Stuttering Problems with SINGLE 4870 GPU

[MatTheCat]

I am wondering if anyone else notices stuttering problems when running games on a HD4870 gfx card.

Whilst practically all games run at a solid 60 FPS with all setting on High, there are those games that run a smooth 60FPS, and those that FRAPS shows running at 60FPS but stutter around like hell giving quite a lesser subjective quality of smoothness.

For example...

STALKER SOC.....Stutters horrendously....especially when around 'fire'
Timeshift....Stutters a lot
Mass Effect....Stutters a bit
COD4, stutters sometimes but runs very smooth overall.

I have other games that also run at a solid 60FPS and have no stuttering problems at all.

Bioshock
Grid
Gears Of War

and Crysis (which does not run at 60FPS but does run very smooth at between 30-45)

Anyone out there got any answers?

 

[oli_ramsay]

Are you using latest drivers?

 

[EastCoasthandle]

Run your CPU at 3.60GHz with your ram at 1066MHz at 5-5-5-12
Then lower the CPU voltage and northbridge voltage a tad. Make sure you run your ram at it's recommended voltage. Running your ram at 851MHz just so that you can do 4-4-4-12 may yield slower, stuttering performance. I've tried something similar using Crysis Warhead (attempting 1:1) and it was slow with some mild stuttering.
I have some of the games you mentioned and never noticed any stuttering problems.

 

[MatTheCat]

Are you using latest drivers?

Indeed I am!

Run your CPU at 3.60GHz with your ram at 1066MHz at 5-5-5-12
Then lower the CPU voltage and northbridge voltage a tad. Make sure you run your ram at it's recommended voltage. Running your ram at 851MHz just so that you can do 4-4-4-12 may yield slower, stuttering performance. I've tried something similar using Crysis Warhead (attempting 1:1) and it was slow with some mild stuttering.
I have some of the games you mentioned and never noticed any stuttering problems.

I will try out what u suggest and report back with my findings.

P.S. What I mean by stuttering is 'microstutter'. FPS is still 60FPS but...........game stutters quite badly.

 

[phanbuey]

i have had the same issue in stalker with the fire... with my 8800GT (even now, to a much lesser extent, with the GTX 260's). Every time you look at the fire it seems like youre getting 10 fps...

I've never played any of the other games, but the Stalker 'fire' issue probably has to do with the game's coding. (just google "fire stutter Stalker" and see what i mean).

 

[eidairaman1]

check your services, something has gotta be runnin in background for it to stutter like your saying.

 

[MatTheCat]

Tried it out.

Made no difference in the games concerned.

With STALKER, the stuttering would only occur when the character was looking at or in and around flames.......(which is basically all the time)

The thought that this is only a problem that my 4870 suffers from is quite annoying...surely other single 4870 users must experience similar issues?

EDIT @ Phanpheuy.

Ah..some light shed on the situation......

I am thinking that the same thing will probs apply to the other games I mention as well......think most of them are 360 ports.......

 

[phanbuey]

yeah its definitely not the hardware... i wish i had the other games layin around just to see if they stutter with my setup...

The only thing you can do for shitty coding is to make sure the games have their latest patches.

 

[siapnar]

Sorry to revive this thread, but I think I'm having the same issues as you. There's a more in depth discussion of this topic at Guru3D in this thread: http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?t=274651

Page 5 is where I make a 'breakthrough' you could say, although the issue is still not resolved. That's why I hope some of you gurus here could provide some much needed insight.

Here's a copy of what I posted in that forum regarding my stuttering/skipping:

Here's the test I just did:

Download a frame limiter from here: http://www.bethsoft.com/bgsforums/in...owtopic=902594 (great tool for benchmarking)

follow the guideline in the thread, it's pretty straight forward.
Create a .bat file for Crysis running at 30 fps.
Boot Crysis up, load up whatever map and run to a densely forested area where a ton of shadows are being cast. Maybe try to look out onto the water too, or get some baddies shooting at you even. What's important is that you find an area with a lot of motion on screen without u needing to touch the keyboard or mouse.
NOW, I found that, running at 30 fps, if I just stood still and didn't touch the mouse or keyboard that everything moving on screen was very smooth... pretty much flawless.
I then strafed back and forth with the keyboard, and it seemed to be hitching/stuttering quite a bit.
Then I just used the mouse to look around (no keyboard movement) and the stuttering was even worse
The stuttering is almost like every frame is being copied and dragged 1 millimeter behind as the next frame is rendered. It's hard to explain, but I'm sure you know what I mean. The bottom line is, the stuttering is very evident and extremely annoying. The key thing is that it didn't happen when I avoided using the keyboard and mouse.

