GTX 470 SOC stuttering without fps drop (single gpu microstutter?)

K

Kelv

Limp Gawd
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May 10, 2008
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Fraps shows my framerate at a near constant rate which is around 30-40 fps based on the map and location but when I turn the camera around, the game physically looks like its under 10 fps but fraps does not show the framerate dipping.

My computer has a bunch of problems at the moment so it's annoying to diagnose one but hopefully someone has ran into this problem as well. It seems like I'm experiencing microstutter on a single Gigabyte GTX 470 SOC. My problem is very clear when playing Crysis 2 on the highest settings including the DX 11 and texture update. I'm using the 280.26 drivers. The card was rmad in which they replacing a memory chip. It runs perfectly well when I bump the graphics down 2 levels and add v-sync.
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I made a video showing the problem. This Crysis 2 map in particular, the pier, has consistently shown the problem but I've seen it in other maps as well. I've only tested Crysis 2 but I think I may have noticed in in Metro 2033 as well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYO-0vjdj3E

Thanks for the help.
 
The 470 is in the SFF box I see in your sig? What power supply is running that setup? Also is your cpu or gpu overclocked. Finally it sounds like it could be a CPU issue possibly. Looking at the video it also looks like you could be running out of video memory. Strange.
 
That doesn't look like microstutter to me, it's actual stutter, which suggests a possible instability/interruption somewhere, perhaps with the CPU?
 
Are there benchmarks that test the video card memory? The PSU is a custom 600W Silverstone for that specific case. It also has been having some coil whine problems but I'm told that shouldn't affect performance. I'm also curious about the quality of power I'm getting in my new apartment. The GPU is factory overclocked.

What makes you think it would be a CPU issue and any recommendations for testing that?

I also told you that I was having several other problems, well one of them was a blue screen that was occurring when I went to Netflix and all the movie covers were trying to load. It didn't load any of them and crashed instead. I was able to duplicate it a couple more times but now it seems to be working properly again.
 
I switched all the settings to the lowest settings (high) which brought the framerate to 90 - 100 fps. I brought the resolution down to 800 x 600. Which made the framerate 150-250. Everything is at the bare minimum and its still feels awful. Everything seems jerky.

I saw another video on youtube that said switching to windows mode solved their problem. I realized the killer combination, v-sync and windowed mode. Its so smooth.

With the killer combination and the low enough effect settings, fraps shows a constant 60 fps. Without windowed mode, it is right around 60 fps but its constantly changing, every frame. Fraps changes so frequently you can't even tell what frame rate its on. That's what I noticed whenever I had that awful effect. The frame-rate looks like its high but the second digit is constantly changng, 3[blur of numbers]. It normally looks like its hovering between two close numbers, 34-35-34-35.

It still seems to support my idea of single card microstutter. Could it be a power issue and window + vsync causes the video card to under-work and draw less power?

Thanks for reading.
 
Update: I knew Metro 2033 was not running smoothly when I first started playing it a couple weeks ago but I through it was the game, not my system. I checked with fraps to see if it was similar to the Crysis 2 problem and it seemed to be the same problem but even worse effects. The fraps thinks its constantly hovering around 30-40 fps with all settings set to maximum but its switches between that and 5 fps.

A noticeable effect is that the gun twitches which you can see in Crysis 2 video I uploaded. It does the exact same thing in Metro 2033. I'm wondering if implies the problem is not solely the graphics card, or not the graphics card at all since it seems to be interrupting the mouse information. I'm smoothly moving the mouse left and right and fps shouldn't affect the tilt of the gun model to visualize turning.

I ran Sandra benchmarks. I'm wondering if there are any benchmarks to look out for.

I also notice the problem in Cryengine 3 SDK in windowed mode. It seems once the FPS gets above 100, its no longer noticable. CS at 300 fps works great.
 
Had the exact same problem on a number of games with Nvidia drivers, mostly BC2. Fraps would show no frame rate drop yet the game was running like crap. Its the Drivers. Get the 266 series of drivers and skip the 270,275,280 drivers. Install the 266 series and the problem is gone. I've heard that the new 285 beta drivers fix the micro stutter in games but I haven't tried them yet...
 
Record a fraps benchmark and check the frame times, not the frame rates. That should give you some idea.
 
Thanks for the replies. I'm going to try the earlier drivers today. I am running the beta drivers now but there was no difference in results. I made some graphs of the frame rate.

This is all taken from gameplay in a subway tunnel in Metro 2033, no action going on. Just walking around.

At some points its perfectly stable. Other times...

http://i.imgur.com/VutEU.jpg

More often it looks like this.

http://i.imgur.com/H4M4y.png

Here is a case of it perfectly stable:

http://i.imgur.com/vUr82.jpg
 
I know exactly what you mean man. When I had my GTX570 and my friend had his 6870, his 6870 was smooth as butter but on my GTX570 which would normally be much much faster than the 6870 it sure didn't feel like it. When I ran fraps it said I was getting like 40 fps more than the 6870, but it was stuttering like crazy. Then I came across the thread I mentioned over at overclockers and installed the older drivers and like magic it was gone. The game BC2 ran perfect. I've tried all the new drivers and none of them are as good in BC2 as the 266 series. Keep us updating on weather the older drivers work better I'm curious myself if that fixes your problem like it did mine...
 
zod96 said:
I know exactly what you mean man. When I had my GTX570 and my friend had his 6870, his 6870 was smooth as butter but on my GTX570 which would normally be much much faster than the 6870 it sure didn't feel like it. When I ran fraps it said I was getting like 40 fps more than the 6870, but it was stuttering like crazy. Then I came across the thread I mentioned over at overclockers and installed the older drivers and like magic it was gone. The game BC2 ran perfect. I've tried all the new drivers and none of them are as good in BC2 as the 266 series. Keep us updating on weather the older drivers work better I'm curious myself if that fixes your problem like it did mine...
Click to expand...
I reverted to 266.77 and the problems did not go away. All I did was click clean install. I didn't remove the old drivers before hand. Maybe I should do that instead. Which exact version of 266 are you using.

I did notice in metro 2033 if I keep all settings on the highest but set the game to DX 9, the stuttering goes away. If I choose 10 or 11 it comes back. The only problem with that test is DX 9 also increases the frames quite a bit. DX 11 is around 40 fps, DX 10 is around 60 fps and DX 9 is around 80 fps. I didn't see any hint of stuttering at all on DX 9.

My GPU usage is around 99% in game so its not a usage problem. Mine is factory overclocked. I could try down-clocking it.
 
I'm using the 266.66 and when I had my GTX570 I used the 266.58 try those...
 
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