Moved from Thrustmaster T-GT to Fanatec GT DD Pro

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Hi,

I purchased the Fanatec GT DD Pro (5 Nm) and aslo buyed the V3 pedals, because I knew I wouldnt like the standard pedals. I play Gran Tursmo Sport and used until now a Thrustmaster T-GT with T-LCM Loadcell pedals.

With all this, I was afraid that I would miss the rumble effect of the T-GT, and as it went out I even underestimated this. The FFB of the GT DD is very nice, its smooth and you feel in cornering sections the forces without any interrupts.

But as said, the extra rumble vibration from T-GT is simply just not to replaceable with an wheel which hasn't this function, even its a DD. The rumble is always on and you can feel the grip of the tyres very good, especially when understeering. The vibration gives you a feeling od actually driving a car.

I tested the GT DD also in Asseto Corza Competitione and there the Feedback of the surface and vibrations are way much better and you get an idea what a direct drive can do. Its not like the rumble effect but its much more sensitive then in Gran Turismo Sport and gives you a way better feeling.

So I post this because I would like to know if someone has similair experiences. And the other reaason is, if you're thinking abot going to DD but have already the T-GT and play only Gran Turismo, then dont do it now and wait for Gran Turismo 7. Because my hope is, they will improve the FFB on the GT DD to get out more of the wheel. Well, at least I hope it, since its the official wheel of the game.

Update 16.02.2022:
Meanwhile I have purchased the Boost Kit for the DD Pro since yesterday. What should I say, the difference is so huge that you think its a totally different wheel. Not only the FFB is stronger, its more importantly much more detailed. Without Boost Kit its so limitied and feels simply weak and num. I surely would have not missed the Thrustmaster T-GT and opened this thread if I had the Boost Kit from the begining. Now I have the feeling that I bought a DD.
So its obvious that I recommend the Boost Kit to everyone. The price 150 € feels unfair tbh, but without it the wheel is just too limited.
 
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Have you tried changing the FFB sensitivity? I use 1, because I only care about performance and not realism, but for "road sensation" FFB sensitivity 10 should give you more vibrations and twitching even while driving straight ahead.

With FFB sens 1, you only feel the information that's important to road grip.

Also, I've ordered an GT DD Pro (no express), but with my G29 and max torque 4, FFB sens 1, I can clearly feel understeer. The wheel goes lighter, the tyres scream, and if I understeer even more then it starts vibrating/rattling. With other FFB settings this effect becomes more subtle or disappears entirely.
 
Hi,

I purchased the Fanatec GT DD Pro (5 Nm) and aslo buyed the V3 pedals, because I knew I wouldnt like the standard pedals. I play Gran Tursmo Sport and used until now a Thrustmaster T-GT with T-LCM Loadcell pedals.

With all this, I was afraid that I would miss the rumble effect of the T-GT, and as it went out I even underestimated this. The FFB of the GT DD is very nice, its smooth and you feel in cornering sections the forces without any interrupts.

But as said, the extra rumble vibration from T-GT is simply just not to replaceable with an wheel which hasn't this function, even its a DD. The rumble is always on and you can feel the grip of the tyres very good, especially when understeering. The vibration gives you a feeling od actually driving a car.

I tested the GT DD also in Asseto Corza Competitione and there the Feedback of the surface and vibrations are way much better and you get an idea what a direct drive can do. Its not like the rumble effect but its much more sensitive then in Gran Turismo Sport and gives you a way better feeling.

So I post this because I would like to know if someone has similair experiences. And the other reaason is, if you're thinking abot going to DD but have already the T-GT and play only Gran Turismo, then dont do it now and wait for Gran Turismo 7. Because my hope is, they will improve the FFB on the GT DD to get out more of the wheel. Well, at least I hope it, since its the official wheel of the game.
I went from the new G29 to TM T300 and the sensation you get from the tires and the car behavior is not even comparable… The sensation you get from grip loss alone has knocked of time on my laps! I am really intrigued about the new DD wheel from Fanatec and everyone feedback, especially from the people who really play GT.
 
