Stuttering issues - discussion & suggestions

Does anyone know if this helps : Windows System Timer Tool - a fix for stutter in games?
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In the Nvidia control panel there is a kind of "broadcast" setting that was forced on in the latest update. It produced massive stutter in R3E.
When I disabled it, stuttering was gone... so be sure to take a look there.

Don't know if it affects AMS though, since I just bought it, but it runs fine - apart from the two side screens being white with some grey pictures flickering all the time when in menu. The center screen is OK.

My FPS counter on the left screen is there, but unreadable, and the little Steam window is also flickering on the right screen...

Is this all normal ? ( while racing all is OK).

 

I definitely have this too. Haven't noticed it too well until I put in a new graphics card. It seems a bit worse now... I have a GTX 1070 now and the old one was a GTX 770.

Track & Layout Used: Kansai, 100% sure of that. But others too, though haven't tested extensively yet. Mod tracks seem to not have this or at least is barely noticeable if present. At least in my experience Queensland, Monza and Vanport seem to work pretty well with shadows on and time scale at x1.
Car Used: SuperV8, Caterham 360R & 620R

 

A helpful guy over at AC support forum (!) suggested to run AMS in windowed mode, which fixed the stuttering for me completely! I have now stable fps again.
Well...

 

@RMR1 Maybe reading this would have helped: FORUM RULES & SUPPORT INFO - Please read before posting

 

Guess you have problems in the reading part, nice attitude by the way!

It doesn't say that you cannot create bug reports.

It says to report it on the specific topic created for it, which is the one the developers will take a look at when they have their time.

 

3 pages of support from community, the best dev team you can find, and this is the result...seriously guys what is going on?
Games community are going wrong and worse these days...

 

Ya, the stutter is 100% related to the Sky Update Frames setting which is related to, both, shadows and time-scale (explained here); our testing clearly shows this.

The problem only occurs when, both, shadows and time-scale are enabled (regardless if low, med, high, full). The timing-interval of the stutter depends on what number Sky Update Frames is set to. This can all be verified and repeated.

I hope we gave Reiza all they need in order to get rid of this non-sense from the game-code itself because clearly ISI never did before-hand.

 

Mine is already 1ms for some reason (can't track down the culprit exe) so shouldn't be an issue. Not sure this is a "legit" thing anyway...

Doesn't change anything on my system.

 

The Windows Timer Tool is not some pseudo-bullcrap stuff, lol. The thing is, most games (if not all) automatically reduce the setting from around 16ms to 1ms so the tool isn't really needed. The tool only further increases it from 1 to 0.5. I still use it just for that tiny difference but it honestly isn't needed as it's so minor.

A lot of sound engineers/"guys" used to open up certain programs that would automatically reduce it (like how the game reduces it from 16ms to 1.0ms) and they would leave those programs open in the background while working. Instead of having to open programs and leaving them running in the background, this tool was created.

It apparently made some big differences to people running Counterstrike servers. I guess Counterstrike didn't lower Windows to 1.0 like most games.

Like I said though, most games (AM included) automatically set Windows to 1.0ms (from 16-ish) so the tool isn't needed unless you want to go down from 1.0 to 0.5 which is so minor to the point it's probably pointless but it doesn't hurt. The worst it could do is nothing.

 

Thanks for the information Didn't mean the timer adjustment would be snake oil as such but rather if it's an appropriate thing to change in hopes that it fixes the problem. Knowing that this kind of stuttering can be turned on and off on specific tracks by setting time scale "on" and shadows on. I can't really see the connection between the specific stuttering and the timer adjustment. But then again I don't know that much about these things

 

With time scale on, the sun will move in the sky, from dawn to dusk; then you will have a night. So the shadows are updated constantly, to follow the ever changing sun position.
With time scale off, the sun is fixed, and so are the shadows. Needs less resources obvioulsy. But you have less immersion too! Having the shadows moving can change your reference points.

 

I wanted to just write: "Yes, I know how Sun and shadows work, thanks " but then I sat here thinking whay did you write that post and then I realised it! I guess I wrote it ambiguosly/wrong. I meant I can't see the connection between this specific stuttering issue and the "suggested fix" of lowering the timer value. Sorry for the confusion!

