G-Sync Emulation Settings

[FamiDriveDuo]

So I finally caved and purchased a AOC G2460PG G-Sync monitor and am loving it so far, though I'd like to know, to any G-Sync users here, what are some ideal settings for MAME & RetroArch?

[ZellSF]

Last time I tried the ideal setting for RetroArch was not using it. It didn't work with g-sync at all.

[lettuce]

I believe you want to enable the 'Black Frame Insertion' option, and if using mame use GrooveMAME.

A good test game to check if your getting smooth scrolling is Mortal Kombat on the title screen where the character faces and scrolling down the side of the screen

[FamiDriveDuo]

I believe you want to enable the 'Black Frame Insertion' option, and if using mame use GrooveMAME.

A good test game to check if your getting smooth scrolling is Mortal Kombat on the title screen where the character faces and scrolling down the side of the screen

I checked and while there's to tearing, the scrolling feels a tad jerky. Is that normal? Is it supposed to be smooth like 60hz in G-sync? I know it's a 54hz game, so maybe what i'm seeing is natural... I'm running both Libretro MAME & Mameuifx64.

[lettuce]

I believe you want to enable the 'Black Frame Insertion' option, and if using mame use GrooveMAME.

A good test game to check if your getting smooth scrolling is Mortal Kombat on the title screen where the character faces and scrolling down the side of the screen

I checked and while there's to tearing, the scrolling feels a tad jerky. Is that normal? Is it supposed to be smooth like 60hz in G-sync? I know it's a 54hz game, so maybe what i'm seeing is natural... I'm running both Libretro MAME & Mameuifx64.

I think only GroovyMame will have the super smooth scrolling, is your monitor 144hz or just 60hz?, if just 60hz i dont think you can get the smooth scrolling

[FamiDriveDuo]

I believe you want to enable the 'Black Frame Insertion' option, and if using mame use GrooveMAME.

A good test game to check if your getting smooth scrolling is Mortal Kombat on the title screen where the character faces and scrolling down the side of the screen

I checked and while there's to tearing, the scrolling feels a tad jerky. Is that normal? Is it supposed to be smooth like 60hz in G-sync? I know it's a 54hz game, so maybe what i'm seeing is natural... I'm running both Libretro MAME & Mameuifx64.

I think only GroovyMame will have the super smooth scrolling, is your monitor 144hz or just 60hz?, if just 60hz i dont think you can get the smooth scrolling

It maxes at 144hz, though I've currently have it on 120hz.

[Fudoh]

If you enable the Black Frame Insertion mode on the monitor you don't get to use G-SYNC. It's either or, not both. That's currently true for all G-SYNC monitors.

ULMB is tempting since it heavily reduces any motion blur, but it's really besides the point when you're using emulation. The point of combining a G-SYNC monitor with emulation is to maintain a system's (or game's) original refresh rate and have the monitor to adapt to that instead of adapting the game's refresh rate to the monitor's as you would usually do with a non G-SYNC monitor (or a G-SYNC monitor in ULMB mode).

In other words: you cannot use any of the high-frame rate modes (120 or 144Hz). You need to stick to a baseline of 60Hz and allow the monitor to adapt to frame rates "around" that using it's G-SYNC capabilities.

A game like R-Type (with horizontal scrolling at 55Hz) or Raiden (with vertical scrolling at 54Hz) has to feel 100% smooth. It's like running a game with v-sync lock on a classic 60Hz non G-SYNC monitor.

[Xyga]

I believe you have to set the emulator to output the game's original refesh rate and let G-Sync do the syncing job.

In the days I understood MAME better it was as simple as activating 'switch refresh rates' and untick 'sync to monitor' or anything else that could force a 60Hz synced-to-OS-display output.

If MAME's frame meter (F11) shows a stable **/** figure ingame, and the scrolling is butter-smotth without tearing: success.

Now with GM and RA thingshave become a little bitm more elaborate/complicated, dunno.