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I just switched from a T300 to the DD Pro, but I prefer the feedback feel of the T300.

Keep in mind this is the "out of the box" experience. I'm sure the DD will feel better with some tweaking and/or firmware/game updates, but first impressions are disappointing. I found the recommended settings on the Fanatec forum better than the defaults, but it's still not quite there.

Main things I feel the T300 does better is lateral grip (especially in high speed corners) and shock/rumble/understeer.
Examples: The DD gives no feedback at all at the last corner at Willow Springs, and understeer rumble is very "crashy".

At max torque 4 in-game, the DD (5nm) has about the same perceived feedback strength as the T300 (which is fine by me), but some rumble effects are much "harder". Lowering SHO on the wheel might help, but it may drown out some desired effects too...

GT settings thread @ Fanatec forums: https://forum.fanatec.com/discussion/652/gran-turismo-sport-ps4-fanatec-recommended-settings
 
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SHO controls the vibration of the electric motors in the steering wheels that have them, and has nothing to do with the FFB.
I was referring to the "crashy" shock effects (especially from understeer), although rumble strips and surface bumps seem fine in level. Understeer definitely felt like a somewhat canned vibration effect on the T300, but as I'm not familiar with Fanatec wheels I'm not sure how to "interpret" the effects.

I'll have to experiment a bit with settings, will report back if I find a wonder cure.
 
Ske
I was referring to the "crashy" shock effects (especially from understeer), although rumble strips and surface bumps seem fine in level. Understeer definitely felt like a somewhat canned vibration effect on the T300, but as I'm not familiar with Fanatec wheels I'm not sure how to "interpret" the effects.

I'll have to experiment a bit with settings, will report back if I find a wonder cure.
GTS is crap when talking about FFB. You should try other games. I play PC2 on PS4 and used T300 for 4 years. It was good wheel but DD1 I bought is incoperable - its much better in all ways and my pace increased a lot. DD pro I think is about the same, just less powerfull.
 
With all this, I was afraid that I would miss the rumble effect of the T-GT, and as it went out I even underestimated this. The FFB of the GT DD is very nice, its smooth and you feel in cornering sections the forces without any interrupts.

But as said, the extra rumble vibration from T-GT is simply just not to replaceable with an wheel which hasn't this function, even its a DD. The rumble is always on and you can feel the grip of the tyres very good, especially when understeering. The vibration gives you a feeling od actually driving a car.
That's exactly what I was thinking if I would swap the T-GT for the GT DD Pro. Thank you for letting us know.

In my opinion, the T-GT is irreplaceable in Gran Turismo. I've tried every wheel out there (except the Podium and GT DD Pro) and for me the T-GT makes all the difference in GT Sport.

With a modification from Acelith it even looks damn nice! :)
 
GTS is crap when talking about FFB.
GTS is the game I play, though.
The T300 delivered absolutely serviceable FFB in GTS (quite a lot better than PC2, imho).

Maybe the DD does better in PC2 and vice versa, but as I'm done playing PC2 it's a bit of a moot point.

It might be a matter of firmware/game updates needed for the wheel to fully understand the game's signals.
I'll play around with compatibility mode as well.
 
Ske
GTS is the game I play, though.
The T300 delivered absolutely serviceable FFB in GTS (quite a lot better than PC2, imho).
Are you joking? :) Of course it is very personal, but IMHO FFB at PC2 is much better with T300 too. I have GTS since release but I found it very flat when come from PC1 and PC2 and I don't play GTS. And yes I know what GT is, because I had almost all of them since GT1.
 
Are you joking? :) Of course it is very personal, but IMHO FFB at PC2 is much better with T300 too.
Not joking at all, but I haven't played PC2 all that much and I know FFB quality varies a lot from car to car.
I guess it's as much about what you're used to/subjective.

