How sensitivity works

[DPI Wizard]

What is sensitivity?

A common misunderstanding is that mouse sensitivity adjusts the speed of the input from the mouse, or the speed of your crosshair/character movement. While increased or decreased movement speed is the primarily perceived effect, what it really does is modifying how far each count from the mouse moves your crosshair.
 
When you are adjusting the sensitivity, you are actually defining a grid to which your movement snaps. The lower the sensitivity, the finer the grid.


This is sensitivity

The animations on the left show the actual in-game movement for a 1 degree turn in Battlefield 3 with a resolution of 1920x1080 and a FOV of 90. 1 degree with these settings equals 12 pixels. The image on the right display the actual pixels and crosshair movement from the animation, and the black dots represent the grid as defined by the sensitivity. As you can clearly see, lower sensitivity gives you a finer grid, which again gives you more accurate aim and smoother movement. Even at a 1:1 ratio between the grid and pixels, the movement is quite choppy.

Sensitivity: 0.627370 | Counts/degree: 3 | Pixels/count: 4



Sensitivity: 0.311185 | Counts/degree: 6 | Pixels/count: 2



Sensitivity: 0.153093 | Counts/degree: 12 | Pixels/count : 1

Sensitivity: 0.074046 | Counts/degree: 24 | Pixels/count: 0.5



Sensitivity: 0.034523 | Counts/degree: 48 | Pixels/count: 0.25

[Zoddom]

Hello! I made a topic about this on reddit concerning CS:GO.

There were multiple questions coming up about how DPI influences the mouse sensitivity. Ive replied that the DPI doesnt change the counts/degree or anything at all. I said that the BEST way to play is by turning your DPI up all the way and scale your mouse sens down accordingly.

But I am not 100% sure on this. Can you maybe tell me about how DPI is influencing the mouse sensitivity? Or maybe directly reply on the reddit topic.

 

 

[Xbye]

Okay, so using this guide I decided to set my G502 to it's max DPI (12,000) but have a dual-monitor setup. I find myself frequently clicking out of the game while playing, causing my game to minimize. Yes, I am in full-screen and I've even tried Ultra-mon to constrain my mouse to my primary monitor but nothing seems to be working.

 

High DPI = Randomly clicking out of my full-screen game. (Not windowed borderless)

[DPI Wizard]

Sorry for the late replies here!

 

Okay, so using this guide I decided to set my G502 to it's max DPI (12,000) but have a dual-monitor setup. I find myself frequently clicking out of the game while playing, causing my game to minimize. Yes, I am in full-screen and I've even tried Ultra-mon to constrain my mouse to my primary monitor but nothing seems to be working.

 

High DPI = Randomly clicking out of my full-screen game. (Not windowed borderless)

Never experienced this myself, what game is this happening in? I have a three monitor setup, and playing on the middle one.

 

Hello! I made a topic about this on reddit concerning CS:GO.

There were multiple questions coming up about how DPI influences the mouse sensitivity. Ive replied that the DPI doesnt change the counts/degree or anything at all. I said that the BEST way to play is by turning your DPI up all the way and scale your mouse sens down accordingly.

But I am not 100% sure on this. Can you maybe tell me about how DPI is influencing the mouse sensitivity? Or maybe directly reply on the reddit topic.

As I see it, there are a few possible drawbacks and one important point when using maximum DPI.

 

1. Sensor accuracy. Some sensors, like the G502's or similar, are excellent at maximum DPI. But some sensor might cause a lot of inaccuracies at max DPI, hence lowering it will make the sensitivity better. Reading up on tests etc or doing some testing yourself should reveal this.

 

2. Cursor sensitivity. A lot of games do not have a separate sensitivity for the cursor, so when using something like 12000 DPI, navigating menus etc is very difficult.

 

3. Game engine. Some game engines may have trouble interpreting higher DPI, mainly because it can cause higher report sizes.

 

And the important point: At a certain point, the increase of DPI gives you no benefit. When I analyze games, I usually test them with the lowest sensitivity possible, and often I see that 1 count simply does nothing. The crosshair does not visually move at all. But this is extreme cases.

There's a lot of factors to consider though, like the game, your distance/360, FOV and more.

 

I'd say, If you don't have any problems with points 1, 2 and 3, go all out.

[Xbye]

Sorry for the late replies here!

 

Never experienced this myself, what game is this happening in? I have a three monitor setup, and playing on the middle one.

Left4Dead 2, using full-screen. Not windowed, not borderless windowed. I am also on Windows7 SP1.

 

EDIT: I enabled Aero but unfortunately still no dice.

Edited December 30, 2015 by Xbye

[Elias Rössel]

And the important point: At a certain point, the increase of DPI gives you no benefit. When I analyze games, I usually test them with the lowest sensitivity possible, and often I see that 1 count simply does nothing. The crosshair does not visually move at all. But this is extreme cases.

 

 

What do you mean with "a certain point"? Does that mean anything over 4000DPI is unnescessary? Or anything over 6000 or 8000?

[DPI Wizard]

What do you mean with "a certain point"? Does that mean anything over 4000DPI is unnescessary? Or anything over 6000 or 8000?

Where the point is depends on several factors like resolution, FOV, 360 distance and game engine. It's hard to say where the benefit of high DPI stops for each scenario, but in my opinion you should have at least pixel accurate sensitivity.

 

By that I mean 1 count from the mouse moves the crosshair 1 pixel.  Maybe 10 counts pr pixel is better, but 100 counts is probably overkill.

[hellothere]

Where the point is depends on several factors like resolution, FOV, 360 distance and game engine. It's hard to say where the benefit of high DPI stops for each scenario, but in my opinion you should have at least pixel accurate sensitivity.

