A small tip about steering dead zone settings in the input calibration section of wheel settings. I set a value of 1% dead zone and realised it was causing quite severe latency problems while driving and also made the steering feel a little strange. I then reset to 0% and the latency problem totally disappeared and the steering felt normal again. It seems as though it does actually give a dead zone just latency. Not good. So I would advise not to use any dead zone setting. Hope this may be useful to some of you.
I think you're maybe misinterpreting what's happening. I just tested and it definitely isn't adding any noticeable latency to the steering, looking at the on-screen wheel or while driving. It is, however, completely ungainly and weird to drive, and could be 'felt' as latency around centre. That's because deadzone shouldn't be used on a wheel, probably ever but certainly when the increment is 1% and wheels these days are doing 900°+ of rotation. There's just no reason to add deadzone, and it won't work properly as a steering wheel around centre. Maybe there was a time where wheels with 180° of rotation (90 each way) driving very sensitive cars might have sort of benefited from it, but IMO you just shouldn't use it at all. But I certainly can't see any latency, just deadzone. (testing latency with the wheel turned about 90°; testing around centre would be misleading since that's where the deadzone takes effect)
The latency was showing on the on screen wheel. The on screen wheel was definitely showing latency compared to my wheel. I have never had any latency before setting the 1% dead zone and it totally disappeared after resetting to 0% which is my normal setting. I have worked out what is happening, testing with the GTE Aston which has 514 degrees total steering angle, 1% equals 5.14 degrees total 2.57 degrees each way. Setting 1% in settings actually produces more than this, probably in the region of 10 degrees, which is exaggerating the dead zone. My wheel matches the 514 degrees exactly so it's not the settings of my wheel. The extra degrees makes it appear as if it's latency. The reason I tried the 1% dead zone was because the car I was driving was tending to weave when going down a long straight and I thought adding a little dead zone may help reduce it. Can't remember which car it was. Won't be using any dead zone again. P.S. The 1% dead zone setting may be 1% of the wheels total rotation and not 1% of the cars total rotation. My wheels total rotation is 880 degrees which would be close to the 10 degrees I observed.
The only reason I can imagine adding dead-zone to steering would be to replicate Classic / Vintage / severely worn steering systems. It seems to me, that may already be represented in certain vintage cars by design but, something I tend to tune out / minimize with wheel-base settings. In my younger days, I drove many vehicles with sub-standard steering (free-play), and it did indeed feel like latency issues.