Anyway, I found a trick to getting some more detail back in the GT-DD:
  • In-game: 4/4 => 5/1
  • Wheel: Force Feedback Interpolation (INT) => 1
  • (Also reducing Natural damper, but that's as expected and not a "trick")

Any amount of in-game sensitivity or wheel interpolation seems to nuke any FFB details...
I can understand the interpolation bit, but not sure what's up with the weird sensitivity slider behaviour as increasing this added detail on my T300. Maybe there's a real reason why the official Fanatec post recommends 5/1?

INT OFF on the wheel revealed even more detail, but lead to a very "coggy" feel. INT 1 was the sweet(est) spot for me.

Increasing the in-game max torque also helped, weird that the perceived feedback from the GT-DD is lower than the T300 (?).
 
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Ske
Not joking at all, but I haven't played PC2 all that much and I know FFB quality varies a lot from car to car.
I guess it's as much about what you're used to/subjective.

Anyway, I found a trick to getting some more detail back in the GT-DD:
  • In-game: 4/4 => 5/1
  • Wheel: Force Feedback Interpolation (INT) => 1
  • (Also reducing Natural damper, but that's as expected and not a "trick")

Any amount of in-game sensitivity or wheel interpolation seems to nuke any FFB details...
I can understand the interpolation bit, but not sure what's up with the weird sensitivity slider behaviour as increasing this added detail on my T300. Maybe there's a real reason why the official Fanatec post recommends 5/1?

INT OFF on the wheel revealed even more detail, but lead to a very "coggy" feel. INT 1 was the sweet(est) spot for me.

Increasing the in-game max torque also helped, weird that the perceived feedback from the GT-DD is lower than the T300 (?).
Any FFB sensitivity in GT Sport above 1 just feels like compressing the FFB dynamic range to me. Sure, some might find that 10 feels "immersive" going straight ahead, but... Why care? There's no FFB information there worth having for performance. I want to feel when I got grip, when I don't, and a smooth transition inbetween - so I can react quickly and appropriately.
(If you want to feel alive, and have that mechanical sensation, ride a motorcycle in real life. Super cool, I promise.)
 
Ske
not sure what's up with the weird sensitivity slider behaviour as increasing this added detail on my T300. Maybe there's a real reason why the official Fanatec post recommends 5/1?
Turning that up is a bit like turning up 'min force' in some other games. As HugoTwoWheels says, you're compressing the dynamic range. This helpful on lower powered wheel bases like the T300, because it is boosting the smaller parts of the signal. On the GT DD Pro in 5 Nm mode, maybe it is also preferred to run this a little above 1. But I wouldn't do it in the 8 Nm mode.
 
Any FFB sensitivity in GT Sport above 1 just feels like compressing the FFB dynamic range to me.
Turning that up is a bit like turning up 'min force' in some other games. As HugoTwoWheels says, you're compressing the dynamic range. This helpful on lower powered wheel bases like the T300, because it is boosting the smaller parts of the signal. On the GT DD Pro in 5 Nm mode, maybe it is also preferred to run this a little above 1. But I wouldn't do it in the 8 Nm mode.
Thanks for confirming. I got the impression that was the case (I dabble in audio engineering so I can relate to the signal compression concept).

What I find hard to wrap my head around is how I seem to feel more low-level detail in steady state cornering when dialing back the "compression". Could be a placebo effect i suppose? Or a side-effect of interpolating the signals? Since so much detail gets lost even at INT 2, does GT sport send a really spiky signal that's hard to interpolate without losing information?

Side note, but does anyone know the FFB refresh rate of GTS?

SHO controls the vibration of the electric motors in the steering wheels that have them, and has nothing to do with the FFB.
Forgot to mention this but I believed (wrongly) that most wheels did have a vibration system. I suppose that makes it even weirder (to me) that the character of the effects are so different between the two bases. I guess the reason some of the effects feel smoother on the T300 could be because of some built-in signal compression, belt dampening, or maybe clipping?
 