[FamiDriveDuo]

If you enable the Black Frame Insertion mode on the monitor you don't get to use G-SYNC. It's either or, not both. That's currently true for all G-SYNC monitors.

ULMB is tempting since it heavily reduces any motion blur, but it's really besides the point when you're using emulation. The point of combining a G-SYNC monitor with emulation is to maintain a system's (or game's) original refresh rate and have the monitor to adapt to that instead of adapting the game's refresh rate to the monitor's as you would usually do with a non G-SYNC monitor (or a G-SYNC monitor in ULMB mode).

In other words: you cannot use any of the high-frame rate modes (120 or 144Hz). You need to stick to a baseline of 60Hz and allow the monitor to adapt to frame rates "around" that using it's G-SYNC capabilities.

A game like R-Type (with horizontal scrolling at 55Hz) or Raiden (with vertical scrolling at 54Hz) has to feel 100% smooth. It's like running a game with v-sync lock on a classic 60Hz non G-SYNC monitor.

So you're saying I need to drop back to 60hz for the emulators to take advantage of G-Sync?

[ZellSF]

If you enable the Black Frame Insertion mode on the monitor you don't get to use G-SYNC. It's either or, not both. That's currently true for all G-SYNC monitors.

ULMB is tempting since it heavily reduces any motion blur, but it's really besides the point when you're using emulation. The point of combining a G-SYNC monitor with emulation is to maintain a system's (or game's) original refresh rate and have the monitor to adapt to that instead of adapting the game's refresh rate to the monitor's as you would usually do with a non G-SYNC monitor (or a G-SYNC monitor in ULMB mode).

In other words: you cannot use any of the high-frame rate modes (120 or 144Hz). You need to stick to a baseline of 60Hz and allow the monitor to adapt to frame rates "around" that using it's G-SYNC capabilities.

A game like R-Type (with horizontal scrolling at 55Hz) or Raiden (with vertical scrolling at 54Hz) has to feel 100% smooth. It's like running a game with v-sync lock on a classic 60Hz non G-SYNC monitor.

So you're saying I need to drop back to 60hz for the emulators to take advantage of G-Sync?

No, G-Sync will adjust the refresh rate of the screen itself to as many frames as your application outputs.

You will however not get any advantage from 120hz+ either, that's something that will only benefit you in PC games (or if it's your thing: motion interpolation in media players).

[Joelepain]

If you enable the Black Frame Insertion mode on the monitor you don't get to use G-SYNC. It's either or, not both. That's currently true for all G-SYNC monitors.

ULMB is tempting since it heavily reduces any motion blur, but it's really besides the point when you're using emulation. The point of combining a G-SYNC monitor with emulation is to maintain a system's (or game's) original refresh rate and have the monitor to adapt to that instead of adapting the game's refresh rate to the monitor's as you would usually do with a non G-SYNC monitor (or a G-SYNC monitor in ULMB mode).

In other words: you cannot use any of the high-frame rate modes (120 or 144Hz). You need to stick to a baseline of 60Hz and allow the monitor to adapt to frame rates "around" that using it's G-SYNC capabilities.

A game like R-Type (with horizontal scrolling at 55Hz) or Raiden (with vertical scrolling at 54Hz) has to feel 100% smooth. It's like running a game with v-sync lock on a classic 60Hz non G-SYNC monitor.

I think he was speaking about a black frame insertion option inside the emulator and not on the monitor (I know RetroArch has this option, don't know for the demi billions different build of MAME)
That should work with g-sync (it should ouput double the base framerate of the emulated game). Not as efficient as ULMB, but it should be better than just g-sync at ~60hz.

[Tatsuya79]

Mortal Kombat 1 Title screen scrolling on Mame is a nice quick test to see if that's working (smooth) or not.

[Exidna]

As I understood it, to use G-Sync all you do is enable it in the NVIDIA Control Panel and then run your game in Full-Screen Exclusive Mode (not Windowed) with the in-game V-Sync options disabled.
With RetroArch specifically, it uses FSW mode by default so you will have to change that to FSE.
You will also have to set it to limit game speed to 1.0x since V-Sync is off.
I'm not sure if you would also have to disable the audio sync feature - though it should not be necessary if you're running at exactly 1.0x speed.

