Many things set PC gaming apart from console gaming, but what truly pleases the eyeballs of the keyboard and mouse clan is gaming at – or above – 60 frames per second (fps).
Let those who say that 60 fps is no different pass you by, because we can unequivocally tell you that games running at 60fps are truly spectacular to behold, and are as smooth as the low-fat yoghurt you had for breakfast. Movies, too, look their best at 60Hz.
Gigabyte has a range of notebooks including the P37, P35, P57 and P55 that all support frame rates of up to 144Hz, a refresh rate most notebooks don’t even consider supporting.
Unfortunately, just plugging an HDMI cable into to your new TV or 144Hz monitor isn’t all you’re going to have to do to see games and movies at their best. No, what you’ll need to reach 60Hz and beyond is an HDMI connection known as HDMI 2.0 that’s compatible with something called HDCP 2.2.
HDCP 2.2
You’re probably familiar with HDMI (an acronym for “High-Definition Multimedia Interface”), but you may not be aware of HDCP 2.2 and how it impacts you.
HDCP – High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection – is a way for content creators to protect their movies and TV shows from being copied/pirated as they travel from a Blu-ray player or your Gigabyte PC to your TV. HDCP 2.2 is just the latest version of the spec, and it supports 4K video played at 60Hz.
The idea here is that HDCP can’t hinder the content as it travels, but more importantly neither can anything else, resulting in copy-proof data streams.
Up to 18Gbps
When it comes to streaming game data from PC to screen, HDCP is less important than HDMI. In the case of its latest laptops, Gigabyte has gone with HDMI 2.0 ports which support data transfer speeds of up to 18Gbps, a figure so high it easily allows sufficient data to transfer in order to reach 60fps and beyond in your games and movies.
This high bandwidth means that no matter if you’re gaming at 1080p on a 144Hz monitor or watching a 4K movie at 60Hz on your fancy curved TV, your Gigabyte notebook supports it all.
These future-proof features will ensure you’re still on the cutting edge of high-fidelity entertainment for years to come.
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Your TV may have an HDMI port, but not all HDMI ports are created equal. Often, the only way to check if your TV has the latest is to go online to see your TV’s tech specs, or to look on the box.
But if you threw the box out in the excitement of setting up your new TV, there is an easier way as long as you have a 4K Blu-ray player to test with. Just be aware that regular non-4K Blu-ray players won’t work for this, however.
Connect that 4K Blu-ray player to your Ultra HD TV and then use an Ultra HD Blu-ray disc to see if your content plays. If your TV starts playback at the low resolution of 480p, your TV doesn’t support HDCP 2.2 and you won’t be able to get UHD content to run at 60fps, or games to run at frame rates above that.
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