Stable frametime on Retroarch?

General Games
#16

I’ve played Day of the Tentacle on the ScummVM core this week. Both on a debian based distro with x11 on a 4K display at 60Hz and on an arch distro with wayland, QHD display at 140Hz with Freesync. And I had to cap the framerate to 25 or 30 in the ScummVM core options, video section, to avoid stutters when using shaders.

Which is not a problem at all, because those games were running often below that on real hardware. And the shader on top was running at the refresh rate set in the RA settings, with noise and hum bar effects moving smoothly, despite the frame cap in the core itself.

Oh and I also played some PSX games running at barely 20FPS, I think about good ol’ Armored Core, but that also seems on par with the real deal from what I remember. Which makes me think you may want to test and tweak some overclock settings in the core options to get more stable frametime depending on the game maybe? Or in the case of the PS2 core see if there’s a patch that could be applied?

I think there’s no one size fits all.

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#17

It definitely would.

On my 60Hz displays or on any display when the desktop resolution was set to 60Hz, I limited my frame rate to 60fps.

As stated above, when using VRR/Sync To Content Refresh Rate and using a desktop refresh rate set to any refresh rate 60Hz or higher, I limit my frame rate in RetroArch to 60fps.

I’m not saying or suggesting that anyone else should, though. I’m just stating what works for me.

#18

SNES reports 60.1 refresh rate, dosbox can go up to 70hz, so capping is not recommended

#19

Try with Rolling Thunder arcade, that goes beyond 60 hz. I do not cap Retroarch but do use VRR, and everything runs butter smooth here.

#20

Are you monitoring your frame time? Uncapped 120hz gives me unstable frame time even if FPS might look like a stable 60fps in monitoring. The only way I am able to get absolute stability in frame time is capping RA to 60 FPS in Rivatuner and setting 60 in output settings, I can also keep auto frame delay on.

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#21

What’s preventing someone from setting their cap to 60.1 or 61fps or 70fps? Also, if someone has a 60Hz display its only going to go up to the max it can handle regardless which may or may not be exactly 60.000Hz.

#22

Remember Auto Frame Delay is not required nor recommended if using VRR/GSYNC/FREESYNC/Sync To Content Refresh Rate.

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#23

it would be better if Retroarch supported internal frame cap for non-vrr monitors and saved it in individual core override options

but really, this is more useful for 3d games in vrr. Or else one is also forced to switch the refresh rate in monitor settings.

#24

Hey, late reply, I know, but I tried limiting my FPS in NVCP to 3 fps below my refresh rate on my new TV (120 hz) to 117.

This results in my games in retroarch to play at 57/58 fps instead of 60, which introduces all the issues I previously described.

So it really seems that limiting the fps is a bad idea in general with emulators. Unless I’m still doing something wrong.

#25

Why not set the limit to 120fps then? Or 60 or 61fps? Can’t you adjust the limit depending on what you’re running? Limiting frames isn’t only about getting the lowest possible latency by not being V-Sync’d. Some users simply use frame Limiters as a means of ensuring the best possible consistency, the smoothest possible gaming experience and keeping their GPU’s thermal performance and available headroom in check.

Well if that happens, no one is forcing you to play that way or leave it like that.

I don’t agree with that conclusion and I have no issues whatsoever regarding latency or frame pacing. What you might be doing wrong is trying to set a global limit for playing variable framerate PC games at the lowest latency possible and using that same philosophy for fixed framerate games running on an emulator.

Sometimes you need to adjust your settings to fit different scenarios. I’m not telling you how to use your machine or set things up. I am just sharing what works and has worked for me for years. Your mileage may vary but why make blanket and concrete sounding statements on the topic as if everyone is supposed to do things the same way?

In Nvidia control panel and the Nvidia App you can setup profiles for different apps. You can also do that using RTSS.

Some have discouraged the use of frame limiters in RetroArch due to RetroArch having its own frame pacing mechanisms while others have criticized the frame pacing in RetroArch or lack thereof.

I use what works for me and I’m happy with my experience. You now have enough information to choose how you want to go about your own setup.

#26

Thx for the detailled reply @Cyber . I get that I need different solutions for different scenarios. That’s what I’ve been doing all along. I was just asking out of curiosity, because I’m not very knowledgeable about these things.

To recap, OP stzarted this thread saying:

“Hi folks, here are my settings regarding video in RA. I have an LG CX which is 120hz with VRR, I have capped it to 117 with Rivatuner as advised in various places for GSynch to perform best with my RTX 3070ti.(VSync is disabled in the NVidia app)”

That led me to write:

“I thought you were never ever supposed to hard cap the framerate for emulation. Whenever I tried this, the game would feel slowed down and choppy. […] Why would anyone cap max frame rate to 3 fps below max for emulation?”

To which you replied:

“I don’t see a problem once it’s at or above the framerate of the content or at or below the refresh rate of the display.”

This led me to believe that if I had a display that went above 60hz (which I now have) I could limit the max fps to 117 (like OP suggested), and not get the slowdowns in Retroarch.

But I’ve just confirmed that the slowdowns still happen, and I don’t see why they wouldn’t happen to OP as well.

So my original question still stands: Why would anyone cap their max frame rate for emulators like retroarch that seem to depend on an uncapped frame rate to run properly?

#27

RetroArch doesn’t depend on an uncapped frame rate to run properly.

Most Retro games that were designed to run on CRT TVs run at or near 60fps. Setting an fps limit above that shouldn’t cause it to not work properly but you would lose any benefits of capping your framerate at the content fps would provide.

