HL2 Ep1: the return of the stutter

I'm up to "Lowlife" and haven't encountered a single stutter, specs below:

Athlon 64 3200+ s939
1GB PC3200 dual channel
Asus A8N-E (nForce4 Ultra)
eVGA 7600GT 256mb PCI-E
SB Audigy
Raptor X 150gb
 
Meh, it used to stutter when I had 1GB of RAM but after I got two gigs, no stutter at all . . . been playing EP1 for over two hours and it played completely smooth all the way through.
 
fallguy said:
Really, almost everyone had it? Where are the facts to back this up? Most people from what I have seen, have not had any stutter. "Stuttering" can be confused with low frames. You playing on a 440MX... ouch, thats painful just thinking about.
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I remember quite a few people having the stutter too. Whether that was the majority or not is moot. There really isn't any way to tell, but I can tell you that i've had it. Actually I still fucking have it and I don't care because I don't like the game. Snap, crackle pop CRASH is what it used to give me on my old athlon xp system. On this 64, it just stutters like it's trying to load but it doesn't (loading missing files even after file integrity check).

Right after they had the file checking system it was so nice and fluid and that one patch fixed it PERFECTLY for me for like one day. The next day they released a patch and it started hitching and stuttering again. I remember that vividly.
 
The_Dark_Abyss said:
Meh, it used to stutter when I had 1GB of RAM but after I got two gigs, no stutter at all . . . been playing EP1 for over two hours and it played completely smooth all the way through.
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unless you had tons of things running 2 gigs wouldnt make any difference. no Source games get close to using even 1 gig.
 
trek554 said:
unless you had tons of things running 2 gigs wouldnt make any difference. no Source games get close to using even 1 gig.
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Nope. I always closed everything when I played games. In fact now that I'm using 2 gigs I actually have more programs running. Yet I stuttered when I had 1 gig of RAM but after I switched to 2 gigs (without changing ANYTHING else in my system) all the stutter in the usual places was gone.

Also 2 gig will help regardless of whether the source engine will actually use more than 1 gig of ram or nt.
 
The_Dark_Abyss said:
Nope. I always closed everything when I played games. In fact now that I'm using 2 gigs I actually have more programs running. Yet I stuttered when I had 1 gig of RAM but after I switched to 2 gigs (without changing ANYTHING else in my system) all the stutter in the usual places was gone.

Also 2 gig will help regardless of whether the source engine will actually use more than 1 gig of ram or nt.
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well if it was never getting close to using 1 gig then how would 2 gigs help? the only way more ram would have helped is if you were getting a stutter because you were hitting the hard drive. thats not possible if you didnt have other programs running. 2 gigs is not a fix for the audio stutter in HL2. there are plenty of people with 2 gigs that get the stutter.
 
trek554 said:
well if it was never getting close to using 1 gig then how would 2 gigs help? the only way more ram would have helped is if you were getting a stutter because you were hitting the hard drive. thats not possible if you didnt have other programs running. 2 gigs is not a fix for the audio stutter in HL2. there are plenty of people with 2 gigs that get the stutter.
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I never experienced stutter due to the audio if that's what you are referring to and I've run HL2 on everything from AC97 to Soundblaster Live 24-Bit, Audigy 2 and X-Fi.
 
The_Dark_Abyss said:
I never experienced stutter due to the audio if that's what you are referring to and I've run HL2 on everything from AC97 to Soundblaster Live 24-Bit, Audigy 2 and X-Fi.
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well its normally called the sound/audio stutter. it cracks and pops during explosions and loops sometimes. it has something to do with auto saves, sound cache and other things too.
 
I fixed the stuttering problem on my box, dead simple fix.

Removed the joke of a sound card creative call the X-FI. Iv had no end of trouble with that thing, from random reboots even when the cards drivers arent installed to constant poping in games. I even changed mainboard in the hope it was my cheapass (tm) Asrock board that I had causing the problem and a better board would work with the X-FI,, nope.

Removed the card, installed the on-board realtek HD sound and everything is fine, not a pop, stutter or fucking reboot insite.

The store i bought the X-FI wont take it back, im going to lead a charge against creative for my money back, anyone with me??
 
weebob said:
The store i bought the X-FI wont take it back, im going to lead a charge against creative for my money back, anyone with me??
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Why don't you just sell it?

I love my X-Fi btw . . .
 
The_Dark_Abyss said:
Why don't you just sell it?

I love my X-Fi btw . . .
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Wouldnt want to wish the bane of my life on anyone lol.

I will be doing if creative dont help. which they dont seem to be doing based on the partitions that had sprung up demanding better driver support.
 
trek554 said:
that Steam update a few months ago fixed 99.9% of the stutter for me in HL2. WELL WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED IN EP1 CAUSE ITS BACK. it cracks, pops and stutters just HL2 did before that update fixed it. how can Source games be the ONLY games that have ever have stuttered like that? Valve..have you learned nothing? i lowered everything and turned off all services and that barely made a difference. to be honest the game seems a little cheesy so far but that could be cause i am pissed off. :mad:
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Do you have onboard sound by chance?
 
weebob said:
Wouldnt want to wish the bane of my life on anyone lol.

I will be doing if creative dont help. which they dont seem to be doing based on the partitions that had sprung up demanding better driver support.
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I can understand the frustration.....but I have the X-Fi cheapo and Ive never had those problems.....the sound improvement over the Audigy 1 I used to use is amazing.....but thats just me. I hope you get the problem solved. Ive read where it may be card/MB combinations that cause the greatest problems.
Yes, i occasionally have sound stutter in HL2 and in SiN, I'll see tonight if it happens with the expansion,er Episode1. Ive never been overly bothered by the stutter and Ive not had the game crash due to stutter.

