Abstract: A method and apparatus for detecting differences between an image update rate and a display update rate and to provide a viable solution that produces minimal adverse visual effects is achieved by first detecting an image delineation from a stream of images. The image delineation is then used to determine the image update rate which is compared to the display update rate to produce a relationship between the two update rates. The relationship is then compared to a plurality of desired relationships to determine if it is sufficiently similar to one or more of the desired relationships. If it is, an image display pattern associated with the desired relationship is used. For example, if the relationship is sufficiently similar to the desired relationship of 1:1, then the image display pattern will be 1111 . . . In other words, the image display pattern would display each received image once.