Ske
Forgot to mention this but I believed (wrongly) that most wheels did have a vibration system. I suppose that makes it even weirder (to me) that the character of the effects are so different between the two bases. I guess the reason some of the effects feel smoother on the T300 could be because of some built-in signal compression, belt dampening, or maybe clipping?
Increasing INT and decreasing FEI will make the GT DD to feel smoother.
 
Increasing INT and decreasing FEI will make the GT DD to feel smoother.

Increasing INT or decreasing FEI removes way too much definition for my tastes.
Right now I'm leaning towards either INT 1/FEI 100 or INT 0/FEI 80, maybe also play around with inertia/friction. *

"Smooth" was probably not the best word to describe what I meant.
"Muted, but still with some sharpness" may be more describing.

Like a vibration effect (hence my thinking of shock) rather than a series of jolts.
Anyway, it might be just how a (probably clipping) lower midrange belt drive interprets GTS' signals. I don't think one can replicate the other, I'll probably get used to it like I did the T300.

*) Edit: Scratch that, lowering FEI seems to introduce some kind of delay which throws me off.
I think the "jolting" may just be a symptom of too much torque for my taste (from going in the wrong direction).
Gonna try starting from scratch at 4/4 but keeping INT low or off (maybe a bit of damper/friction to even it out)
 
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Thank you all for your posts! I took the recomended values of Fanatec. Decreasing the INT helped a lot, I even lowered it to zero. I think the more Feedback you get the better in this case.
 
What's the auto setting in the CSL DD/GT DD Pro? What does it mean that the wheel settings are being fed by the game? Does it suck for GT Sport? Will it suck for GT7? Should one just copy the settings posted here earlier, on the Fanatec forums, and possibly experiment from there, instead of using the auto setting? I've not seen anyone mention this.
 
What's the auto setting in the CSL DD/GT DD Pro? What does it mean that the wheel settings are being fed by the game? Does it suck for GT Sport? Will it suck for GT7? Should one just copy the settings posted here earlier, on the Fanatec forums, and possibly experiment from there, instead of using the auto setting? I've
New "Auto Setup" which is the factory default for P DD, CSL DD, GT DD PRO, CSW V2.5, CSL E WB PS4:

  1. Settings in Auto Setup can only be changed by the game, for example to push recommended settings.
  2. While in Auto Setup the user can only view the settings, but not change them.
  3. If the settings aren't set by the game, the factory default will be used.
  4. To customise settings the user can choose one of the custom setups.
 
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Can we expect that GT7 will be providing more Details to GT DD than GTS does?
I can't confirm this, but I am confident that this will be the case. For two reasons: GT7 is clearly a step forward in technology for the series, and Polyphony Digital have been working with GT DD Pro units for some time.
Ske
Since so much detail gets lost even at INT 2, does GT sport send a really spiky signal that's hard to interpolate without losing information?
I don't think it can be easily explained. The way GT Sport handles FFB in general is unique.
Ske
I guess the reason some of the effects feel smoother on the T300 could be because of some built-in signal compression, belt dampening, or maybe clipping?
Most likely belt/mechanical/electronic dampening.
Ske
Increasing INT or decreasing FEI removes way too much definition for my tastes.
Right now I'm leaning towards either INT 1/FEI 100 or INT 0/FEI 80, maybe also play around with inertia/friction. *

"Smooth" was probably not the best word to describe what I meant.
"Muted, but still with some sharpness" may be more describing.

Like a vibration effect (hence my thinking of shock) rather than a series of jolts.
Anyway, it might be just how a (probably clipping) lower midrange belt drive interprets GTS' signals. I don't think one can replicate the other, I'll probably get used to it like I did the T300.

