What happens to extra FPS

G

Gordon.C

Member
Hi,

what happens to extra FPS that is above your monitors refresh rate. Majority of monitors have 60 Hz refresh rate right?

Does it work in a way that monitor requests an updated frame 60 times per second and the GPU just provides one frame whenever requested and discards the other frames?

How does software such as Fraps know the frame rate?
 
If it's above your refresh rate it will sometimes try rendering two frames at once. This is called screen tearing and can result in a "tear" running across your screen where the two frames meet. To eliminate this just turn on V Sync and it'll lock your framerate to no higher than your refresh rate.

It's a good idea to just always have Vsync on because it'll throttle your video card. You don't need it running to pump out 200fps on a Counter Strike just because it can. It won't hurt you in performance (normally) either though.

As to where the frames "go." I don't really know what you mean.

And yeah 60Hz is the normal refresh rate, although 120 and 144 is becoming more popular.
 
Aha I see.

What I meant was, unless you have v-sync on the GPU still creates those extra frames but those frames never make it to the screen right?

Anyway the more important part is, how does Fraps count FPS? Does Windows have a frame rate counter built in or does Fraps have to implement some own method?
 
I don't know how FRAPS works honestly.

I'm not sure but I think that it sends all the frames to the screen and it'll try and render more than one at once, which is your screen tearing. I'm not 100 percent sure on that but I think that's right.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top