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Every PC gamer appreciates how important framerates are. It\u2019s this figure, perhaps more than any other, that we look for when considering a new component and how it will affect the experience we have while playing – the higher the FPS, the better. While this is broadly true, there are a few technical stumbling blocks worth making yourself aware of.<\/p>\n
First, what is FPS? This is one of the rare computer-related questions with a simple answer. FPS measures the number of images rendered in a single second. The higher the number, the smoother the motion appears to be. You can check out this video<\/span> to see a side-by-side comparison of a few different frame rates.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n PC gaming, ideally, takes place at sixty frames or higher. Thus it\u2019s tricky to get a side-by-side comparison because streaming sites like Youtube only allow for sixty fps. What\u2019s more, there\u2019s another limiting factor \u2013 the speed at which your display (in this case, usually a computer monitor) refreshes, and this is measured in Hz. If the frame rate is higher than the refresh rate, then those extra frames just won\u2019t be displayed.<\/p>\n We spend hours watching films shot at twenty-four frames per second, and we don\u2019t really complain about it. Many animated films are at less than that, with animators drawing a picture every two frames. Plus, if you watch a film at a higher frame-rate, like The Hobbit or Gemini Man, then you might find that it looks a little bit weird (especially if your television is automatically \u2018interpolating\u2019 between the frames using TrueMotion). So what makes games different?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n This has a lot to do with expectations. When we sit down to watch Homes Under the Hammer, we expect a higher framerate than we do when watching a major Hollywood film. Stick one frame rate onto the other, and things are bound to look a bit wonky.<\/p>\n Being limited to twenty-four frames is a problem for filmmakers – there are certain types of shot where this is evident. Slow pans across environments with lots of lines (say, trees or walls or buildings) tend to look as though they\u2019re stuttering. Wheels in motion can look as though they\u2019re travelling backwards. Helicopters can appear as though they\u2019re levitating.<\/span><\/p>\n Unlike in films, in a game, all of this stuff is out of the control of the director \u2013 the player has the freedom to look wherever they like. And then, there\u2019s the fact that we need to be able to react quickly to what\u2019s happening on-screen, which requires a steady supply of frames.<\/p>\n Fast-paced games like Doom and Hades benefit enormously from higher frame rates. Once you go up to 144hz, you\u2019ll never go back. Some monitors will get you even higher. Is playing at 240 FPS worth it? It\u2019s a matter of personal preference. If you\u2019re playing esports in a competitive environment, then those extra frames might make all the difference!<\/p>\n To bump up the frame rate, we can do a few different things. The most obvious is to turn down a few settings. If it takes the graphics card 1% longer to render a given frame when it has to apply higher-detail shadows, then turning down the detail might result in a smoother experience. Spread this principle over multiple settings, and you\u2019ll reduce the load on your card.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Post-processing effects tend to be the most burdensome \u2013 but every game is different. Naturally, if you\u2019d rather not sacrifice visual fidelity, then you can instead invest in a more powerful graphics card, and get more frames without compromising.<\/p>\n Of course, it\u2019s not just the graphics card that does the work. Walk into a heavily populated town or an environment where lots of physics is being performed by the CPU, and it won\u2019t matter how great your graphics card is: The CPU will cap the framerate.<\/p>\n Lowering the resolution will, in many cases buy, you more frames. For this reason, many modern games will dynamically scale the resolution on the fly. A few frames at half-resolution aren\u2019t going to be noticed, which makes this approach a clever one.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n When you\u2019re messing with the resolution, it\u2019s best to select the one that matches the native resolution of your display (i.e., the one that reflects the actual grid of tiny LEDs that you\u2019re looking at). Look for a resolution scaling option to downsample; this will eliminate any weird behaviour that comes with messing about with the main resolution setting. If the frame rate is static no matter how much you fiddle with the resolution, it\u2019s usually a sign of a bottleneck.<\/p>\n If there\u2019s not enough bandwidth available to send all of that data from your graphics card to the monitor, then those extra frames you\u2019re rendering won\u2019t arrive in time to be displayed. The result? A garbled signal, or a blank screen.<\/p>\n So, you need a Displayport or HDMI cable with sufficient bandwidth. At higher resolutions, a single frame will take up more data. You can theoretically describe four 1080p frames in the same amount of data as a single 4k one. So, lower the resolution, and you\u2019ll be able to fire over more frames in a given timeframe. That\u2019s why the 48Gbps of HDMI 2.1 can carry a 4k signal at 120fps, but an 8k signal at 60fps.<\/p>\n As well as the FPS that your machine can achieve, we also need to worry about the speed of the monitor, which tends to be linked to the native resolution. 4k monitors tend to have lower refresh rates than 1440p ones. To achieve truly ridiculous refresh-rates, you need to go down to 1080p \u2013 or crack open your wallet.<\/p>\n So, what happens if your refresh rate is higher than your FPS? In many cases, you\u2019ll run into a problem called tearing. The display will start rendering one frame and then receive the next one midway down the screen, resulting in a choppy effect that\u2019s especially noticeable if you\u2019re moving the camera quickly near a vertical line, like the corner of a wall or doorway.<\/p>\n Back in the day, we\u2019d correct this problem with something called vertical-sync. This matches the frame rate to the monitor\u2019s refresh rate (or a subdivision of it). No more tearing; but we\u2019ve introduced a nasty lag, which is far from ideal. And if the framerate dips beneath the refresh rate, we get a sudden drop in fps.<\/p>\n The solution here is something called adaptive sync, or VRR (Variable Refresh Rate). This comes in the form of G-sync from NVIDIA<\/span>\u00a0or FreeSync from AMD. Compatible monitors will adjust their refresh rates automatically depending on the incoming video \u2013 but you\u2019ll need to be sure that you match the monitor to the graphics card manufacturer.<\/span><\/p>\n FPS might give you an idea of what to expect, but it can also be misleading. Often, it\u2019s better that the framerate be consistent at 60 than jumping regularly from 60 to 100. For this reason, many games allow you to cap the framerate at a given level.<\/p>\n Moreover, we also need to worry about the spacing between one frame and the next. A game that consistently delivers one frame every 16ms is going to be far smoother than a game that doesn\u2019t, even if both technically add up to 60fps gameplay. Thus, frame times are arguably more important than frame rates \u2013 even if they are difficult to quantify.<\/p>\n Unfortunately, it\u2019s not easy to predict what sort of FPS you\u2019ll achieve in a given title with a given machine. Your results might vary considerably from game to game \u2013 and patches and new graphics-card drivers can often lead to dramatic changes further down the line. If you want to be sure of\u00a0<\/span>a PC that\u2019s suited to a particular game<\/span>, then why not check out our range of prebuilds? We\u2019ve got machines tailored toward a range of popular titles \u2013 and there\u2019s room for tweaking if you have more specific needs!<\/span><\/p>\n Every PC gamer appreciates how important framerates are. It\u2019s this figure, perhaps more than any other, that we look for when considering a new component and how it will affect the experience we have while playing – the higher the FPS, the better. While this is broadly true, there are a few technical stumbling blocks worth making yourself aware of.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":174380893,"featured_media":977,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1364],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gaming-pc"],"yoast_head":"\nIf films are at 24fps, isn\u2019t that enough?<\/h3>\n
Is playing at 240fps worth it?<\/h3>\n
How do graphics cards affect frames-per-second (FPS)?<\/h3>\n
Does lowering resolution increase FPS?<\/h3>\n
Displayport and HDMI<\/h3>\n
Refresh rates<\/h3>\n
Frame times<\/h3>\n
How to buy a PC based on FPS rates<\/h3>\n
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