Intermittent consistent stutter

[Rebel28]

On 6/4/2024 at 6:45 PM, Nightstalker said:

I've already excluded DCS from my antivirus along with my TrackIR

Did you also add the DCS saved games folder?

[Nightstalker]

Yes, sorry I didn’t see your reply.

[Papamiraculi]

Same here. I get periodical stutter exactly every 3 seconds on an otherwise flat constant fps. GPU usage at 65%. No RAM/VRAM/Page file problems.

It also happens when I pause the game via ESC. 

The in-game graph looks like this:

[Nightstalker]

On 6/4/2024 at 6:58 PM, darkman222 said:

You have a pretty similar PC as me. Try the following. Download process lasso. And disable hyperthreading as shown in this image:

Restart DCS and see if DCS CPU affinity gets these CPUs tagged like that:

 

For unkown reasons you can not achieve this by disabling the efficiency cores and hyperthreading in BIOS. Also starting DCS with the "affinity" argument does not work.

Let me know if that helps. If you want to know more about what I found and tested already about the micro stutters look in my thread about it here.

 

Like I said. If you tried it ( process lasso is free) please let me know.

I didn’t download process lasso but I did check to see if Windows11 was parking my cores on my I9 13900k and it was.  I followed the great video posted elsewhere in the forum here and like magic my stutter all went away.  I’ve been flying for 2 days straight on all of my maps including Afghanistan with ZERO stutter or frame drops showing on my DCS fps monitor.  The only time a frame drop happens is entering in or out of the F10 map screen.  I’ve slowly upped my max fps with vsync enabled from 60 fps to 90 fps to 100 fps and the 2 lines stay completely flat.  Thanks.

[Carbon715]

On 6/4/2024 at 3:45 PM, Nightstalker said:

I don't play in VR but it seems from the last or maybe last two patches my buttery smooth gameplay has gone to constant micro-stutters.  I had a hamstring injury and didn't sit at the computer for the last few months but now that I've returned and purchased the F4e, I'm now noticing this weird stutter when I look to the left or right out of the canopy.  It doesn't just happen in the F4 and it happens on other maps like the Sinai.  It's very subtle but you see it happen every 3-5 seconds.  I have very good frame rate but the spikes keep happening which causes the stutter.  As I said, I was offline for a while but it happened over the last couple of updates.  I've tried everything to get rid of it.  I've never had micro stutter at all since multi-thread was implemented.  I've already excluded DCS from my antivirus along with my TrackIR.  I've tried DLSS, MSAA, TAA, TLAA.  I've cleaned out all of the shaders numerous times and even did a DCS repair.  Nothing is changing the stutter.

I9 13900k, 32g DDR5, RTX 4080.  

This, I have been away for a few months and came back to notice this annoying jitter stutter when panning around the cockpit randomly of my viper. Was never an issue before. Updated bios, reinstalled windows, fresh reset of everything, trip to the witch Dr, nothing has helped. Happens with track ir, locked to 60fps and should be butter especially with VRR. Not anymore. 13900k, 4090, 64gb ddr5 ram to name a few specs.

[darkman222]

8 hours ago, Carbon715 said:

I don't play in VR but it seems from the last or maybe last two patches my buttery smooth gameplay has gone to constant micro-stutters

Yeah stutters are back. I had good results using process lasso to disable E Cores and Hyperthreading for DCS but after the latest updates its just micro sutters again. Also not related to be close to other aircraft that can trigger LOD switching. Its something new now.
I give up because I dont have the nerves to investigate again in it.

[Carbon715]

15 hours ago, darkman222 said:

Yeah stutters are back. I had good results using process lasso to disable E Cores and Hyperthreading for DCS but after the latest updates its just micro sutters again. Also not related to be close to other aircraft that can trigger LOD switching. Its something new now.
I give up because I dont have the nerves to investigate again in it.

Same, at a loss. It's an ever so slight stutter panning the camera...enough to be annoying.

[Darcaem]

In my case I think stutters are caused by the number of units. It seems in previous patches (I don't really know exactly which one, but definitively after 2.9) the game handled with good performance a way higher number of units on the map. The very same Syria sandbox mission I've been playing since forever used to run smothly (~1050 units and statis with custom scripting), and now is unplayable unless I remove most units (removing all scripts has no effect)

What is more worrysome for me is that I was playing the Operation Cerberus North campaign with good performance (I was at mission 16 part2) but the very same mission is now completely unplayable

 

(VR with G2, i9700, 64GB@3200, rtx3070 at low graphics)

Edited July 31, 2024 by Darcaem

[darkman222]

Although I said I would not investigate. Seems like the stutters getting worse each time you visit the menu when connected to a server. Might be placebo, but it seems to help if I respawn with the keybind ( its per jet and called: Get new plane - respawn) instead of using the menu to respawn.

