screen stutters

[Chalenge]

The system has the Realtek 5.1 digital audio chipset on it. I suppose I could go to Bestbuy and grab a Soundblaster just to see if it makes a difference...if not I just take it back...LOL

From the kettle to the fire so to speak...

[gyrene81]

Skuzzy the IRQ's are clear. Even looked at the DMA channels. Nothing is crossed.

I figured out the glitch with my frame rates...I didn't have the game resolution set the same as the monitor resolution. Didn't make sense but now I'm running between 60 and 57 frames. I think I have the issue with the stuttering almost figured out as far as my issue goes. As the frame rate fluctuates the object refresh rate fluctuates, which is the visible stuttering effect. Short small stutters happen when there is 1 or less than 1 fluctuation in the frame rate. Higher fluctuations in frame rate causes slower more pronounced stuttering until the frame rate returns to a stable or near stable state regardless of what it ends up being (i.e. high or low).

I updated my video driver and without any changes the stuttering effect was worse until I changed the in game resolution. It's playable now even though the stuttering effect is still there, it's more like little tiny twitches and my frame rates aren't going over my video refresh rates then bottoming out.


Straffo, no Network Acess Manager or otherwise.

[Chalenge]

Face palm! 

[gyrene81]

This is still an existing issue. It's not as bad as in some previous revisions but still happens all the time, the fluctuation in the frame rates isn't a direct cause of the stuttering though it does contribute to the severity...and it doesn't matter if detailed terrain is on or off. With 512MB video memory available and only 87MB showing in game as being used with detailed terrain on...the question about memory usage and preloading textures comes to mind again.

[Skuzzy]

The game automatically preloads textures.  If it was a texture load problem, laptops with thier hideously slow 5400RPM hard drives would be stuttering all the time.  I just spent 4 days watching a mess of laptops run the game as smooth as silk.

The ones that struggled all had 70+ (up to 95) processes running in the background.

[gyrene81]

Skuzzy, the newer 5400 rpm SATA drives in laptops (especially the high capacity drives) are fully capable of running the textures in AH as smoothly as 7200 rpm drives. Still, I'm not saying it's absolutely a texture load issue...however if it's not a texture load issue considering v2.13 used 100+ mb of video memory with 512 textures loaded and v2.16 is only using 80+ mb of video memory with 512 textures, then it has to be a rendering issue, maybe caused by chipsets or drivers.

Every single revision since 2.14.0 was released has had reports of stuttering to varying degrees regardless of ATI or Nvidia chipsets. With some tweaking most everyone has been able to minimize the effect so that it doesn't interfere with game play.

Without just dismissing the idea is it possible that considering the manner in which it manifests itself and increases with the amount (not size) of textures rendered, that the stuttering could be eliminated by making some changes to the way textures are preloaded in memory?

[Skuzzy]

It is absolutely not a texture preload issue.  A texture preload issue would impact everyone equally.  The preload before, would load things that may never be needed.

The new graphics engine is more efficient.  That is one reason why older computers are running the new version better than the old version while the new version looks better as well.

If you are getting stutters regardless of how the "Detailed Terrain" option is set, then it is something else not releated to rendering.  It has to be.

5400RPM SATA drives are slow as snails.  A 25% increase in the rotational latency and a reduction in the areal density, is going to slow things down.  It cannot help but do so.  It is painfully obvious if you put a 7200RPM drive next to the same computer with a 5400RPM drive.

[gyrene81]

The preload before, would load things that may never be needed.

The new graphics engine is more efficient.  That is one reason why older computers are running the new version better than the old version while the new version looks better as well.

How is it possible for older computers to run the new version bettter when you have to dial down the in game graphics settings to get decent frame rates when it wasn't necessary with the 2.13 version? I seem to remember a massive outcry from people using older systems with older video cards when 2.14 was first released, and if that were the case then my P4 with the 7300GT should be able to get as good if not better in game performance with the same settings (512 textures, bumpmap and detailed terrain on, all other off).
Or are you referring to older systems with upgraded video cards? I could understand that since a P4 processor can handle the load, or should be able to and a simple video card upgrade could put enough hardware power into it to overcome any limitations.

If you are getting stutters regardless of how the "Detailed Terrain" option is set, then it is something else not releated to rendering.  It has to be.

I'm not totally sure either way Skuzzy, that's why I'm asking. If I had access to the code I could find out for myself...but not going there...so I'm just tossing out the ideas based on my observations and knowledge of 3d rendering. Could it be a bottleneck problem with not enough pixel pipelines or maybe 128bit vs 256bit interface? There was one patch (5? or 6?) that the stuttering went away...and I didn't see anything in the release notes that showed a change that would account for it.