I will agree that Creative support and driver updates are sub-standard at best. Ive emailed them several times about issues and never heard back or I get some off the wall lame answer back. :eek:
 
The_Dark_Abyss said:
Nope. I always closed everything when I played games. In fact now that I'm using 2 gigs I actually have more programs running. Yet I stuttered when I had 1 gig of RAM but after I switched to 2 gigs (without changing ANYTHING else in my system) all the stutter in the usual places was gone.

Also 2 gig will help regardless of whether the source engine will actually use more than 1 gig of ram or nt.
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I see in your sig you have an x-fi sound card. I know creative has said that any sound popping can be reduced by having your memory in dual channel mode (whichmost likly you have)

For those who have one gig and a sound card, the next question would have been is it just one stick of memory or do you have two for 1 gig.
 
weebob said:
I fixed the stuttering problem on my box, dead simple fix.

Removed the joke of a sound card creative call the X-FI. Iv had no end of trouble with that thing, from random reboots even when the cards drivers arent installed to constant poping in games. I even changed mainboard in the hope it was my cheapass (tm) Asrock board that I had causing the problem and a better board would work with the X-FI,, nope.

Removed the card, installed the on-board realtek HD sound and everything is fine, not a pop, stutter or fucking reboot insite.

The store i bought the X-FI wont take it back, im going to lead a charge against creative for my money back, anyone with me??
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My last post: is your memory in dual channel?
 
Netrat33 said:
My last post: is your memory in dual channel?
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yes, but i had tried with and without. the Asrock i had before wasnt dual channel as well.
 
Topweasel said:
I always thought that was an issue with Creative cards as it was about the only difference between mine and my dads machine. I wouldn't be surprised if it was as I have always had bad luck with their drivers. I wish soundstorm or Aureal would come back, as I hate AC'97 but not as much as I hate Creative.
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i hear ya man, i still will not let loose my Aureal SQ2500 in my sig rig.
and i am still waiting to use my Rare SQ3500 Turbo.
some old habits are just hard to die!

I Hate Creative!
 
i've had shutter problems with HL2; however, I got a WD Raptor 74G and that seemed to solve the problem
 
I have made a thread which may or may not have information relevant to this. As its more general advice; I felt it warranted its own thread.
 
i had this problem before, and i found out that you have to go in your Launch options, and type in

-console -debug -dev

and sometimes adding
-heapsize maximum 128000
i am not sure the correct wording on that last one, but i Guarantee the first 3 work like a charm!
 
Episode 1 has crashed once with a sound loop. I have a creative Audigy in my machine.
 
I have a 74gb Raptor and a X-Fi Fatal1ty and I never had the stutter bad in HL2. By bad I mean it never ruined the game play.

I just got EP1 and it was a problem from the second I started a new game, the intro froze (sound looped) on me the first time I played the game. Then the stutter went away after a few restarts and didn't start again until much further into the game. Then I froze on me again when I met up with Barney. Then after that solved it's self, it froze on a "Loading" screen when I went into the hospital.

I almost tossed the computer out the window more than once cause I really enjoyed the game but the looping was killing it for me. After I beat the game, I started again, listening to the comentary, it froze on me again when DOG tossed the car over the gorge.

I went to update my X-Fi and there are no updates for it. I defrag every week and don't run a lot of programs in the background, I run virus scans every day and take really good care of the rig in my sig, so I don't get WTF is up with Source. Is there any word on what can solve this problem?
 
Majin said:
I have a 74gb Raptor and a X-Fi Fatal1ty and I never had the stutter bad in HL2. By bad I mean it never ruined the game play.

I just got EP1 and it was a problem from the second I started a new game, the intro froze (sound looped) on me the first time I played the game. Then the stutter went away after a few restarts and didn't start again until much further into the game. Then I froze on me again when I met up with Barney. Then after that solved it's self, it froze on a "Loading" screen when I went into the hospital.

I almost tossed the computer out the window more than once cause I really enjoyed the game but the looping was killing it for me. After I beat the game, I started again, listening to the comentary, it froze on me again when DOG tossed the car over the gorge.

I went to update my X-Fi and there are no updates for it. I defrag every week and don't run a lot of programs in the background, I run virus scans every day and take really good care of the rig in my sig, so I don't get WTF is up with Source. Is there any word on what can solve this problem?
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no theres not. please go over Steam forums and bitch too. you have a good machine and would be nice to have someone back me up over there. most of those kids say get a better comp every time someone says they have the stutter. they deleted two of my threads becuase they didnt like what i was saying. i linked to the Firingsquad review that actually mentioned the sound stutter and it pissed the moderators off so they deleted that thread. i know at least two people were banned for bitching about the stutter problems. :mad:
 
Athlon xp3000+ socket A, 9800 pro, Audigy2 zs, no stuttering..
Athlon xp3000+ socket A, 9800 pro, onboard sound, no stuttering...
Opty 175, 1900xt, x-fi, massive stuttering..
Opty 175, 1900xt, onboard sound, mild stuttering...
Opty 175, 1900xt, audigy2 zs, no stuttering..
2gigs of ram in both systems.. Just my experience with HL2.. I was able to return the x-fi craptality thankfully...
 
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