First time having a 144Hz monitor, what should I try out?

[CGurrell]

Hey guys, 

 

Bought myself a new monitor over the weekend. Picked up an Acer XV272UP, which seems to tick all the boxes (1440p, 144Hz, IPS, GSync compatible, good colour accuracy etc). 

 

Although it's a step down in terms of resolution from 4K, I immediately noticed the smoothness just at the desktop moving the cursor around last night, and I can't wait to get home from work and play some Rainbow Six Siege. 

 

Whilst I'm travelling to work though, I thought I'd ask the community, and those of it who already have high refresh rate/GSync/Freesync monitors, what should I do to get the most out of it, and also to properly bask in its glory? 

 

Thanks in advance to everyone who replies and have a nice day

 

EDIT: Forgot to mention, I have GSync compatible mode enabled now after a little digging around getting the right monitor driver and enabling Freesync in the menus (thanks to the posts on this and other forums for helping with that!) 

[Samfisher]

You should try not having a secondary monitor that is a different refresh rate, cos any media playing on the secondary screen, even a blinking Steam chat notification will totally tank your frametimes.  It's annoying to say the least...  But other than that, enjoy your high refresh display! You can never go back to 60fps

[CGurrell]

1 minute ago, Samfisher said:

You should try not having a secondary monitor that is a different refresh rate, cos any media playing on the secondary screen, even a blinking Steam chat notification will totally tank your frametimes.  It's annoying to say the least...  But other than that, enjoy your high refresh display! You can never go back to 60fps

Cheers, yeah I have a little switch under my desk I can use to disconnect the secondary monitor when in games, I normally only use two when working from home for whatever reason, or maybe when streaming (which I haven't done for a long time). Thanks for the heads up though, much appreciated! 

[flashiling]

7 minutes ago, Samfisher said:

You should try not having a secondary monitor that is a different refresh rate, cos any media playing on the secondary screen, even a blinking Steam chat notification will totally tank your frametimes.  It's annoying to say the least...  But other than that, enjoy your high refresh display! You can never go back to 60fps

question about this.

if i have 3 monitors one at 240 with a G-sync module and another at 144 that's G-sync compatible and a 60Hz one that has no G-sync.

Could that be a cause for frame drops in games?

i noticed that after enabling my 240Hz monitor i went from 320fps to 120

 

[Samfisher]

Just now, flashiling said:

question about this.

if i have 3 monitors one at 240 with a G-sync module and another at 144 that's G-sync compatible and a 60Hz one that has no G-sync.

Could that be a cause for frame drops in games?

i noticed that after enabling my 240Hz monitor i went from 320fps to 120

 

FPS drops probably not, more of a frametime issue.  The FPS stays high but it stutters like a mofo.  I only have 2 monitors tho so your issue may be a different one.

[flashiling]

try shooting games.

Personally i got a lot better when going from a dirty laptop screen with 60Hz and 90Fps to my first 144Hz 1440p monitor (it was also 10 inches bigger).

basically went from being a 40 - 45% player on the leaderboard i ended up getting into the top 7%

[Samfisher]

8 minutes ago, CGurrell said:

Cheers, yeah I have a little switch under my desk I can use to disconnect the secondary monitor when in games, I normally only use two when working from home for whatever reason, or maybe when streaming (which I haven't done for a long time). Thanks for the heads up though, much appreciated! 

I guess you can also download Nvidia's Pendulum demo and show off your monitor

[flashiling]

Just now, Samfisher said:

FPS drops probably not, more of a frametime issue.  The FPS stays high but it stutters like a mofo.  I only have 2 monitors tho so your issue may be a different one.

hmm bummer.

i don't have frametime problems it's just the fact that my fps litterally dropped by 200

[Samfisher]

1 minute ago, flashiling said:

hmm bummer.

i don't have frametime problems it's just the fact that my fps litterally dropped by 200

Does it stay locked at 120?  Your GPU manufacturer's subreddit (Nvidia or AMD) might be a better place to ask, much much much wider circle of people on those places, you could find a solution there.