If using subframes for things like BFI or CRT Beam Simulator then you shouldn’t set a frame limit below the 120fps that it requires to work.

It’s very possible that you and the OP have been other settings which are the issue.

I posted my settings already but it is imperative to click on the “Set Display Reported Refresh Rate”.

#28

@Cyber You say “RetroArch doesn’t depend on an uncapped frame rate to run properly.”

Then there is something fundamental that I don’t understand. Let me give a concrete example of what’s happening on my end:

If I start Mario Kart 64 with the mupen core and leave the NVCP frame limiter disabled, I get the game running normal at full speed. Retroarch reports 60fps once the game is launched.

Now let’s say I limit the the max fps in NVCP to 60 fps:

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This will make Mario Kart 64 run at half speed. Retroarch reports 30fps.

So on my end, limiting the fps globally even by 1 frame below the refresh rate, will cause slowdonws in Retroarch. If I limit it to 60 fps (half my refresh rate) I will get the game running at half speed.

Does Retroarch behave differently for you?

Could you take a look at my settings and tell me if there is something wrong, please?

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#29

Okay, I’m seeing some potential issues here:

I would disable Background Application Max Frame Rate if I were you, at least temporarily.

Same goes for Low Latency Mode. I don’t have that setting in my nVidia Control Panel but I know some of those “recent” latency reducing techniques discard frames which wouldn’t otherwise be seen by the user and stuff like that. So they interfere with frame pacing and are more geared towards variable frame rate PC games and not fixed frame rate games, where you want each and every frame to be presented and seen.

In RetroArch, VSync Swap Interval should be set to either Auto or 2 when running 60Hz content with the display refresh rate at 120Hz. Definitely not 1. Auto should be the safe bet.

If you’re after better latency, you can try lowering your Max Swapchain Images from 3 to 2.

I temporarily disabled RTSS frame limiter and tested the Nvidia frame limiter and both worked fine.

I had previously posted my settings but in case you missed them. Here they are:

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#30

If you set the frame limit below 60, RetroArch’s vsync is going to drop it down to 30 FPS, yes, because it will miss every other swap.

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#31

Thank you for your suggestions. I found the problem.

Turns out when Low Latency Mode in NVCP is set to “Ultra”, the issue I described occurs (“On” is fine).

Now I can set the global fps to 117 and don’t get slowdowns. However, I’m too inexperienced to tell why this is happening or which setting I should choose.

Should I leave global max frame rate at 120 fps / uncapped and leave Low Latency Mode on Ultra or should I disable Ultra and set global max frame rate at 117 fps? What would you suggest?

Also, I saw that you enabled adaptive Vsync in your settings. What does that do? I believe I read somewhere, that adaptive Vsync should not be used with Gsync. Don’t know why, though.

EDIT:

Limiting max frame rate to 120 fps (not uncapped) and leaving Low Latency Mode on Ultra also works.

Again don’t know why, don’t know what is the best setting. Setting up Gsync is really complicated when it comes to PC games. It’s even more complicated when emulators are involved.

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#32

Great! I’m glad you sorted that out. Hopefully the OP can get their issues sorted out as well.

There are application profiles in NVCP and the Nvidia App. You can use them to set what’s optimal for specific scenarios like RetroArch.

It’s supposed to do what it says in the subtext - Disable VSync when the framerate can’t keep up with the refresh rate to avoid normal VSync behaviour, which is to drop it to half the framerate.

I suppose you’re right in that it might be redundant when using GSync. I’ve had no issues with it on though. I use VSync more so that games can run at their native refresh rates (Sync to content refresh rate) and to get better latency and not having to use frame delay because the frames are supposed to be immediately ready for presentation or something like that.

I’m not really thinking of using it to avoid large quantization drops to half the framerate as one who is playing variable framerate games would.

In my experience enabling GSync doesn’t completely eliminate tearing 100% of the time but VSync does this.

#33

But what IS the optimal setting for Retroarch? LLM off and max frame rate cap to 117?

I found this forum post, which suggests that if the hardware is strong enough to run the game reaching the frame cap, LLM off is better. For other scenarios LLM Ultra is better. At least that’s what I think I understood. Since retroarch will in most cases reach the frame cap, LLM off should be better: https://forums.blurbusters.com/viewtopic.php?t=13642

But I think I could just leave LLM on Ultra and cap the frame rate at 120 fps, since that’s what works right now.

#34

Stop confusing yourself and obsessing over low latency. In the past decade, I’ve seen year after year techniques for reducing latency and I personally am not a competitive gamer and I think most of them suck.

I don’t even care that GSync allows you to dip below 60fps while keeping things smooth. Give me all 60 of my frames every second please. I value consistency and in general 60fps is fine for me. I don’t want to spoil myself by getting hooked on 120Hz/fps+ then not be able to go back and have to keep spending more and more chasing my tail.

If you read over everything I posted over the last couple days you’ll see that I’ve posted my settings which I think are optimal for me in RetroArch. I already commented on your settings, including Ultra Low Latency Mode. So you can take all of that and make a profile with recommended settings in NVCP for RetroArch.

You can leave the ULL stuff in the global settings for variable framerate PC gaming.

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#35

For Retroarch there is no need for frame limit. This is mostly for 3D games running above 60 fps. On Nvidia settings I have:

Max Frame Rate: off

Preferred Refresh Rate: application controlled

Vertical Sync: use 3d application setting

So Retroarch display the proper monitor refresh rate (100 in my case instead of 97)