How much does your arcade stick lag? Arcade stick input lag testing & results thread

[Ahbee]

Just my 2 cents, sorry if I’m just repeating things, I didn’t read the whole thread.

So let me get this straight…even a few milliseconds of lag can lead to an action starting 1 frame later than it should have. Not always, but sometimes depending on whether the time between the button press and the next frame is less than the lag. So greater the lag, the greater the chance this would happen. And in the In the case of lag exceeding 16.67 ms, always at least a frame of lag.

I agree that it’s not really possible for us to perceive 1 frame of lag. I sure as heck wouldn’t be able to tell the difference. But that isn’t the point. 1 frame can be the difference between moves trading or one beating the other outright. Whether a punish with strict timing is successful or not. Getting a certain move out (like just frame stuff). We don’t feel the lag but the results speak for themselves. So the difference in milliseconds can make a difference, especially in close games.

Now, as to why pros don’t make a big deal out of this, well, they’re still human. When they switch sticks, they can’t feel the difference either, especially since, again, it won’t lag a frame every time. And during a match, most of the time, the lag doesn’t even matter. But when it does make a difference, I think many players including pros just assume it was a late button press. Imagine if, while playing footsies, you traded blows with an opponent instead of beating him outright; do you think, “aw man, it must have been the lag,” or that that’s just what should have happened?

Anyway, while some of you scoff at this info, I think it’s great. Knowing which stick lags the least would definitely influence my purchase.

I think it would also help your reaction time, the standard deviation for reaction time is about 26 ms. so in other words 15 ms is the difference between good reactions and word class reactions. Go to training mode and try whiff punishing with 5 frame move vs a 4 frame move. The 4 frame move will be noticeably easier to whiff punish with.

[Teyah]

^ It’s only an issue if both players press an input with the same amount of start up frames at the same exact time, down to the millisecond. Otherwise, it’s a non-issue, because 99% of the time during a match this is never, ever going to happen.

Actually, input lag matters for anything involving reaction time. Which is includes a huge variety of things that you can do in a fighting game. Some practical examples include:

• Blocking mixups that border the edge of reaction time. In SF4, blocking dive kicks where the character can change a crossup to a dive kick that hits in front (Seth, Cammy, Yun, E.Ryu, Akuma, etc). In GGXX, blocking 17-20 frame overheads like Eddie 6K or Testament 6P that lead to half life combos and oki which mean you likely lost the round. It’s already hard enough against some characters, but with 1F extra delay your success rate at reaction blocking fast overheads will go down.

• Teching throws purely on reaction in games that have generous tech time windows, like in Tekken or Blazblue (throws tend to hurt in these games)

• Hit confirming into unsafe specials/supers, like SF4 Cammy’s cr.mk xx spiral arrow, Ken cr.mk xx super in 3S, etc

• Whiff punishing attacks reliably, like anything with a total frame count of 20+F (covers a good chunk of mp/mk attacks and higher)

• Punishing predictable, but really fast moves on pure reaction, like Jaguar Kick, ultra’ing through a Sonic Boom, confirm Yun st.mp xx shoulder and punishing on reaction, avoiding chip death from fast EX moves, etc

• Trying to DP against fast or low jumps, like against Mr.Karate, Kyo or Iori’s hops in KoFXIII which are already very difficult to AA

• Trading attacks on reaction which was already mentioned; in some games losing a trade means getting full air comboed or ground bounced or OTG’ed into huge damage or a dead character.

The success rate on all of these things are negatively affected by extra delay for reasons which (I hope) are obvious. The more ms of delay you introduce, the harder things like the above become to do, and since these examples are already bordering the edge of reaction time, a 1F difference or even a 0.5F difference can have a pretty big impact in the long run.

[Tensho]

If a sticks lag makes such a difference then it sucks that the pros at EVO have to practice on garbage LCD screens instead of CRT or that 10ms of delay will screw them up at the tournaments big time.

[jongoo]

^ It’s only an issue if both players press an input with the same amount of start up frames at the same exact time, down to the millisecond. Otherwise, it’s a non-issue, because 99% of the time during a match this is never, ever going to happen.

It’s not simply for that particular situation. Think about it, most times there’s a trade, the players did moves that didn’t have the same startup frames nor is it likely that they hit their button at the exact same time. It shouldn’t be too hard to figure out that even one frame of lag could have made what would otherwise be a clean hit a trade instead.

But again, it’s really hard to tell in these cases whether it is indeed an instance of lag. When we play, most of the time, we just accept that what we see happen is the way it should be. For one thing, we’d be hard pressed to say what really happened when there’s factors on top of lag like when exactly did each player hit their button in relation to the other.

