G-Sync, is it worth the extra €200?

jc4517

Hey guys, just put a rough circa €1000 budget gaming build and I've come to the monitor.. Is it worth shelling out for a G-Sync monitor or is a standard 60Hz 1080p monitor fine? Build is:

Gigabyte GTX 970
i5 4460
ASRock H97 Pro4
8GB Crucial Ballistix RAM
be quiet! 500W PSU
Kingston 120GB SSD
1TB Seagate Barracuda
Nanoxia DS3

Totals to €899 on HW and put through geizhals..

Do you guys see anywhere I may be able to cut back in order to go for a g-sync monitor if it is worth it? I have a friend who swears by his and says he would never go back.
Cheers!

FAILSAFE 00

jc4517 wrote: »

Hey guys, just put a rough circa €1000 budget gaming build and I've come to the monitor.. Is it worth shelling out for a G-Sync monitor or is a standard 60Hz 1080p monitor fine? Build is:

Gigabyte GTX 970
i5 4460
ASRock H97 Pro4
8GB Crucial Ballistix RAM
be quiet! 500W PSU
Kingston 120GB SSD
1TB Seagate Barracuda
Nanoxia DS3

Totals to €899 on HW and put through geizhals..

Do you guys see anywhere I may be able to cut back in order to go for a g-sync monitor if it is worth it? I have a friend who swears by his and says he would never go back.
Cheers!

G-Sync is great. It's so smooth with no screen tearing.

You'll need a lot more than €200 to get a G-Sync monitor.

Serephucus

I think he means "Extra €200 over a comparable non-G-Sync monitor".

I haven't had the opportunity to try one personally (I'm waiting on a curved 21:9 29" VA for that) but if it were me, I would. It's up to you though.

Luck100

I just got my hands on a G-Sync monitor yesterday. The smoothness is amazing, and none of that nasty v-sync lag when you move the mouse. I think I would take a single 970 + G-Sync over 970 SLI and no G-sync.

Digital Solitude

Nice build mate, don't know much about monitors but dropping your case down, and picking up a second hand R9 290 will give similar performance and should allow €100 or so towards the monitor

jc4517

Digital Solitude wrote: »

Nice build mate, don't know much about monitors but dropping your case down, and picking up a second hand R9 290 will give similar performance and should allow €100 or so towards the monitor

Yeah a 290 off ebay or adverts could be a good call! I presume free sync and g sync are more or less identical in terms of performance?

ondafly

jc4517 wrote: »

Yeah a 290 off ebay or adverts could be a good call! I presume free sync and g sync are more or less identical in terms of performance?

Performance kind of similar but compatibility for nvidia on free sync or amd on gsync isn't currently possible.

Robert ninja

I'll just chime in as a 120Hz monitor user. Screen tearing is eliminated in most games at these uncapped refresh rates. Only a small handful of games I've played actually tear and it barely even bothers me. I don't think G-sync is worth spending a cent on, it's just one of those things you can kinda smile that you have IF it comes with what you were going to buy anyway... not a feature that should be the thing that makes you buy it in the first place and definitely you should consider other purchases if it's upping the cost. Lots of very good, reasonably priced displays on the market right now.

I'll also add another thing from my personal experience is that HDMI tears a lot more than dual link DVI. I don't even mind tearing that much but I know some people go crazy over it enough to actually turn on v-sync which just blows my mind with how much lag it introduces. Gsync is supposed to be the best of both worlds but it's not since it costs money and playing without v-sync costs no money to me and I'm largely tear-free.

FAILSAFE 00

Robert ninja wrote: »

I'll just chime in as a 120Hz monitor user. Screen tearing is eliminated in most games at these uncapped refresh rates. Only a small handful of games I've played actually tear and it barely even bothers me. I don't think G-sync is worth spending a cent on, it's just one of those things you can kinda smile that you have IF it comes with what you were going to buy anyway... not a feature that should be the thing that makes you buy it in the first place and definitely you should consider other purchases if it's upping the cost. Lots of very good, reasonably priced displays on the market right now.

I'll also add another thing from my personal experience is that HDMI tears a lot more than dual link DVI. I don't even mind tearing that much but I know some people go crazy over it enough to actually turn on v-sync which just blows my mind with how much lag it introduces. Gsync is supposed to be the best of both worlds but it's not since it costs money and playing without v-sync costs no money to me and I'm largely tear-free.

I am on the opposite side of this. I have 144hz G-Sync monitor and when I turn the G-Sync feature off I notice screen tearing and less smoothness. Tearing has always annoyed me with games.

The smoothness of G-Sync is fantastic. At the moment you pay a premium to enjoy it and you have to scarifice all the traditional ports such as HDMI and DVI in order to use it so it's not for everyone.

Blazer

Anyone that has got a flawless g-sync monitor raves about it and swears they'd never go back.
I'm very tempted to upgrade but waiting to see how Asus's IPS panel works out when it arrives soon.
The ROG Swift was getting great reviews but the Acer seems to have a lot of quality issues at the moment..so did the ROG in fairness but they're all ironed out now.
Looking at the thread on overclocks on the Acer you're advised to stay well away from it. I'l hold out for the Asus one when it arrives.

Luck100

The other thing you get with G-sync monitors is ULMB mode. It strobes the backlight which greatly enhances the sharpness of moving images - far beyond what you get at 120 Hz or 144 Hz without strobing. Check out the ufo test:

http://www.testufo.com/#test=framerates&count=1&background=none&pps=960

When I enable ULMB mode, I can clearly see each of the tiny white dots along the side of the spaceship. If it's too blurry, you can pause it from the "speed" selection box.

