So you've purchased a monitor that offers a 120Hz or 144Hz refresh rate and plugged it in–great! Just don't cease at that place. Your monitor may not actually run at its advertised refresh charge per unit until you lot alter some settings and sort out your hardware.

Prepare Your Refresh Charge per unit in Windows

Most importantly, you'll want to ensure Windows is actually set at the advertised refresh rate and non a lower refresh rate, like 60Hz.

On Windows ten, head to Settings > System > Display > Advanced Display Settings > Display Adapter Backdrop. Click the "Monitor" tab, choose your monitor'due south advertised refresh rate from the "Screen Refresh Charge per unit" list, and click "OK".

On Windows 7 or eight, right-click the desktop and select "Screen Resolution". Select your monitor (if you take multiple monitors) and and then click the "Avant-garde Settings" link. Click the "Monitor" tab and cull the refresh rate from the "Screen Refresh Rate" box.

If you don't run into your monitor's advertised refresh rate in this list—or if you can't seem to get your monitor to stay configured at the advertised refresh charge per unit—in that location's more you need to exercise.

Check Your Cables

Y'all can't just use whatsoever old cablevision and expect a high refresh charge per unit. Some monitors may accept both HDMI and DisplayPort connections, but may exist limited to a 60Hz refresh rate when connected via HDMI. In this example, you'd need to use a DisplayPort cablevision. Check your monitor's specifications or setup guide for more than information.

You don't just have to worry about the type of cable, either–you have to worry about the cablevision itself.

If you're using DisplayPort, exist sure you have a properly certified cable that'southward built to the DisplayPort specification. A properly manufactured, certified cablevision built for DisplayPort 1.ii should work perfectly fine with DisplayPort one.iv. Unfortunately, in that location are a lot of poor quality cables out there, then a cable congenital and sold for DisplayPort 1.2 may not piece of work with DisplayPort 1.4. At that place are also a few Reduced Bit Rate (RBR) DisplayPort cables on the market place that will just support 1080p—just brand sure you don't have one of those. Visit the official DisplayPort website for more information.

If y'all're using HDMI, you'll want to ensure y'all're using a "high speed" HDMI cable and not an older "standard" HDMI cable. Still, yous don't need an HDMI cablevision with Ethernet included. Visit the official HDMI website for more information.

When in doubt, use the cablevision your monitor came with. It should work–in theory. Unfortunately, cheap, depression-quality cables can also crusade bug. Your monitor's included cablevision might non fifty-fifty be good enough. We recently found that the included cable with an ASUS monitor couldn't provide a stable indicate at 144Hz. Instead, the screen would occasionally flicker and the refresh rate would drop down to 60Hz until we rebooted the reckoner. We replaced the cable with a higher-quality Accell DisplayPort cable and the monitor operated fine at 144Hz without any flickering or refresh charge per unit drops.

Every bit e'er, make sure your cables are deeply continued. If y'all're experiencing a problem, effort unplugging the cable and plugging it back in to ensure a solid connection. A loose cable connection could crusade problems.

More Troubleshooting Tips

RELATED: How to Update Your Graphics Drivers for Maximum Gaming Performance

Lots of other issues could cause your monitor to not function at its advertised refresh rate:

  • Your computer's GPU isn't good enough. Integrated graphics or older discrete graphics might not back up your monitor'due south refresh rate. Be sure your graphics card supports the monitor'south resolution and refresh charge per unit.
  • Y'all need to update your graphics drivers. Exist sure to install the latest bachelor version from NVIDIA or AMD'southward website.
  • You're attempting to run your monitor at a lower resolution. Select your monitor's native resolution–information technology may simply support the higher refresh rate at its native resolution and exist limited to 60Hz at lower resolutions.
  • Yous're playing a game and that game has its own integrated graphics settings. You may need to select your monitor'south native resolution and the refresh rate of 120Hz or 144Hz in each game's graphics options carte or that game may apply a lower refresh rate.

Hopefully, subsequently going through these steps, you'll find that your monitor runs in its butter-shine high refresh rate.

Paradigm Credit: Lalneema

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