[WereCat]

1 hour ago, Samfisher said:

You should try not having a secondary monitor that is a different refresh rate, cos any media playing on the secondary screen, even a blinking Steam chat notification will totally tank your frametimes.  It's annoying to say the least...  But other than that, enjoy your high refresh display! You can never go back to 60fps

While this has been true for me for many years, there is a way to go around it. 

Play in a true full screen mode and don't use Windowed/Borderless mode. 

Disable Fast Startup in Windows10. 

Set GSync to work only in FullScreen applications. 

 

I have 165Hz and 2x60Hz and I can play videos and stuff on the other screens and nothing stutters anymore. 

 

Have in mind that GSync will work only as long as your FPS is lower than the max refresh rate of your monitor so if you want to have it enabled all the time you have to cap your FPS. 

Luckily many games now allow you to do that and always use the in-game FPS cap when available instead of a 3rd party application. 

 

R6S is a great game to try the high refresh rate on. But you will likely notice the difference vs 60Hz just by moving mouse cursor on the desktop. 

Generally any games where you move a lot like ApexLegends will be a massive difference vs 60Hz.

[Samfisher]

1 minute ago, WereCat said:

While this has been true for me for many years, there is a way to go around it. 

Play in a true full screen mode and don't use Windowed/Borderless mode. 

Disable Fast Startup in Windows10. 

Set GSync to work only in FullScreen applications. 

 

I have 165Hz and 2x60Hz and I can play videos and stuff on the other screens and nothing stutters anymore. 

 

Have in mind that GSync will work only as long as your FPS is lower than the max refresh rate of your monitor so if you want to have it enabled all the time you have to cap your FPS. 

Luckily many games now allow you to do that and always use the in-game FPS cap when available instead of a 3rd party application. 

 

R6S is a great game to try the high refresh rate on. But you will likely notice the difference vs 60Hz just by moving mouse cursor on the desktop. 

Generally any games where you move a lot like ApexLegends will be a massive difference vs 60Hz.

This isn't even a workaround, more like do something completely different  We're playing in borderless cos alt tabbing is a mainstay in PC usage now with how powerful cheap hardware is.  Plus games like Destiny 2 won't even let anything hook into their client so to stream it you CANNOT play in full screen otherwise you'll be streaming a blank screen.

[WereCat]

1 minute ago, Samfisher said:

This isn't even a workaround, more like do something completely different  We're playing in borderless cos alt tabbing is a mainstay in PC usage now with how powerful cheap hardware is.  Plus games like Destiny 2 won't even let anything hook into their client so to stream it you CANNOT play in full screen otherwise you'll be streaming a blank screen.

I have to admit that I had issues adjusting from being used to not alt+tab to having to start doing it. 

 

IDK about Desriny2, never played it. That's weird though... 

[Samfisher]

1 minute ago, WereCat said:

I have to admit that I had issues adjusting from being used to not alt+tab to having to start doing it. 

 

IDK about Desriny2, never played it. That's weird though... 

Any game that has pretty stringent anti-hack will block any programs from hooking into their executable.  Destiny 2 is just one of the few I've been playing recently.

[SnakeFerBrains]

On 1/6/2020 at 8:35 AM, Samfisher said:

You should try not having a secondary monitor that is a different refresh rate, cos any media playing on the secondary screen, even a blinking Steam chat notification will totally tank your frametimes.  It's annoying to say the least...  But other than that, enjoy your high refresh display! You can never go back to 60fps

also got a question about this, what about running the 2nd monitor from the onboard gpu if its only 60 fps? if available of course.

[Samfisher]

5 hours ago, SnakeFerBrains said:

also got a question about this, what about running the 2nd monitor from the onboard gpu if its only 60 fps? if available of course.

I've tried it (and lots have as well) but it doesn't work.  It's just Windows refreshing the desktop at the same refresh rate so borderless windowed games are considered the desktop.  Fullscreen (exclusive fullscreen) overrides this and that software gets priority for any refresh.