HL2.2 goes under the frame-o-scope

Hey,

Theres no point in having amazingly high frame rates, why have 100 fps if your monitor only shows 60 fps?

My monitor is 75hz, meaning it can display 75 frames per second, am i right?

I paid loads for a new gfx card before I realized this, so I may get those high framerates, but I dont see it.

Just thought its something you should all be aware of, please correct me if im wrong.

true, but there's also an issue with the synchronization between the framerate of the videocard and the monitor. if your monitor's framerate is offset compared to your videocard, you get only parts of the actual frame being shown. this is especially evident in fast paced games where sequential frames are substantially different from each other. you can solve this problem by enabling something called v-sync, but this will impose a few more calculations on your gpu. so basically you want to shoot for the highest resolution that gives you a framerate near what your monitor is capable of.

Cant the human eye only see anything 25fps and under ? everything over that is smooth.

The eye doesn't see life in "fps." This is a very stupid myth that sheep like to spout. There's no point even explaining how wrong this thinking is, just go play a game at 25fps then play one at 200fps. Hell, even 40fps.

While it might be true that the human eye can only see 25 fps, having 25 fps in a video game will still be choppy, as it isn't synced with the eye. So you're still going to need a higher framerate to prevent it from being choppy.

You only need 30fps for everything in a game to look nice and smooth. Unfortunately games are not like movies where you keep the same fps throughout the entire game. You can see it in the graphs. Yeah they're peaking at 120-160fps, but they're also getting lows of 20-36fps. Most of the time reviews list the average fps, which don't give you the whole picture. The min/max frame rate will let you know how the card will perform under heavy load. 160fps while looking at nothing and 5fps when the actions picks up is no good.

Even if a graphics card is able to not dip below 100fps it's not a waste of money to buy. Those numbers will give you a indication of how long you'll be able to run that card before you'll have to start looking at replacing it. I'm not talking about just staying with the latest and fastest, but actual playability. If graphics card A can barely run todays games, future games will be pretty much out of reach without turning off all the special effects. But graphics card B is able to chew through any of todays games at 1920x1200 with settings maxed, it'll be a while before you need to think about replacing it.

24 frames per second is the minimum number of frames per second you can display before the eye starts to perceive the individual frames, which the brain then translates as a flicker. It's not the maximum the eye can distinguish, it's the value that corresponds with the minimum response time of the retina - the time it takes for the retina to reset after being exposed to an image. There's no known upper limit to the number of frames we can perceive.

If it were the upper limit there'd be no need for monitors to have higher refresh rates than 60Hz.

Fluid motion is around 24 fps. However, the issue is that you need to be able to render MORE fps because you need to keep the 24fps sustained. If a card is working hard just to keep 24fps and a very graphically intense scene comes up, it can really lag and drop into the single digits. So you need something capable of handling more than what you're capable of seeing anyway just so it doesn't get choppy.

Max FPS and sustained/average FPS are very different beasts

no its suppost to be 60 fps. I remember when the playstation 1st came out it could never do anything close to 60 fps, I had a sega saturn and i could always tell the difference . The color on the playstation/ps2 has always bothered me too. Of course most lcds are hardly better then an average crt, unless you want to buy a top of the line flat panel than it may come close.

Yes there is a point, first of all, try running HL2 in 1680x1050 + resolution with 6xAA, 16xAF. Thats all I need to say.

Actually, if you play a game at constant 60+ fps, and then after a while limit the fps to 25, you're going to notice how choppy it is at that rate.
Fluency is the keyword, and you won't get that at 25 fps.
Google it, you'll see :)

television (PAL) works at 25fps and looks smooth (30fps for NTSC). However, most video games need a higher framerate to look smooth. 

This is because a television frame contains 1/25th of a second data. i.e. the camera shutter is open for just under 1/25 of a second. When all the frames are put together, you see a smooth picture. If you pause a DVD with some movement in the frame, you'll notice the picture is a bit blurry because it contains 1/25th of a second action.

Most computer games, (unless blurring is turned on like some newer titles) only display a single instant in time. If capture a single frame, it shows an instant in time. Therefore, it looks like motion at about 25-30 fps, and is playable, but when you get up to about 60fps, you'll notice that it's smoother.

Some people will get headaches playing games at 25fps because their brain is putting more effort into stitching all the single points in time into a motion picture, but at 60fps the brain doesn't have to do as much work, and the game 'feels' smoother.

TV (PAL) can work at 25 fps because each frame shows 1/25 of a second. That's why when you pause a DVD, a single frame looks blurred if it has any action in it.

Computer game frames show only an instant in time, no blur (excepting a few titles). So even though a computer game looks like motion at 25fps, your brain is working harder than looking at 25fps video, because it's turning less information into motion. That's why it feels smoother looking at a 60fps game. Your brain doesn't have to do as much work. Sitting a lot closer to your monitor than tv doesn't help the situation either.

I like to play my games at a steady 102hz.
Or 150hz if i play them at a low resolution 
like 1024x768.

Unfortunately, partly because of the apparently widespread myths about 24-30fps being smooth, we all have to suffer framerates around 30fps in all new games.

Aside from the horrible latencies and ghosting associated with today's LCD-monitors, they sport a whopping 60hz maximum refresh rate.

That's why I'm keeping my 21" CRT that 
does 102hz@1600x1200, until OLED, SED or FED can replace it. I just hope it doesn't
break down until then, because new CRTs
are getting tough to find.

The human eye can much see more than 24 fps, a minimum of 60 fps in a game would be ideal. The reason:- If you are looking at an image travelling toward you like a post in the distance from an in car forward facing camera view, it moves across the screen very slowly, however, if the camera was looking sideways from from the same vehicle the image would not look smooth, hence the reason why 24 fps in a first person shooter looks very bad when turning fast on the spot.

Films use 24fps to get reasonably smooth motion, but the eye can see flicker at this frame rate. Which is why cinema projectors show each frame twice, so you get 48 frames flashed up on the screen per second, to hide the flicker.

But this still isn't enough for smooth motion in all circumstances. The classic example is the old Westerns, with the stagecoach wheels running backwards. You need a much higher frame rate to get rid of this artefact.