My mouse is USB 2.0 (basic, black Logitech Optical) and my keyboard is a pretty ****ty Logitech one for 10 or so bucks.

I'm thinking either my mouse and keyboard are too low quality (low dpi for mouse and whatever delay for keyboard), my USB 2.0 driver or soemthing isn't up to date, or I'm having some kind of incompatibility or issue with Windows using my keyboard/mouse.

Either way, since it runs perfectly smooth when I don't use any inputs (even at 30 fps), the stuttering HAS to have something to do with the inputs.

My specs are (all stock speeds):

Intel E8500 3.16ghz
Diamond HD 4870 512mb
2 GB OCZ Reaper DDR2 1200mhz
ASUS P5Q mobo (normal, not deluxe or anything)
WD 120GB 7200RPM
SB X-Fi Xtreme Gamer
OCZ GameXstream 600w PSU
Acer AL2216W LCD
Win XP 32 bit

This is an extremely frustrating issue since my PC is essentially being bottlenecked when I could be running Crysis and Fallout 3 smoothly at max detail.

Any help would be appreciated

 

[Binge]

I think the problem with the guy above is the fact that you're running at max detail... particle effects will destroy a 4870 at maximum settings. Looking out over large distances and stuttering is a result of the frame buffer being too small for the resolution.

You need to specify your graphics settings in game along with resolution and AA/AF if any.

 

[siapnar]

I'm not running at max at all.. I should be running pretty close to it at around 30 fps but I'm not because currently 30 fps stutters like hell when I move.
I've put all the settings down to low just to test, but as long as my framerate is under 60, I get stuttering. Under 50 fps is when it really starts to stutter badly.
As I said in my post, when I set the frame limiter to 30 and run Crysis I can stand still and not move the mouse or touch the keyboard and the stuttering is gone. Once I move using the keyboard or look with the mouse I get really bad stuttering.

 

[Binge]

Can you reduce your visibility settings?

What I'm getting at is that you might be viewing too much for your resolution. If you can reduce the max visibility settings and see if that helps. Another thing that has helped me in the past with the 4870 has been to down the lighting settings.

Good luck!

 

[siapnar]

no, it really has nothing to do with the graphics settings at all, whether it be resolution, LOD, view distance or anything else.

For instance, I'll run Fallout 3 on everything low and LOD and view distances all the way down. If I cap the fps off at 50 and below I get very noticeable stuttering

As stated in my other post, considering the tests I've done, the stuttering must be due to inputs and how windows handles them at anything lower than 60 fps.
Any help regarding this would be what I need.

BTW I replaced both my keyboard and mouse with no effect.

Again, this thread has all the information on what's been tried already to fix the issue: http://www.bethsoft.com/bgsforums/in...owtopic=902594

 

[siapnar]

OK, here, I recorded and compressed a video of what the 'stuttering' looks like: [B]http://www.speedyshare.com/413224520.html[/B] (1.9 mb)

You should be able to clearly see the 'stuttering', especially when concentrating on the bottles on the top of the shelf to the right.

If you guys can't tell from that video, I can upload the uncompressed, 69mb version

I'm convinced it's not a mouse issue, since it happens when I stand still and something moves across the screen

 

[lemonadesoda]

I looked at your mp4, and I must say, I cant see what the problem is. It might be that I'm looking for another issue. But what I see is this:

1./ NOT very high framerate. What is it? You've got fraps but isnt showing the fps!

2./ You character, when it turns, will turn at say 1 degree rotation at a time. This means that nearby objects might move "smoothly" but far away objects will "jump" each time the GPU renders a screen, since the object is now in a new place in your vision based on the fact that you just moved 1 degree about axis.

Not all game engines are created equal. Some may handle "rotation" better and more smoothly than others.

I think your demo isnt the same issue as the STALKER problem where you strafe and the picture turns into a slideshow. In such a situation, I have to agree that I suspect it is a memory issue on the GPU... new "world coordinates" are being uploaded and they arent being uploaded fast enough, OR, there is a framebuffer memory mapping lag introduced due to fragmented memory on the GPU. Only a new drivers/firmware or larger ram on the GPU could fix that.

Try creating a timedemo (record, then playback the script in the game engine), to convince yourself it isnt an INPUT/CONTROLLER problem, but is actually the game engine and/or the GPU memory issue.

 

[siapnar]

Since my issue isn't directly related to the one discussed at the start of this topic, I made a new thread: http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?p=1054148#post1054148

BTW I ran the Crysis benchmark which is a fly-by, so I didn't need to touch the inputs, and the stuttering was still there.

thanks for your input so far

 

[bas3onac1d]

Your problem points to memory capacity problems. Either you're using too much or have too little.