Monitor Refresh Rates and Video/Game Frame Rates: How Do They Affect Eachother?

[bigsilly]

Hi!

I have a monitor, and its maximum refresh rate is 60(khz?)

Now because my monitor is not an interlaced display (like a TV or some HDTV's), that must mean that it's a progressive display, right?

So - then does that mean that, on my computer screen, the maximum that can be displayed in terms of frame rates is 60 fps? And anything over that will cause tearing, and result in no appreciable increase in smoothness?

What about if I'm watching 24p material? or what about some arbitrary frame rate, like 10 or 15 or 48? Does anything under 60 still "match up" temporally, or is there some inaccuracy introduced by the refresh rate? For example, there are HDTV's that support 29/30 frames-per-second progressive video (NTSC), but must use special processing in order to play back 24p video. Is it the same with my computer, and there's some kind of unavoidable inaccuracy, or is there something different about the monitor that allows it to play back a wider range of formats at their true native speed, with no conversions?

Thanks!

 

[Davros]

your talking about a crt ?
a pc will send a new frame to the crt 60 times a sec (obviously most of the time it will be sending an identical frame) + your crt will refresh the screen 60 times a sec (with vsync on)

 

[swaaye]

Without Vsync, tearing can occur at any framerate. With Vsync at 60 Hz, there will be no tearing but you are limited to 60 fps, yes. Also, with vsync, if you don't have the option to use (or force) triple buffering, you will get stuck at various fractions of the refresh rate if the video card can't manage >= 60 fps. 55 fps becomes 30 fps. 25 fps becomes 15 or 20. It's a very annoying issue that.

And, yes, progressive means no-interlacing.

 

[bigsilly]

So what about playing progressive material on a computer monitor?
No matter what the progressive frame-rate is, will it always be accurately timed?
I ask because even HDTV's that support progressive still must exercise additional processing of 24p material in order to have it timed correctly.