It's not going to be something big or necessarily obvious...could just be a small item that was thought to be "unnecessary". All I know is 2.13 ran totally awesome with 512 textures and all other options active on my 7300GT AGP but since 2.14 my much better 9500GT PCI-E 2.0 on a better hardware platform is having issues that never appeared in the previous version or on my older system...and I'm not the only one.

For me this isn't a huge deal for me...just an annoyance that I'm fairly certain can be resolved from the programming end.

5400RPM SATA drives are slow as snails.  A 25% increase in the rotational latency and a reduction in the areal density, is going to slow things down.  It cannot help but do so.  It is painfully obvious if you put a 7200RPM drive next to the same computer with a 5400RPM drive.

Yeah that's true, I was more referring to data path flow....which the SATA standard is the same across the board regardless of drive speed. Seek and read/write times are going to be better on a 7200 rpm drive, but once you get to the point of data flow it would be the same.

[Skuzzy]

The current version of the game is based on a new graphics engine.  Everything is being differently.  This benefited lower end systems of today as the way things are done now are in step with what they can do.  The old version was doing things based on how a video card worked 5 years ago.

Bottom of the line video cards can run with "Bump Mapping" and "Detailed Water" and it will look better than the previous game version did when it was being run full tilt.  Not only look better, but it will perform about 10 to 15% better as well.

2.13 cannot be compared to 2.16.  They are very different.  2.16 places far more burden on the video card than 2.13 was capable of, in many areas.  It is not surprising, nor expected, that many computers cannot run 2.16 with all the details enabled.  The graphics engine in 2.16 will need to last 5 years.  The 2.13 graphics engine was at the end of its 5 year life.


The data stream from the hard disk of a 5400RPM drive will not be able to sustain itself when compared to a 7200RPM drive.  The SATA bus will outrun the 5400RPM drive, by quite a bit.

[guncrasher]

sorry to do a little hijacking here skuzzy, but if I understand correctly an older hd may cause mini warps or stuttering?.  reason i ask that that i have been having the same problems as posted here and all my components are brand new, mobo, vc cpu (e8400) except for the older hd that I still use it's a about 5 years old.

semp

[Chalenge]

If you have some of the more 'paranoid' software that uses licensing processes (Corel uses Protexis and Autodesk uses Autodesk Licensing and Adobe uses FLEXnet...etc) you can build up quite a bit of latency in background processes. Couple that with known interference patterns like nvidia chipsets mixed with SB drivers and you have a disaster in the making. Its a wonder computers work at all!

[Skuzzy]

Do not forget about iTunes.   The background helper is very ill-behaved.  Then there are many AV programs also.  And anything from Adobe.

[gyrene81]

iTunes - not installed
Adobe Acrobat - disabled all quickstart/helper objects
Windows Update - disabled
MS Office - disabled all quick start objects
Windows default mouse driver


Avast - disable active protection before gaming
Saitek Cyborg profiler - active
Nvidia control panel - active

Gameboster - disables everything except Saitek profiler and network connectivity processes

Before going into the game paging file is down to 270MB...that is as low as it gets.



If the graphics engine of the game is hitting the graphics card the system background processes should not affect the graphical performance of the GPU.

[Skuzzy]

<snip>
Before going into the game paging file is down to 270MB...that is as low as it gets.

If the graphics engine of the game is hitting the graphics card the system background processes should not affect the graphical performance of the GPU.

That page file seems a bit large to me.  Should be around 150MB, but I have seen worse.

Not quite true about the graphics engine.  The data still has to get to the graphics card.  Anything on the CPU side can impact that.

[gyrene81]

The paging file is a bit larger than I would want for AH...most of it is the remaining Avast resident files...but with 2.14 patch 5 or 6 I ran with a bigger paging file and no issues. Wasn't that just before the change was made in the way the shadow textures were handled?


I'm down to 256 textures now because last night my frame rates went stupid and hit an all time low of 8 while I was on the deck trying to shoot another player down. Did it 3 separate times...not a big furball...maybe 1 or 2 other planes high that I could see in front of me...several behind me and 1 or 2 others firing at the same plane...on the deck at tree top level...as soon as I pulled the trigger the frame rates hit bottom...to get my frame rate back up, I had to point the nose up for about 30 seconds. I tried it with only bump map terrain turned on...same deal.


My system is above "recommended hardware specifications"...and I doubt the current recommended specifications would run AH with anything more than bump map terrain turned on at 1024x768 resolution and 128 textures...there are too many people running Nvidia video cards for it to be an Nvidia issue.

I know there is another update coming so I'm not going to jump on a bigger video card yet.