Testing your input lag

[evilsofa]

Kaori posted this interesting link in the u2711 megathread:

http://www.humanbenchmark.com/tests/reactiontime/index.php

The page notes that the average times collected so far average to 215ms.

I have two NEC 20WMGX2 monitors - one on a Mac Mini with a Microsoft USB mouse and the other on a Win 7 PC with a Logitech G9 mouse. On both, I did indeed average in the 220 to 225 range; on the Mac Mini, the best I did was 190ms and on the PC the best I did was 180ms, a negligible difference I attribute to luck.

The point of this post is to stir up an argument about whether monitor input lag of 40ms or less matters when human input lag is that high. But I wonder if monitor input lag figures into this test the way I would assume it does?

 

[gmohr]

Yes, monitor lag figures in, as the test is simply computing the difference between when the software says "Green" and the receipt of your mouse click. This is evidenced by the fact that my tests on my CRT vs my IPS panel show a 36ms (16% ) additional delay in response time (225 vs 261). Is 16% more delay relevant to you, that's the question...

 

[SJetski71]

The point of this post is to stir up an argument about whether monitor input lag of 40ms or less matters when human input lag is that high.

No argument necessary, It matters because all lag adds together to produce a potential mess.

Human Lag --> mouse lag (up to 8ms) --> video card related lag ---> monitor/display lag ---> internet lag

Like i said, all of those numbers get added together. So it's in our interest to reduce it where we can, which means lowering the mouse polling rate till it reaches 1-2ms, purchasing a display with lower lag, and gaming on servers with low ping.

Otherwise my headshot will hit you first, because i saw you first and got the chance to react first, assuming our skills and reaction speeds are equal of course. There is no ifs, ands or buts, a faster display is an advantage.

 

[evilsofa]

I ran through the test again, got as low as 181ms and averaged 207 over 20 tries. I felt more dialed in on this run. In another run, I even got a 61ms time from a lucky twitch, but I'm not going to pretend I can consistently do under 190ms.

I think the human element of "tired" versus "not tired" adds too much variance to the score for a 20% difference to be meaningful. 20% of 200ms would be 40ms, so I don't think that monitors within 40ms of each other are going to have any detectable impact on any but hardcore professional FPS players.

 

[SJetski71]

so I don't think that monitors within 40ms of each other are going to have any detectable impact on any but hardcore professional FPS players.

Or us regular joes who have played the same game hundreds of times, and know what to expect. <-- many of us fall into this category.

I notice it all the time in the various monitors around my home (i game old school FPS games a lot on 3 different rigs). On my CRT i'm invincible, on my decent LCDTV i'm excellent/above average, on another high lag TV i'm very mediocre.