5870 & TF2: "Stutter"/"Hitching"?

[Infaustium]

Anyone else have/had a "stutter"/"hitching" like a slight constant "jerking" with a single 5870 in TF2?

I only just recently fired-up TF2 after moving to an XFX 5870, Cat 10.3 WHQL drivers and noticed this happening. Never before with GTX 280.

Is this a driver issue? Some setting in the CCC that oddly affects TF2?

 

[Greenwit]

I play tf2 all the time, a couple hours tonite in fact, and never noticed a thing with my 5870. And I had a completely different system six weeks ago. However I had the problem u described with a 5770 in my core duo rig and fixed it by reinstalling directx.

 

[Astronomica]

Try playing with Vsync on.

 

[Infaustium]

Well, I always play with Vsync on, because I cant stand tearing.

Haven't attempted reinstalling DirectX since I've never heard of that causing such a problem, but if that fixed the problem for you, I can attempt it...

Any other known issue (aside from a bad card) known to cause this?

 

[Infaustium]

That's odd... turned down AA from 8x to 4x and it seems to have stopped, I think.

Something just told me, though that doesn't make sense... TF2 is actually a stronger engine than people think, but the 5870 should be able to handle it, not that there's much of a noticeable difference between 4x and 8x in most games.

 

[Sotorious]

I used to have this problem when i built my new rig under 7 at first it was my hard drive then i think i figured out it was my rates, try setting the correct rates for the game and see how that acts.

 

[Infaustium]

Correct "rates"? You mean the tick rate (or what ever it's called) for TF2? If so, not sure how to do that.

...and I'm assuming you mean you had this issue under Windows 7?

Just for the hell of it, I reinstalled my GTX 280 an hour ago... no problems, so it cant be Win7 or necessarily the rates (if I think I know what you're referring to).

I don't know, but all around, I'm starting to notice more issues with the 5870 again in several games and getting fed-up dealing with it.

Edit: Could there be any issues with Catalyst A.I. enabled in any game?
It's on "Standard" as usual, but maybe it's causing problems. Would it affect anything visually with it disabled, or performance?

 

[Greenwit]

Well, I always play with Vsync on, because I cant stand tearing.

Haven't attempted reinstalling DirectX since I've never heard of that causing such a problem, but if that fixed the problem for you, I can attempt it...

Any other known issue (aside from a bad card) known to cause this?

It was the very last thing i tried after trying everything else. It is no big deal to reinstall directx.....simply go the the MS page and get the latest version. Seems like every new game install checks and updates as necessary anyway and in my case I had not installed the latest and greatest game.

BTW, the problem I had was that the frames would simply freeze momentarily when I was killed or studder badly when I entered an area with lots of activity. And overall, frames were slow by maybe 20% before the fix. Sure was annoying.

 

[Little_4nic8er]

Did you use Driver Sweeper or something like it to get rid of the left over Nvidia bits? May wish to if not.

TF2 is very CPU heavy. AA is known to be a hard hit with the 5870. I simply don't use it in TF2 and get 100+ FPS. TF2 is badly optimized on top of it. (Check out the TF2 Steam forums.) Some maps are worse than others.

It's a lot to do, but I'd hazard a guess a fresh install of Windows and TF2 would sort it out. (If Driver Sweeper doesn't.)

 

[Sotorious]

rate 25000
cl_updaterate "67"
cl_cmdrate "67"
cl_interpolate 1
cl_interp 0.1
cl_smooth 0


Use console.

 

[Dogboy714]

That's odd... turned down AA from 8x to 4x and it seems to have stopped, I think.

Something just told me, though that doesn't make sense... TF2 is actually a stronger engine than people think, but the 5870 should be able to handle it, not that there's much of a noticeable difference between 4x and 8x in most games.

Funny - I had the exact same problem with my 5870 & TF2, and this is what I did to solve it as well (along with fixing a problem with my NIC drivers). I doubt it's a problem with the card having enough power, but instead something weird with the drivers & 8x AA in TF2. Since finding this "fix", I haven't been playing it much though. BC2 has replaced my TF2 itch.

 

[Infaustium]

Did you use Driver Sweeper or something like it to get rid of the left over Nvidia bits? May wish to if not.

