At a glance
- What
- A study of the cursor jitter that arises when mouse polling and display refresh fall out of step: do people notice, and does pointing suffer?
- Why
- Mouse and display run on separate clocks, so on high-refresh monitors jitter is unavoidable. A model predicts its size, not whether people notice or how fast a mouse must be.
- How
- In a triangle test, 23 participants tried to tell lower polling rates from an 8000 Hz mouse; gamers then ran a Fitts' law test to measure throughput.
- New
- Twelve of 23 could tell 500 Hz from 8000 Hz, and 1000 Hz was borderline on some displays. Throughput was unaffected, yet perceptually today's 1000 Hz is not enough.
