Comment on How are 144hz screen possible?
skullgiver@popplesburger.hilciferous.nl 1 year ago
The 60 rule is actually based on a 59.97 rule and it’s not really a rule, just a standard that stuck around. What’s better than 60? Two times 60! What’s better than two times 60? Four times sixty!
With VRR you can run certain screens that get sold right now at exactly 91.3 fps if you want, it’s just extremely unpractical.
CRT monitors actually used to run at higher refresh rates (120Hz CRTs came way before anything close to flat panels were introduced) but the shitty limitations of the first ten years of flat panels changed the way displays were used and marketed.
MeanEYE@lemmy.world 1 year ago
It’s not by chance 60fps. It was chosen because power grid in USA is 60Hz, so it was easy and cheap way to synchronize frames without having additional timing hardware. As for 59.97, that was a 0.1% slowdown introduced when color TV was added to prevent cross-talk in chroma channels. Weird solution but it worked out fine. Today there’s no reason for sync anything with power grid but 60 is still a very convenient number as it’s easily divisible by many others.
skullgiver@popplesburger.hilciferous.nl 1 year ago
Of course, and that’s why European Youtubers will sometimes upload video in 4k@50fps (because the grid frequency in Europe is 50Hz instead, and that’s what a lot of cameras are configured for to prevent banding).
Syncing with the power grid is one of those great ideas that lead to some very silly side effects, like that time the grid frequency in Europe sagged for a while and everyone’s alarm clocks started drifting. Grid operators increased the frequency slightly over the following months to correct the clocks as well, so if you adjusted your alarm clock you’d need to adjust it again!
MeanEYE@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I thought modern cameras compensate for that. Apparently not.
Overzeetop@kbin.social 1 year ago
Funny effect, though - many cheap electronics (think coffee makers and microwave ovens) use the line frequency as a time base. Taking a 60Hz or 50Hz appliance and plugging it into the other causes the clock to be off.
kadu@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Not only that, but the grid frequency is not perfect and oscillates a bit constantly.
Investigators can then take the background electrical noise in audio recordings, look at the spectrum, and pinpoint the moment in time they were recorded based on the specific oscillations heard.
sanguinepar@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Huh, now that is interesting - our microwave’s clock continually edges forward until it’s a few minutes out from the oven clock right next to it. I wonder if that’s why. I’m in the UK and as far as I know, all our appliances are too, but maybe not?
Overzeetop@kbin.social 1 year ago
That's probably just fluctuations in the line frequency and the method for keeping time varying between the two (one might use a crystal that drifts). Being on the "wrong" frequency will have it shift by hours every day. I had a (US/60Hz origin) microwave in my apartment in Bonaire (50Hz) last year that never seemed to have the right time, and when I did the math I realized it was the frequency - it was behind by ~4 extra hours every day (50/60 x 24 hours).
MeanEYE@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Yup.