Games play only at 30fps in a 4k tv set at 1080p

[peterjam]

Hi everyone,
So I'm having a small problem. I used to have my PC connected to a 1080p tv, but I recently bought a 4k one and changed it, so now the desktop resolution is set at 3840x2160. I like to game a lot, but I preffer my games to run at 60fps, so when I started playing a game I decided to set the resolution to 1920 x 1080. I started playing the witcher 3 expansion but noticed that it ran at only 30fps when it used to run at 60, and I was using the same settings I used before. I found out that by turning off V-Sync the game runs at a steady 60, but there is a lot of screen tearing. If I turn V-Sync back on, the game drops to a steady 30.
After some tinkering, I found out that if I exited to windows and changed the system resolution to 1920 x 1080 (which kinda sucks, because then the desktop icons are huuuge even when set to a small size), then the game runs smooth as butter at 60fps, with V-Sync turned on. I tried other games that I hadn't played in a while, like Arkham Knight and Layers of Fear and a couple of others, and the exact same thing happened.
Now my question is this, do I have to change my windows resolution to 1080p everytime I want to play a game so that it can run smoothly, or is there anything I can do to solve this problem?
Thanks a lot in advance.

 

[getochkn]

Are you running in full screen in the game or "borderless window" mode. From what I know, borderless window mode is still a window, so it's going to be bound by the desktop setting still, but running in full screen mode, it can than set the resolution to whtaever it wants.

 

[geofelt]

Many 4k TV's will only run at 30hz at 4k resolution.
You need a displayport 1.2 connection which TV's do not have.
If your connection is hdmi, I think it requires hdmi 1.4 or 2.0(can't remember which) to handle the bandwidth at 60hz.
That needs to be both on the graphics card and the monitor.

 

[getochkn]

Many 4k TV's will only run at 30hz at 4k resolution.
You need a displayport 1.2 connection which TV's do not have.
If your connection is hdmi, I think it requires hdmi 1.4 or 2.0(can't remember which) to handle the bandwidth at 60hz.
That needs to be both on the graphics card and the monitor.

None of that matters. If you read, they are trying to play at 1080p@60fps and they can play at that if their desktop resolution is set to that. If their desktop resolution is at 4k@30fps, then the games stay at 30fps regardless if the game is at 1080p or not, hence my solution about full screen vs borderless.

 

[peterjam]

Are you running in full screen in the game or "borderless window" mode. From what I know, borderless window mode is still a window, so it's going to be bound by the desktop setting still, but running in full screen mode, it can than set the resolution to whtaever it wants.

Hey thanks for answering. Yeah, I've tried running it in a borderless window, but this causes the game to run in a small window in the center of the desktop. I remember doing this on my old 1080p tv, and the game basically ran in full screen, there was no difference, but now I don't know if it's because the resolution is set at 4k, but the window is small.

Thanks for your help

 

[peterjam]

Don't worry, I found the solution, for some reason windows was set to 30Hz in the 4k resolution, so all I did was right-click on my desktop, click on screen resolution, then on advanced settings, monitor, and changed the screen refresh rate to 60Hz, and boom!! problem solved. The game runs at a steady 60fps, just as before, and now even the mouse cursor on the desktop is more responsive.

Thanks a lot