Black Frame Insertion has nothing to do with G-Sync.
To use BFI you need to have a display running at 2x the game's original speed.
So a 55Hz game would require that your monitor is operating at 110Hz when BFI is enabled for example.
BFI will halve your brightness, but double your motion clarity. Or at least it should in theory, but BFI is very ineffective with LCD displays in my experience.
With an LCD you really need a display which supports backlight strobing to be effective, since the LEDs can switch on/off instantly unlike the LCD panel which is very slow changing to black every other frame.
NVIDIA's ULMB, which is found on most G-Sync monitors, is quite effective backlight strobing. The problem with ULMB is that it is restricted to 85/100/120Hz. So it's largely useless for emulation unless you wanted to try 120Hz ULMB with BFI for a 60Hz game.

When using a CRT BFI is very effective. Using 110Hz with BFI on a CRT monitor looks just as if it were running at 55Hz natively - only most monitors won't sync to anything below 60Hz.
Running a 55Hz game at 110Hz on a CRT will result in double-images when things move across the screen. Enabling BFI halves the brightness and causes it to flicker more, but gives you much clearer motion.

Mortal Kombat 1 Title screen scrolling on Mame is a nice quick test to see if that's working (smooth) or not.

That won't work in RetroArch. RetroArch has the ability to "reclock" games so that they sync up to your current refresh rate perfectly without any audio or video stuttering/glitches.
The only benefit of G-Sync with RetroArch is ensuring that you are running at exactly the original speed.
If you don't care about running 55Hz arcade games ~9% faster (reclocked to 60Hz) there's no need for it.

[ZellSF]

As I understood it, to use G-Sync all you do is enable it in the NVIDIA Control Panel and then run your game in Full-Screen Exclusive Mode (not Windowed) with the in-game V-Sync options disabled.
With RetroArch specifically, it uses FSW mode by default so you will have to change that to FSE

G-Sync supports windowed mode for DirectX programs. Don't think it supports windowed mode for OpenGL though.

[Tatsuya79]

Mortal Kombat 1 Title screen scrolling on Mame is a nice quick test to see if that's working (smooth) or not.

That won't work in RetroArch. RetroArch has the ability to "reclock" games so that they sync up to your current refresh rate perfectly without any audio or video stuttering/glitches.
The only benefit of G-Sync with RetroArch is ensuring that you are running at exactly the original speed.
If you don't care about running 55Hz arcade games ~9% faster (reclocked to 60Hz) there's no need for it.

Retroarch can be configured to do this or not.
Settings in audio: audio sync, timing skew...
Frame Throttle settings: maximum speed x1
Video settings: lot of stuff there.

But by default it doesn't push a 55Hz game to 60Hz, this would be quite noticeable (= bad)!
I haven't got a g-sync screen to do some testing.
Would love to run those 50/55Hz arcade and computer games (MSX, X6800...) smoothly one day.

[FamiDriveDuo]

Bumping this thread to seek more help. I've got MAME working fine with G-Sync, but I would like to know if there are any compatable emulators that work with the technology at all. I'm still dissapointed that RetroArch doesn't work 100% with it.

[Ed Oscuro]

Just give Newegg a few days to send out my replacement XB271HU and I should be able to check this stuff out again. For now, my nVidia control panel shows different settings since it's hooked up to a non-G-SYNC display (via VGA, even!).

I have a feeling I suggested checking some settings before, but if not, here's a few things to check:

- Maximum pre-rendered frames: 1
- Multi-display/mixed-GPU acceleration: single
- Triple buffering: Off

I don't think any of these settings should have any impact on your setup but you might take a look. In particular I think that max pre-rendered frames set to 1 can be helpful in general - I don't believe it should be an issue in an emulator, but you never know.

