FO3 running too fast

Surly73

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Dec 19, 2007
Messages
1,782
So I've been looking at my backlog of games trying to decide what to play next and I decided that I'd tackle FO3. I put about 13h into it and stopped playing about a year ago. I launch it and now it's running unplayable fast - audio is normal speed but movement and all animations are super accelerated. Think Benny Hill plays FO3. When you talk to someone all of the mouth movements blur by in one second while the audio dialog continues to play.

I saw one thread out there stating that VSYNC off caused this for them - this has no effect on my issue. I have been strictly loading my old save games because I haven't wanted to go through all of the character creation crap... Some combination of settings caused the stutter people have reported, but I remember fixing that early 2009 and never having any game engine problems after that.

FO3 v1.7.0.3 via steam
Q6600G0 stock
BFG GTX260 OC 196.21
Forte v1.1
Vista Ultimate x64
no settings forced by Forceware
1920x1200 4xFSAA 16xAF all settings "Ultra"

Other than the usual hotfixes, upgrades, games that come and go over the last year the only major changes:

  • Migrated Audigy 2ZS -> Forte v1.1
  • upgraded NV from 190.62 (IIRC) to 196.21
  • GFWL is now fully installed because I played Batman:AA but I have now disabled it for FO3 since all of my savegames are local not associated with my Gamertag

I was using a Pipboy HUD mod and FO3 High Definition pack v1 (which I added to v1.4 before the v1.7 upgrade came out) but I have deleted the game and installed fresh from Steam with no improvement.

196.21 has been working great with ME1, L4D, L4D2, the entire FEAR franchise, Batman:AA, MW2 and Call of Juarez, all of which have been played through (and L4D2 continues to the played regularly) since the upgrade to 196.21. I don't like to up/downgrade Forceware willy-nilly when I find something that works and nothing online indicates that 196.21 causes speed problems with FO3 but I may have no other choice to start messing around with Forceware.

Does anyone have any ideas of things I should try?
 
Yeah, I bet you used one of those fallout3.ini modifications that are supposed to help but don't do a damn thing. One of them does this. Delete your fallout3.ini , go back into options and set up your graphic and relaunch the game. Everything should be fine.
 
*facepalm*

I didn't knowingly do anything stupid in the FALLOUT.ini, but moving it aside does indeed fix the problem. Perhaps it's something that worked fine in 1.4 but not in 1.7, explaining why everything was dandy when I last ran it.

I'll have to check out some outdoor scenes and see if the stuttering is back. In the meantime, I'll get that same PIPBOY or a similar HUD mod in there. The biggest thing it did was smaller fonts and more data on screen. Since I run 1920x1200 the giant text drives me nuts.

If anyone knows a better mod of this type than MTUI feel free to drop me a note. FO3 has such a following and it's really hard to keep up when you're just trying to get into it and play it through the first time.

Thanks, bigdogchris, for helping me with such a noob problem without calling me a noob. When it's such a stupid thing I would really have expected to get some google hits. Oh well.
 
The newest Nvidia drivers were supposed to fix the stuttering but they didn't. I verified the 185/186 work great with FO3 .... but they don't downclock when the GPU is idle.
 
FYI, I'm still running 196.21 and in the tire-kicking I've done since fixing my "Benny Hill" problem, I haven't seen any stuttering or lagging in outdoor scenes. I'm running everything maxed @1920x1200 including full AF and AA with no alterations in NV control panel. BFG GTX260 OC (216SP)
 
What OS? Also have you had any crashes?

I remembered after leaving the house I forgot to state Vista x64.

I didn't have crashes (CTD or BSOD) a year ago when I put about 12h into the game. I honestly haven't played it enough in 2010 to comment on stability.
 
I remembered after leaving the house I forgot to state Vista x64.
Oh OK. The 'stuttering' issue with GTX 260's was supposed to be fixed in Windows 7 (it wasn't). Vista x64 has it's own section of release notes and it doesn't say anything about it being an issue with that OS.
 
Oh OK. The 'stuttering' issue with GTX 260's was supposed to be fixed in Windows 7 (it wasn't). Vista x64 has it's own section of release notes and it doesn't say anything about it being an issue with that OS.

If I understand you correctly, you mean a W7-specific FO3+NV stuttering issue was allegedly fixed.

I know that late 2008/early 2009 there were a lot of stuttering problems in all OSs, and I had a bunch of issues when I started playing FO3. I remember finally stumbling across a proper combination of drivers and settings that stopped it, and I remember the night it happened, and I remember I was eating pretzels, but I can't remember what the fix was.:rolleyes:

*That* stuttering hasn't returned since reinstalling FO3 v1.7, wiping my .INI and going to 196.21, if that helps anyone.
 
