The age-old debate about whether borderless or fullscreen mode delivers better performance in PC games has long plagued gamers. While surface-level advice might suggest that fullscreen offers a slight performance edge, the truth is far more nuanced. This article delves into the intricacies of how games are displayed on your screen, shedding light on the evolution of graphics technologies and debunking the performance myth surrounding borderless and fullscreen modes.
Initially, the prevailing wisdom held that exclusive fullscreen mode, where the graphics card takes complete control of the display, would result in better performance compared to borderless mode. This was due to the belief that borderless mode required additional resources for the Desktop Window Manager (DWM), a Windows service responsible for desktop composition. The DWM, introduced in Windows Vista, renders the entire screen to memory before displaying it, potentially leading to a small performance penalty in borderless mode.
However, with the advent of Windows 8 and the introduction of the DXGI flip presentation model, this conventional wisdom has become outdated. The flip model, a more efficient way of displaying frames, essentially renders the DWM’s role in performance irrelevant. Instead of copying the entire frame to memory, the flip model simply changes a pointer to indicate which buffer is currently being displayed, eliminating the need for additional resource-intensive copying operations.
This shift in display technology has fundamentally changed the way games are rendered on modern systems. Even when running in fullscreen mode, games now rely on the DWM for composition, allowing for smoother transitions between games and enabling features like overlay functionality.
Therefore, the choice between borderless and fullscreen mode often comes down to personal preference rather than a significant performance difference. While there might be a few older games where exclusive fullscreen still offers a slight performance advantage, this is generally not the case for modern titles.
This article aims to provide clarity and eliminate the long-standing confusion surrounding borderless and fullscreen gaming. In the grand scheme of things, it ultimately boils down to personal preference. If you prefer the convenience of borderless mode or simply enjoy the visual aesthetics of fullscreen, go ahead and choose what feels right. The performance difference, if any, is likely to be negligible in most scenarios.