TF2 is very CPU heavy. AA is known to be a hard hit with the 5870. I simply don't use it in TF2 and get 100+ FPS. TF2 is badly optimized on top of it. (Check out the TF2 Steam forums.) Some maps are worse than others.

It's a lot to do, but I'd hazard a guess a fresh install of Windows and TF2 would sort it out. (If Driver Sweeper doesn't.)

The 5870 in general is hit hard by AA? Or specifically with TF2? Never heard/seen the 5870 being hit hard by AA.

Seems fine in other games, except Mass Effect 2, which is a disaster with the 5870 when enabling AA in the CCC, which you have to do since there's no in-game AA offered.

CPU is not a problem. I'm running an i7 950 (3.07) and I'm running a relatively new install of Win7 64 (just recently reformatted this drive).

Funny - I had the exact same problem with my 5870 & TF2, and this is what I did to solve it as well (along with fixing a problem with my NIC drivers). I doubt it's a problem with the card having enough power, but instead something weird with the drivers & 8x AA in TF2. Since finding this "fix", I haven't been playing it much though. BC2 has replaced my TF2 itch.

Well, that is interesting... definitely shows it must be a driver issue and 8xAA with TF2, especially since I can use 8xAA in Fallout3, though I stick with 4xAA since with my resolution there's no noticeable difference between the two.

Yeah, it seems fine no... no jerking, stuttering, hitching... what ever it should be called.

I have yet to reinstall BC2 on this drive with this build and the 5870. Think I'm going to do so today, and see how it runs.

Thanks for the responses! Definitely helps clarify the issue.

 

[Little_4nic8er]

The 5870 in general is hit hard by AA? Or specifically with TF2? Never heard/seen the 5870 being hit hard by AA.

Seems fine in other games, except Mass Effect 2, which is a disaster with the 5870 when enabling AA in the CCC, which you have to do since there's no in-game AA offered.

CPU is not a problem. I'm running an i7 950 (3.07) and I'm running a relatively new install of Win7 64 (just recently reformatted this drive).

TF2 especially. (It handles 4x much better now.) Dirt 2 did to at release, but later drivers fixed it. I like to twitch snipe, and from I gather from some reading I have done every FPS counts when it comes to mouse polling/timing/syncing with the FPS or some such. (Sorry, terrible memory.) Even if on an LCD and technically stuck at 60Hz.

It may have been placebo effect but when I turned off AA after getting the 5870 (Raising my FPS compared to my 8800GTX quite a bit.) the mouse response felt snappier. (Problem is the server I like to play on has less than optimal ping.)

 

[g-money]

A few things here.....I run a 5870 with TF2 and all my other games and have seen some of these issues in the past.

Take a look at what type of AA algorithm you are using in CCC. If you are expecting to do 8x Edge-Detect in TF2 (=24xCFAA), thats just not going to happen without some type of slowdown.

Box @ 8xMSAA works perfectly well without any stuttering and looks good. Alternatively you can do 2x or 4x with Edge (I do 4x w/ Edge).

TF2 did have a known stuttering issue specifically on death for a while, this was due to a data caching/reading the cache issue on the HDD which was fixed in one of the recent patches. Since TF2 auto-updates this should not be an issue. However, try to exclude the STEAM folder from your AV and see if there is any difference.

As for the DirectX thing, you can't actually *reinstall* it, simply overwrite the existing files with a fresh copy from MS, as you've already done. IMHO this isn't going to change anything.

Defrag the Tf2 Cache file, or defrag the drive its on with the Win 7 defragger, this might help some. I'm probably preaching to the choir.

I didn't see it mentioned what resolution you are playing in. If its higher than 1680x1050 then at 4X or higher AA, you might indeed be having CPU caused slowdowns. Try OC'ing your CPU just a touch, like 3.2 or 3.4 and see if it makes a difference. EDIT: To clarify this -- you'd only have a CPU slowdown because TF2 is CPU intensive especially the more people are on the map or your screen + some poorly coded maps. Other games won't necessarily have this issue, nor require any OC.

One other thing, Windows 7 does run some background processes sometimes -- look in the task scheduler, there were a few things I had to set to run at odd hours or simply turn off because they'd cause a massive spike due to CPU usage while gaming.