*) Edit: Scratch that, lowering FEI seems to introduce some kind of delay which throws me off.
I think the "jolting" may just be a symptom of too much torque for my taste (from going in the wrong direction).
Gonna try starting from scratch at 4/4 but keeping INT low or off (maybe a bit of damper/friction to even it out)
For our DD bases, I consider dropping FEI below 100 to be a 'last resort'. INT is the more sophisticated filter, and due to the way the interpolation works, it can smooth out a rough/harsh/spiky/grainy signal without removing too much 'detail'. Therefore I would always recommend turning INT up (even to relatively high values) before considering turning FEI down. But in the case of GT Sport, the signal already seems to have its own smoothing, which is why you are finding that very low INT values are effective. Low FEI values can create a feeling of latency and cause more oscillation, so this is normally not recommended.
 
What does it mean that the wheel settings are being fed by the game?
(I'm assuming) games that support this feature can send a data object with the developer's recommended values. It could probably also be used for sharing/storing user settings - like loading a car setup in-game, but for your hardware - but that's if the API and/or implementation allows it.

Does it suck for GT Sport?
As far as I can tell it doesn't do anything for GT Sport - the game most likely doesn't support this feature.
Which means auto settings for GT Sport will just use the wheel(-base)'s default settings.

Should one just copy the settings posted here earlier, on the Fanatec forums, and possibly experiment from there, instead of using the auto setting?
I suggest trying different settings one parameter at a time to understand how each affect the feedback.
If your wheel base isn't too powerful you could try min/maxing each parameter to see what happens (and how severely) - but don't max out random values on a powerful base...

I don't think it can be easily explained. The way GT Sport handles FFB in general is unique.
That's my conclusion as well. I tried some other games and all of them were objectively better with the DD, with no obvious side effects. GT Sport is the only game I've tried in which I notice a loss of something.

I'm guessing it's too late to hope for a FFB patch for GT Sport now, all hands are probably on the GT7 deck.

On a side note, I also tried a G923 which also felt weirder in GT Sport than other games.
For all I know Thrustmaster got some unique insights and/or influence during their partnership with PD?

For our DD bases, I consider dropping FEI below 100 to be a 'last resort' ... Low FEI values can create a feeling of latency and cause more oscillation, so this is normally not recommended.
Thanks for confirming, a bit worried I might be imagining things 👍
 
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Some people in the community are thinking that PD will turn off the TGT-mode in GT7, so there will be no rumble effect anymore with TGT. I somehow cant imagine they would do this. What are your thoughts about this?
 
Some people in the community are thinking that PD will turn off the TGT-mode in GT7, so there will be no rumble effect anymore with TGT. I somehow cant imagine they would do this. What are your thoughts about this?
I would hope that the DFB feature stays but can also be utilized by other games. It's a real shame that it's exclusive to GT.
 
Some people in the community are thinking that PD will turn off the TGT-mode in GT7, so there will be no rumble effect anymore with TGT. I somehow cant imagine they would do this. What are your thoughts about this?
This image below is from the PS 5 compatible T-GT 2. This isn't conformation that there will be no rumble effect in GT7 but to me it certainly doesn't look good, and while I do like it and would probably miss it, I'm sure my ButtKicker will continue to be my main source of tactile feedback.

agh.png


 
I am using the T300 in GT Sport and its just fine, nothing special. I have it mounted to a wheelstandpro. The T3PA pedals are also mounted until I get my T-LCM pedals, hopefully this weekend. Part of the problem is that I have used an Accuforce on PC for over 5 years and so I am hooked on DD force feedback. GIMX does not yet work on PS5 and so I went with the T300 as a stop gap measure.

All of that being said, any thoughts on whether I should at least use a T-GT, since it has stronger FFB and the vibration feature? Or, should I just suck it up and get the Fanatec DD Pro?
 
Just as said in opening post, I strongly recommend to wait until GT7 release. If the vibration feature is still suported like in GTS, I would say go for TGT if in same time GT DD is not better in his FFB like now in GTS. Because I think (and hope) the GT DD will be provided with more detailed FFB information in GT7. So dont buy anything now and look what the situation is when the game comes out.
 
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