jfjohnny5
12-31-2007, 02:02 PM
After days of tinkering with calibration settings, my receiver and TV, I FINALLY figured out the root cause of the issue and how to make it go away.
PROBLEM:
People that have been experiencing this have found they need to calibrate the drums with an Input Lag 40-80ms more than with the guitar in order for it to be accurate. I've been the same way. After reading some other posts, I found I got best results by calibrating the drums by ear only. i.e. I would close my eyes and tap along to the beat when calibrating the Input Lag setting (the second calibration screen). I could then play the drums, but then I was always "off" with the guitar. But if I calibrate the guitar by ear, I would still be off. I found I HAD to calibrate the guitar by watchng the icon and strumming. That's when it hit me. I had two different methods of playing. I play the drums by ear or feel. But I play the guitar much more visually.
SOLUTION:
After I realized that the problem was in the method I had to think about WHY it was happening. The answer...Dolby Digital. DD breaks the sound into 5 discreet surround channels and the subwoofer (hence 5.1) This takes processing time. Apparently this takes 40-80ms of processing time. After turning off DD in the Audio Options, I re-calibrated. I again did the drums by ear and then the guitar by sight. And I ended up with a result of -10ms for the drums and -5ms for the guitar. So I tried playing both instruments at -5ms and they were both solid. So the upside is my drums and guitar are in-sync. The downside is no more surround sound.
IDEAS:
It's hard to say if it's the game or the hardware (receiver) that is introducing the delay. Though I plan on more testing in that area. However, if Harmonix were to allow individual input lag settings for each instrument, the problem could still be solved and you could keep DD Surround Sound.
Hope this helps!!!
:)
PROBLEM:
People that have been experiencing this have found they need to calibrate the drums with an Input Lag 40-80ms more than with the guitar in order for it to be accurate. I've been the same way. After reading some other posts, I found I got best results by calibrating the drums by ear only. i.e. I would close my eyes and tap along to the beat when calibrating the Input Lag setting (the second calibration screen). I could then play the drums, but then I was always "off" with the guitar. But if I calibrate the guitar by ear, I would still be off. I found I HAD to calibrate the guitar by watchng the icon and strumming. That's when it hit me. I had two different methods of playing. I play the drums by ear or feel. But I play the guitar much more visually.
SOLUTION:
After I realized that the problem was in the method I had to think about WHY it was happening. The answer...Dolby Digital. DD breaks the sound into 5 discreet surround channels and the subwoofer (hence 5.1) This takes processing time. Apparently this takes 40-80ms of processing time. After turning off DD in the Audio Options, I re-calibrated. I again did the drums by ear and then the guitar by sight. And I ended up with a result of -10ms for the drums and -5ms for the guitar. So I tried playing both instruments at -5ms and they were both solid. So the upside is my drums and guitar are in-sync. The downside is no more surround sound.
IDEAS:
It's hard to say if it's the game or the hardware (receiver) that is introducing the delay. Though I plan on more testing in that area. However, if Harmonix were to allow individual input lag settings for each instrument, the problem could still be solved and you could keep DD Surround Sound.
Hope this helps!!!
:)
