The Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA) has confirmed that Adaptive-Sync is now an official feature of the DisplayPort 1.2a video interface standard for external monitors, promising that products including the feature will be appearing on the market soon.
Adaptive-Sync, added to the Embedded DisplayPort (eDP) standard in 2009 but missing from the full-fat DisplayPort standard until now, is equivalent to
Nvidia's G-Sync technology: the refresh rate of the connected display is dynamically altered to match the content being displayed. For gamers, it means smooth motion with no tearing or stuttering; for those viewing more static content such as web pages or documents, it means reduced power draw - hence its inclusion in eDP for mobile devices to use. It's related to
AMD's FreeSync, which was donated to the VESA group several years before the technology was made public.
'
DisplayPort Adaptive-Sync enables a new approach in display refresh technology,' claimed Syed Athar Hussain, Display Domain Architect at Nvidia rival AMD and VESA board vice chair. '
Instead of updating a monitor at a constant rate, Adaptive-Sync enables technologies that match the display update rate to the user’s content, enabling power efficient transport over the display link and a fluid, low-latency visual experience.'
Being a formal part of the standard, DisplayPort Adaptive-Sync - as the technology is now known - will come with a full suite of compliance testing and a certification system to guarantee compatibility between DisplayPort Adaptive-Sync graphics chips and external displays. The technology is also being offered to all VESA members - including Nvidia - free of charge, potentially helping to boost adoption of the technology above and beyond Nvidia's proprietary equivalent.
Although VESA has indicated that DisplayPort Adaptive-Sync is ready to deploy, neither the group itself nor its member companies have yet indicated when we'll be seeing the first official products hitting shop shelves.
Want to comment? Please log in.