 

EDIT: Forget it. Its a placebo. I spawned into a stuttery mess on the server right from the beginning.

Also reverted to the previous Geforce drivers did not help.

Unplugging the mouse as some people say it causes stutter did not help either.

 

To sum it up: I really give up now.

Edited August 1, 2024 by darkman222

[Reflected]

I'm seeing the same since the last update, both in 2D and VR

 

[Reflected]

On 7/31/2024 at 6:39 PM, Darcaem said:

In my case I think stutters are caused by the number of units. It seems in previous patches (I don't really know exactly which one, but definitively after 2.9) the game handled with good performance a way higher number of units on the map. The very same Syria sandbox mission I've been playing since forever used to run smothly (~1050 units and statis with custom scripting), and now is unplayable unless I remove most units (removing all scripts has no effect)

What is more worrysome for me is that I was playing the Operation Cerberus North campaign with good performance (I was at mission 16 part2) but the very same mission is now completely unplayable

 

(VR with G2, i9700, 64GB@3200, rtx3070 at low graphics)

 

Exactly. I spawn in a mission with many (not SO many) units, stutters. If I run the same mission but delete all AI, it's smooth, just like when it's paused. An update or 2 ago DCS lost the ability to handle large number of AI (i.e. more than 15).

[Moxica]

Me to. I can count to seven between each hiccup, flying in a straight line.

[LOW_Hitman]

+1 stutters every 5 seconds

[Tom Kazansky]

My frame time saw tooth pattern comes and goes even when the game is paused (and I don't mean active pause).

What about your hiccups?

[Papamiraculi]

It seems some scripts are broken and/or the last updates broke them. 

It's the OH6 side gunner script+hook for me. Some people have reported the same about Tacview.

After I deleted the scripts and hooks from saved Games/dcs.../scripts I got rid of the periodical stutter every 3 seconds.

[peachmonkey]

in the last update ED moved AI calculations to a separate thread and it screwed it up on my system (5800x3d+4090 at 39ppd) as well, stuttering galore.   So I'm building a new system (7950x3d+4090), hoping this much beef would resolve it, but haven't tested it yet...

forgot to mention, a lot of stutters come on when getting close to the AI units (ground or air). Flying on a empty map is usually pretty smooth.

I feel the AI code needs optimization for a dedicated cpu thread, I wonder if ED did any, or simply 'off-loaded' it hoping for the best..

Edited August 3, 2024 by peachmonkey

[av8orDave]

4 hours ago, peachmonkey said:

in the last update ED moved AI calculations to a separate thread and it screwed it up on my system (5800x3d+4090 at 39ppd) as well, stuttering galore.   So I'm building a new system (7950x3d+4090), hoping this much beef would resolve it, but haven't tested it yet...

forgot to mention, a lot of stutters come on when getting close to the AI units (ground or air). Flying on a empty map is usually pretty smooth.

I feel the AI code needs optimization for a dedicated cpu thread, I wonder if ED did any, or simply 'off-loaded' it hoping for the best..

 

I have that system, and that much beef doesn’t resolve it. Badly in need of “optimization.”

[Tom Kazansky]

Any news about those stutters after yesterday's DCS 2.9.8.1107 ?

[darkman222]

ED worked on the thread distribution on multithreading. For me very heavy multiplayer missions that used to get stuttery and bad performance if the server was up for a long time got a lot better.

Will still keep an eye on that. But looks as if there is some improvement to report.

[Hellbat]

I've also been plagued by stuttering in multiplayer ever since MT was introduced.  I assumed it was RAM related, but increasing RAM made no difference.

I was just on a relatively empty aerobatics server and initially it was fine.  Then I went to the F10 map, zoomed out to see my aircraft location and returned to the cockpit view, and my frame rate dropped from 70-90FPS to 10-30FPS and was a stuttery mess.  I then jumped into another slot on the same server and reproduced this behaviour: smooth when I start in the cockpit but stuttery as soon as I had zoomed out on the F10 map.  It was almost like viewing the F10 map loaded all of these additional objects into the 3d engine.  Has anyone had a similar experience?

