS games at 110hz and 90+FPS.
I notice even with 70+fps ALWAYS at 1440P NS2 lags a lot in game. It's just not smooth like other games are at the same FPS. and my monitor can display the frames at 110HZ.

I bet max already knows why we perceive this lag. An internal tick number likely at 30-60 ticks per second perhaps. Or perhaps some sort of player polling of position at 30ticks?.

I just want everyone to be aware of this, and hopefully there's an easy fix.

ASRock z68, 2600K @ 4.8ghz HT enabled, 16gb RAM, 256gb SSD, SLI GTX 680, 1440P Ocable LG 110Hz.

Wakelagger

I have noticed a similar issue as well. I do have a 120hz monitor. I will be getting 100 fps and it will visually appear that I am getting around 30 fps or so. It seems to happen randomly on starting an instance of ns2. I am afraid that I don't have more specific parameters for recreating it, but I will try playing around with it the next time I notice it.

Just to check if we have this in common, but do you make use of Virtu MVP (graphics pipeline virtualizer)? I have a feeling that it has had negative side effects in several of the games I play.

Unoid

I'm not using Virtu, Just SLI 680's. Disabled intel GPU on my 4.8ghz 2600k.

IronHorse

If you are using ambient occlusion, disable it.
It inherently comes with some input lag.
Also are you using any Vsync? Because it can cause input lag
Oh and are you using AFR or SFR? Because AFR also comes with inherent input lag. :-D

shonan

Theres a lot of talk about this issue, so I'd say theres definitely something up, I also experience it sometimes.

Mattk50

IronHorse said:

If you are using ambient occlusion, disable it.
It inherently comes with some input lag.
Also are you using any Vsync? Because it can cause input lag
Oh and are you using AFR or SFR? Because AFR also comes with inherent input lag.

What are AFR and SFR?

Nordic

Forgo your input devices as they create lag too. Must connect brain directly.

SquishpokePOOPFACE

Alt/Split Frame Rendering. Multi-GPU stuff. Looks like a sandwich. 

IronHorse

Since your fps is defying what your brain is sensing.. I assumed it was input lag.
There are many things which cause input lag that are unrelated to ns2, so it's best to check all those out first before ruling ns2 as the culprit.

Dual GPU solutions are ripe with these issues, historically. So my first bet is you're using AFR. It was a cute trick used to gain significantly more fps in benchmarks.. But comes at the cost of input lag. Should investigate all those suggestions of mine though.

Unoid

Not input lag. More of the internal game logic type lag.

IronHorse

You say this.. But I'm wondering if you went through all my suggestions ;-)
Hmm.. Need some way to quantify this. Perhaps frame latency ?

ScardyBob

Any chance you have access to a camera where you can record your monitor and mouse movement at the same time? If do you, it would be great if you could record playing NS2 and another game without the issue. Also, make sure to upload the raw video somewhere (e.g. dropbox) rather than put it on YouTube.

Regnareb

And record it with a high speed camera, because it would be the same as Youtube if it's not the case.

But yeah, you can have 100 FPS and have a game not fluid. And it can be separated from input lag.

http://techreport.com/review/21516/inside-the-second-a-new-look-at-game-benchmarking

ezekel

Yes, the game is not fluid even when my fps is above 120; input lag comes when it goes around 50-90~ frames, but when it's around 160-200 fps it just doesn't feel like 160-200 fps.. if that makes sense, no idea what it is

SDK 09 suffers the same issue, compared to SDK 07, sdk 07 is smoother at lower framerates while sdk 09 requires almost twice as many frames to feel as smooth -- it's like 150 fps to 260 fps difference, however it might not be the entire SDK; could have just been something that went wrong during the games engine swap (not ns2)