Here's another one:
http://www.testufo.com/#test=photo&photo=quebec.jpg&pps=960&pursuit=0&height=0
With ULMB turned on those pictures are just as sharp as when they are paused. It's like sliding a photograph along your desk while you follow it with your eyes - no blurring.

Robert ninja

FAILSAFE 00 wrote: »

I am on the opposite side of this. I have 144hz G-Sync monitor and when I turn the G-Sync feature off I notice screen tearing and less smoothness. Tearing has always annoyed me with games.

The smoothness of G-Sync is fantastic. At the moment you pay a premium to enjoy it and you have to scarifice all the traditional ports such as HDMI and DVI in order to use it so it's not for everyone.

I'm sure that's fine but for games that I play @120 I only play them at that when they're fully stable ie beyond 120. That's as smooth as it gets, really. Any drops are not seeable/feelable unless they go below 120 which so form of any-sync can help with. Although I know there's some CSGO players who can feel framedrops outside their Hz but that's a bit beyond my power level.

Luck100 wrote: »

The other thing you get with G-sync monitors is ULMB mode. It strobes the backlight which greatly enhances the sharpness of moving images - far beyond what you get at 120 Hz or 144 Hz without strobing. Check out the ufo test:

http://www.testufo.com/#test=framerates&count=1&background=none&pps=960

When I enable ULMB mode, I can clearly see each of the tiny white dots along the side of the spaceship. If it's too blurry, you can pause it from the "speed" selection box.

Here's another one:
http://www.testufo.com/#test=photo&photo=quebec.jpg&pps=960&pursuit=0&height=0
With ULMB turned on those pictures are just as sharp as when they are paused. It's like sliding a photograph along your desk while you follow it with your eyes - no blurring.

Yes, I'm using lightboost on this monitor which is capable of 3D. I think it's the 3D hardware that does the magic. I can see the UFO fairly smoothly. I never turn this strobe effect off, always v-sync off, no motion blur etc. Quite a brilliant experience. Hard to go back.

If you gave me €400 quid to spend again on a monitor I still wouldn't get a g/free-sync one. I'd go for one of those overclockable LED Korean monitors @ 1440p resolution. Good colours, over 1080p AND high refresh rates? Gimme that.

Luck100

Robert ninja wrote: »

Yes, I'm using lightboost on this monitor which is capable of 3D. I think it's the 3D hardware that does the magic. I can see the UFO fairly smoothly. I never turn this strobe effect off, always v-sync off, no motion blur etc. Quite a brilliant experience. Hard to go back.

If you gave me €400 quid to spend again on a monitor I still wouldn't get a g/free-sync one. I'd go for one of those overclockable LED Korean monitors @ 1440p resolution. Good colours, over 1080p AND high refresh rates? Gimme that.

Yes, Lightboost can be used for the same purpose as ULMB. The difference is that Lightboost was made to support 3D - using it for blur reduction is a hack which isn't supported by NVidia. ULMB is explicitly made and supported for blur reduction so you can rely on it working under new drivers, Windows 10, etc. From what I've read at blurbusters ULMB also works better (brighter than Lightboost and colors don't degrade). I can certainly say that when I enable ULMB on my monitor it's plenty bright enough to use in the daytime with normal room lighting.

Of course, there is a significant price premium for G-sync at the moment. You clearly do get significant features for that extra money, but obviously it's a personal decision as to whether it's worth the cost. No doubt the prices will come down in the next couple of years, much like 3D-capable monitors did in the past.

Robert ninja

^ Good info. But yep, I'm not making an outright jab at g-sync or ULMB, I'm just saying they're a premium price and there's much better aspects of a display and monitors on the market these days that will give you way more value for your €.

You're right that using it for blur reduction is a hack but I don't see that as a way to put it down. Downsampling used to be a hack, too and now that's natively supported. The consumers always know what they want and how to use whatever hardware/software is available to achieve that. The corporations don't even catch on to that until the 'hacks' become widespread enough that you hear them pretty much anytime you bring up the product, then they realise "Oh this is why people buy this from us, we should probably market that feature now."

I think I might be done paying premium for displays like I did with this one, though, especially if they're TN panels. In fact, if HMDs take off and they're really good, I may sell this monitor and double down on a Korean OC'able 1440p LED/PLS/IPS display and one HMD. Good HMDs will naturally have high refresh rates and blur reduction and I'm interested in the virtualisation of displays rather than actually buying and plugging up multiple displays for different purposes... the electricity bill! :pac:

jc4517

Aware that I'm steering the topic away from it's original intentions.. But could I get a few recommendations on monitors under say €150 that I could add on to my build, should be ordering it in the next few days off Amazon or overclockers (still deciding which is cheaper) and my budget is beginning to stretch.. G-sync is far off in the distant future for me at the moment

Robert ninja

^ What is the monitor for?

jc4517

Gaming with a gtx 970, mostly AAA titles so graphically demanding stuff

Digital Solitude

BenQ 2450 is supposed to be a middling 1080p screen, should fit your budget

moc moc a moc

Depends on what's powering it, but if you're sticking with 60Hz 1080p on a 970 I wouldn't bother. G-Sync would be more useful at 1440p or 4K where a 970 will have framerates (or dips) below 60fps.

Digital Solitude

moc moc a moc wrote: »

Depends on what's powering it, but if you're sticking with 60Hz 1080p on a 970 I wouldn't bother. G-Sync would be more useful at 1440p or 4K where a 970 will have framerates (or dips) below 30fps.

Fixed