[sleighzy]

26 minutes ago, Hellbat said:

I've also been plagued by stuttering in multiplayer ever since MT was introduced.  I assumed it was RAM related, but increasing RAM made no difference.

I was just on a relatively empty aerobatics server and initially it was fine.  Then I went to the F10 map, zoomed out to see my aircraft location and returned to the cockpit view, and my frame rate dropped from 70-90FPS to 10-30FPS and was a stuttery mess.  I then jumped into another slot on the same server and reproduced this behaviour: smooth when I start in the cockpit but stuttery as soon as I had zoomed out on the F10 map.  It was almost like viewing the F10 map loaded all of these additional objects into the 3d engine.  Has anyone had a similar experience?

It’s a known problem that’s been around for a long time, and is generally worse for VR given the performance impact. Some workarounds; always zoom back into your plane before getting into the cockpit view, decrease textures in your settings (not an awesome option for this one problem), try alt+tabbing out of the game for a few seconds and then back again (after going back to the cockpit view). 

[Slaobladder]

As a side note did you delete fxo amd shaders directories after the update?

[Kanelbolle]

I have compiled a list I go through myself and post to others when there are performance problems.

I first off suggest disabling VR and get the game to run smoot without it. After that is fixed you can start changing things to get VR smooth.

Here is some steps of things to try :

 

1. Try to update to the latest GPU drivers or reinstalling it. NVIDIA: Always use the option "Custom installation" and select "Clean installation". Not doing a clean installation sometimes causes issues.

2. You can try this if you have a Nvidia GPU: Change "Background Application Max Frame Rate" to "ON" and example "100" (or what you want to keep it at) in "Nvidia Control Panel" under "Manage 3D settings". Start DCS and check if the problem is still there. It's a bug in the driver, if it's off... sometimes it does 30-40 fps.

3. Delete the content in the "fxo" and "metashaders2" folders from the saved games folder. ( usually under %USERPROFILE%\\Saved Games\\DCS.openbeta )

4. Run a cleanup and repair (slow repair) on DCS : \[https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/support/faq/709/\](https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/support/faq/709/)

5. Try setting the "Low" graphics preset for testing.

6. Disable VR and get the game running properly in 2d first at a good FPS.

7. Remove all MODS if nothing else works. (scripts and mod files that were installed) Might need to rename your DCS profile folder to be Shure.

8. Turn off hotplug under "Adjust controls". (Disables DCS from checking if a device was connected while the game is running.) In some cases this can cause lag.

9. Always have the game and your windows page file on a SSD drive (not on a regular HDD). Also check if you're low on space.

10. Check that your system components are not throttled by heat. CPU, GPU and motherboard. Example with HWINFO64 while running the game.

11. Streamdeck export scrips might cause issues, remove them from the game if installed to check if they are the cause.

12. Unplug any USB hub if you use one. Sometimes hubs can cause problems in DCS.

13. Disable the DCS Launcher and run the game directly from "DCS.exe" (not dcs_update.exe) in the "mt-bin\" folder.

14. If you have Windows 10/11:
 Added both .exe files to the "Custom graphics settings" list in Windows Display settings.
You can find it under "Display Settings" ->"Graphics" or "System" -> "Display" -> "Graphics" in Windows.
Add both .exe files in "\bin" and "\mt-bin". Set it to "High Performance"

15. Check your Windows power plan/mode,  change it to "Best performance". To change the power mode, select Start > Settings > System > Power & battery.

 

16. Check 3d settings in Nvidia Control settings if you have a custom profile for DCS. Changing these might help. Have not checked if you need to add both DCS.exe files from "\bin" and "mt-bin"  to this list and change the one you are running.

Edited October 4, 2024 by Kanelbolle

[TOViper]

50 minutes ago, Kanelbolle said:

2. You can try this if you have a Nvidia GPU: Change "Background Application Max Frame Rate" to "ON" and example "100" (or what you want to keep it at) in "Nvidia Control Panel" under "Manage 3D settings". Start DCS and check if the problem is still there. It's a bug in the driver, if it's off... sometimes it does 30-40 fps

Hey Kanebolle, thanks for the long list you provided!
Where did you got information regarding item 2. from? Or did you try it on your own?

[Kanelbolle]

1 hour ago, TOViper said:

Hey Kanebolle, thanks for the long list you provided!
Where did you got information regarding item 2. from? Or did you try it on your own?

I had this issue half a year ago or so. I got capped at around 30 fps. Found the solution in a YouTube video back then.