Running too fast, it sounds like it's related to the iFPSClamp option in the INI.

See if setting the iFPSClamp option to 0 (default), if this makes no difference, try the following:

Use FRAPs to determine what your lowest FPS is in game then set "iFPSClamp" to that frame rate. You wont want to go any lower than 30 though.

Edit your FALLOUT.ini (Dont forget to make a backup)
VISTA: "C:\Users\[your username]\Documents\My Games\Fallout3\FALLOUT.ini"
and change iFPSClamp=0 to the framerate determined by FRAPS

XP: "C:\Documents and settings\[your username]\My Documents\My Games\Fallout3\FALLOUT.ini"
and change iFPSClamp=0 to the framerate determined by FRAPS

Now download FPSlimiter.

You need java to run the FPS limiter gui. Browse to "fallout3.exe" and set the FPS limit to the amount specified in "iFPSclamp".

Create a shortcut to the file FPS limiter generates and there you go.

NOTE: If you set the FPS higher than the minimum FPS you got from FRAPs the game WILL suffer from slowdowns when the framerate drops below the FPS cap.
 
If I understand you correctly, you mean a W7-specific FO3+NV stuttering issue was allegedly fixed.
Excuse me, both Vista and 7 x64 (just reread the patch notes for 195.62)

"Windows Vista/Windows 7 64-bit Issues
Single-GPU Resolved Issues
GeForce GTX 260/295: Fallout 3 ‐ the game has an occasional frame drop (stutter).[589699]"

The issue (at least for me) was not fixed.


*That* stuttering hasn't returned since reinstalling FO3 v1.7, wiping my .INI and going to 196.21, if that helps anyone.
I installed the game for the first time on my current OS installation and I had to continue rolling back to 188.25 before the stuttering went away. Someone I know playing through right now with 196.21 does not get the stuttering but they are not using a GTX 260/295.
 
I put some time into FO3 last night and have a follow question about your stutter, bigdog.

When it happens is it a continuous combination of jerkiness, lag and what appears to be low framerate? (when it happened to me I used to be able to see it simply panning around in a large outdoor area - it was FPSClamp related I think, like Mr Zen is talking about) Or is it a half- to one-second freeze every so often?

I'm getting the latter now. I remember this game running smooth maxed out a year ago. So good that I loaded higher res texture packs without any issues. Since then NV drivers have been updated, I went from an old E6400 to a Q6600 G0, and I dropped the HD texture pack and now this year I get hitching like loading delays quite often. Heck, when I'm underground with the "sugar bombs" guy every time I turn around and see a flaming barrel it seems to freeze for half a second and then resume. Still looking into it...
 
The stuttering I experience is you'll be running along and the game simply pauses for a1/10 of a second then continues on. I can stand in one area and run in circles (nothing is being loaded) and it continues doing it, once every 5 seconds or so ... just a quick pause and it continues.

Anyways, rolling back to the 188.25 took care of the issue so I don't experience it anymore.
 
The stuttering I experience is you'll be running along and the game simply pauses for a1/10 of a second then continues on. I can stand in one area and run in circles (nothing is being loaded) and it continues doing it, once every 5 seconds or so ... just a quick pause and it continues.

Anyways, rolling back to the 188.25 took care of the issue so I don't experience it anymore.

Hmm, might be the same thing I'm seeing then, but mine feels like longer than 1/10s.

I'm going to look into again when I can and report back.

A lot of times mine often feels like when your system simply isn't up to snuff - pauses and hitches right during a firefight etc... but the system was less powerful and still more than powerful enough a year ago. I've lowered some settings and it was still doing it. I'll check it out...
 
Well Fallout 3 and Oblivion always stutter. Thats on every machine weather you notice it or not. That is what that framecapper + ifpsclamp fixes. There is also Oblivion Stutter remover and now Fallout Stutter Remover by Skyranger which work great. That is an issue with the game engine.

The other now famous stutter is that Nvidia related one. I still see it with 196.21 but disabling AA seems to get rid of it for me. I hear that people that did have it with 196.21 now don't have it with 196.75 but I wouldn't recommend installing that driver right now.
 
so this "bug" is still present? damn...
Pretty sure I said with 188.25 drivers I don't see it. Maybe I didn't. But I know I did.

