Game Lag White Paper › L2 Client OS and device

Timer resolution Timer resolution (Windows 15.6ms)

Cause ID co-timer · Primary owner Game team (Client development)

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Windows’ default timer ticks every 15.6 ms, so “sleep for just 1 ms” actually lasts until the next timer tick, up to 15.6 ms.

Why Frame limiting and packet sending are implemented with Sleep (a short wait) → Effect The OS wakes the thread only every 15.6 ms → On screen Frame intervals and input send intervals become uneven

Symptoms

Stutter

Factors

Jitter

Who’s affected

Just me

When

Always

Owner

Primary owner Game team (Client development)

Game team action items

Use high-resolution timers, replace Sleep-based waits with event- or V-Sync-based pacing.

Ballpark numbers

15.6 ms steps can’t hit a 16.7 ms interval, so frame intervals alternate between 15.6 ms and 31.2 ms.

On the graph

Always high · Frame interval distribution

Where to look

Look at the distribution of PresentMon’s MsBetweenPresents (frame interval) and the “Platform Timer Resolution” entries in the powercfg /energy report (processes that changed the timer resolution)

Confirmed if

Frame intervals cluster at multiples of 15.6 ms, such as 15.6 ms and 31.2 ms, and the game doesn’t request a higher timer resolution

Ruled out if

Intervals spread out evenly: more likely “Background processes taking up CPU” or frame load than the timer

Check with

The player’s own environment

Learn more

In older versions of Windows, when one program set the timer to 1 ms, it applied to every program. That’s where the saying “leave a browser open and your game runs smoother” came from. Since Windows 10 version 2004, the change applies only to the program that requested it, and Windows 11 may ignore requests from windows that are minimized or fully hidden and not playing sound.

Sources

1. _WDF_TIMER_CONFIG (wdftimer.h) Microsoft
   Standard timer accuracy is the system clock tick interval, 15.6 ms by default; high-resolution timers get 1 ms
2. timeBeginPeriod function (timeapi.h) Microsoft
   Before Windows 10 2004 it was a global setting; since then it applies only to the requesting process, and Windows 11 doesn’t guarantee high resolution to processes whose windows are hidden or minimized
3. CreateWaitableTimerExW function (synchapi.h) Microsoft
   High-resolution waitable timer flag CREATE_WAITABLE_TIMER_HIGH_RESOLUTION
4. PresentMon Capture Application (README-CaptureApplication.md) Intel
   MsBetweenPresents: time between this Present() call and the previous one (ms)
5. Results for the Idle Energy Efficiency Assessment Microsoft
   Default system timer resolution is 15.6 ms; the “Platform Timer Resolution” entries in the energy report show which processes changed the timer resolution
6. Powercfg command-line options Microsoft
   powercfg /energy: analyzes the system and generates an energy report (HTML)

See also

Same layer: L2 Client OS and device

• Background processes taking up CPU
• Power saving and thermal throttling
• Mobile app sent to the background
• Wi-Fi ↔ LTE/5G switching
• Packet inspection by security software
• Receive buffer overflow
• Client low on memory and swapping
• Out of graphics memory (VRAM)
• Wi-Fi background scanning
• NIC power saving and driver issues
• Other apps on the same device using up bandwidth
• Throttling when the window is minimized or unfocused
• Overlay software interference
• Display, input device, and frame generation latency

Same symptom (Stutter), other layers

• Frame time spike L1 Client game process
• Client garbage collection L1 Client game process
• Synchronous loading and shader compilation on the main thread L1 Client game process
• Slow storage delays asset streaming L1 Client game process
• Rendering load from large crowds L1 Client game process
• Missing or too-short interpolation buffer L1 Client game process
• Excessive extrapolation (dead reckoning) L1 Client game process
• Fixed-timestep catch-up spiral L1 Client game process

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