re: PC Discussion - Gaming, Performance and Enthusiasts

Gateway mod...

I just got in two motherboards I forgot I ordered. They are refurbs but they were on sale for $30 the other day. Anyone need one?

LINK

Yes, I use Lastpass, and I am dangerously reliant on it (as in, there are some passwords I know I have forgotten, and in fact, I'm 100% sure of my lastpass password anymore.)

si

And it begins:

Acer's $500 AMD FreeSync monitor drastically undercuts Nvidia G-Sync pricing

Another thing I learned from that article -- Acer's 1440P g-sync IPS is actually $800. https://us.acer.com/ac/en/US/content/model/UM.HB0AA.001

It's definitely evidence that ASUS was probably overcharging by a couple hundred bucks since they were the only 1440p gsync in town.

More reading material: Nvidia Explains Why Their G-Sync Display Tech Is Superior To AMD's FreeSync

It has some weasel-wording. At times, Peterson is essentially saying "G-sync is implemented in this way. AMD doesn't do that," and go on to state all of g-sync's capabilities, not explicitly stating but expecting readers to infer that because they do something a certain way, they're unique in X capability. (I do this kind of writing for a living).

They do point out the ghosting issue with Freesync, and it's been observed in a couple of freesync reviews. Apparently Freesync (or Adaptive-Sync/variable refresh in general) does have a refresh rate "sweet spot." NVIDIA actually released a new gsync demo for reviewers to use on freesync monitors, which purposely demonstrates what happens when refresh rate exit that sweet spot. Flickering at the low end, and heavy ghosting at the high end, or Freesync totally stops working or something. Not clear on that, need to read more. Ghosting video

PCPer says the sweet spot range varies depending on monitor model. The LG panel had a very narrow window of 26Hz, while the ACER and BenQ had a 104Hz range. The PCWorld article mentioned they saw ghosting on the Acer IPS, but didn't see any on the LG 34UM67 (The video link above does show ghosting on it, though). Depends on the quality of the panel, according to AMD.

Supposedly, the g-sync module prevents this ghosting because it's "tuned for each display to prevent ghosting by change the amount of voltage going to pixels at different refresh rates, allowing pixels to untwist and retwist at different rates."

A 26hz window is not good unless you are in total control of your frame rate (i.e., capped frame rate, and settings low enough that you don't dip too much in more intense scenes). A 104hz window is not bad at all though. I can't think of any game, even an ubisoft abortion, where my frame rate varied by that much. Of course, you still have to cap your frame rate and keep your settings low enough that it won't fall below the threshold, but this won't be a problem for anyone who'd even consider buying one of these.

So, assuming the biggest caveat of freesync is that it shits the bed outside of a specific refresh rate window, it's definitely worth considering the right panel. It's pretty typical of AMD's "openness," where YMMV depending on the accompanying hardware. (For example, crossfire performance can vary greatly depending on chipset/mobo, whereas NVidia has certain specific requirements, therefore more controlled and consistent, for their SLI technology.)

I'm hoping the competition will eliminate my indecision, but it sounds like NVIDIA is positioning themselves to keep overcharging for gsync.

I will wait for better reviews. PCPer's was not thorough enough. They're being accused of being NVidia shills/fanboys/etc, but I think more than likely they simply did an inept review. There are some extremely enlightening comments to the PCPer article, though: PCPer review

So anyway, TL;DR -- Some initial articles and a rushed review seem to indicate Freesync has some limitations that g-sync doesn't have, but if you buy the right panel and are reasonable with your in-game settings so that your frame rate isn't all over the place, the issues with freesync will be invisible to you.

For me, the deciding factor may end up being which technology handles multi-GPU better.

So I am doing an HTPC build and wanted to get yalls opinion. I'll be running the full Openelec/Kodi setup but I also want to be able to do some gaming and get some emulators.

AMD Athlon 5350 APU 2.05Ghz
ASRock Mobo micro AM1H-ITX
Cruz Ballistix 4GB RAM
Minibox M350 Case
ADATA 128GB SSD

Mainly just for emulators. I have my normal rig but the wife likes playing old school NES type games.

eh I said frick it and I am just gonna sideload Kodi onto a firetv

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And it begins:

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If I had to bet, once more and more Freesync monitors become available, we will see the pricing level out and be almost identical between the two technologies.

In the article, you see what Peterson said about pricing. They are going to keep it as high as people are willing to pay. I bet he chuckled when the reporter asked about the $200 price of the G-sync module. You and I both know that damn module probably costs $1.50 from China. That $200 module is just pure profit for nvidia. They can lower that buy in price any time they get ready to and will if they feel threatened by Freesync.

And...I went and bought one of the damn overpriced things anyway. And I love it...



But yeah, there are a lot of new Gsync/Freesync monitors hitting the market and it makes sense to wait it out. The price on the particular monitor I bought dropped by $100 already.
I am satisfied though, it does everything I wanted it to do and does it very well. If I had waited though, I could have gotten more bang for my buck. As is always the case with new technology. If you want to be the first kid on the block to have that new toy, you are gonna pay more for it.

If I had it to do over again, I would probably end up with the same monitor again.