Just to set things up in advance: When you talk about running Mortal Wombat, you mean via a MAME core? I'll also have a look at black frame insertion.

[FamiDriveDuo]

Just give Newegg a few days to send out my replacement XB271HU and I should be able to check this stuff out again. For now, my nVidia control panel shows different settings since it's hooked up to a non-G-SYNC display (via VGA, even!).

I have a feeling I suggested checking some settings before, but if not, here's a few things to check:

- Maximum pre-rendered frames: 1
- Multi-display/mixed-GPU acceleration: single
- Triple buffering: Off

I don't think any of these settings should have any impact on your setup but you might take a look. In particular I think that max pre-rendered frames set to 1 can be helpful in general - I don't believe it should be an issue in an emulator, but you never know.

Just to set things up in advance: When you talk about running Mortal Wombat, you mean via a MAME core? I'll also have a look at black frame insertion.

I'll try out those settings, currently messing around with vanilla Mednafen. The version of MAME I'm using is mameuifx64, of which I applied some settings given to me from the now-banned bulbousbeard. However, that variant is arcade-only, and I wanted to dick around with the MESS portion of MAME and am looking for a good alternative just for that. I'll try out MESSUI again, but I can't figure out how to set up GLSL in the INI...

Regarding the MAME Libretro core, it seemed to force every game to run at 60hz, so it was pretty useless for me.

Edit- I'm still getting microstutter for 60hz in emulated content. I've tested WonderSwan (75hz) and a PAL NES game, Super Turrican, and they ran buttery smooth, but NTSC Mega Man 1 had stutter. This is all on vanilla Mednafen BTW.

[ZellSF]

Bumping this thread to seek more help. I've got MAME working fine with G-Sync, but I would like to know if there are any compatable emulators that work with the technology at all. I'm still dissapointed that RetroArch doesn't work 100% with it.

It's impossible in most cases to detect if a game running at 59.5hz is running at that speed or artificially sped up to 60hz. So you really can't tell if G-Sync is doing anything for you most of the time.

I haven't noticed any stuttering in any other emulators than RetroArch though.

Edit- I'm still getting microstutter for 60hz in emulated content. I've tested WonderSwan (75hz) and a PAL NES game, Super Turrican, and they ran buttery smooth, but NTSC Mega Man 1 had stutter. This is all on vanilla Mednafen BTW.

Obvious thing here, but never assume the stutter isn't there on the real system. Not all games run buttery smooth, even if you remember them that way (can't tell for sure about Mega Man, just saying).

[Ed Oscuro]

It's starting to sound more like a problem with just that core. I certainly wouldn't expect that kind of behavior from a 60Hz NES game, but here we are.

Could you describe this microstutter more? I've noticed, in my own non-emulation G-SYNC adventures, that some games run well, but others (even ones that are less CPU intensive!) stuttered sometimes, to the point of unplayability. There is a difference between a rolling hiccup on a predictable schedule (which can be a sign of GPU/CPU limitations, or some other intrinsic feature of the program), and random hiccups due to background processes (for example). This probably isn't something affecting you, but it is worth considering, and perhaps testing.

[FamiDriveDuo]

Bumping this thread to seek more help. I've got MAME working fine with G-Sync, but I would like to know if there are any compatable emulators that work with the technology at all. I'm still dissapointed that RetroArch doesn't work 100% with it.

It's impossible in most cases to detect if a game running at 59.5hz is running at that speed or artificially sped up to 60hz. So you really can't tell if G-Sync is doing anything for you most of the time.

I haven't noticed any stuttering in any other emulators than RetroArch though.

Edit- I'm still getting microstutter for 60hz in emulated content. I've tested WonderSwan (75hz) and a PAL NES game, Super Turrican, and they ran buttery smooth, but NTSC Mega Man 1 had stutter. This is all on vanilla Mednafen BTW.

Obvious thing here, but never assume the stutter isn't there on the real system. Not all games run buttery smooth, even if you remember them that way (can't tell for sure about Mega Man, just saying).

