Refresh rate switching for Retroarch on Xbox

RetroArch Microsoft consoles
#1

Hi,

I am using the UWP version of Retroarch 1.9.0 on Xbox One S and Xbox Series X and have it working fairly well however there is one stumbling block I’ve come across - I can’t seem to find any way to get it to auto-switch (or even manually switch) to 50hz refresh rate.

As a lot of the emulators I use like C64 and Amiga need to run at 50hz this is a problem. Some of the retro-arch cores seem to offer the option to automatically switch refresh rate (such as PUAE for Amiga) however this does nothing with the screen remaining at 60Hz.

Likewise I can’t find any retroarch global settings that actually have any effect on the xbox build. While not many apps use it, the Xbox One/Series S/X do actually support on the fly refresh rate switching under command of an application - so it’s possible in principle for this to work, but it looks like this is not currently implemented in the UWP build of Retroarch.

Does anyone know one way or the other if changing refresh rate will be possible one day ?

#2

Hmm, it’s certainly possible. Someone would have to figure out how to do it and then do it, though.

In the meantime, 50 Hz content should run at the proper speed, just with tearing (i.e., audio sync without video sync). If you would rather it run at 60 Hz (i.e., faster but without the tearing), you can increase the max timing skew threshold in settings > audio > synchronization until it syncs up (should be something like 0.15, I think).

#3

It currently runs with the Emulator running at 50Hz at correct speed with correct sound but with pretty major and ugly judder on any smooth scrolling effects - which Amiga and C64 demos and games are full of.

When you say tearing I assume you would be referring to disabling vsync as it is on by default and tearing would only be possible with it disabled.

I’m not sure what is worse though, tearing or judder.