Looking to Get a new Monitor But I am Confused (120hz/144hz)

[flexy]

I want to get a new monitor and would like to get a 120hz or 144hz monitor.
G-Sync from what I see is still way too expensive for me. I have a GTX 970.

What is confusing is vsync at 120hz or 144hz which (as I understand it) is the purpose of a 120hz/144hz monitor.

Problem: There is a hardly a game (if any!) where I could even reach a constant 120hz or 144hz - BF4? Lol, for sure not unless I'd run quad SLI or something.

So what is the purpose of 120hz/144hz if a mortal with a "normal" setup cannot even reach such frequencies?

Don't tell me you play whatever modern game at 120hz or 144hz at moderate/high settings because I would not believe you, not with an average setup like a single GTX970/GTX980. Even THEN I'd probably rather crank up settings high so I'd no reach those frequencies or do people play at lower settings to get, say, 120hz?

 

[Viper GTS]

You don't need to be able to render at 120/144hz to benefit from vsync, vsync is just a method to make sure that only full frames get drawn on the screen. G-Sync is a more advanced method of doing that.

Having the ability to display 120 or 144 frames if you happen to have that many to display is nice, but it doesn't obligate you to provide them.

Viper GTS

 

[flexy]

So does that mean, since a 120hz monitor supports more than 60hz, I can Vsync at any FPS up to the max what the monitor can handle? Whereas with a 60hz monitor Vsync at 60 is of course the maximum.

 

[therealnickdanger]

So does that mean, since a 120hz monitor supports more than 60hz, I can Vsync at any FPS up to the max what the monitor can handle? Whereas with a 60hz monitor Vsync at 60 is of course the maximum.

Two things:

1. You set the refresh rate of the monitor to what you want. 60Hz, 70Hz, 90Hz, 100Hz, 120Hz, 144Hz, whatever.

2. You turn Vsync on or off - you don't choose a frame rate.

With VSync ON, the display will only show completed frames drawn by the GPU at the refresh interval provided by the monitor. This means that if your GPU is drawing slower than your display (50fps at 60Hz), then you will see repeated frames. If your GPU is drawing faster than your display (80fps at 60Hz), then you will skip frames. Neither scenario is ideal, but most believe it is better than screen tearing (VSync OFF).

Speaking from experience, set the display to the maximum refresh rate (144Hz), then turn VSync on. There are some other tools at your disposal, such as Adaptive VSync, Frame Rate Limiter, Frame Smoothing, etc. that can help you have a better experience no matter what path you take. Personally, I will usually adjust my settings to medium or high instead of ultra in order to get more fps.

If I can make one more suggestion: wait a bit longer, save your money, and buy a G-Sync monitor. It is seriously worth it. The Acer XB240H is usually priced under $400.

 

[PrincessFrosty]

What is confusing is vsync at 120hz or 144hz which (as I understand it) is the purpose of a 120hz/144hz monitor.

That's not the purpose of a 120hz/144hz monitor, the purpose is very simply, higher refresh rates give a smoother and hence better experience, how you decide to mix that with vsync/gsync is completely optional and down to preference.

Problem: There is a hardly a game (if any!) where I could even reach a constant 120hz or 144hz - BF4? Lol, for sure not unless I'd run quad SLI or something.

Well there's thousands of games on the PC platform that range from AAA games with ground breaking graphics, to indie games or just plain older games designed for slower hardware. The vast majority of games in existence will run at 120hz on average hardware, it's only brand new state of the art games that wont.

So what is the purpose of 120hz/144hz if a mortal with a "normal" setup cannot even reach such frequencies?

None, if you cannot reach those frequencies for whatever reason then these more expensive monitors have little to offer over 60hz monitors, when building a PC and picking parts you have to buy parts that are appropriate for each other, if you're getting a rubbish video card or CPU that can't run games at high frame rates then there's no point in wasting money on a monitor like this.

Don't tell me you play whatever modern game at 120hz or 144hz at moderate/high settings because I would not believe you, not with an average setup like a single GTX970/GTX980. Even THEN I'd probably rather crank up settings high so I'd no reach those frequencies or do people play at lower settings to get, say, 120hz?

I have a GTX980 and a 120hz 1080p monitor I use for games sometimes (more rare these days since I got my 4k panel) and I have 524 steam games, probably 95% of those games run at 120fps with max settings just fine, some of the others might need a few quality settings lowered to reach those frame rates.

The bottom line is that what you prefer to sacrifice in terms of graphics quality vs frame rate is merely your subjective preference, other people have different preferences and may sacrifice quality for speed, especially those people playing competitively online and perform better with smoother game play experience.

Don't fall into the trap of measuring performance of modern video cards in gaming based soley on things like benchmarks or a single game like BF4, you're talking about 1 game in an ocean of tens of thousands of other titles that all perform in different ways, benchmarking sites deliberately pick the top few games out that need the most GPU horsepower to test and stress the cards, it does not represent reality proportionately, there's many more hours put into games like DOTA2 and TF2 for example that will easily run at something like 300fps or more on a decent rig.

 

[PrincessFrosty]

So does that mean, since a 120hz monitor supports more than 60hz, I can Vsync at any FPS up to the max what the monitor can handle? Whereas with a 60hz monitor Vsync at 60 is of course the maximum.

Oh and vsync just synchronizes you frame rate with your refresh rate, it doesn't matter what your refresh rate is at the time. If your frame rate cannot meet you exceed your refresh rate then vsync will sync to some whole fraction of your frame rate (1/2, 1/3, 1/4 etc)

The purpose of things like Gsync and Freesync was to have monitors which can dynamitcally alter the refresh rate to meet the frame rate and you eliminate the problem of slow frame rates causing vsync to look awful, it also removes latency between input and output.