There's always going to be some lag/stutter while new assets load but it's not something you should see every few seconds.
 
lol just installed it again. Seeing this thread made me want to start a new charactor.

haven't noticed any stuttering though, fortunately (gtx295, 196.21 drivers and win7 64). The player/main character seems to keep walking for a second or two after you stop pressing "w" occasionally... very odd
 
Well, I've got lots of hitching and some stuttering - confirmed. Sometimes I get periods where it's like a continuous reduction of framerate into the teens (but it isn't). I'll walk through the same area again and it's fine. I've also got the 0.5-1.0 second pauses often at the worst time. I tried turning AA right off - no change at all. I don't think it's a system resource issue.

Is this "Fallout Stutter Remover" the best way of looking into this? Or the iFPSClamp+FPSLimiter? Will this fix the jerky fps issue or the 1s hitch issue? Every other title is silky smooth on this system (except MW2 SP maxed out when things get really heavy).
 
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Well, I've got lots of hitching and some stuttering - confirmed. Sometimes I get periods where it's like a continuous reduction of framerate into the teens (but it isn't). I'll walk through the same area again and it's fine. I've also got the 0.5-1.0 second pauses often at the worst time. I tried turning AA right off - no change at all. I don't think it's a system resource issue.

Is this "Fallout Stutter Remover" the best way of looking into this? Or the iFPSClamp+FPSLimiter? Will this fix the jerky fps issue or the 1s hitch issue? Every other title is silky smooth on this system (except MW2 SP maxed out when things get really heavy).
Well have you tried rolling back drivers yet? I can't get anything 190+ to work w/o stuttering with my GTX260.

Also, last year there was a FO3 thread about this. I was experiencing a degrading performance over time. Like, the game played fine for 15-30 minutes then it was slowly start to get laggy (was running 8800GTS 512 SLI at the time). The fix was to drop the settings from Ultra to High. I've noticed fallout 3 using upwards of 650 MB of GPU memory @ ultra settings at the resolution I Play. Those cards only have 512MB so I bet I was maxing the memory on them.
 
Well have you tried rolling back drivers yet? I can't get anything 190+ to work w/o stuttering with my GTX260.

I'm going to try to look into everything else before that. The system is also used to play new titles (MW2, L4D2, Batman:AA, ME2 soon) and I want "current era" drivers for those titles. I'm not the only user and my wife enjoys different titles than I do (and logs more hours than I do). If I broke her L4D2 I'd be toast :p

I realize that it may end up that nothing fixes it except rolling back, but I'd like to explore changes that affect FO3 only.

Also, last year there was a FO3 thread about this. I was experiencing a degrading performance over time. Like, the game played fine for 15-30 minutes then it was slowly start to get laggy (was running 8800GTS 512 SLI at the time). The fix was to drop the settings from Ultra to High. I've noticed fallout 3 using upwards of 650 MB of GPU memory @ ultra settings at the resolution I Play. Those cards only have 512MB so I bet I was maxing the memory on them.

I know what you mean here. I think I've seen the light stutter come and go during a session. I think I've had only one CTD in 10h of play so it's been pretty stable in that regard.

When I set iFPSClamp again I got the Benny Hill play back. It's like it renders the game's content at 30fps but then still generates frames as fast as it can. v1.4 didn't do this, so this must be a 1.7 behaviour. If I use FPS_limiter then the speed is correct again.
I guess I had iFPSClamp set in my original INI from a year ago and that's what caused the problems which lead to me starting this thread.
 
Well think about this. It takes 5 minutes to uninstall and install a different driver, and test a couple games to see if they are still compatible (new ones). You can spend (and have been spending) weeks or months looking for individual game fixes. Sometimes it really is simply a driver issue and not the game itself. If the driver doesn't work, simply reinstall the newer one. The mid 180''s/early 190's drivers were released summer 09', which was only a month or so before those games shipped. Really unless there was a bug fix, the newer drivers likely do not offer any benefit to the games.
 
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FWIW, for the time I've been playing with IFPSClamp + FPSlimiter it has been considerably more consistent.

I set IFPSClamp to 30, so there's always a little bit of light "stutter" since it's only 30fps. I still get some hitches but far fewer of them and I don't think they occur any longer when doing something stupid like running in a circle.

I have not yet left instrumentation running watching my GPU memory usage or tried dropping from "ultra" to "high", but I have left AA off for the time being.
 
Need to implement a "Are you sure you want to Necro this post?" Confirmation dialogue popup...
 
I think this is the first topic-necro that has been so bad as to cause me to lol in real-life (both due to the extra age of the topic and the very time-specificity of the topic).
 
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