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Comment by boyter | Hacker News Reader

I thought I was in 2... till I actually got a 120Hz screen. Since I flip between my desktop at 120Hz and Macbook Air M1 at 60Hz frequently I discovered I really notice.

Its always so much nicer when I leave the Air. Everything is so much smoother.

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John Linneman from Digital Foundry made a great point about refresh rates (or framerates in his context). Lower refresh rates generally is perceived as way worse when you often switch around between high and low refresh rates. Case in point if you change from 60hz to 120hz and move your mouse etc. you will definitely feel that its way smoother, and 60hz would feel extremely sluggish. But if you just stuck with the 60hz for a while eventually you will perceive it as smooth again. They use the example of 30fps seemingly feeling very bad when you keep switching between Quality and Performance mode on console games, but 30fps is actually okay for many instances. Of course 60fps will feel smoother no matter what, but the point is is that the difference is heightened when you switch back and forth.

Same difference between 30 and 60hz I imagine. Feels like you go from mega choppy to smooth as butter.

A variable rate between 30-60 is absolutely worse than consistent 30fps.

If you display those frames on a 60Hz screen, it's an awful effect. If the screen natively supports variable frame times, there's a lot more upside and a lot less downside.

I get used to 60 pretty quickly, but I really notice it when I move back.

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