Mouse DPI settings and ingame sensitivity

[PatrickCah]

Hello all,

My mouse G500 gave up last week and I am getting a free replacement (G500s). One positive to come out of this is that I've realised that my settings were wrong. I've since disabled Windows acceleration. Game play is smoother and more accurate since. I am using a DPI setting of 2000. Windows mouse speed is set 6.
Some sites recommend maximising the DPI setting and then turning the ingame sensitivity to 0. Is this correct? I can turn sensitivity off in Starcraft 2 and the mouse works fine. The lowest setting in Black Mesa is one. Do ingame mouse settings have any side effects? More specifically, does ingame mouse sensitivity cause pixel skipping in the same manner that increasing the mouse speed in the OS does?
Thanks for your help.

 

[Cerb]

Hello all,

My mouse G500 gave up last week and I am getting a free replacement (G500s). One positive to come out of this is that I've realised that my settings were wrong. I've since disabled Windows acceleration. Game play is smoother and more accurate since. I am using a DPI setting of 2000. Windows mouse speed is set 6.
Some sites recommend maximising the DPI setting and then turning the ingame sensitivity to 0. Is this correct?

If there aren't any tracking malfunctions, yes. Mainly because some games here and there have a fairly coarse conversion from pixel-level mouse movement to PoV angle changes. Games well-tuned for mice don't get such benefits (IoW, it's usually games also developed for consoles). The sky-high DPIs supported by these mice make good tracking difficult, though, so you will generally hit some practical maximums well before the mouse' max DPI.

With a game like Starcraft, you would typically want the mouse to move just like it does outside of games.

 

[PatrickCah]

Hi Cerb,
Thanks for replying. I was hoping I would get more input from this forum. Looks like I'll have to look elsewhere.
I did find a download which alters the registry, disabling acceleration. http://www.esreality.com/?a=post&id=1846538
It might be helpful to someone else.

 

[Cerb]

Well, there's not a whole lot to it, once you have acceleration disabled. For games where you use a cursor, 1:1 with the desktop is generally best. With indoor shooters, distance/360 is about all that matters. With outdoor shooters/FPRPGS, higher DPI can help. With outdoor shooters/FPRPGs that don't handle fine mouse movement so well, higher DPI is a way to prevent frustration, to get finer movement.

 

[Wall Street]

As others have stated, there are two types of games:

1. Games with a cursor (RTS, MOBA, 3rd person RPG) - set acceleration off and windows to 6/11. Use the hardware controls on the mouse to adjust DPI until you are comfortable with the speed. Most people play best at 800-1600 DPI. It can be best to use the same setting you use on the desktop since this cursor speed will already feel familiar. Generally the best RTS players play at a higher sensitivity than most people would naturally use on their desktop to increase APM (e.g. small mouse movements make the cursor move fast).

2. First person "mouselook" games (FPS) - The Windows settings generally don't impact these games and you don't need too high of a sensitivity - even 400 DPI mice like the Wheel Mouse Optical are still used at the highest levels competitively. What I like to do is just use whatever sensitivity I use for RTS games and on my desktop and adjust the in-game sensitivity to taste. Generally, the best FPS players set the sensitivity lower than you would imagine to improve accuracy (they move the mouse very far to do a 360).

I generally don't like to use mouse software (Setpoint, Logitech Gaming Software, Razer Synapse) as this interpolates the DPI, can add lag and is generally software bloat.

 

[Wall Street]

Hi Cerb,
Thanks for replying. I was hoping I would get more input from this forum. Looks like I'll have to look elsewhere.
I did find a download which alters the registry, disabling acceleration. http://www.esreality.com/?a=post&id=1846538
It might be helpful to someone else.

The MArkC fix is only for really old games. If you are playing Counterstrike 1.6, then you may need to use it. Any game on the Quake 3 engine or more modern should bypass the need for this fix.

 

[PatrickCah]

Okay, thanks Wall Street. I don't play any games as old Counterstrike. Anyway my the mouse is more responsive since adjusting the settings.
Thanks.