That is a very powerful recreation stat it’s best to care about

Amongst all the sport stats that I monitor, the Body Time Graph is the one which I hold going again to time and time once more to effective tune my efficiency. Right here’s why that’s…

The significance of body time

The Body Time Graph is a measurement of the period of time it takes for a single body to be rendered on display. You’ll be able to entry it in most body charge counters — like MSI Afterburner — however there are additionally specialist frame-time seize instruments like CapFrame X focusing on capturing and analyzing body time.

These apps are helpful for recording, analyzing, and evaluating Body Time Graphs for various video games and for various {hardware} configurations so to gauge how your PC ought to carry out. Certainly, there’s lots you possibly can surmise concerning the Body Time Graphs of two completely different graphics playing cards operating the identical recreation. However what’s body time anyway, and why must you care?

It’s vital to notice how body time differs from body charge. Whereas the body charge signifies what number of frames are proven on display per second, the body time measures the time interval between every of these frames.

A graph of this information, subsequently, provides a visible illustration of the time between frames over time. This tells us how properly a PC produces frames at a constant tempo.

The FPS remains to be an vital metric that I have a look at, and will all the time be included if you’re analyzing body time, however it doesn’t give me the identical form of details about pacing. In a nutshell, body charge is a gauge of efficiency, whereas the body time tells me extra concerning the expertise of taking part in the sport — which is what actually counts.

For instance, in a recreation during which my PC is producing a mean 60 FPS, an excellent body time is 16.6 milliseconds between frames (1/sixtieth of a second), which suggests the gameplay will probably be easy and stutter free.

If I see that rising to longer body occasions, say spikes of 52 milliseconds per body midway right into a map, it often means there’s stuttering and choppiness. That’s regardless of the typical FPS being fairly good.

How I learn the Body Time Graph

Studying the Body Time Graph is straightforward. The vertical axis reveals the body time (in ms) whereas the horizontal axis signifies the body quantity or recording time.

What I ideally wish to see is as near a flat line as potential. After I say flat, it’s regular for there to be some variation in body time, resembling if you’re on the transfer from location to location in a first-person shooter — you simply don’t wish to see large spikes that final a very long time.

If I see large spikes within the body occasions, then there’s an issue that I want to analyze. Stutter and choppiness are the toughest issues to place up with whereas gaming, even worse than low FPS.

Actually, if I had to decide on between gaming with a fast FPS that slowed down intermittently, or a slower FPS that stayed constant all through my recreation, I’d select the slower FPS any day. Why? As a result of the mind simply isn’t wired to take care of fixed interruptions even when they’re simply milliseconds transient.

It’s the identical motive you possibly can fortunately watch a black and white Charlie Chaplin film operating at a lowly 15 FPS (which appears so sluggish by our present cinematic customary of 24 FPS) so long as it performs at a constant 15 FPS. But when it have been to all of a sudden spike or drop FPS midway via, watching it could develop into insufferable.

What to do for those who discover a problem

My purpose as soon as I’ve found spikes within the Body Time Graph is to make body time extra constant once more. To try this I take a look at different key stats like my CPU’s core and GPU utilization to pinpoint precisely the place the issue lies.

Then I’ll troubleshoot settings and tweak issues like my decision, OS settings, or else my {hardware} settings in response. It will usually resolve or no less than ameliorate the issue. I’ll additionally do issues like examine that I’ve the proper video drivers and/or the required Nvidia software program loaded.

The sweetness about monitoring a Body Time Graph is that if I watch it carefully, I can inform precisely what particular elements of my recreation I used to be in when the spike occurred. Typically that may permit me to discover a fast repair.

For instance, if it occurred in part of the sport that required intensive rendering, all that could be wanted is a change to the feel or shadow settings within the recreation menu.

If my settings tweaks fail to make a distinction, although, it may imply that my {hardware} is simply too underpowered for the sport. Then once more, if my PC meets the developer’s really useful {hardware} specs (or above) it’s often the sport accountable, in that it’s poorly coded.

This can be a explanation for body time issues extra usually than it needs to be. We noticed this with the video games Gotham Knights and Elden Ring, each of which had shader compilation issues that resulted in body time inconsistencies and stuttering.

If it’s the latter, sadly there’s not lots you are able to do about it, bar placing a restrict on the body charge to attempt to optimize the body pacing. Or else you possibly can politely ask the developer to look into it and supply a patch or an replace that can repair the issue.

Most builders will attempt to resolve any points like this, so for those who do establish points, it’s all the time worthwhile letting them know.

Additional studying: Fullscreen vs. borderless? Why I finished tripping on the gaming mode query