It's been a long while since I've played Mega Man on real hardware, but it was never that choppy. What emulators besides RA do you use?

[FamiDriveDuo]

It's starting to sound more like a problem with just that core. I certainly wouldn't expect that kind of behavior from a 60Hz NES game, but here we are.

Could you describe this microstutter more? I've noticed, in my own non-emulation G-SYNC adventures, that some games run well, but others (even ones that are less CPU intensive!) stuttered sometimes, to the point of unplayability. There is a difference between a rolling hiccup on a predictable schedule (which can be a sign of GPU/CPU limitations, or some other intrinsic feature of the program), and random hiccups due to background processes (for example). This probably isn't something affecting you, but it is worth considering, and perhaps testing.

For regular PC games, G-Sync works perfectly fine with what I've thrown at it. Even shit like Mega Mari, a doujin game that had abysmal tearing with no v-sync options runs smooth as butter. When it comes to emulation, it's all over the place. I mostly notice the microstutter on 60hz machines (NES, SNES, Etc.), especially in sidescrollers, and it's very distracting. MAME on the other hand is glass smooth after some minor tweaks.

[Ed Oscuro]

It sounds like maybe it's synced to the wrong setting - e.g. desktop at some frame rate, game at 59.97Hz (or whatever). I know I've said this before, but I'd still double-check that the G-Sync setting is set for windowed and fullscreen mode as well as any settings in the emulators about windowed / fullscreen mode.

I believe that OpenGL vs. DirectX doesn't matter for G-SYNC. Of course, some driver versions brought about problems, but all the reports were with recent games, I didn't read about anybody else using emulators with this setup.

[ZellSF]

Bumping this thread to seek more help. I've got MAME working fine with G-Sync, but I would like to know if there are any compatable emulators that work with the technology at all. I'm still dissapointed that RetroArch doesn't work 100% with it.

It's impossible in most cases to detect if a game running at 59.5hz is running at that speed or artificially sped up to 60hz. So you really can't tell if G-Sync is doing anything for you most of the time.

I haven't noticed any stuttering in any other emulators than RetroArch though.

Edit- I'm still getting microstutter for 60hz in emulated content. I've tested WonderSwan (75hz) and a PAL NES game, Super Turrican, and they ran buttery smooth, but NTSC Mega Man 1 had stutter. This is all on vanilla Mednafen BTW.

Obvious thing here, but never assume the stutter isn't there on the real system. Not all games run buttery smooth, even if you remember them that way (can't tell for sure about Mega Man, just saying).

It's been a long while since I've played Mega Man on real hardware, but it was never that choppy. What emulators besides RA do you use?

I don't actively use any emulators, but I tried these:

Dolphin
higan
MAME
Ootake
PCSX2
PPSSPP

I probably tried some PSX emulators and Kega Fusion too, but I'm not sure. RetroArch was the only one that really stuck out because it just would not work regardless of what I did.

I believe that OpenGL vs. DirectX doesn't matter for G-SYNC

Windowed OpenGL apps don't seem to work with G-Sync. Windowed DX apps do.

[Ed Oscuro]

I'll have to mess around with that some when I get the monitor in. I've looked around for references to any OpenGL limitations in windowed apps, nothing so far. Is there one program in particular that's breaking, or many?

[RdP]

I bought a GSync monitor but does not work! I tried Mame 0.106 and tearing remains. I also have to enable vsync?

[Guspaz]

I bought a GSync monitor but does not work! I tried Mame 0.106 and tearing remains. I also have to enable vsync?

Yes, gsync is just variable vsync.

EDIT: I'm wrong.

[Xyga]

I thought you typically had to not enable vsync in the emulator settings, and just enable g-sync in the gpu's control panel. (?)

[Guspaz]

I thought you typically had to not enable vsync in the emulator settings, and just enable g-sync in the gpu's control panel. (?)

You're correct, I'm wrong. Sorry.

[RdP]

I cannot get running GSync with Mame! What options should I use? Help!