 

By that I mean 1 count from the mouse moves the crosshair 1 pixel.  Maybe 10 counts pr pixel is better, but 100 counts is probably overkill.

What would this be for csgo? (I use 1080p does res matter?) I have a g502. Also is the g502 really native at 12000 dpi and most responsive at that dpi?

[WhoCares?]

Can you explain why a 1:1 ratio between the grid and pixels isn't 100% smooth? Theoretically it should be jitter free, or not?

Edited October 5, 2016 by WhoCares?

[Elias Rössel]

Can you explain why a 1:1 ratio between the grid and pixels isn't 100% smooth? Theoretically it should be jitter free, or not?

It is 100% smooth! What dpi, hz and resolution are you using? 

[WhoCares?]

It is totally smooth for me. I am just wondering why DPI Wizard is telling another Story

[DPI Wizard]

It is totally smooth for me. I am just wondering why DPI Wizard is telling another Story

Remember that the gifs on this page are really zoomed in, which is why they don't look smooth at 1:1.

 

1:1 will about as smooth as it can for most people I think, although games interpolate between pixels to seem even smoother if you go above 1:1.

[WhoCares?]

But does zooming in really matters? I mean when hitting every pixel you hit every pixel and there is nothing between it, right? Shouldn't it look the same at 1:1 or 1:10? And do games still interpolate mouse movement, when using raw input?

I can hit every horizontal pixel with the crosshair without skipping any with my settings, so i guess that's the optimum or not?

Edited October 14, 2016 by WhoCares?

[DPI Wizard]

As you can see from the gifs, it's no problem going between pixels. Remember that the game and mouse/DPI doesn't care about pixels at all. The mouse sends one count, and the game converts this to X degrees (the black dots on the gifs).

 

Whether this is less than a pixel, exactly a pixel or skipping several pixels is actually irrelevant for the game

[WhoCares?]

Would you advise me to double my DPI from 400 to 800, to a  Pixels/Count:0.5. Just in case....

[potato psoas]

Hey, I have some questions:

Does a higher count per movement ratio affect a game's performance (FPS)? Don't you have to render more frames since there are more counts? Does that mean counts are kind of the same thing as frames? And does the game skip counts it can't render... actually, is it even possible to have more counts than you can render?

[jabbothehut]

can anyone explain how zoom and fov changes differ?

say a game like bf3 for example. I know that the sensitivity is reduced by 50% on a red dot sight but that the fov changes as well. Is the zoom only provided by fov change or is there something more?

[potato psoas]

can anyone explain how zoom and fov changes differ?

say a game like bf3 for example. I know that the sensitivity is reduced by 50% on a red dot sight but that the fov changes as well. Is the zoom only provided by fov change or is there something more?

Yes pretty sure BF3 ADS sensitivities are affected by FOV, but not the hipfire - the same as in BF4. The calculator doesn't say it but pretty sure that's the case.

 

However, if you want the perceived sensitivity to be the same you need to make sure the FOV is also the same when calculating turning rate. That's why you should utilise the "convert monitor distance" option in the calculator.

 

This video is great at explaining why and how to do it:

[potato psoas]

I was really really wondering if it is possible to allow monitor distance to have decimals since I would like to use a coefficient I calculated.

Edited December 6, 2016 by Joshua Willis

[HaruNanase]

Hi! One question.

 

Question: Is "Mouse Smoothing" in KF2 the same as "Raw input" in CS:GO? 

Game: Killing Floor 2

 

Sincerely,

mouse-sensitivity fan, wo0lfie.

 

[Skwuruhl]

Hi! One question.

 

Question: Is "Mouse Smoothing" in KF2 the same as "Raw input" in CS:GO? 

Game: Killing Floor 2

 

Sincerely,

mouse-sensitivity fan, wo0lfie.

 

20170123064451_1.jpg

Don't use mouse smoothing. It's this weird interpolation thing to make your mouse movements look smoother even if less accurate.

[firefall777]

I hav a few questions.

I use a Logitech G502 on a 1080p 27" Monitor and Im not sure which DPI I should use. I heard that you need a minimum DPI to be able to hit every pixel on the monitor How can I calculate the minimum DPI I need to have a good experience on 1920*1080 ?

In your animation the lowest sensitivity looks the best because of perfect smoothing. Should I choose this sensitivity and adjust the DPI to a point where it feels perfect for me for havving great and pricized movement? 

Or should I choose a DPI lets say 800 and adjust the sensitivity when we speak about BF3?

[WhoCares?]

(Horizontal resolution x (360 / HFOV) / Inches for a 360° turn ) = min. DPI for hitting each Pixel. 

Than you should round that value up to the nearest 100DPI (Or whatever DPI steps your mouse is supporting) and multiply it by 4. (because of Shannon's law :P)  

 

So first find a good sensitivity for you, calculate the needed DPI for it, and calculate the new sensitivity related to it again 

 

Edited May 16, 2017 by WhoCares?

[Badmon]

Hi sorry for any inconvenience but I was wondering  if my sens of 1.1@800dpi with 1280x960 stretched(no black bars) in csgo,  would be the same in a game in 1920x1080 or do I need to tweak something in the calculator to get my actual sensitivity? Thx

[gbtg]

hey, i was wondering if

On 10/1/2013 at 2:00 PM, DPI Wizard said:

As you can clearly see, lower sensitivity gives you a finer grid, which again gives you more accurate aim and smoother movement. Even at a 1:1 ratio between the grid and pixels, the movement is quite choppy.

hey, i got a question regarding this, but i am not sure if there is a definitive answer to it:

the vast majority of csgo pros use 400dpi. why do they not increase their dpi and reduce their ingame sens accordingly, in order to gain accuracy and smoother movement? is there such a thing as "too much accuracy", at which point having your mouse pick up on the tiniest of movement becomes a disadvantage?