What Res is Least Taxing?

[ipodlover77]

What scaled res is the least taxing? Or is it all the same? Trying to lessen the frame drops as much as possible.

 

[Wallabe]

The default one. It doesn't have to downscale or upscale anything.

 

[Queen6]

The default one. It doesn't have to downscale or upscale anything.

It does on the 12" Retina MacBook, equally the impact is very less these days across the available scaled resolutions. Easiest on the GPU technical would be one resolution down from default 1152 by 720 HIDPI as the display`s native resolution is 2304 by 1440. I run my own Retina MacBook scaled at 1440 by 900 HiDPI, without issue.

Q-6

 

[MyopicPaideia]

It does on the 12" Retina MacBook, equally the impact is very less these days across the available scaled resolutions. Easiest on the GPU technical would be one resolution down from default 1152 by 720 HIDPI as the display`s native resolution is 2304 by 1440. I run my own Retina MacBook scaled at 1440 by 900 HiDPI, without issue.

Q-6

Exactly correct. The least taxing is the x2 HiDPI 1152x720, or the "larger text" option in display settings. Everything else that is available as an option in display settings (and those up to around 1680x1050 using third party apps) will be more taxing, but ultimately to a nearly identical degree, and not something that will be readily apparent or even noticeable for the most part. This is because the "off screen" scaling calculations aren't significant enough to make much of a difference. (the super high res calculations aren't actually "drawn", hence the term "off screen." So, unlike what a lot of people here seem to believe, these higher resolutions aren't "pushing" 4K UHD pixels at a scaled resolution of 1920x1200 for example.) It is only when you start actually drawing those higher number of pixels on a larger external display that you start to see proper, noticeable degradation in performance.

A lot of these are placebo effect it seems like. People expect it to perform less, so they see it.

 

[shenan1982]

What scaled res is the least taxing? Or is it all the same? Trying to lessen the frame drops as much as possible.

Definitely 640x480 256 color LOL... eyes rolling.

 

[Laserducky]

Definitely 640x480 256 color LOL... eyes rolling.

Very helpful comment for sure !

 

[Alex Meek]

Windowed mode used to be noticeably slower quite a ways back in the day, but for a while now they solved the issues of full-acceleration without having to monopolize the display. It's negligible in pretty much every game I run and I'm a few generations behind hardware-wise.

Resolution and effects settings will dominate the performance facto

 

[xmichaelp]

Exactly correct. The least taxing is the x2 HiDPI 1152x720, or the "larger text" option in display settings. Everything else that is available as an option in display settings (and those up to around 1680x1050 using third party apps) will be more taxing, but ultimately to a nearly identical degree, and not something that will be readily apparent or even noticeable for the most part. This is because the "off screen" scaling calculations aren't significant enough to make much of a difference. (the super high res calculations aren't actually "drawn", hence the term "off screen." So, unlike what a lot of people here seem to believe, these higher resolutions aren't "pushing" 4K UHD pixels at a scaled resolution of 1920x1200 for example.) It is only when you start actually drawing those higher number of pixels on a larger external display that you start to see proper, noticeable degradation in performance.

A lot of these are placebo effect it seems like. People expect it to perform less, so they see it.

I'm pretty sure it actually is pushing all those pixel in scaled resolutions. Just because the screen scales it down to the lower resolution of the screen doesn't mean the hardware doesn't have to push it.