But for me at least, it’s great knowing that my stick is less prone to lag even if that factor doesn’t come to play every match. And I’m sure some of the less laggy sticks are about the same price if not cheaper than the laggier sticks. So why not?

[Moonchilde]

You guys are dumb.

[Ariesno]

I have a lot of arcade stick…TE-S/VX/QRAF/V.S and some PS360+ first build.

That was always clear for me : Hori VX has the best PCB and Qanba QRAF has a very good PCB.

[lamhazaart]

Any chance of this one being tested? http://www.ebay.com/itm/New-Zero-Delay-Arcade-USB-Encoder-PC-to-Joystick-for-5pin-Sanwa-Type-Push-button-/171060862728?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item27d4059f08

I have a lot of arcade stick…TE-S/VX/QRAF/V.S and some PS360+ first build.

That was always clear for me : Hori VX has the best PCB and Qanba QRAF has a very good PCB.

But which one do you actually use lol.

[Ariesno]

Mostly ,i use this :[details=Spoiler]

[/details]

Because QRAF is almost as fast as Hori VX SA but also more stable and confortable.
That funny cause for my spécial home’s arcade stick i use a PCB of VX SA , and i made it before this thread start.

For exemple ,on my camera (Olympus EP5) there is a feature to reduce input lag of one frame but that consumes more batery … the difference is significant and sometimes it is very useful.

Thanks Teyah for your work ,is very interesting.I 'm very curious about result of Razer and all newcommers (PS4/X1).

[Teyah]

Thanks Ariesno. Be careful though, I am fairly sure the clear Q4 uses the laggier PCB that the other Q4s and Q2s use. It’s just the early Eightarc Fusions and early Q4RAF Blacks that have the fast PCB.

I do plan to test PS4 sticks, once GGXrd is out on PS4 and some of us locally pick up the console and sticks.

[Heihachi]

Thanks Ariesno. Be careful though, I am fairly sure the clear Q4 uses the laggier PCB that the other Q4s and Q2s use. It’s just the early Eightarc Fusions and early Q4RAF Blacks that have the fast PCB.

I do plan to test PS4 sticks, once GGXrd is out on PS4 and some of us locally pick up the console and sticks.

thanks for taking all the time and effort for testing all the sticks. I would like to see the PS3 pad & xbox pad on the list and also Hori vx sa kai 360 since its still readily available.

[Teyah]

I would need somebody to mail me a padhacked stick with Quick Disconnects in order to test the PS3 or 360 pads, since there aren’t any of those available in my area. For the VX SA Kai, same thing - I’m no longer buying new sticks for 360 and the Kai (and the Razer Atrox) aren’t owned by anyone in my local (Calgary) area.

[Heihachi]

I personally don’t have a padhack sticks or vx kai since I am actually looking into buying new sticks. but your results was helpful in determining my purchase. I actually ended up getting a paewang stick since it did very well on both test.

[Cagan]

So, flying over here I thought about something - could a bad usb cord contribute to any lag? Or does the cord either work or not work?

[RoboKrikit]

So, flying over here I thought about something - could a bad usb cord contribute to any lag? Or does the cord either work or not work?

Usually a bad USB cord will not work or only work intermittently. Theoretically you could have a scenario where retransmits are happening because of a poor connection, which would effectively cause lag, but you would probably see other issues too. Same for cable length that is longer than spec.

[jaquio]

Any chance for someone to test this board?

http://www.gyarcade.com/gyjoystickboardpcps2ps33in1187-p-67.html

[Darksakul]

You angered Segata Sanshiro

https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcR3rp_8bh0SMspvNXEZ0dyqd_9kQP8lEKar0vKX8Nv812sAksIZkA

With your pathetic mewling

Now let this cursed thread die

[Teyah]

Any chance for someone to test this board?

http://www.gyarcade.com/gyjoystickboardpcps2ps33in1187-p-67.html

A friend of mine recently got one of these, so there’s a good chance it’ll get tested in the future. Probably not for a couple weeks though as I’ve been quite busy lately.

[jaquio]

Thank you!

[Mr-Phelps]

Teyah, Could one assume that you’ll be testing on the new Ultra TE sticks being release on the PS4/Xbone?

[Teyah]

Hey - I will be testing the TE2 once GGXrd hits PS4 and people start buying sticks for that. So not for a couple months at the earliest unfortunately.

It’s very unlikely I’ll be testing XBox One sticks.