Framerate locks at 30 FPS when a video is fullscreened on second monitor.

So I've had this problem for a while now with Path of Exile (and no other game, mind you) where if I have a fullscreened video (Youtube or twitch stream are both affected) on my second monitor, my framerate in Path of Exile gets stuck at 30 frames per second. This happened both on my current computer and my old one, which have vastly different setups. I have absolutely no idea why this is happening, but I suspect it's got something to do with Youtube and twitch only displaying videos at 30 frames per second, and that somehow causes PoE to get into a fit and limit itself to 30 frames as well.

For your information my current setup is:

Asus Rampage IV Extreme
Intel i7 3930K
Nvidia GeForce GTX 680 4 GB
16GB RAM

Any solutions would be appreciated!

Could you let me know if you have v-sync enabled in PoE, and if you are using windowed, fullscreen or windowed fullscreen?

Sorry for the late reply.

I am using Vsync, as well as Windowed Fullscreen mode. I tend to tab in and out a ton so this mode fits me the best.

Edit: The problem doesn't seem to occur in Fullscreen mode, and if I disable Vsync I get Around 130 FPS, so it seems like its VSync causing the problem somehow.

Bump.

Also figured I might mention that I'm running Google Chrome as my browser, with the latest update to both the browser and Flash/Shockwave Player. I haven't tried with other browsers as I don't really use them at all.

The vsync is definitely what is causing this, but its not a bug - it's actually how vsync works. In a very basic sense what vsync does is limit your FPS to the refresh rate of your monitor. These days vsync is a little bit more complicated, as there are alternate methods to improve the outputted image. These newer methods have a downside however, which is that when the application cannot maintain the required 60 FPS to keep up with the refresh rate it limits it to a lower multiple which in this case is 30 FPS.

I would strongly recommend reading this post: http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=928593 as it goes into a lot of detail regarding what you are experiencing.

I read through the post you linked me to, but it doesn't describe the problem I'm having, as I never get below 80 FPS without vsync on, which means that vsync should never cut my framerate, and it doesn't normally. It only ever cuts my framerate in half when I'm playing a video on my second monitor in fullscreen.

I assume that this is caused by the fact that the video itself is limited to 30 frames per second, and your game's vsync somehow gets confused by the second monitor showing a fullscreen application limited at 30 FPS and subsequently limits Path of Exile's frames to 30 as well.

Again, if I'm not running a fullscreen video on the second monitor, I'm getting a stable 60 FPS with vsync enabled, when i press F1 it sometimes shows 61 or 59 FPS but it doesn't drop to the 30 frames the post you linked to described.

I'd also like to reiterate that it is ONLY Path of Exile I have this problem with. None of the other 20-odd games I have installed have this problem with vsync.

You're making a great game, and I appreciate it, but this problem IS annoying and it to some degree saps my enjoyment of the game by killing my framerate.

i`ve got the same problem over here, after like 5mins when I do not touch my mouse, watching a video my screen lags out and its at like 20fps (The movie). But when I restart my Pc its totally gone.

I apoligize for necro'ing this thread. I'm having this problem ATM.

First off my specs:



My setup includes a 1080p 144hz monitor connected via DVI to my dedicated GPU, and a 1280x1024 60hz monitor connected via VGA to my CPU's integrated GPU.

While operating in Windowed Fullscreen with POE on the GPU display, the FPS in game will be limited to 24fps with vsync on. Turning off Vsync unlocks the FPS (obviously) however this change is not actually reflected in the game. The FPS counter says the framerate being passed on is ~300-400fps, however the actual framerate it's displaying is still around 30.

Going fullscreen this no longer becomes an issue.

This issue I believe is not with POE, and rather is an issue with the way windows handles multiple displays at different refresh rates on one workspace. I have not found a workaround, but I'll keep looking for a solution.