 

Ohhh, no worries Tero, I misunderstood you. The last time I told people about the Windows Timer Tool was in the rFactor 2 forums where I was attacked by multiple people including ISI themselves and people calling it snake oil then ISI even locked the thread, lol! So I misunderstood you but, ya, it doesn't do anything for the stutters, it's just for latency / input lag. I think the tool did make a difference to stutters here and there on an older PC of mine when playing Crysis back in the day.

Ya, I completely agree with you, I can't see the connection between the timer tool and these specific stutters. But at-least we tried . These stutters seem directly related to the game-engine; I bet nothing will change it other than game changes itself.

 

Just thought I'd join the party to show my findings on this.
I had the stuttering occasionally a couple of months back, put shadows to high and turn off shadow blur and it's been fine until recently when it cam back with a vengeance, it would stutter on corners so consistently I knew when it was going to happen, did a 48 lap race last week and it did it coming out of the pits and the same time on every corner!! Was a difficult race I can tell you.

I recently tried updating NV driver, switching to a different HD, turning off shadows, time progression, putting it on 180hz, limiting FPS etc etc, decided to reinstall last night and cleared my system of all traces, I run no overlays or any other programs, my system is a dedicated gaming rig so no excess stuff, no anti virus as clean as a new install on Win 10.

Specs are i7 4790k (stock), GTX970, 16GB DDR3, SSD etc.

Tried after the re install.completely vanilla except for tuning off music, setting wheel and driving.

Thought I would work on one track and work from page 2 backwards so started with Caterham 360 on Brands Hatch (I have the DLC), as soon as I turned right into the pits it was there, not really a stutter but a micro hitch like it was losing 1 out of 10 frames, FPS did not drop it was around 200, it stuttered on the first corner and then the hairpin.

Went out and tried the MCR on BHatch, smooth as silk from the off, butter smooth, then tried the Trainer, stutter same as the Caterham almost identical.

Went back and repeated it 3 times with the same 3 cars and it did it exactly the same, MCR was smooth the other 2 stuttered.

Took the Caterham around Buenos Aires 12 as it is our next league race but in the Copas, the Caterham stuttered but the Copa De Marcas didn't?

So it seems to me to be car related not track or shadows related as I also tried it with shadows and time progression off.

Can anyone reproduce this with the same 3 cars on Brands?

 

Doesn't seem like the same stuttering issue that for example I and @Spin have. Because the stuttering we experience can be disabled with shadows off or timescale off, and enabled by setting both of them on, with 100% accuracy.

 

The other day I was testing several cars in Kansai. The only car I had stuttering was the Caterham. I also tried to totally disable the shadows and the stuttering disappeared with the Caterham.

I think the problem of stuttering is related to some car (like the Caterham) and also to the shadows.

Regards.

 

Javi, I'm going to try tests with other cars but I think I did that.
I'll report back in a few hours.

One thing to keep in mind is, I'm assuming, each car can make a difference to the overall scene which may affect the stutters even though it may not necessarily be the car itself causing the issue but, instead, the rendered scene overall (all shadows/lighting from everything: car, buildings, track, etc.). This could be the case but I'm just speculating.

One thing is for sure, when it does happen, it's directly related to shadows on/off, time scale on/off, and the stutterr timing/frequency is directly related to the number the SkyUpdateFrames setting is set to. If that is not the case with your stutters, then it's a different issue.

I'll report back soon. I don't have any DLC content so unfortunately can't test it.

 

I will wait for your results. I remember when the Boxer Cup came out, this car had stuttering (I tried it the other day and it is now smooth).

I think Reiza should check out the Caterham as they did with other car models (in some Automobilista changelogs there are references to revised cars in relation to performance/stuttering problems).

I have also noticed that the Caterham goes more smoothly at Interlagos than at Kansai.

It seems that stuttering problems have several different origins.

Regards.

P.S. Sorry for my bad english, it's not my native language.

 

Looking for information on stuttering, I found this in Racedepartment.
The last two comments from Alex72 and William Wester are similar to my last post.

FPS drop after new triple screen setup